What Really Happened In Chile 30 Years Ago

"and shoot a democratically elected president."

Hitler was also democratically elected. The world would have been better of if he had been shot.

How so?

Allende shot himself. With a Kalashnikov given to him as a gift by none other than Fidel Castro himself. As for "democratically elected", bear in mind that Hitler was "democratically elected", too. Castro was setting up a intellegence base in Allende's Chile. Do you support the DGI?

1) It was in jest.

2) The article talked about the French agents being involved in some rather unsavory, violent, and extreme activities. If Pinochet's officers learned from the Frogs how to subdue an insurgency, then they would have invariably adopted less than humane methods.

Chile is today democratic and prosperous thanks to General Pinochet

From the end of the article:

" But then, a Socialist president once again governs Chile."

Unfortunately, Chile's own Democrat Party is threatening to send the country back down the toilet of socialism.

Well, Madam Thatcher did laud Pinochet highly.

Falkenhayn lost a power struggle on the German General Staff - his only supporter was the Kaiser and the other generals were jealous of him. But Mosier believes Falkenhayn was one of the few realistic generals of the war - he believed that a breakthrough wasn't possible and that minimizing losses was important to keep up morale. Also, the Germans utilized withdrawal tactics - pull back just before a major attack and then let the attackers slog through the mud ("Porridge" at the Somme) with the defending German machine guns going. Mosier is controversial but has very interesting opinions in his book. His analysis of the superiority of German artillery vs. Allied artillery shows why the Germans were inflicting huge losses on the French and British - the Allied trenches would disappear as the Germans "nibbled" at them with their howitzers. I think you'll find The "Myth of the Great War" an interesting read.

FYI - I'm interested in this subject b/c my grandfather was a combat engineer in the U.S. Army in WW1 - apparently he was a tunneler and somehow got hit with mustard gas at the front.

Remembering Anolther 9/11 [1973 Coup Ousted Chile's Red Regime]
Human Events | 9/15/2003 | James R. Whelan

Remembering Another 9/11

Allende's 1973 Ouster Halted Communist Rule in Chile

Henry Kissinger once quipped that Chile was a dagger pointed straight at the heart of Antarctica. That quip melted in the white heat of another 9/11--Sept. 11, 1973, when the Chilean military ousted from power the first Marxist-Leninist regime to reach power via the ballot box.

The revolution that put an end to the government of Salvador Allende Gossens would become the most successful in the history of Latin America.

It would also become the most reviled in the annals of Latin America.

Since--by comparison with other major Latin American revolutions of the 20th century--it was also the least bloody, the question is--why? Why has the man who led that revolution--Augusto Pinochet Ugarte--become one of the most vilified figures of modem times, routinely grouped (in the literature of the left, which is to say, most literature) with Adolf Hitler, Idi Amin, Francisco Franco. (Stalin, Mao, or some of the genuine African butchers, somehow don't make it into the rogue's gallery of the left).

The essence of the answer is one the left cannot--and never will--accept.

Pinochet, and those who accompanied him, stopped cold the advance of Communism in the hemisphere. Far from a dagger pointed at the heart of Antarctica, Chile would have given the Soviet Union a strategically-invaluable base from which to project power across the southern Pacific, into neighboring South American countries--greatly amplifying the significance of the base they already possessed in Castro's Cuba, greatly complicating the geopolitical security risks for the United States at a time when the Cold War was at its peak.

Halting the advance of Communism inevitably triggered an avalanche of propaganda--and outright lies--emanating from the Soviet Union and its satrapies. Within days of the coup, Radio Moscow announced that 700,000 persons had been killed, that hospitals had been destroyed, and Nobel Laureate (and lifelong Communist) Pablo Neruda murdered. Not a word of that was true, but those Big Lies provided the smokescreen for an unending procession of "little" lies.

But the attacks came not only from outright Communists. Chilean exiles--mainly Communists, socialists, radicals, Christian Democrats--were welcomed with open arms by their counterparts across Europe and Latin America, in international organizations from the United Nations on down.

Writing recently, Profi Alan Angell, Director of Latin American Studies at OxfordUniversity--and surely, no supporter of the Pinochet government--observed that Chilean exiles found "strong and generalized support," not given the leftist exiles from the military regimes of Brazil, Argentina or Uruguay.

"It is difficult," he wrote, "to exaggerate the impact the Chilean coup had on the political conscience of a great number of countries..."

Mexico, always supportive of leftist causes, decreed three days of official mourning, as did Argentina, ruled then by Juan Domingo Peron, and Venezuela. Britain's Labor Party gave a standing ovation to Allende's last Ambassador, first time a foreigner had been invited to address the annual convention since "La Pasionaria" during the Spanish Civil War. Fidel Castro, visiting Hanoi, said the ouster of Allende made plain: "There is no longer any alternative except a revolutionary struggle."

Shrill voices were raised in the United States, as well. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D.-Mass.) rose on the floor of the Senate to assert that the waters of the MapochoRiver--mostly, a dry gulch which traverses Santiago--were clogged with bodies of the dead. A few weeks later, he proposed a "Sense of Congress" resolution calling on the President to cut off all but humanitarian assistance to Chile.

The New York Times editorialized that even humanitarian aid ought be ended. The liberal-dominated Congress, in the thrall of the Watergate investigations, soon launched a series of investigations into what had gone "wrong" in Chile. While the overwhelming majority of Chileans celebrated their deliverance from what a former president termed "a carnival of madness," a leading U.S. academic said the military "will haul the nation back to the Stone Age, where a primitive and simplistic warrior village will be bedded down for a long sleep..."

The generals and admirals who threw out a communist----- regime now found themselves under fire not only from the left, but from the very citadel of western resistance to--Communism!

The truth is that the Big Lie did not begin on September 11. It began with the election of Salvador Allende, on Sept. 4, 1970. It was quickly overlooked that he had edged his nearest, rightist rival by a mere 40,000 votes (1.3 percentage points). It was quickly forgotten that Allende was voted in by the Congress only in return for signing a Statute of so-called "Guarantees," which he would confess just four months later he had signed purely as "a tactical necessity."

The problem is that he had no electoral mandate to lead the country along any such road, and as the months wore on, he--his government--resorted ever more to lawlessness, arbitrary and frequently violent measures. By March of 1973, the man who more than any other individual was responsible for Allende's ascent to power--former President Eduardo Frei Montalva, the Christian Democrat who had preceded Allende in the presidency, would lament: "Chile is in the throes of an economic disaster; not a crisis, but a veritable catastrophe no one could foresee would happen so swiftly nor so totally... the hatred is worse than the inflation, the shortages, the economic disaster. There is anguish in Chile..." Two months later, he warned of an impending "totalitarian danger."

But the world took no note of that. Nor would the world take note of the reality that the Pinochet government inherited a wreckage.

The country the military bequeathed--when they voluntarily relinquished power on March 11, 1990--was (and is) the most dynamic, flourishing economy in all of Latin America, underpinned by the sturdiest institutions. Indeed, the Constitution that the military and their civilian colleagues painstakingly crafted, and which was overwhelmingly approved in a plebiscite in 1980 (as were reforms they agreed to in another. in 1989), remains in force today, after 13 years of democratic (but decidedly hostile to them) center-left governments.

What the world does see is human rights abuses--and abuses there unquestionably were. But the toll of dead and missing was not 700,000; or even the 25,000 or 50,000 so commonly claimed--but 2,279. And more than half of that number fell during the first three months after the revolution, months of serious fighting at first, sporadic battles thereafter.

The left, led by the Communists, has seen to it that human rights is the one and only topic--something between ironic and galling coming from the Communists, members of the political movement with more blood on its own hands than any in all of recorded history. With a socialist now once again in the Chilean presidency, it is not surprising that by now, even in Chile, human rights overshadows every other topic in this, the 30th anniversary year.

As for Pinochet, approaching 88, he lives on, ostracized ever more since his illegal arrest five years ago in London and subsequent release when a blue-ribbon medical panel found him mentally unfit to stand trial. (That was later reaffirmed by a Chilean medical panel). Meanwhile, those who served with him find themselves ever more in prison, or facing prison. Former terrorists, or those who aided and abetted them, occupy government posts, receive honors.

For the military, who did not seek power but responded reluctantly to the clamor of a desperate people, their victory, however just, was precarious from the start. And now, truly, the victors are the vanquished.

PHOTO (BLACK & WHITE): Former Marxist Chilean President Salvador Allende (right) speaks with Cuban Dictator Fidel Castro in Valparaiso, Chile during Castro's state visit Nov. 30, 1971. Gen. Augusto Pinochet ousted Allende in a coup Sept. 11,1973, which saved his nation from a Communist dictatorship and thwarted further Soviet encroachment in Latin America and the Western hemisphere.

~~~~~~~~

By James R. Whelan

Mr. Whelan is the author of seven books, two of them on Chile, including a widely acclaimed history of that country, Out of the Ashes: Life, Death and Transfiguration of Democracy in Chile, 1833-1988 (Regnery). He served as Visiting Professor at the University of Chile, 1993-1995, and is now at work on a biography of Gen. Pinochet.

The same number as George Washington, that is zero.

What others have said bears repeating. George Washington was elected by the electoral college, as all US presidents have been.

They both then built a democracy.

In the case of George Washington, he was elected and took office after a republic had already been established. (The distinction between a democracy and a republic is not trivial.)

You can guage how successful a person is by how much he is reviled by the 'mainstream'. Thanks for posting this. Pinochet doesn't deserve the vilification. He did what he had to do and left Chile better for it. That's what the left can't abide

But when Communists are elected, you can't vote them out after they have consolidated power.

Something for everyone to keep in mind as Hillary and McCain play musical chairs for the WH.

"Allende shot himself. With a Kalashnikov given to him as a gift by none other than Fidel Castro himself."

What a helpful piece of propaganda, I suppose you believed it then too.

You and the other apologists for the worm, Pinochet, have let your hatred for the worthless Allende lead you to accept this monster. I hope his death was horrible, painful and he was terrified He deserved such a death.

(The distinction between a democracy and a republic is not trivial.)

You are correct . I will watch my words more carefully in the future. The founders of the Republic knew what they were doing. A true democracy will not last.

CALGARYSUN.COM

Tue, May 11, 2004

Augusto Pinochet rescued Chile from sins of Marxist dictator

By Paul Jackson -- Calgary Sun

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher regarded General Augusto Pinochet as a great man of heroic stature who halted the total enslavement of the people of Chile under a brutal Communist regime.

Now, any individual Thatcher admires surely deserves the admiration of others who believe modern-day Stalinists shouldn't be allowed to trample on people's rights and freedoms.

Yet Premier Ralph Klein has got himself in some hot water by suggesting there was something positive in Pinochet cleaning up the chaos left by Marxist Salvador Allende after the reckless and ruthless leader had been in power just three years.

Klein was right and anyone who has read the carefully-assessed and critically acclaimed works Allende: Death of a Marxist Dream and Out of the Ashes: Life, Death and the Transformation of Democracy in Chile 1883-1988 by famed historian James R. Whelan (Winner of the prestigious
Nieman Fellowship at Harvard) will attest to that.

My only surprise at Klein's comments was that, after making his initial assessment of Pinochet, he then tempered his stance somewhat by suggesting Pinochet committed no worse sins than Allende. Actually, Pinochet
committed no sins, but simply rescued his countrymen from the sins of Allende, and deserves the praise of every Chilean for his courage and accomplishments.

President Richard Nixon himself saw the havoc Allende would wreak on Chile and authorized the funding of attempts to prevent him from coming to power in 1970 and backed Pinochet's coup d'etat against the Marxist
politician in 1973. Nixon has been much maligned by his enemies in the lib-left, but he beat them at their game by dying with the reputation of a honourable statesman.

During the three years Allende was in power, he ruined his nation's economy with massive state takeovers of huge sectors of industry and confiscated the assets of U.S. companies in that nation. Shortages of basic commodities were commonplace, and massive strikes erupted in protest.

Within the same period of time Pinochet, with the help of world renowned economists such as the University of Chicago's Milton Friedman, turned the nation's economy around so dramatically observers dubbed it the "Miracle
of Chile."

Allende had pledged to follow the disastrous economic, political and social policies of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro -- who turned his nation into an impoverished slave state -- and Pinochet, a true patriot, felt he
had to act for his own people's sake. He wanted, he proclaimed, "to make Chile not a nation of proletarians, but a nation of entrepreneurs."

That, as evidenced by Chile's revival, he certainly did. Naturally, there's nothing the lib-left and their Stalinist allies like better than to distort history and demean the achievements of their opponents.

The campaign against Pinochet never ceases, but never succeeds either.

Revisionist history tells us Pinochet was a dictator, but he was the first dictator to hold a democratic plebiscite and oust himself out of power.

He did that in 1988, when he felt the woes and corruption left by Allende were finally gone.

Following that plebiscite, in which he still won more votes than Allende had in 1970, Pinochet accepted defeat, staying in power only until 1990 when his term legally expired. After that, he was appointed Commander-in-Chief of Chile's armed forces, and later a senator. Hardly
actions that showed he was hated by the new democratic government of Chile or the Chilean people.

In 1998, while on a visit to Britain, a renegade judge in Spain used an obscure law to order his extradition to Spain to face charges of rights abuses. The free government of Chile itself opposed this bogus move.
Indeed, even Prime Minister Tony Blair's (socialist, at that) government refused to extradite the retired right-wing politician to face a sham showcase trial. Again, hardly a condemnation of Pinochet.

Pinochet returned to Chile and, in 2002, the Supreme Court of his country refused to prosecute Pinochet on any number of phoney charges.

Assess the actions of Allende and of Pinochet and the scales of justice and truth are weighted heavily in favour of Pinochet. The rewriting of history by unrepentant supporters of Allende and continuing attempts to impose the discredited theories of Marxism on society simply must be countered.

CASTRO Y PINOCHET
James R. Whelan

Martes, 9 de mayo de 2000

Cuando Fidel Castro hizo su entrada triunfal en La Habana, el 8 de enero de 1959, Cuba era uno de los países más prósperos del mundo. Cuando Augusto Pinochet y sus colegas militares depusieron al marxista-leninista Salvador Allende, el 11 de septiembre de 1973, encontraron un país al borde del colapso económico. Lo que desde entonces ha sucedido en ambos países es imposible tapar con el dedo.
Castro gobierna una nación donde prácticamente todo está racionado, un país que Freedom House clasifica como "estado policial de un solo partido" y “sin libertad” por 40 años, caso único en nuestro hemisferio.

Por el contrario, Chile figura entre los países "libres" según Freedom House, desde que Pinochet, derrotado en un plebiscito entregó voluntariamente el poder. Pero Castro es adulado y tratado con respeto por dirigentes políticos y periodistas en todas partes del mundo. El más vergonzoso y reciente ejemplo lo dio Janet Reno, Procuradora General de Estados Unidos, postrándose ante Fidel Castro en el caso del niño Elián González.

En cambio, Pinochet es perseguido y vilipendiado por una amplia gama de observadores y analistas. La misma Janet Reno aportó los formidables recursos de su Departamento de Justicia al flagelo "legal" de Pinochet.

El contraste del muy distinto trato recibido por estos dos líderes latinoamericanos parece provenir de las páginas del libro de George Orwell, "1984", donde encontramos términos como "nuevohablar" (blanco es negro, arriba es abajo) y "doblepensar" (creer en dos ideas contradictorias a la vez). Se trata, ni más ni menos, del triunfo orwelliano de la propaganda política impulsada por la izquierda internacional y del conveniente olvido de los hechos por quienes tienen la obligación de reportarlos.

Poco antes de irrumpir Castro en el poder, el ingreso per capita de los cubanos se aproximaba al de los italianos. Cuba figuraba en el lugar 22 entre las –entonces- 122 naciones del mundo en términos de desarrollo. Más de 12 mil italianos esperaban visas para emigrar a esa isla de oportunidades. Y los indicadores sociales avanzaban paralelamente: el alfabetismo se ubicaba en 80 por ciento, una cifra bastante alta para aquellos tiempos.

Cuba tenía más médicos y dentistas per capita que Holanda, Francia, el Reino Unido y Finlandia. Los cubanos gozaban de las tasas más bajas de mortalidad infantil y las más altas de longevidad de los países latinoamericanos. En 1959, los cubanos tenían ingresos similares a los puertorriqueños, mientras que hoy ganan menos de una décima parte.

Durante años, Castro pudo esconder su incompetencia detrás de las asombrosas subvenciones soviéticas. La historiadora rusa Irina Zorina calcula que la URSS le regaló a Castro cien mil millones de dólares, es decir, cuatro veces el total del Plan Marshall, y tres veces la ayuda recibida por toda la América Latina bajo la Alianza para el Progreso.

Cuando Rusia suspendió su ayuda económica en 1992, la economía cubana se contrajo violentamente, perdiendo 50% de su capacidad productiva y 80% de sus industrias se vieron obligadas a cerrar.

La mejor prueba del inmenso fracaso de Castro es que en ningún consulado cubano alrededor del mundo hay gente haciendo cola para emigrar a Cuba. Por el contrario, más de 1,5 millones de cubanos han huido de la isla, la mayoría de ellos arriesgando sus vidas y abandonando lo que tenían.

El caso Pinochet difícilmente podría ser más diferente. El ex presidente chileno, Eduardo Frei Montalva, sintetizó la situación del país en vísperas de la Revolución de 1973: "Chile está hundido en un desastre economico, no una crisis, sino una verdadera catástrofe... peor que la inflacion, la escasez, la violencia es el odio. Hay angustia en Chile..."

El mismo Allende, a pocos días de su caída, anunció que quedaba pan sólo para cuatro días. La inflación galopaba fuera de control, acercándose a mil por ciento. Un país, antes orgulloso, se había degenerado en un verdadero infierno socialista.

A partir de 1973, el régimen militar chileno tuvo que enfrentar boicots, embargos y hostilidad generalizada, no sólo de parte de países comunistas sino de los supuestamente anticomunistas, encabezados por Estados Unidos.

El gobierno de Pinochet transformó lo que era la segunda economía más estatista de América Latina (después de Cuba) en la más libre y próspera. Sin embargo, en la prensa mundial Pinochet aparece como el villano y a Castro siempre se le da el beneficio de la duda. ¿Dónde está el George Orwell de nuestra generación capaz de desenmascarar tanta hipocresía?

bump

Please do not put Pinochet and Franco in the same sentence as Reagan, Thatcher and John Paul II. The former two were thugs and dictators. The latter three espoused freedom.

bttt

What did Pinochet do that earned him your hate? I admit I don't know all that much about Chile.