A Hard Line

A determined tug of war has been going on behind the scenes in Brazil's revolutionary government. On one side stands little (5 ft. 5 in.) President Humberto Castello Branco and those who prefer to deal with corruption and subversion by constitutional methods. On the other side range the linha dura (hardline) military men who want to continue the star-chamber purges that Castello Branco ended after six months (TIME, Oct. 16). Last week Castello Branco gave in to the linha dura in order to get on with the important business of saving Brazil from economic ruin.

Talk of a Coup. The military move started last month in the northeast state of Ceara, when an army general arrested four deputies in the state legislature, accusing them of Communist subversion. Castello Branco ordered the deputies released, but the general was backed by powerful allies--chief among them War Minister Artur da Costa e Silva, a prime architect of the revolution. For three days neither side budged, while the officers talked openly of a coup. Then the Ceara legislature mercifully intervened, revoking the deputies' constitutional immunity--thus making it legal for the army to arrest them.

As news of the "Ceara solution" spread, other linha dura officers took it as a hunting license. They ousted the mayor of Niteroi, across the bay from Rio, leveled charges of graft against the presidents of Brazil's Senate and Chamber of Deputies and the governor of prosperous Sao Paulo state. The man who drew the most fire was Mauro Borges, 44, governor of the central farmland state of Goias. He was charged with outright subversion. According to the military, Borges maintained a close link with top Brazilian Communists and has been receiving "bulky" sums of money from Cuba and other Iron Curtain countries. The soldiers demanded his ouster.

Outmanned & Outgunned. Last week, invoking a constitutional provision that permits intervention in a state when "national integrity" is threatened, Castello Branco let the military have its way. In the space of two days, 6,000 federal troops poured into the state capital of Goiania. The troops took over the telephone and telegraph systems, power companies and a water-treatment plant, formed up around the palace. Outmanned and outgunned, Borges caved in and turned the government over to the military. The way the brass told it, they got Borges just in time.

Three days later they announced the arrest of more than 200 leftists whom they accused of planning a wave of terrorism across Brazil.

Such harsh tactics have made enemies for the new government among those who fear that the revolution will descend into dictatorship. Yet thoughtful Brazilians also recognize Castello Branco as a man who, alone among recent Brazilian presidents, is doing what he set out to do. Of 147 bills sent to Congress since the March revolution, 102 have been approved, covering everything from agrarian reform to low-cost housing credit. Foreign capital is flowing back into Brazil for the first time in three years. And some cherished Brazilian ideas are going down the drain--that uncontrolled inflation is inevitable, that a man should be well paid for a job he does poorly, that corruption is illegal only when discovered.

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