Military coup in Chile (1973). What causes a trucker strike
https://www.site/2015-11-26/obezglavlennye_tela_chetvertovannye_trupy_k_chemu_privodit_protest_shoferov
"Decapitated human bodies, quartered corpses..."
What causes a trucker strike
Yesterday, November 25, marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of one of the most famous dictators of the twentieth century, Augusto Pinochet. Some associate his name with the overthrow of the legitimate president, the idol of ordinary Chileans, Salvador Allende, and with the subsequent terror. Others - with the restoration of order, the flourishing of capitalism and the Chilean "economic miracle", the recipes of which in the 1990s were tried in our country.
Popular not so unity
The socialist Salvador Allende, who became president of Chile in 1970, stubbornly led this South American, by regional standards, prosperous country into a bright communal future. They say that not without the financial assistance of the "big brother" of the USSR and former partisan commanders from Cuba, who generously shared their combat experience in subversive and sabotage work. As with any redistribution of personal and social wealth, the country was divided in two. The poor, naturally, supported the course of the government of the coalition of the left forces "People's Unity" towards nationalization and import-substituting industrialization, the middle class looked at the experiments with alarm. And the Chilean bourgeoisie, large landowners and owners of mining enterprises were not at all laughing: Allende, under the guise of agrarian reform, arranged the expropriation of private lands, and also established state control over most private companies and banks, the centuries-old agrarian-oligarchic way of life collapsed before our eyes.
Was the socialist economic policy successful? Opinions vary. Some researchers claim that under Allende the economy simply collapsed: political populism pushed wages up, eventually the printing press was launched, inflation jumped, goods and products disappeared from the shelves, coupons appeared - all the “charms” familiar to Russians. However, others argue that the results were quite decent: the economy grew steadily, the authorities curbed unemployment, and the United States was largely to blame for the crisis that followed by 1973 (where would it be without them!), Applying sanctions that put an end to the export of minerals - after all, many of the nationalized (but, by the way, at the same time bought out by the socialist government) companies were of American "origin".
Under Allende (right), Pinochet (left) had a brilliant career, but appetite comes with eating
In addition, the situation was greatly destabilized by the activities of far-right anti-communist organizations, such as Patria and Libertad. Every day, 30-50 terrorist attacks were committed, mainly at infrastructure facilities - power lines, substations, bridges, roads, oil pipelines. Only bridges were blown up over two hundred, the total damage amounted to a third of the country's annual income. Due to the collapse of the infrastructure, it became impossible to continue doing business, the cattle merchants massively slaughtered livestock, up to half of the 1972 harvest died - and this is an important export component of the country.
Oil was added to the fire by a national, all-Chilean strike, initiated in October 1972 by truck owners.
Nevertheless, Allende's methods were approved by many segments of the population, the president really claimed for re-election in the next elections. Director Miguel Littin, who was expelled from Chile under Pinochet, recalls in a book dedicated to him by Nobel laureate Gabriel Garcia Marquez: “During the time of Allende, small busts of the president were sold in the markets. Now, flowers are placed in front of these busts in poblacions (municipalities - ed.) and lamps are lit. His memory lives on in everyone and everything: in the old people who voted for him for the third and fourth time, in his voters, in children who know him only from other people's memories. From different women we heard the same phrase: "The only president who fought for our rights is Allende." However, he is rarely called by his last name, more often simply - the President. As if he was still alive, as if there were no others, as if they were waiting for his return. In the memory of the blacions, it was not so much his image that was imprinted, but the greatness of his humanistic designs.
Shelter and food are not the main thing, the main thing is dignity, - say the inhabitants of the outskirts and clarify: - We do not need anything, except for what was taken from us. Voice and the right to choose ... "
Called from above
It happened on September 11, 1973 (yes, Chile has its own September 11), as a result of a military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet, who made a rapid career under the government of "People's Unity": to the post of Deputy Minister of the Interior and Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces. What happened was quite consistent with the "Chilean spirit": the history of the country already knew the periods of the junta. With the help of aviation, the La Moneda presidential palace was fired upon and captured, President Allende shot himself (according to another version, he was killed) from a Kalashnikov, not allowing himself to be put to trial by the putschists, and perhaps even tortured.
The coup was not spontaneous - it was well thought out in advance and there were practically no misfires. This was indirectly confirmed by Pinochet himself. Back in 1993, our well-known TV traveler Mikhail Kozhukhov was the only Russian journalist who managed to talk to Pinochet in person:
“- And if I ask you yourself: what kind of person is General Pinochet?
09/11/1973. Last lifetime photograph of President Allende
A soldier who received an order and carried it out. And not bad. Because I realized that my country is being given to foreigners. And who? The President of the Republic! It was my duty to protect her sovereignty. That's why I intervened. Do you know how many weapons we found when we went out on 9/11? Thirty thousand barrels! That's how things were... Even the Cuban General Antonio La Guardia was already here. He later wrote a book, where he confessed: under his command there were fifteen thousand partisans in Chile. They had to fight the military government, just imagine! .. Now they say: [Marxist] theory was good, but the practice failed. And I say: no, this system is no good. You put the best performers - the result will be the same. The communist system has failed! No state will ever have the money to feed all the idlers.”
Whose orders were carried out by the general (according to legend, recruited by the CIA back in the 1950s)? This is easy to imagine from the words of Miguel Littin “Simple miners, smeared with soot, gloomy, tired of endless promises that could not be fulfilled, opened [Allende's] soul and became the bulwark of his victory. Assuming the presidency, he began by fulfilling a promise he had made that day to the Lota-Schwager miners by nationalizing the mines. Pinochet first of all returned them back to private property, like many other things - cemeteries, trains, ports and even waste disposal ... "The generals also tried to fall for the pie, Augusto and his" colleagues "were not at all disinterested: they participated in privatization, their children are all oligarchs. As well as our general's sons.
A bloody path to an "economic miracle"
Immediately after the putsch, a tough and cruel eradication of supporters of the former, socialist, regime followed, so that Pinochet had something to call a "bloody dictator." An independent commission of the Catholic Church counted "only" 2,300 victims during the 17 years of Pinochet's reign of 15 million Chile, among them mainly militants and saboteurs. The number of those expelled from the country (in the "Pinochet" interpretation - those who were offered to leave it voluntarily) allegedly also amounted to no more than a few thousand.
The National Stadium in Santiago has been turned into a concentration camp and a torture chamber for tens of thousands of people.
Too “humane” figures to be true, you draw a conclusion from Littin’s testimony: “Closer to the city center, I already stopped admiring the beauties behind which the military junta hid the blood and suffering of more than forty thousand dead, two thousand missing and a million deported from the country ... Twelve years ago, at seven o'clock in the morning, the sergeant in command of the patrol fired an automatic burst over my head and ordered the arrested to stand in line, whom he led to the building of the Chilean film studio where I worked. Explosions rumbled all over the city, machine-gun fire rumbled, military aircraft rushed by at a low level. We... saw the first dead on the streets; the wounded, bleeding on the pavement with no hope of help; civilians clubbing supporters of President Salvador Allende. We saw prisoners lined up against the wall and a platoon of soldiers pretending to be shot... The building of the Chilean film studio was surrounded, machine guns were aimed at the doors in front of the main entrance... We did not return home and wandered through other people's apartments for a whole month with three children and a minimum of necessary things escaping from death, which followed on our heels until it squeezed us into a foreign land ... "
The international tribunals that took place back in the 1970s also agree on a much more impressive figure - at least 30,000 dead in the first month after the putsch and more than 12,000 tortured and killed subsequently. Russian sociologist Alexander Tarasov: “The infamous National Stadium in Santiago, turned into a concentration camp by the junta, can accommodate 80,000 people. In the first month, the number of detainees held at the stadium averaged 12,000–15,000 people per day. A velodrome with stands for 5,000 seats adjoins the stadium. The velodrome was the main place of torture, interrogation and execution. Every day, according to numerous testimonies of witnesses, including foreigners, from 50 to 250 people were shot there. In addition, the Chile stadium was turned into a concentration camp, accommodating 5 thousand spectators, but it contained up to 6 thousand arrested people. At the Chile stadium, according to survivors, the torture was especially monstrous and turned into medieval executions. A group of Bolivian scientists who got to the Chile stadium and miraculously survived, testified that they saw decapitated human bodies, quartered corpses, corpses with open stomachs and chests, corpses of women with cut off breasts in the locker room and in the stadium's first-aid post. In this form, the military did not dare to send the corpses to morgues - they took them out in refrigerators to the port of Valparaiso and dumped them into the sea there.
The Catholic Church generally reacted favorably to the crimes of Pinochet. On the left is Pope John Paul II.
There are also numerous testimonies, including foreigners who ended up in Chile at their own misfortune at an unkind hour in this country: how 10 students were shot in front of the school building in the poor people's quarter; how the carabinieri machine-gunned over 300 people, including women, who were employees of one enterprise; how the corpses of the dead were laid out along the streets and avenues to intimidate the survivors; how in the provinces entire neighborhoods were fired from machine guns, regardless of the political views of their inhabitants.
Emphasizing their commitment to Christian values, in fact, Pinochet and Co. did not stop before the clergy, who dared to prevent repressions, take the muzzle of machine guns away from the innocent: thousands of Catholic activists who sympathize with "People's Unity" were imprisoned, as were 60 priests, 12 of whom were killed. Gentle, however, official Catholic statistics.
Fascist in the full sense of the word
“With the announcement of ‘normalization’, ‘military operations’ against the civilian population did not stop,” says Alexander Tarasov. - When, at the end of 1973, General Pinochet visited the village of Quinta Bella to attend the ceremony of renaming the village to Buin (in honor of the regiment of the same name), this was preceded by an act of intimidation: the military drove all 5 thousand inhabitants of the village to the football field, selected 200 of them people, of which 30 were shot, and the rest were declared hostages. On the night before Pinochet's visit, the soldiers constantly shelled the village. Several dozen people were injured. Later, Chilean television showed the arrival of Pinochet in Quinta Belho and the women weeping around him and explained that the women were crying from a feeling of tenderness and gratitude to the general for the fact that he "liberated them from Marxism." Although they sobbed, of course, for completely different reasons.
Neo-fascist organizations, before the putsch, diligently filed the country's economy in order to topple the Allende team, did not stand aside after the coup. Fascist parties were instructed to ideologically substantiate the new regime in schools, universities, and enterprises. The names of Hitler, Franco, Mussolini soon became respected and glorified, and the number of fascist organizations grew 20 times. A wave of anti-Semitism swept across the country, nine out of ten Jewish families left the country, which at the same time became a haven for former Nazi criminals. Most of the million who left were intelligentsia, 60% never returned, the scientific, cultural, moral level of the country's population dropped sharply.
Visiting Chile in 1971, Fidel Castro (in the middle) could not even suspect that he was standing next to the future leader of Chilean fascism
Alexander Tarasov: “Denunciations were encouraged. The scammer received a bonus of one and a half million escudos and all the property of the person he denounced. Relatives and neighbors who were in a quarrel denounced each other in hundreds and thousands. The city of Chuquicamata was infamous as the "cradle of informers": there, teenagers from wealthy families raced to inform on their own parents - in order to get their property and quickly squander it. We had one Pavlik Morozov, there were 90 of them in the little Chuquikamata!
True, the pro-fascist organizations were soon disbanded - Pinochet would not have tolerated armed formations on his territory. Many militants subsequently settled well in the new military-police hierarchy. Thus, during the time after the coup, 492 thousand Chileans were convicted and sent to prison, at least once every third was arrested, the slightest offense, for example, curfew violation, was the reason.
economic monster
“After the military coup, the Mapocho River became associated throughout the world with the mutilated bodies that carried its waters after the nightly pogroms carried out by patrols on the outskirts - in the infamous “blacions” of Santiago. However, in recent years, regardless of the season, the true tragedy of Mapocho has been the hungry mobs fighting dogs and vultures over the garbage dumped into the riverbed near the city markets. This is the wrong side of the “Chilean miracle” created by the military junta at the instigation of the Chicago School of Economics,” Miguel Littin characterizes the economic achievements of the Pinochet regime in this way.
An export-oriented oligarchic economy is the recipe for prosperity for Santiago under Pinochet
According to the filmmaker, who secretly returned to Chile in the mid-1980s, the “miracle” was largely due to ostentatious, rampant consumerism: funds from domestic private capital and multinational corporations, proceeds from denationalization and privatization, went to luxury that created the illusion of economic prosperity: “For more things were imported in one five-year plan than in the previous two hundred years, and they were bought with foreign currency loans secured at the National Bank with funds received as a result of denationalization. The complicity of the US and international lending institutions completed the job. However, the hour of reckoning has come: six-seven-year-old illusions crumbled to dust in one year. Chile's foreign debt, which was $4 billion in the last year of Allende's rule, rose to $23 billion. It is enough to walk through the backyards of the markets along the Mapocho River to see the true social cost of these 19 billion thrown to the wind. The military “economic miracle” made the few rich even richer, and let the rest of the Chileans go around the world.”
Already in 1974, the national currency devalued 28 times, and prices for basic products rose by about the same amount. The "shock therapy" that began the following year, officially launched to attract investment to the country and develop the banking sector, bulldozed through the most vulnerable categories of the population. "Chile must become a land of proprietors, not proletarians!" Pinochet proclaimed. And the new authorities completely closed the topic of social security and free healthcare. The average wage in industry was $15. And the peasants completely sabotaged work on the land, transferred back into the possession of the former owners, the latifundists.
In the 1990s, Russia repeated the path of Pinochet Chile to the "economic miracle"
The completely depreciated escudo was replaced by the peso, which was equated one to one with the dollar, but by the end of Pinochet's reign, the dollar was already worth 300 pesos. Indicators for 1980: unemployment - 25%, inflation - 40%, maintenance of the army and police - 43% of the budget. In the towns of the south of the country, where winters are cold, special teams collected the frozen corpses of the homeless. More than 5 million people were forced to move to the slums. “It is hard to imagine a trading floor where long silent rows [of hoarders] would not line up. They trade everything and everyone, they are so numerous and diverse that their very existence betrays a social tragedy. Next to an unemployed doctor, a ruined engineer or an arrogant lady selling cheap clothes left over from better times, homeless children selling stolen goods, or destitute women selling homemade bread ... "
On the other hand, new financial-industrial groups were formed, which used the borrowed money to privatize depreciated assets. The junta did not fight corruption, but led and controlled it. No wonder the authors of the Chilean "economic miracle" visited Russia in the 1990s...
Features of national fishing
The country was dragged out of the economic abyss not so much by the emerging financial-industrial groups, but by the mass class of entrepreneurship - those same “traders”, “sacks” (in our opinion, “shuttles”). In addition, America, which raised lending rates and the dollar exchange rate, gave a kick to speculative sectors, many nouveaux riches, if not ruined, then reformatted - it's time to invest in the real sector. The now popular Chilean wine, Chilean fresh produce, fish, meat, timber have appeared on the global market.
In the end, the new elite that arose on the entrepreneurial upsurge began to be embarrassed by their "taskers" in uniform - not everyone abroad was ready to purchase products in places where blood flowed like a river. Fundamental disagreements also appeared in the armed forces: many of the dictator's associates resigned, "on a well-deserved rest", and newcomers came in their place, not stained with the blood of the first years of the junta. They did not make friends with Pinochet, they did not know him well, but they saw perfectly well that “it is impossible to live like this any longer”, it is necessary to establish a dialogue with civilians, to go on democratic lines.
Having lost in the very first free elections, the dictator, out of habit, called in the troops, but his bloody manners were fed up with the military
The new constitution, which was written under the control of the president, included a clause on a plebiscite - a nationwide referendum on confidence in the head of state, the date of which he himself set in 1989. Having lost it to the representative of the Christian Democratic Party, Patricio Aylvin, Pinochet gave the order to bring troops to the streets, but the young generals no longer wanted to shed the blood of their compatriots. The presidency had to be relinquished. However, Pinochet retained the post of commander-in-chief for another 8 years, thereby protecting himself and his entourage from court, and after that he was self-appointed as a senator for life ...
March 2000, great time in Chile. Pinochet takes long walks in the park of his villa near Santiago. Five children and twenty-four grandchildren and great-grandchildren create a caring fuss around the head of the family. The ex-dictator had just arrived from London, where, having arrived for treatment, he spent a year and a half under house arrest: the authorities of Spain, whose citizens disappeared without a trace during the years of his reign, “got” it. In England, he had to do his best to portray an infirm old man, whom it is more merciful to leave alone. Finally, the British Home Secretary allows the former dictator to leave for his homeland - old, sick, sort it out yourself.
Reagan and Thatcher favored Pinochet; during their reign, the official number of victims of the Chilean dictatorship decreased by an order of magnitude
Augusto watches television newscasts: demonstrations in all major cities of the country call for him to be judged. The other day, the socialist Ricardo Lagos was elected president, a victim of his dictatorial regime, was arrested back in 1986. Upon taking office, Lagos said that he was not going to forgive Pinochet: too many people suffered, too many mourn their relatives. We must show the world that Chile is a democratic country and the courts in it are independent and fair.
But they won't prove it. The military, who refused Pinochet's dictatorial whim, will say their weighty word to the democratic authorities and will not hand over the old man. The elite will offer a deal: let him leave politics, leave the post of senator, and live quietly, no one needs shocks. He will agree. And he will last until the last second in December 2006, although attempts to prosecute him for crimes will not subside and Pinochet will undergo house arrest four more times.
After his death, which occurred in 1992, a letter to the nation was made public: he explained that he had chosen the fate of exile and loneliness for the sake of the Fatherland, and made sacrifices in order to prevent an even greater catastrophe - the civil war and the victory of Marxism (by the way, after it Chile was ruled mostly by the Socialist Party and the country is doing quite well.)
“Chile is a democratic country. It was democratic when I was born. And it's not for me to change that. No matter what they say about the fact that I am a fascist and a dictator,” Pinochet boasted in an interview with Mikhail Kozhukhov. Attributing to themselves the dignity and merits of an inflexible and hardworking people.
General Augusto Pinochet (pictured left) led Chile already at an elderly age - 58 years old. And for another 17 years he ruled the country undividedly
General Augusto Pinochet carried out a coup d'état, unleashing a bloody terror in Chile. And he also saved the country from ruin, contributing to the Chilean economy becoming one of the most developed
On the morning of September 12, 1973, in the main Soviet newspaper Pravda, millions of citizens of the USSR read the alarming TASS message: "Military mutiny in Chile." The day before, the Chilean army, led by General Augusto Pinochet, stormed the presidential palace of La Moneda, in which the incumbent head of state, the socialist Salvador Allende, barricaded himself.
“I will not resign,” Pravda published a radio message from the President of Chile. “I declare my adamant intention to fight back by any means at my disposal.”
When this manifesto appeared in the Soviet press, Allende was already dead. The revolution took place.
The Pinochet regime in the USSR was called the junta. Although this Spanish word is translated as council, assembly. But in the Russian language, at the suggestion of the Kremlin ideologists, this neologism later began to mean exclusively the power of the military, who carried out a coup and established a dictatorship.
For the Union authorities, the coup in Chile was particularly painful. First, in 1970, in this Latin American country, for the first time in the history of mankind, left-wing forces professing Marxism came to power through democratic elections, and not as a result of a revolution.
Secondly, these same leftists nationalized large enterprises, especially in the field of copper mining, which was largely controlled by American corporations. Chile has a third of the world's reserves of this metal, and nationalization has caused enormous damage to the US corporate sector.
The coming to power of Pinochet brought down all the hopes of the Soviet Union to get a new ally, like Cuba, at the side of official Washington.
In Chile, not only the socialist republic collapsed - the civil world shattered to pieces. Pinochet unleashed a big purge - Allende's supporters were killed on the streets in broad daylight, exiled to concentration camps, one of which was hastily built at the country's largest stadium - Nacional de Chile.
But having stepped over a lot of blood, which is difficult to justify, the Republic of Chile, under the leadership of Pinochet, headed for a free, neoliberal economy. And as a result, the country became the richest on the continent.
Beginning of the End
In the fall of 1970, Allende, a great friend of the USSR, won the presidential election. Washington was betting on incumbent President Eduardo Frey, secretly sponsoring his campaign. As a result, the White House was terrified at the prospect of Chile turning into a rebellious Cuba. At this time, according to the CIA, there were about 30,000 career agents of the Cuban special services in Chile, acting as various advisers. The specter of communism roamed Europe for a long time, but now its shadow has fallen on Latin America, and the US shuddered.
In the first days of his reign, Allende nationalized about 500 large enterprises, private banks, taking them away from foreign owners without any compensation.
This step allowed to increase salaries and pensions to the population. But these payments grew faster than the economy. To meet demand, money had to be printed. Even Allende decided that children under 15 years of age should receive milk every day, placing a fee for this on entrepreneurs. They started raising prices. The Chilean leader, who built socialism with a human face, froze prices.
And then the main food products began to disappear from the shelves. In December 1971, the women of Santiago, the Chilean capital, took to the streets to protest against the shortage. This action was later called the march of empty pans.
The following year also did not bring good news to the Chileans: the prices for copper, the basis of the local economy, collapsed on the world market. The government has announced a partial ban on foreign debt payments - a technical default. And in December 1972, Allende flew to the USSR to ask for help. His daughter Isabel recalled: “Everyone refused to lend us money and sell food. My father was very upset after arriving in Moscow: he asked [Soviet Secretary General Leonid] Brezhnev to lend, but for some reason he did not show any generosity.”
The situation became a stalemate. By mid-1973, Chile's annual inflation had reached a world record of 800%. The budget deficit is 22% of GDP. This is twice as high as the Ukrainian budget deficit in 2014 at the height of the conflict with Moscow.
The traditionally influential force in Latin America, the military, reacted to the economic collapse. On June 29, 1973, seven tanks of the Chilean army bombarded the presidential palace. But the first attempt at rebellion bogged down. About a week before this event, Pinochet, then head of the Santiago military garrison, came home, where he met his worried wife, Lucia Iriart Rodriguez. Her question was somewhat strange:
“When will you finally lead the conspirators?
— I am a military man, my duty is to serve the country. We must respect the constitution and the law,” the future dictator replied.
In fact, Pinochet had already acted in concert with the rebels, but did not want to advertise this fact, since the coup might not have happened.
Clear massacre at the Technical University, corpses in the Machopo River, destruction of the Sumara textile factory - Newspaper Truth about the horrors of the Chilean coupOn July 25, 1973, the Truck Owners Confederation held a nationwide strike. The authorities have declared a state of emergency in the country. A month later, on August 23, Allende dismissed the commander-in-chief of the army, Carlos Prats. On the same day, the general wrote in his diary: "Without exaggerating my role, I believe that my resignation is a prelude to a coup d'état and the greatest betrayal."
What clarity. On the same day, Allende made an amazing personnel miscalculation - he appointed Pinochet the supreme commander of the Chilean army, although he knew about the anti-communist views of the general.
Less than three weeks later, the new commander launched one of the most high-profile military coups of the 20th century. The first day of the rebellion - September 11, 1973 - was the last for Allende.
War of the Worlds
"It's raining in Santiago." This innocuous message, transmitted over the radio frequencies of the Chilean military, was the code signal for the start of the assault.
The mutiny was started by sailors in the port of the city of Valparaiso: they arrested 3 thousand people and imposed a curfew. And in the capital at that moment the putschists began to storm the presidential palace. In the course went not only tanks, but also aircraft. Footage of the bombing of the palace spread around the world.
By noon, Allende pleaded defeated. He refused to surrender to the military and committed suicide in his office by shooting himself with a pistol given to him by revolutionary Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
The same junta came to power in Chile - a group of military men, which included the commanders of the army, navy, air force and the carabinieri corps. Pinochet, who represented the army, became the leader of this powerful quartet.
On September 12, the Pravda newspaper published a TASS report: “An order was transmitted through the radio stations of the rebels to all state and private companies to immediately interrupt all radio transmissions and all radio communications, as well as telegraph and telephone communications with the outside world.<…>The military junta has declared a state of emergency and a curfew in Chile.”
And so it was. Violators of the order were immediately arrested. Those who were captured with weapons in their hands were shot on the spot.
All the same Pravda, referring to the British edition of The Guardian, told Soviet citizens about the first bloody deeds of the junta: “Here, in Santiago, terrible events really took place: an obvious massacre at the Technical University, corpses in the Machopo River, the destruction of the Sumar textile factory.”
On September 13, Pinochet, coming out to the press, said: “I take this opportunity to remind everyone who intends to oppose us, violate the established order and obey orders coming from Moscow, using respected institutions of power for this, that I intend to stop all their attempts with a firm hand."
Pinochet's hand was more than firm. News agencies have spread around the world photographs of the Nacional stadium, which the junta has turned into a concentration camp. Several thousand people were shot here every day.
On November 21, 1973, a duel between the football team of Chile and the USSR was to take place on its field, at which the fate of a ticket to the upcoming World Cup in Germany was decided. The first game in Moscow ended in a goalless draw. The Soviet Football Federation demanded that FIFA move the return match to a neutral field. The International Federation sent emissaries to Santiago. Those received guarantees from Pinochet that the game would be safe.
On November 14, 1973, Izvestia published another angry article, False Guarantees of the Junta. Its author wrote: “Against the ominous background of mass executions and torture, which have become everyday and commonplace in the gloomy everyday life of the Chilean fascist dictatorship, the “promises” of the junta, which has lost the idea of even the most elementary norms of attitude towards a person, is an empty phrase.”
Soviet football players did not fly to the game in Chile. Although, according to Vladimir Muntyan, midfielder of the USSR national team, there were opportunities to find a compromise. “Now there are hostilities in the Donbass, and Shakhtar is playing not at home, but in Ukraine,” he gives an example. “We could play the first game on a neutral field and the return game on a neutral field.”
As a result, the Chileans went to the German World Cup.
Big change
Oleg Yasinsky has been living in Chile for 20 years - he has his own travel business. He tells NV that in the circle of his current friends and acquaintances there are a lot of victims of Pinochet's dictatorship, and they remember those dark days with a shudder.
At the same time, he notes that under the dictatorship, they carried out economic and social reforms, known today as neoliberal ones. “Pinochet, who had no economic plan, gave carte blanche to the ‘Chicago boys’,” says Yasinsky of the Chilean economists who were educated at the University of Chicago and appointed by Pinochet to run the country’s economy. “They streamlined and improved the economy at the cost of eliminating the social ballast of the state.”
However, things didn't go well for the new team at first. The new government first began the privatization of enterprises nationalized by Allende. This maneuver did not give quick results: by 1975, annual inflation had reached 340%. Because of the atrocities committed and sanctioned by the junta, the Republic of Chile has received a disgusting international image. Investment in the country was slow. By 1977, Pinochet realized that in order to bring the state out of the crisis, qualitative changes were needed in matters of social and economic freedoms.
As a result, speaking to members of the Youth Front of National Unity in the city of Chacarillas, the dictator determined that by the early 1980s the military should be removed from government. Then we need to hold democratic presidential elections.
The "Chicago Boys"—originally five economists who led the Department of the Economy, the Department of the Treasury, the Central Bank, and the Department of Labor—pushed Pinochet toward economic neoliberalism. And the Chilean authorities agreed to become an experimental platform for their practices.
The shock therapy plan was supported by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. The first phase was the reduction of the money supply and government spending. This measure brought inflation down to a reasonable level, but drove the unemployment rate from 9% to 18%.
The Chicago Boys have lifted almost all restrictions on foreign direct investment. In particular, they allowed one hundred percent export of profits from the country. This increased interest in the Chilean economy of international capital.
“Foreign private capital entered Chile in the 1980s, and a lot of new private mining companies sprang up,” says Yasinsky. “Now the private sector mines about 60 percent of Chile's copper.”
Another risky move by the architects of the Chilean reforms is that they lowered the customs tariff from 50% to 3%. The country was literally bombarded with imports, which dealt a colossal blow to local producers: hundreds of entrepreneurs instantly went bankrupt.
The costs of transitioning to a neoliberal economy have plunged Chileans into debt. The country's external debt reached $20.6 billion. More than half of export revenues were spent on servicing it. Hernán Bihi, Chile's 30-year-old finance minister and Columbia University graduate, stepped in to remedy the situation. He provided subsidies to the private sector, strengthened state control in the economy. However, the general course towards liberalization was not cancelled.
Today, in the Index of Economic Freedoms, which is published by The Heritage Foundation in conjunction with The Wall Street Journal, Chile is in seventh place. Ukraine - 162nd.
“The Chilean economic system is the main center of logistics and financial operations of large international corporations in the region,” Yasinsky explains. “Practically everything is in private hands.” Today, Chile is the only country in its region where there is no deterioration in social conditions of life, and it is also the least corrupt state of all in Latin America. Chile's GDP per capita is No. 1 on the continent.
When Pinochet died in December 2006, about 60,000 people came to say goodbye to the general. Some of them were crying. But still, most of the country did not forgive Pinochet for the atrocities that he committed at the beginning of his reign. “An economically efficient model has been created,” Yasinsky sums up. “But at the cost of destroying the historical memory of the people, at the cost of destroying the entire social sphere, culture and the middle class.”
September 11, 1973 in Chile, the supporters of Augusto Pinochet overthrew the legitimate president of the country, Salvador Allende.Poet Viktor Khara killed by Pinochet putschists
Forty-three years ago, on September 11, 1973, there was a military coup in Chile. With the support of the United States, which was not denied by official Washington. The government of the center-left coalition "People's Unity" was overthrown by force.
The President of the country, Salvador Allende, a socialist, romantic and intellectual, refused to surrender to the putschists and did not let go of his machine gun until the last bullet, defending the country, the Constitution, and democracy. Regarding his death, there are different versions: killed, committed suicide. But Allende showed the whole world that in Latin America there are not only presidents - drug dealers, corrupt officials and American puppets. There are presidents who sacrifice their lives for their country and their people.
General Augusto Pinochet, who came to power on the bayonets of the military and on American dollars, established a repressive regime in the country, which went down in history as the “Chilean terror”. More than 3,000 people became victims of repression, torture, and massacres at stadiums. More than 40 thousand (out of 10 million people of the then population of the country, that is, for today's Russia this number would be 1 million) went through arrests and torture. Including the current president of the country, Michelle Bachelet.
Rebels, supporters of Allende after the coup
Until now, the events of September 1973 and the Pinochet dictatorship that followed them, which lasted until 1990, are not a distant story for Chileans. Dictatorship, the struggle against it and the consequences of this tragedy are woven into the life of society. Heroes and anti-heroes live side by side. They are even a tourist attraction. In the center of Santiago there is a "glamorous restaurant" where guides like to take guests of the Chilean capital. And it's not just that a delicacy is served there - the dietary meat of a giant snail that lives only in the northern Pacific waters. In the evenings, elderly men gather in this restaurant for a glass of fine Chilean wines - this is a favorite meeting place for associates of the dictator Pinochet. What are they talking about?
Given that a few years ago, President Michelle Bachelet launched an active campaign to bring to justice those responsible for the bloody crimes of the Pinochet regime, it is possible that these elders are discussing their own security concerns. Only in 2016 (in 2016!) the Chilean Supreme Court sentenced the state of Chile to pay damages to the families of four people who went missing during the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. The total amount of compensation is about $1.3 million, La Jornada reported, citing the country's judicial authorities. Chile's Supreme Court made this decision after it found that disappearances and violent deaths at the hands of dictatorships are "crimes against humanity, and therefore do not have a statute of limitations and are not subject to amnesty."
And only in 2015, Michelle Bachelet launched a campaign under the motto "Stop being silent!", During which the killers of the cult singer Victor Jara were brought to justice.
We remind those who were born much later than the Chilean events. Victor Jara - poet, theater director, singer, member of the Communist Party of Chile - was killed by putschists during a military coup in 1973. The brutal murder was committed at a stadium in Santiago, turned into a concentration camp, a few days after the military junta came to power. For four days he was beaten, tortured with electric current, and his arms were broken. Then Viktor Khara's hands were cut off. 34 bullets were fired into his body. The dead singer was hung next to his guitar.
Almost forty years after the murder and 35 years after the fall of the dictatorship, at the direction of Michelle Bachelet, an investigation began into the true circumstances of the death of the Chilean writer and poet, diplomat, member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Chile Pablo Neruda. Before that, the official cause of death was cancer. Now the experts are questioning the nature
However, it is possible that Pinochet's associates do not think about their own safety at all and continue to lead a calm, measured life. Close to your victims. After all, most of those involved in the bloody "Chilean terror" still feel quite comfortable.
Wall with photographs of the victims of the Pinochet regime at the Museum of Remembrance and Human Rights in Chile
“War criminals – associates of Augusto Pinochet – never pleaded guilty. Of the 1200 convicted of crimes during the dictatorship, 90 people spend time in "five-star prisons",enjoy the comfort created especially for them. As was the case with the recently deceased head of the DINA secret police from 1973 to 1977, Manuel Contreras,” said the well-known Chilean publicist Pablo Villagra, commenting on la Radio del Sur. And the reason is not only in the inaction of the authorities.
Chilean society is still split in half on the basis of attitudes towards the personality of Pinochet and what happened during the dictatorship. Pinochet is credited with the “Chilean economic miracle”, which helped bring the country out of the crisis.
(note about the mythology of the miracle
see Steve Kangas - On the Chilean "economic miracle" (polemical notes) http://www.tiwy.com/sociedad/2000/economicheskoe_chudo/
and "Chilean economic monster" http://www.kommersant.ru/doc/731005)
Note, however, that the main creator of the miracle was not Pinochet's economists, but generous investments from the United States and other European countries. The coming of the socialists to power in Chile, together with the socialist Cuba, could seriously change the processes in the region, strengthen the role of the USSR, and official Washington could not allow such a development of the scenario.
In September 1973, the media reported that the sailors of Soviet ships who were in Chile during the days of the coup were subjected to severe beatings. Hatred of socialism and the USSR poured out on innocent people. And not just for Chileans. And to strengthen the position of Pinochet, dollars flowed into the country like a river. Housing construction began, the strengthening of agriculture, the opening of folk restaurants.
The bloody "skill" of the German Nazis, who found shelter after the war in Chile, was in demand in the torture chambers of the Chilean dictatorship. Let us also recall the role of the infamous Colony Dignidad, created by Nazi criminals who fled Germany and during the years of Pinochet's rule turned into a concentration camp, where children were not only tortured, killed, but also raped. And both sexes. History repeated itself, but on a different continent.
In the best Soviet play devoted to the events of the dictatorship in Chile, created by Genrikh Borovik, "Interview in Buenos Aires" says a lot: about the responsibility of journalists - those who opposed "People's Unity", and then themselves became victims of the dictatorship.
The phrase "Carlos Blanco is silent" became a household word after the premiere of "Interview in Buenos Aires", because the silence of a journalist can also become evidence of refusal to participate in evil, a kind of resistance. The play also says a lot about the psychology of the shopkeeper, the basis of any fascist regime.
It has not been outlived in Chile. And not only there. And that the desire for freedom and justice, which becomes a reality only in the struggle, is an integral feature of the best representatives of Latin American societies.
The story of the "Chilean terror" will not end for Chile until the last executioner who tortured the stadiums, who participated in the "Death Caravan", is punished. Even in absentia, if he has already managed to leave peacefully from life. So far, every year on Pinochet's birthday, some deputies and politicians of the country, and there are not so few of them, will hold ceremonies in memory of the bloody dictator and minutes of silence in his honor in the parliament building of Chile. Only a united people can defeat this evil. For "El pueblo unido jamás será vencido!
Monument to Salvador Allende in Santiago, Chile
On the morning of September 11, 1973, at 6:20 a.m., Chilean President Salvador Allende received a message about a mutiny in the fleet in Valparaiso. The ships of the Chilean Navy at that time were joint with the US Navy maneuvers "Unitas". Several hundred sailors and officers - supporters of Popular Unity, who refused to support the rebellion, were shot, and their corpses were thrown into the sea. In the morning, the rebels shelled the port and city of Valparaiso, landed troops and captured the city. At 6:30 am, the rebels launched an operation to capture the Chilean capital. They captured a number of important objects. Radio stations "Agrikultura", "Mineriya" and "Balmacedo", owned by right-wing figures, informed the country about the coup and the creation of a military junta. The provisional government included Augusto Pinochet - head of the ground forces, Jose Merino - commander of the Navy, Gustavo Lee - commander of the Air Force and Cesar Mendoza - commander of the Carabinieri Corps.
The Chilean Air Force bombed the Portales and Corporación radio stations, which supported Popular Unity and the legitimate president. Interestingly, the planes of the Chilean Air Force destroyed two television towers that were in the capital of Chile. This strike is reminiscent of the events of September 11, 2001 (the organizers are the same). At 9:10 a.m., the last address of the President followed, it was broadcast by the Magallanes radio station. Then the Air Force attacked her and she was captured by the rebels. Several dozen radio employees were killed. Then the shelling and storming of the presidential palace began, which was defended by about 40 people. After 8 hours, Allende was dead. While in the burning presidential palace, Allende released those who could not fight, while he himself led the defense. He knocked out a rebel tank from a grenade launcher and fell with a Kalashnikov in his hands.
So, in Chile there was a military coup, as a result of which the military junta, headed by the head of the military department, General Augusto Pinochet, overthrew the country's president, Salvador Allende, and the Popular Unity government. The coup was prepared and carried out under the direct supervision of the US CIA.
Salvador Allende refused to leave the presidential palace during the coup and resisted to the end with his arms in hand.
What caused the revolution
On November 3, 1970, Salvador Allende Gossens became president of Chile. He was formerly general secretary of the Socialist Party of Chile and created the People's Socialist Party. Then he returned to the Socialist Party again, created an alliance with the communists - the People's Action Front. He ran for president in 1952, 1958 and 1964. In 1969, the People's Action Front was transformed into Popular Unity. The coalition included socialists, communists, members of the Radical Party and part of the Christian Democrats. In the 1970 elections, Allende came out ahead by a narrow margin, overtaking the candidate of the National Party.
Allende's economic program provided for the nationalization of the largest private companies and banks. Agrarian reform led to the expropriation of private estates. During the first two years of the Allende government, approximately 500,000 hectares of land (about 3,500 estates) were expropriated, which accounted for about one-fourth of all cultivated land in the country. Including land expropriated under the previous government, the reorganized agricultural sector accounted for about 40% of all agricultural land in the state. Naturally, such a policy met with resistance and sabotage from the latifundists (large landowners). A massive slaughter of cattle began, from the estates on the Chilean-Argentine border, cattle were driven to Argentina. This led to the deterioration of the economic situation of the country.
Tension arose in relations with Washington, which protected the interests of American firms. The United States organized a boycott of Chilean copper, and copper exports provided the country with the main foreign exchange earnings. Chilean accounts were frozen. No loans were given. Many Chilean entrepreneurs began to transfer capital abroad, curtail business, and cut jobs. An artificial food shortage was created in the country.
In 1972-1973. External and internal opponents of Allende organized mass demonstrations and strikes. The main initiator of the strike was the Confederation of Truck Owners. A state of emergency was introduced in the country, the president instructed to confiscate non-working trucks. In November 1972, a new government was created, where the military occupied the most important posts. The former army commander, General Carlos Prats, headed the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Rear Admiral Ismael Huerta - the Ministry of Public Works, Brigadier General of Aviation Claudio Sepulveda - the Ministry of Mining. The country was divided into two hostile camps, opponents and supporters of reforms.
It must be said that, in general, Allenda's reforms were aimed at improving the welfare of the main part of the population. The interest rate of agricultural credit was reduced, tens of thousands of new jobs were created, the unemployment rate was reduced, the wages of low-paid categories of workers increased, the living wage, the minimum wage and pensions increased, and the purchasing power of the population grew. The government has developed a system of numerous allowances and benefits, democratized medical care and schools. Naturally, the big proprietors, the latifundists, the comprador bourgeoisie fell under the blow. And they did not want to give up their positions. Fortunately, they had a powerful ally - the United States.
Salvador Allende Gossens - a man who wanted to free Chile from imperialist dependence and corporate robbery.
The goals of the US and transnational structures
Washington did not want a second "continental Cuba" to appear in Latin America. Allende carried out the nationalization of large-scale enterprises, and began agrarian reform in the interests of the people. Thus, the geopolitical interests of the United States - the desire to keep Chile in the orbit of its influence - coincided with the interests of American corporations. Inside Chile, the Americans had strong support in the form of large property owners.
Tactically, it was required to remove the legitimately elected socialist president Salvador Allende, to crush the socialist, leftist movement in Chile. And it had to be done as harshly as possible, indicatively. Return Chile under the control of TNK, TNB. Return nationalized enterprises to their former owners, including American corporations. It was necessary to stop the transformations of a socialist nature.
Strategically, the successful example of Chile's socialist course was dangerous for US power and transnational corporations and banks in Latin America. Cuba has already been lost. In many countries of South America, strong armed revolutionary groups arose, which took a course towards the liberation of their countries from neo-colonial dependence and robbery by TNK and TNB, towards a socialist revolution following the example of Russia and Cuba. The United States and transnational structures are faced with the threat of losing a significant part or all of Latin America. The threat would have grown especially if the Stalinist course was maintained in the USSR. With the support of the USSR, the countries of Latin America could free themselves from dependence. Unfortunately, the seeds of treason were already germinating in the USSR. Moscow did not use a powerful tool in the form of the KGB to provide effective assistance to Allende.
Allende's victory and his reforms in Chile opened a direct path to the possibility of proclaiming a socialist course and the emergence of a second foothold of socialism in Latin America. It is clear that such a possibility had to be stopped at any cost, burned out with a red-hot iron.
How coups are made
The most complete description of the 1973 coup is contained in a separate report by the US Senate commission on operations in Chile. According to it, 13 million US dollars were spent on organizing the coup. The Americans acted simultaneously in several key areas. The money went to support political parties that were opposed to left-wing movements. First of all, they supported the Christian Democrats. They financed the opposition press, mainly the giant newspaper El Mercurio. The Americans fueled the strike movement. In particular, the movement of truck owners in 1972-1973 paralyzed the Chilean economy (up to 80% of the country's cargo was transported on trucks). Financial assistance was provided to the right-wing terrorist organization Patria and Lebertad. The Chilean government was put under pressure by delaying loans, both at the private and public levels. Weapons were supplied to terrorist groups. In 1970, money was allocated against Allende's election campaign. During the 1970 elections, Americans spent about $0.5 million.
On September 7, 1973, the American ambassador to Chile, Nathaniel Davis, urgently flew to Washington. He held a confidential meeting with Henry Kissinger and returned to Santiago on September 9th. The Chilean ambassador to Mexico, Hugo Vigorena, said that a few days after the coup, he saw documents that a former CIA agent showed him, which outlined a plan to overthrow Allende ("Plan Centauri").
It should be noted that Allende practically deprived himself of the main support. In August 1973, the military, led by Pinochet, organized a provocation against General Prats, who remained loyal to the Popular Unity government. Prats resigned. The President appointed General Pinochet to take his place. On August 23, Carlos Prats noted in his diary: “My career is over. Without exaggerating my role, I believe that my resignation is a prelude to a coup d'etat and the greatest betrayal ... Now it only remains to set the day for the coup ... ". The events of the coup, when the CIA used an interesting psychological technique (the method of unstructured control), speak about the possibilities of Prats. A rumor spread in Santiago that a brigade under the command of Prats (he was under house arrest at that time) was approaching the capital from the north to help the president, and detachments of volunteers were joining it. As a result, Allende's active supporters in Santiago believed the much desired information and began to wait for the arrival of "reinforcements". The organizers of the coup managed to avoid a large-scale confrontation with Allende's supporters in the capital and win, although there were well-trained and well-organized groups of supporters of the legitimate president in Chile and neighboring countries.
Why was Allende so careless? Many researchers believe that Salvador Allende underestimated the danger of a coup, since he himself belonged to the Chilean aristocracy and was a Freemason (he himself admitted this). According to Masonic ethics, one should not touch one's own. Pinochet was also a Freemason, and he should not have gone against his “brother”. However, Allende clearly miscalculated. Masons do not occupy the highest positions in the Western hierarchy. Allende's actions harmed the United States, transnational corporations, so he was sentenced. Peaceful attempts - through elections, strikes, did not lead to the fall of Allende, so they went to extreme measures. Moreover, the People's Unity was suppressed with maximum and demonstrative cruelty, so that others would be repulsed.
Patria y Libertad. On July 30, 1971, US President Richard Nixon replaced the ambassador to Chile, Ed Corry, with Mr. Davis, who was known as an expert on "communist affairs." Davis in 1956 -1960 Headed the USSR Department at the US State Department. He was envoy to Bulgaria and ambassador to Guatemala. In Guatemala, he was noted as the "father" of the "Black Hand" - a paramilitary organization that organized and carried out terrorist attacks against representatives of the left movement. In addition, Mr. Davis was believed to be the organizer of an auxiliary spy organization, the Peace Corps, which had hundreds of informers by the start of the coup in Chile. The activities of the Corps were so outspoken that already in 1969, deputy Luis Figueroa, chairman of the United Workers' Union of Chile, accused him of espionage.
On September 10, 1970, following the example of the Black Hand, the CIA created the Patria i Libertad (Motherland and Freedom) movement in Chile. Its formal leader was Pablo Rodriguez. The Motherland and Freedom movement was supposed to organize Allenda's opponents. Battle groups were created, where fighters were trained, teaching them the skills of shooting and hand-to-hand combat. The head of the combat organization was Roberto Temye. In addition, training camps were set up outside of Chile. In particular, such a camp was organized in the town of Vyacha, thirty kilometers from La Paz. Its leader was a former major in the Chilean army, Arturo Marshall. The number of militants reached 400 people. Ivan Feldes stood out among the leaders of Motherland and Freedom. He was in charge of communications. He brought equipment to Chile that made it possible to intercept the encryption of the intelligence services of all three branches of the armed forces and, if necessary, paralyze the entire internal communications network in the country. The movement was financed by the President of the Industrial Development Association, Orlando Sáez, and a large landowner, Benjamin Matte, who represented the National Association of Agriculture. The Svoboda militants acted in close cooperation with criminal elements.
"Patria and Libertad" organized street riots, attacks on state institutions, educational institutions, the premises of the socialist party, on the leaders of the communist and socialist parties, journalists expressing the interests of Popular Unity. The organization was openly terrorist. On June 17, 1973, the premises of the Communist Party in Nunoa were fired from a machine gun, and the premises of the Socialist Party in Barrancas were attacked. On June 20, a bomb was detonated on national television in Santiago. On June 26, public buildings in Santiago were shelled. Similar incidents occurred almost every day: shelling, explosions, attacks, beatings, arson, etc. The bandits blew up bridges, railways, electrical substations and other important objects. Industrial refrigerators stopped working due to a power outage, and by August the country had lost half of its harvested vegetables and fruits. Due to sabotage on communications, the supply of food to the provinces was disrupted. They beat and killed truck drivers who brought food to the working areas. The situation in the country was being prepared for the "X" hour.
On June 29, the Svoboda militants held a real rehearsal of the future coup. In the morning in Santiago, several tanks, armored vehicles and trucks with soldiers drove out of the location of the 2nd Armored Regiment into the street. Having left for Bulnes Square, one of the tanks fired at the presidential palace, other vehicles moved towards the Ministry of Defense. The Sherman tank approached the facade of the building, climbed the flights of stairs, knocked out the door with a blow from the hull and fired at the lobby. This rebellion was crushed by evening. The military prosecutor's office conducted an investigation and found out that Motherland and Freedom was behind the rebellion.
Pinochet was a front. All organizational work was carried out by professionals from the CIA. All the threads went to the National Security Council, which was led by Henry Kissinger. Dean Roish Hunton was in charge of organizing the economic sabotage and strangulation of Chile. In 1971, he received the position of Vice-Chairman of the Council on International Economic Policy. Hunton in Guatemala, together with Nathaniel Davis, organized a "counter-revolution". The second envoy from the American embassy in Chile was Harry W. Schlaudeman. Prior to that, he worked in Bogota, Bulgaria, Dominican Republic. Also involved in organizing the coup were: Daniel Arzak, James E. Anderson, Delon B. Tipton, Raymond Alfred Warren, Arnold M. Isaacs, Frederick W. Latrash, Joseph F. McManus, Keith Willock (he was the organizer of Operations Patria and Libertad ”), Donald Winters et al.
The neoliberal myth of Pinochet
During the years of domination of liberal ideology in Russia, the myth of the beneficent rule of Pinochet, of the “economic miracle” in Chile, was launched. Pinochet, having seized power, began to pursue a liberal policy in the spirit of Yegor Gaidar's "shock therapy" in the early 1990s in Russia. Such a policy did not lead to an "economic miracle". The economy has not even returned to the level of development achieved under Allende. A tenth of the population left the country. Basically, these were qualified specialists, since ordinary peasants did not have the financial opportunity to leave.
Chile was the first country in the world to implement the ideas of 1976 Nobel laureate Milton Friedman. Pinochet's advisers were the so-called. "Chicago boys" - followers of Friedman's views. Chile was offered a stabilization program based on a monetarist approach (it was the basis of all IMF programs). Monetarists see the root of all troubles in an excess of money supply in circulation, from the state policy of "cheap money" and immoderate emission, which leads to inflation. To "recovery" the economy, they propose to reduce the amount of money through a tight credit and budget policy. The budget deficit is reduced by reducing state programs, including social spending, investments, subsidies, etc. In Russia, figures (or pests?) of this kind dominate the economy and finance to this day. They see salvation in a sharp reduction in spending. While Roosevelt, Stalin and Hitler were making huge strides, investing big money in developing the country's infrastructure.
Monetarists propose to reduce consumer spending by lowering or freezing wages. In addition, this measure leads to a reduction in production costs. In the banking sector - the policy of "expensive money", an increase in interest rates. Devaluation of the national currency, reduction of the state issue of money. Limitation of state regulation of prices and foreign trade (export-oriented industries benefit from this).
In Chile, they reduced wages, reduced the number of people employed in the public sector. Subsidization of state-owned enterprises was canceled. Educational and health programs were cut off from state funding (just a dream of Russian "liberal fascists"!). The state budget deficit was covered mainly by IMF loans. Money emission was reduced almost to zero (in 1985, only 0.2% of GDP).
More than a third of the population was thrown into poverty. There has been a sharp deepening of social inequality and poverty. For example, the director of a paper and cardboard company received 4.5 million pesos a year, and a nurse - 30 thousand pesos (a ratio of 150:1, respectively). In economic terms, the country began to resemble a classical colony, a raw material appendage of the West. Due to external debts, there was practically a loss of national independence. For two decades, Chile was put into a debt hole: from 3 billion US dollars in 1973, the country's external debt increased to 17 billion dollars in 1982 and in 1993 rose to 21 billion dollars.
A “bomb” was laid under the national economy in the form of a sharp drop in government spending on infrastructure development (communication routes, power lines, schools, hospitals, etc.). From 1973 to 1982, infrastructure development rates fell by 22%. In particular, if in 1973 Chile was ahead of Latin America in electricity production by 50%, then in 20 years electricity generation increased by only 1%. The lack of investment in this area of the national economy is one of the characteristic features of all neoliberal “stabilization” programs (in reality, this is a stable degradation). This is a real delayed-action nuclear mine for the national economy. The example of Ukraine and the Russian Federation falling into the same trap is obvious. Both states went along with Western and home-grown neo-liberals, eating away the Soviet legacy and not developing infrastructure. Now hundreds of billions are needed for major repairs, complete replacement and modernization of the country's infrastructure.
The bombing of the presidential palace "La Moneda" during the military coup in Chile.
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On September 11, 1973, a military coup was carried out in Chile, as a result of which the government of "People's Unity" was overthrown.
Three years before this event, on September 4, 1970, presidential elections were held in Chile, in which the candidate of the left bloc "People's Unity" socialist Salvador Allende won.
The new leader set himself the task of making Chile a socialist country. For this, private banks, copper developments and some industrial enterprises were nationalized. Diplomatic relations were established with Cuba, China and other communist countries.
By September 1973, there were over 500 enterprises in the public sector and under state control, which accounted for about 50% of the gross industrial output; the state owned 85% of the railway network. 3.5 thousand land holdings with a total area of 5.4 million hectares were expropriated and distributed among landless and landless peasants. About 70% of foreign trade operations were under state control.
The civil opposition sharply criticized the administration for its intention to switch to a planned economy. A wave of terrorism and armed conflicts between left and right groups was growing in the country. A failed military coup attempt in June 1973 was followed by a series of strikes under anti-government slogans.
On September 11, 1973, the armed forces, led by Allende's newly appointed new commander-in-chief, Augusto Pinochet, staged a military coup.
The coup began in the early hours of September 11, when Chilean Navy ships participating in the United States Navy's Unides maneuver off the coast of Chile bombarded the port and city of Valparaiso. The landing troops captured the city, the headquarters of the parties included in the Popular Unity bloc, radio stations, a television center and a number of strategic facilities.
Radio stations broadcast the rebels' statement about a coup and the creation of a military junta, consisting of the commander of the land forces, General Augusto Pinochet, the commander of the Navy, Admiral José Merino, the commander of the Air Force, General Gustavo Li, and the acting director of the Carabinieri Corps, General Cesar Mendoza.
The rebels began shelling and storming the presidential palace "La Moneda", which was defended by about 40 people. The assault was carried out with the participation of tanks and aircraft. The rebels' offer of surrender in exchange for permission to leave Chile without hindrance was rejected by the defenders of La Moneda. The putschists seized the building of the presidential palace. Salvador Allende refused to step down as president and submit to the putschists. For a long time it was believed that he died in battle, but in 2011 a special forensic examination found out that the ex-president of Chile before the rebel soldiers broke into the presidential palace.
The 1973 coup brought a military junta to power. In accordance with the Decree of the Junta of December 17, 1974, General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte became President of the Republic. He exercised executive power, and the junta as a whole exercised legislative power.
All leftist political parties, trade unions were banned, and strikes were outlawed. In 1975, a law was passed allowing the closure of newspapers and radio stations whose messages could be regarded as "anti-patriotic". Elected local councils and local governments were abolished and replaced by officials appointed by the junta. Universities were purged and placed under the supervision of the military.
According to official figures, during the years of Pinochet's rule in Chile from 1973 to 1990, almost 1.2 thousand were missing, and about 28 thousand people were tortured.
In 1991, a year after the end of the dictatorship, in Chile, which collected information about the dead or missing during the military rule. She reported 3,197 dead and missing during the dictatorship.
Tens of thousands of Chileans went through prisons, about a million ended up in exile. One of the most famous and irrefutable examples of the cruelty of the putschists was the murder of the singer and composer, an adherent of the communist views, Viktor Jara in 1973. As the investigation established, Haru spent four days at the Chile stadium (since 2003 the stadium has been named after Victor Hara), firing 34 bullets at him.
Chile Stadium and the National Stadium in Sanyago were turned into concentration camps. All murders committed during the 1973 military coup were granted an amnesty by Pinochet in 1979.
Augusto Pinochet ruled the country until 1990, after which he handed over power to the elected civilian president, Patricio Aylvin, remaining as commander of the army. On March 11, 1998, he resigned as a senator for life. After repeated attempts to bring Pinochet to trial, in 2006 he was found guilty of two murders. On December 10, 2006, at the age of 91, the former dictator died at the Santiago Military Hospital. His death was marked by numerous demonstrations - both of his opponents and supporters.
In December 2012, the Chilean Court of Appeal ordered the arrest of seven retired military personnel involved in the assassination of singer Victor Jara during the 1973 military coup. Previously, retired army lieutenant colonel Mario Manriquez, who led the concentration camp at the Chile stadium in Santiago, was found responsible for the brutal crime.
The material was prepared on the basis of information from RIA Novosti and open sources
