43 years ago — CIA aided the Chilean military in overthrowing the elected government of Salvador Allende
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6 SOCIALIST ACTION SEPTEMBER 2016 ments, but when necessary, the U.S. would install pro-capitalist dictatorships or authoritarian regimes. The U.S. would invade if needed or if convenient (as it did in the Dominican Republic, Grenada, and Panama) or it would use covert operations, as it did in Guatemala in 1954. The U.S. turned to the national armies of the various client states, whose officers had been trained in the U.S. or at the School of the Americas (originally located in Panama) as an additional tool of control.
Even before the 1970 election, the U.S. used covert operations to prevent a Unidad Popular victory. With the victory of Allende, the U.S. launched a program to prevent his inauguration, and later, it used the CIA to destroy the economy and to create the conditions for a coup. But the economic damage caused by the U.S. was still not enough to alter the congressional elec tions of 1972. Unidad Popular increased its number of seats by eight, strengthening its position in congress, but it fell short of an absolute majority.
Immediately afterwards, Nixon convened and at tended a meeting of the National Security Council, chaired by Henry Kissinger, and adopted National Se curity Decision Memorandum 93, a plan for additional covert operations and economic warfare, along with a push for a military coup. The plan eventually includ ed the blueprints and development of a secret police force and a plan to restructure the Chilean economy along neoliberal lines.
The coup The coup was preceded by a series of crises, includ ing a CIA-supported bosses’ strike in October 1972. This strike included small business owners, truckers, and medical doctors and increasing opposition from within the military. The truckers’ strike created wide spread food shortages and hardships. At the same time, CIA-supported right-wing paramilitary groups, carried out extensive economic sabotage. Finally, op position within the Chilean military increased. Allen de tried to control this opposition by bringing military officers into his cabinet.
The planning for the coup accelerated in 1972 after NSDM 93. Pinochet was not directly involved but also did nothing to prevent or forestall the coup. Ironically, given that he later emerged as the Jefe Supremo (Su preme Ruler), Pinochet was not “our man in Chile.” That distinction went to the commander of the Chil ean air force, General Gustavo Leigh, and the com mander of the navy, Admiral Jose Toribio Mereno.