September, the cruelest month in Chile
By
Saul Landau Read Spanish Version
“Lilacs
out of the dead land, mixing
Memory
and desire, stirring
Dull
roots with spring rain.”
—
T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land
On
September 10, 1810, Chile declared independence from Spain. On
September 4, 1970, Chile’s Popular Unity coalition of left parties
under the leadership of Dr. Salvador Allende won the presidential
elections with a plurality of 36.4 percent. On September 11, 1973,
Army Chief General Augusto Pinochet led a U.S.-backed military coup
that killed Allende and Chilean democracy. The military dictatorship
endured for 17 years.
U.S.
interference in Chile’s elections began in the 1950s and 1960s when
the CIA
poured money into the right wing opposition. Less than a week after
Nixon received the disappointing news about the presidential vote, he
decided to annul the Chilean vote. A quote widely attributed to
Secretary of State Henry Kissinger explained Nixon’s morality: “I
don’t see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist
due to the irresponsibility of its people. The issues are much too
important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for
themselves.”
Nixon
ordered CIA Director Richard Helms, according to Helms’
subsequently published notes, to use violence, economic warfare and
whatever else it took to prevent Allende’s inauguration and,
failing that, to unseat his government. Nixon and Kissinger’s sense
of “responsibility” meant breaking the law — in the name of
“national security.”
Following
the bloody 9/11/73 coup in Chile, Kissinger eagerly recognized
the
Pinochet-led coup’s illegitimate “junta”
and offered it economic aid as well. He also pressured international
lending organizations to open their wallets to Pinochet.
The
U.S. government has yet to declassify documents related to the role
in the coup of U.S. Navy spy ships docked in the Valparaiso harbor —
by coincidence? — on Septmber 11. The ships monitored Chilean
military phone and radio traffic on the day of the golpe
and provided coup organizers with information about units loyal to
Allende that might resist; thus, the coup plotters could repress them
and avoid civil war.
The
coup script also called for Allende to surrender. Since he refused to
play his assigned part, the generals ordered Chilean Air Force jets
to fire rockets into the Moneda Palace. (Think of the Pentagon 28
years later — only the Chilean pilots did not sacrifice themselves,
but flew their military jets to safety!)
The
assault on the President’s office killed Chilean democracy — and
President Allende. The high command of the Chilean armed forces —
unlike the fiends who flew commercial aircraft into office buildings
and the Pentagon — acted at the behest of “higher powers” in
Washington, not in Heaven, although no one should doubt the intensity
of U.S. support for the coup.
General
Carlos Prats, former Chilean Chief of Staff, identified Lt. Col.
Patrick Ryan, a Naval Attaché, as the key U.S. military
liaison officer assigned to the coup plotters. (Prats was
assassinated in 1974 in Buenos Aires by agents of Pinochet’s secret
police.) Ryan
called the day of the coup “our D-Day.” He described the military
operation as “close to perfect.” (Department of Defense, U.S.
Milgroup, Situation Report #2, October 1, 1973
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB8/nsaebb8.htm)
Perfection
for Ryan included the reestablishment of “liberty.” In the weeks
following the coup, the military dictatorship showed its
understanding of liberty: its troops murdered, kidnapped and tortured
tens of thousands and forced hundreds of thousands to flee the
country. Pinochet’s dictatorship endured for 17 years.
Thirty
years later, Secretary of State Colin Powell offered sort of an
apology: “what happened with Mr. Allende…is not a part of
American history that we’re proud of.” (Interview on Black
Entertainment Television’s Youth Town Hall, Feb. 20, 1973)
A
typical congressional responses to imperial crimes came in 1975: post
mortem hearings
about the
CIA’s role in Chile. In the testimony, the Solons “discovered”
that Nixon and Kissinger had ordered the CIA to “destabilize” the
Allende government.
(United
States Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with
Respect to Intelligence Activities,
a U.S.
Senate
committee chaired by Senator Frank
Church
(D–ID).
Sanctimonious
Senators and haughty House Members declared their outrage. Yes, once
again, the President had broken U.S. laws by conspiring to overthrow
governments and kidnap and murder people. This “shocking”
behavior occurred just as Congress voted no more funds to continue
the Vietnam War where such behavior had become routine.
In
one “responsible” gambit, the Agency paid $50,000 to Patria y
Libertad thugs. The extreme right wing “action” group tried to
kidnap Army Chief General Rene Schneider, but the abductors shot and
killed the General and his chauffer.
The
CIA also
organized strikes in strategic sectors of the economy, orchestrated
Chilean media propaganda campaigns to smear Allende and paid
saboteurs to attack power plants and other infrastructural assets.
The
Treasury Department pressured international agencies and foreign
“allies” to curtail Chile’s foreign credit. “Make the economy
scream,” wrote CIA Chief Richard Helms in his notes taken from a
meeting with Nixon and Kissinger about what the Agency should do to
bring down the Alllende government.
Nixon
had to resign in 1974, not because of his criminal acts against
Chile, but rather for showing his contempt for U.S. laws at home as
well. Kissinger, however, continues to receive honorific deference
and high consulting fees. In addition, he still gets his pompous
commentaries published in leading newspapers. Like Nixon before he
died, Kissinger deserves his proper place: in the dock facing charges
of war crimes for conspiracy to commit mass murder and other crimes
against the people of Chile. (Add to his crimes orders to bomb
civilian targets in Vietnam and his support for massive killing in
Indonesia. Kissinger represents the obvious dark side of empire —
that Metternichian balance to “democracy spreaders” who paint
noble intentions over U.S. aggressions.)
Even
after four and a half years of war in Iraq, “naïve Members
still feign
“shock”
when confronted by daily illegal behavior. Imagine, the President
dares violate the very laws and treaties that state Congress must
declare war and outlaws interference in other nations’ destinies!
Haven’t they learned the unwritten clause attached to U.S. laws
that say they apply to everyone else, not the empire’s rulers.
Indeed, how would the empire “punish” naughty — disobedient —
nations if it had to abide by such restrictions as non-intervention?
Others
count much less. The U.S. media paid little or no attention to the
34th
anniversary of Allende’s election, or the military coup in Chile.
When TV or print news cover that Andean nation — rarely — reporters
often fail to mention the coup and the U.S. role in it. Instead,
Chile gets characterized as a “successful democracy,” an example
of “free market” success, where neo liberal economics brought
economic growth.
Amnesia
exists in some Chilean minds as well; not just young people, but
those who don’t want to recall the “unpleasantness” of that
aberrant period. How long does it take to heal from the trauma of a
coup and 17 years of military rule? I asked a Chilean friend.
“I’ll
let you know,” he said.
September
18 is Chile’s national day, a week after September 11. Chileans
count more dead from their 9/11 than the U.S. does from its trauma —
plus the loss of liberties, the constitution, university system and
other institutions deemed dangerous by the military plotters.
Chileans have recovered some freedom, some confidence in old
institutions. Fools
anywhere may continue to trust the military to accept its subordinate
role, but
only idiots will rely on Washington’s repeated assurances that it
will obey international law.
The
loss of innocence is painful and permanent. Salvador Allende, one of
the last true democrats, perished with gun in hand, defending the
Constitution, the people’s document.
In
his last radio speech, tanks surrounding the Moneda Palace, Allende
said: “My words do not have bitterness but disappointment.” He
refused to resign. “I will pay for loyalty to the people with my
life. And I say to them that I am certain that the seeds which we
have planted in the good conscience of thousands and thousands of
Chileans will not be shriveled forever.”
Allende
asked Chile’s workers to grasp the lesson: “foreign capital,
imperialism, together with the reaction, created the climate in which
the Armed Forces broke their tradition…The people must defend
themselves, but they must not sacrifice themselves. The people must
not let themselves be destroyed or riddled with bullets, but they
cannot be humiliated either…These are my last words, and I am
certain that my sacrifice will not be in vain, I am certain that, at
the very least, it will be a moral lesson that will punish felony,
cowardice, and treason.”
One
day, the majority will absorb Allende’s warning.
Saul
Landau is an Institute for Policy Studies Fellow. His latest book is
A
BUSH AND BOTOX WORLD.
His new film is WE
DON’T PLAY GOLF HERE,
available on DVD from roundworldproductions@gmail.com.
