Most people that were born after the mid 70's or that live in what used to be called the "Developed World" or the "First World" have no idea whatsoever of the events that took place in Chile on 4 November 1970. However, some of these people may have a faint recollection about what happened on 11 September 1973 also in Chile. That day there was a coup d'etat (or "golpe de estado" in Spanish) and General Pinochet took control of the country, and the rest is history or so they say.
Well, no.
Very few people, if any, fully realize the importance of the brief Allende government in shaping the current world as we know it today.
Let's begin by stating a few facts:
Fact: Allende achieved power through a fully legal election
Fact: Allende achieved 36.3% of all votes
Fact: The USSR's KGB supported Allende's presidential campaign with illicit funding at minimum.
Fact: As soon as Allende took power, the US initiated overt and covert actions (CIA designed) at multiple levels (economic, political and military) at both the legal as well as illegal levels with the goal of removing Allende from power.
Fact: Allende's overt agenda publicly declared the goal of achieving socialism (albeit in actuality it was communism). Allende never lied in this respect.
Fact: Allende did help a large number of poor people with land, shelter, food, employment, increased consumption, higher salaries, reduced taxes and state insurance.
Fact: Allende did nationalize all Chilean monopolies and many other medium to small size Chilean companies.
Fact: Allende's government achieved a 12% industrial growth, an 8.6% of GDP increase and a decrease in chronic inflation.
Fact: Allende's government achieved a Real GDP contraction (i.e. negative real growth) of -5.6% per year.
Fact: Allende was a cherished president mostly by Chilean workers because of all the social benefits that he provided.
Fact: Allende was deeply hated by a sizeable percentage of the Chilean population (albeit a much smaller percentage than the workers) in most part due to purely ideological reasons.
Fact: Allende never allowed socialist/communist parties to obtain weapons even when faced with an almost certainty of an impending coup d'etat. If he would have allowed this, Chile would have plunged into a bloody civil war.
In summary, Allende's government was the only communist government that came to power through elections and that set-up and placed in motion a conversion process into communism through public and peaceful means.
This is a first and unique event in the political history of the world.
Here we had a communist president that came into power because he was elected by the constituents, that implemented a communist regime, that had a Parliament opposing him and even plotting against him (yet he never took action against them) and ultimately he died in the assault to the presidential palace (the "Palacio de la Moneda"), presumably by suicide. Here we have a convinced communist who was willing to die for his beliefs but was unwilling to use force to achieve them.
Why is this so important?
It is important because this government was cut short by the US and its remote puppet General Pinochet.
In so doing the US may have obtained a few short term points in its fight against communism, but also in so doing the US pretty much guaranteed the dominance of socialism in the future.
This future is today.
Pinochet was the poster boy of communism. He had everything in his favour, particularly the support of a vast number of workers. He also refused to act against the Chilean constitution even when the very Chilean Parliament acted seditiously and patently un-constitutionally throughout his entire presidency.
- He could have shut Parliament down. He did not.
- He could have armed the workers. He did not.
- He could have just imposed communism on everybody. He did not.
From a communist perspective, he was the absolutely best that happened to the USSR since… well… ever!
He was an absolute propaganda coup for communism. Yet…
There is always a yet.
Should Allende's government would have been allowed to continue in power it would have self-destructed through economic mismanagement. This destruction would have showed (in no uncertain terms) that communism simply does not work, even when developed through pacific means and in the best possible conditions.
Yet, thanks to US actions, Allende was deposed and transformed into a communist mythical hero which can now be heralded as a triumph of communism.
Instead of people having incontrovertible evidence that communism simply does not work, we have a mythological economic communist triumph which has enabled most countries throughout the world to embrace communism-light.
How bad is the situation?
Just visit our Special Projects section and review any socialist index. We guarantee you will be shocked. The fact is that the world is far, far more socialistic today that even the USSR used to be! And we owe all this to the US "triumph" over Allende.
Allende's government importance lies in the fact that this was a unique historical opportunity to settle once and for all whether socialism/communism actually works. It was wasted by the incredibly short-sighted politicians in US. Thanks for nothing.
And so the legacy of the Chilean coup d'etat is not the fact that communism was defeated in Chile, but the fact that communism was given carte blanch throughout the world as a consequence of Allende's military removal.
The direct consequence of the brutal termination of Allende's government is the fact that we live today in a heavily socialist world and most people don't even know it. This is a consequence for which many generations from now will pay with their diminished standards of living, if not with their lives. The consequence of the abrupt termination of Allende's government is that political evolution was delayed for many decades and with it people's suffering was concomitantly extended by the same amount of time.
Our current state of affairs and our political and economic future is the direct legacy of the Chilean coup d'etat that very sad 11 September 1973.
Believe it. Don't believe it. It happened. Your choice.
Note: please see the Glossary if you are unfamiliar with certain words.
