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Why is it that Argentina's time zone (throughout this thread, we're talking standard time) has been one hour ahead of where it should naturally be? In other words, why has Argentina been at GMT-3 (the same time zone as eastern Brazil, including Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brasilia, and Recife, considerably to the east of Argentina longitudinally) rather than GMT-4 (which corresponds better with Argentina's longitude, about the same as Bolivia, Paraguay, most of central/western Brazil, and Venezuela - all of which have that time zone)? Is it at least partially because it hasn't wanted to be in the same time zone as the Falkland Islands/Malvinas (which, at least at one point for a long time, has been under GMT-4)? Or more because Argentina wants to make it easier time-wise for business with eastern Brazil?
On a sort of similar vein, why did Chile change very early on from GMT-5, its natural time zone (the same as Peru and Colombia), to GMT-4? In order to minimize the time difference with Argentina, its neighbour, which has been at GMT-3?
Ok, so I know why Spain is in the "wrong" time zone - because back in 1940, General Franco (the dictator there) wanted to align Spain with Germany (whose leader was his ally, Hitler). But why did Argentina and Chile keep on switching time zones back and forth every once in a while between their geographically "right" time zones and those one hour ahead before deciding ultimately on the "wrong" time zones? Were there political and/or economic reasons behind these decisions?
I think the following might go a long way to answering my own question: Having looked over the history of time zones and daylight savings time in both Argentina and Chile on timeanddate.com, it seems to me that the time zone changes in Argentina in 1946 and in 1969 from -4 to -3 were done at the whims of no less than Juan Peron in 1946 and one or two dictators in 1969 (with Peron "aggravating" that situation in 1974). (In Argentina, the time zone was changed back to -4 in 1963, only to revert to -3 in 1969.) As for Chile, it seems that it changed its time zone from -5 to -4 in 1947 to bring it somewhat more in line with what Argentina decided on in 1946. (In the early-mid 1940s, both Argentina and Chile seem to have waffled between different time zones before settling on the respective ones closer to Greenwich.) I guess all of that makes sense?
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