I know there were others before, but....
"Chile marks 40th anniversary of coup" by LUIS ANDRES HENAO | Associated Press, September 12, 2013
SANTIAGO, Chile — President Sebastian Pinera marked the 40th anniversary of the military coup that overthrew Salvador Allende saying Wednesday that Chileans must heal from — but never forget — the events of Sept. 11, 1973, that launched a 17-year dictatorship.
That day, fighter jets surrounded the La Moneda presidential palace, and tanks and soldiers surrounded the building as it burst into flames. Allende, then the democratically elected president, committed suicide rather than surrender to the coup plotters led by General Augusto Pinochet.
That's disputed.
See: The Assassination of Allende
‘‘After 40 years, the time has come not to forget but rather to overcome the traumas of the past,’’ Pinera said.
A minute of silence in Allende’s memory was held later Wednesday at a statue of the late leader outside the presidential palace.
The government estimates 3,095 were killed during Pinochet’s rule, including about 1,200 who were forcibly disappeared.
Pinochet died in 2006 under house arrest.
The anniversary of the coup is often marked by violence.
Is it, or is that just a dig at the anti-agenda Chileans?
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That was September 11 long before there was a September 11, and there is no doubt of AmeriKan involvement.
"40 years after coup, Salvador Allende’s dream pursued; Chile seems ready to return Socialist Bachelet to office" by Luis Andres Henao | Associated Press, September 10, 2013
SANTIAGO, Chile — As bombs fell and rebelling troops closed in on the national palace, socialist president Salvador Allende avoided surrender by shooting himself with an assault rifle, ending Chile’s experiment in nonviolent revolution and beginning 17 years of dictatorship.
That is difficult to do.
But as the nation marks Wednesday’s 40th anniversary of the coup led by General Augusto Pinochet, Allende’s legacy is thriving.
Gandhi would be smiling.
A socialist is poised to reclaim the presidency, and a new generation, born after the return to democracy in 1990, has taken to the streets in vast numbers to demand the sort of social goals Allende promoted.
Related:
"UNREST IN CHILE -- Riot policemen were set of fire by a Molotov cocktail during a protest on Sunday in Santiago, Chile, marking the 1973 military coup that ushered in a 17-year-dictatorship under General Augusto Pinochet. The coup was on Sept. 11 (Boston Globe September 9 2013)."
Just a snapshot in time, if you get my meaning.
‘‘Forty years after, he is mentioned more than ever by the young people who flood the streets asking for free, quality education,’’ said his daughter, Senator Isabel Allende.
‘‘Allende’s profile keeps on growing while Pinochet is discredited.’’
Chileans have focused their anger on the costly university system installed under Pinochet, and on the vast gap between rich and poor that resulted from his free-market economic policies....
That's odd because I've been told Chileans love corporate capitalism.
Salvador Allende became the first elected Marxist leader in the Americas when he took office in 1970, though he won just 36 percent of the vote and faced a hostile Congress.
He embarked on what he called ‘‘the Chilean path to socialism,’’ nationalizing the copper industry that had been dominated by US companies and using the money to fund land redistribution while improving health care, education, and literacy.
And that got some people on the U.S pi$$ed off.
The embrace of socialism, which included a three-week visit by Cuban leader Fidel Castro, was a Cold War nightmare for Richard Nixon, who as president approved a covert campaign to aggravate the country’s economic chaos and helped provoke the military takeover.
The Sept. 11 coup initially was supported by many Chileans fed up with inflation that topped 500 percent, chronic shortages, and factory takeovers.
Yeah, the many U.S tools and assets supported it because of U.S actions.
But it destroyed what they had proudly described as South America’s strongest democracy.
Which is what Chileans wanted.
Pinochet shut down Congress, outlawed political parties, and sent security forces to round up and kill suspected dissidents.
The list of people killed, tortured, or imprisoned for political reasons during Pinochet’s regime totaled 40,018....
That is a lot more than I was led to believe, or what government admits.
See: Chile's Catholic House of Horrors
Why am I not surprised they would help?
Pinochet cut short Allende’s reforms. Chile’s schools largely had been free before Pinochet encouraged privatization and cut funding.
I gue$$ Chileans were $ick of that $tuff.
He privatized pension and water systems, returned land to old owners, trimmed wages, slashed trade barriers, and encouraged exports, building a free-market model credited for Chile’s fast growth and institutional stability.
Related: Chileans Cheer Return of Pinochet
It truly is an agenda-pu$hing paper.
It is his most widely praised achievement. A string of mostly left-leaning governments that followed Pinochet have left the core of that system, and even his constitution intact.
Good Lord, PRAISE for Pinochet!
‘‘His human rights legacy remains a complex and divisive issue for Chileans,’’ noted Patricio Navia, a Chilean political scientist at New York University. ‘‘But the economic model implemented under the dictatorship has been legitimized by five consecutive democratic governments led by presidents who personally opposed the Pinochet dictatorship.’’
Has it? Then why are the kids in the street?
Now, however, many Chileans are starting to demand more: free education, better health care, and pensions.
Why? What could possibly be wrong with the mass-murdering dictator's Chicago School model?
‘‘This new generation is remembering that there are things that are far more important than the economy,’’ said Patricio Fernandez, editor of The Clinic, Chile’s most widely read weekly magazine. ‘‘It’s a return to the energy lived during Allende’s time.’’
Those kids are nut$!
Polls indicate that when Chileans vote for president on Nov. 17, they are overwhelmingly expected to bring back Michelle Bachelet, a Socialist Party member who left the presidency four years ago because Chilean law bans consecutive reelection. She promises to push for the most wide-ranging reforms in four decades.
Related: Slow Saturday Special: Hot Chile
Bachelet’s opponent, Evelyn Matthei, is a childhood friend whose father ran the military school where Bachelet’s own father, a general, was tortured to death for opposing the coup.
Hey, as long as she keeps that corporate model!
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Related: The Most Important Thing to Come Out of Chile
The truth about Condor.
