Coup in Chile
Researchers Uncover More on U.S. Coup to Depose Salvador Allende
President Allende's 1970 inaugural speech.
Researchers at the National Security Archive (a
project housed at Georgetown University that
declassifies U.S. government documents) have
uncovered documentation of U.S. plans to overthrow
the democratically elected socialist government of
Salvador Allende (1970-1973) in Chile, carried out
under the administration of President Richard
Nixon. The documents were released November 3, on
the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Allende's
inauguration. These documents had been suppressed
by the administration of President Gerald Ford.
One set of materials documents the conversation
between Nixon and some of his officials, to assess
the U.S. government's course of action following
Allende's victory in the election of September 4,
1970, in the middle of the Cold War. In one of the
memoranda, dated November 5, 1970, then-National
Security Advisor Henry Kissinger alerted Nixon to
the "most historic and difficult decision in
foreign affairs" that the White House would have
to make, taking into account the adverse effects
that the Allende presidency could have, both in
the relationship between Chile and the U.S., as
well as its possible influence in the hemisphere.
Another of the declassified documents shows
clearly that there were divergent positions among
U.S. officials on how to carry out the plan. While
Secretary of State William Rogers proposed to
promote the fall of Allende in a manner that would
not be "counterproductive" to the public
perception of the U.S., which open hostility and
aggression towards Chile might be, Secretary of
Defence Melvin Laird stated bluntly: "We have to
do everything possible to hurt [Allende] and
overthrow him." In this clash of ideas about
foreign policy, Kissinger fought for the most
aggressive position.
"The U.S. will seek to maximize the pressure on
the Allende government to prevent its
consolidation and limit its ability to implement
policies contrary to the interests of the U.S. and
the hemisphere," reads another of the documents.
Among the policies that would be carried out was
the redoubling of interventionist efforts in the
region by coordinating with other governments,
including those of Brazil and Argentina.
U.S. officials were directed to put pressure on
Allende's government by blocking loans from
multilateral banks to Chile and terminating U.S.
export credits and loans, calling on U.S.
corporations to leave the country, and by
manipulating the international market value of
copper, Chile's main export, "to further damage
the Chilean economy," according to the documents.
Additionally, the CIA was authorized to prepare
related action plans for future implementation.
According to the National Security Archive, at
one point Kissinger managed to postpone a meeting
between Nixon and the National Security Council so
he could talk to the President first. Kissinger
wanted to convince him that the risks went beyond
the bilateral relationship between the two
countries and brief him about how he should push
the foreign policy bureaucracy toward a regime
change posture.
In a memo, former Chief of Staff Harry Robbins
Haldeman described Kissinger's position and his
arguments for postponing the meeting: "For Henry,
Chile could end up being the worst failure of our
administration: 'our Cuba' in 1972," he said.
Later, in a conversation with Kissinger, Nixon
said: "If [Allende] can show that he can establish
an anti-American Marxist policy, others will do
the same." Kissinger went even further: "It will
have an effect even in Europe. Not only in Latin
America."[1]
Chile's economy would soon fall, with
multilateral banks blocked, without access to
international credit and with the monopoly media
also deployed against it. Financial problems, in
addition to the drop in economic activity, created
the environment that would pave the way for the
coup d'etat. Three years after those talks in
Washington, under the leadership of the then
commander-in-chief of the Chilean Army, Augusto
Pinochet, on September 11, 1973, the Armed Forces
would assassinate President Salvador Allende,
putting an end, in a violent manner, to the
socialist Government of Popular Unity.
Kissinger and other officials involved in
planning and executing the coup later justified
their actions saying they were for the
"preservation of democracy." This same Cold
War-era rationale is still given today by the U.S.
imperialists and their allies, to justify their
warmongering and brutal crimes, aimed at asserting
domination over the peoples of the world who are
striving for national liberation, sovereignty, and
peaceful and just international relations.
September 11, 2013. March in Santiago Chile on the
40th anniversary of the coup against the Allende
government which brought Augusto Pinochet to power
demands justice for victims of his brutal rule.
Note
1. To see
the full documentation provided by the National
Security Archive, click here.
This article was published in
Volume 50 Number 45 - November 21, 2020
Article Link:
Coup in Chile: Researchers Uncover More on U.S. Coup to Depose Salvador Allende
Website: www.cpcml.ca
Email: editor@cpcml.ca
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