Andean Machu Picchu, Peru. Click for credits and larger picture

[Second and last part of Pedro's story]

As I said in the first part of this story I am impressed by Pedro’s personality, by his intelligence and extreme hardiness towards fatigue or any kind of climate. He has a lively and authoritative look. He’s pensive sometimes. Not the gloomy pensive, though. The optimistic pensive. He hums while he works.

Pedro directs a team of 10-15 workers, some of them appearing as impenetrable Inca masks to me.

There’s regret in him that the Peruvian ancient cultures were wiped out. “How could they treat the Inca civilization like that?” he laments. Even today – he says – there’s a lot of gold up there. The mountain peasants are poor but they’re surrounded by precious minerals.

“You dig the mountain and you see gold, you see copper. I have been working in the mines. Then foreigners arrived who took away everything. The people, who were poor before, are still poor today.”

His eyes lit up when he saw we speak English at home now and then. He’s therefore started to take English classes.

“We’d be a strong community in Italy had we harmony. There’s envy and jealousy instead towards those who have success.”

One interesting thing he told me about Chile. “After the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship the people have straightened up and now they respect the rules, while everybody in Peru is tricking everybody and there’s total anarchy. A folk sometimes needs some straightening up.”

Ψ

This final observation – let me digress – reported by an ex 1968 student like me who saw Augusto Pinochet as the devil incarnate … Things must be seen from many view angles, and generally speaking democracy isn’t a plant that adapts itself to any terrain, I believe.

Baltasar Garzón Real. A pesar de su nombre y su segundo apellido, nada tiene que ver con los magos de Oriente por más que le gustara serlo. Juez titular del Juzgado Central de Instrucción número 5 y protagonista de excepción en la sociedad española. Nadie duda de sus cualidades como juez (bueno, visto lo visto últimamente, sí se puede dudar), aunque de lo que todo el mundo puede tener la absoluta certeza es de su afán de protagonismo.

Su último numerito lo estamos presenciando estos días. Su decisión de traer a España a los dos piratas somalíes ha causado un revuelo que podía haberse evitado. Y no solo hablamos de simple ruido, sino que lo que se están jugando son las vidas de los marineros españoles secuestrados por los piratas. Y todo podría haberse evitado sin la presencia de este señor.

Sin embargo, una larga trayectoria de polémicos casos le avala. Desde que pidió el arresto de Augusto Pinochet su carrera, o mejor dicho sus espectáculos, han sido seguidos por muchos. No hay que negarle sus méritos en determinados campos, como la lucha contra el terrorismo, pero sin olvidar la poca lógica en varias de sus decisiones, como la causa contra los crímenes del franquismo por la que obligó a abrir 19 fosas comunes en todo el país.

Su carrera judicial tiene como acompañante a la política. Miembro del PSOE durante algunos años, incluso llegó a ser número 2 en las listas de Madrid, justo detrás de Felipe González. Asiduo jugador de los tradicionales partidos contra la droga, casado y con tres hijos e investido doctor Honoris Causa por más de 20 universidades de todo el mundo, la última de ellas hace un par de días en Jaén.

Juez, político, albañil en su juventud, portero de fútbol, cazador con ministros… Tal vez lo de Rey Mago que decía al principio no sea una utopía tan lejana.

The Allende Myth
Vladimir Dorta
07/21/2003

The failed and tragic attempt by Salvador Allende and the Popular Unity at creating socialism in Chile in 1970-1973 has become a myth for the world left, presented as the possibility of a peaceful and democratic transition to socialism that was destroyed only because the almighty CIA acted as master puppeteer of the Chilean reaction. The myth reinforces itself; while the Cold War context is never mentioned, neither is the fact that the CIA’s workings are well documented whereas the Cuban and Soviet interventions are still mostly unknown. The Allende myth may be good for keeping the socialist faith alive, but it evidently contradicts the historical facts.

While Augusto Pinochet’s brutal post-coup repression and terrorism cannot be justified, it is essential to explain what led him and the Chilean armed forces to the fateful coup d’état, outside of the fantasy that had him bursting onto the democratic Chilean political scene on September 11, 1973 with readymade CIA orders to stop a beautiful, pacific and liberating socialist dream. For I have no doubts that if the Chilean Marxist experiment had ended in civil war, as it appeared to most observers at the time, it would have been an even greater tragedy or, had it ended as the totalitarian society it pointed to, it would have lasted much longer and would have brought Chileans much more suffering than Pinochet’s ugly but temporary dictatorship.

There occurred many important episodes leading to the coup, but I have chosen those that most clearly present the myth in all its falseness. To support the post I have selected four diverse books, one by a right-wing author (Moss), another by a trio of Marxists (Roxborough) and two by recognized scholars (Sigmund and Alexander); all of them knew Chile well and had first-hand experience of the Allende period.

The Allende Myth

Had Salvador Allende had not been overthrown by Augusto Pinochet, things would of gotten worse in Chile. Allende is a darling of the left. Chile is better off since Pinochet ruled Chile.

In April Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez reached out to Barack Obama and gave him a gift. It wasn’t a billion barrels of crude or a letter of resignation, which were no doubt what Obama was hoping for, but rather a very normal and inoffensive-looking book (this was still far better than Evo Morales’ gift, which was another round of accusations that the US was trying to kill him. Sigh).

The book was Eduardo Galeano’s Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent, a tome of some existing fame which became an instant bestseller as it was passed from Chavez to Obama.

The title should give some indication as to what the book is about, but given that the gift was an untranslated Spanish-language edition, it’s safe to say Obama hasn’t spent much time pouring over its pages. To avoid the potentially awkward consequences that could ensue from the next meeting between Chavez and Obama (“how did you like your gift” “oh yeah, it was pretty, um, interesting” “so which bits did you like the best” “well definitely the um, the start was pretty, like, um, hey look, there’s Kevin Rudd!” “Who?”), I thought I’d provide some cheat notes to help Obama. He’s a busy man after all; he has a Peace Prize to earn…

Title: Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent

Author: Eduardo Galeano, a Uruguayan journalist and freelance political exile.

Published: 1971, and then again later.

Chapter Summaries

Introduction: 120 Million Children in the Eye of the Hurricane. Explains how Latin America is exploited.

Chapter 1: Lust for Gold, Lust for Silver. Explains how Latin America is exploited.

Chapter 2: King Sugar and other Agricultural Monarchs. Explains how Latin America is exploited.

Chapter 3: The Invisible Sources of Power. Explains how Latin America is exploited.

Chapter 4: Tales of Premature Death. Explains how Latin America is exploited.

Chapter 5: The Contemporary Structures of Power. Explains how Latin America is exploited.

Seven Years After. Explains how Latin America is still exploited.

Setting

Venezuelan oil fields, Bolivian silver mines, Brazilian favelas, Caribbean sugar plantations, Central American banana plantations, Brazilian coffee plantations, Chilean guano deposits and copper mines, nineteenth century Paraguay, Zapatista Mexico, the Panama Canal, Argentine prisons, leaky slave galleons, denuded rainforests………..

Characters

The Spanish. Outsiders that harvested, mined and plundered Latin America for their own benefit. Villains.

The English, and to a lesser extent the other Europeans. Outsiders that harvested, mined and plundered Latin America for their own benefit. Came after the Spanish (see above). Villains.

The USAmericans. Outsiders that harvested, mined and plundered Latin America for their own benefit. Came after the English (see above). Villains.

The Oligarchy. Insiders that privatised, mortgaged and sold Latin America for their own benefit. Villains.

The International Monetary Fund. See the USAmericans.

Augusto Pinochet. Chilean general who became president/dictator through a violent coup. Friend of the Oligarchy (see above) and the USAmericans (see above). A villain.

Salvador Allende. Chilean socialist president overthrown by Augusto Pinochet (see above). A hero.

Isabel Allende. First cousin once removed of Salvador Allende (see above). Wrote the foreword to Open Veins. Likes it. Fled Augusto Pinochet’s coup (see above) carrying a copy of Open Veins (an early edition, before she had written the foreword).

Old Woman. Lives in a São Paulo hovel. Drinks coffee from small tin can and talks to author. Claims that Brazil is “ours”. An anecdote.

Quotes

“We have maintained a silence closely resembling stupidity”.

“The massacres of Indians that began with Columbus never stopped”.

“The human murder by poverty in Latin America is secret – every year, three Hiroshima bombs”.

“There are less than 1,000 computers in Latin America and 50,000 in the United States”.

“One wonders if those that made us paralytic might offer us a wheelchair”.

“One writes to answer the questions that buzz in one’s head”.

Notes for the President (of the USA)

* Don’t take anything Galeano says too personally, after all you were only 10 years old when this book was published, and not directly complicit in, for example, the CIA’s support of Pinochet.

* Galeano is opposed to slavery, to indentured labour, to serfdom, and to other forms of labour exploitation. By aligning yourself similarly you may be able to reach out to those of the left like Galeano and Hugo Chavez. These people cannot vote for you, but being cordial to them might boost your popularity with certain demographics (most of whom also cannot vote for you).

* The CIA, the IMF, the green berets and the oil companies are for the large part unpopular within Latin America. This may be because every time they become involved in Latin America people start dying (according to Galeano). Finding less polarising cultural ambassadors to send to the region may prove worthwhile.

* Galeano wrote Open Veins in the years after Che Guevara was assassinated. Neither this event nor the ongoing embargo seem to have ended the Communist threat in the region. Cuba may be the country that has changed the least from the time of the book’s publication to today. It might be time to consider a new Cuba strategy.

* Five hundred years of exploitation has not caused Latin America to love unreservedly the Spanish (see above) or the English (see above) or the USAmericans (see above). For the USAmericans at least it is not to late to rethink this approach. It might be time to call off the conquest.

A un año de celebrarse el bicentenario de la independencia de nuestro país, me parece necesario reflexionar sobre la trayectoria política de esta ya no tan joven república. En efecto, quiero poner en el acento un tema cardinal que dice relación con el grado de legitimidad de nuestra institucionalidad, no la actual, sino la de estos últimos doscientos años. En este sentido el análisis debe centrarse en el carácter democrático que ha normado nuestra convivencia ciudadana, plasmada en le legitimidad de nuestra vida constitucional; constituciones que en su gran mayoría han nacido bajo la presión ejercida por las fuerzas armadas o las oligarquías de turno que se disputaban el poder estatal.

No pretendo hacer un juicio de valor, sino por el contrario, remitirme a la evidencia histórica de estos 200 años, la que demuestra palmariamente que en nuestro país no ha existido ningún ordenamiento constitucional que haya tenido su génesis en una expresión verdaderamente democrática. Por el contrario, las que nos han regido por más tiempo, han emergido bajo fuertes períodos de convulsión interna donde su promulgación ha carecido de procesos constituyentes que las legitimen democráticamente. Para afirmar este punto, de las 10 constituciones que ha tenido nuestro país, las he divido en tres grupos a saber: las de emergencia, las bien intencionadas y las militaristas.

El primer grupo, abarca un período de 10 años -de 1811 a 1822- (1), el que estará marcado en una primera fase por las constituciones de los años 1811, 1812 y 1814, que corresponden al periodo de la independencia. Estos reglamentos tratarán de generar sobre la marcha un status jurídico sobre la naciente república, las que reflejarán las posturas disidentes en el seno de la aristocracia nacional, particularmente santiaguina. Caso emblemático de este período resulta la constitución de 1812, que fue ratificada por un grupo de santiaguinos de “alta alcurnia” que votaban bajo la convocatoria de una invitación (2). La segunda fase abarca las constituciones de 1818 y 1822, que estarán marcadas bajo la férula del autoritarismo ohiguinista que gobernará con un grupo de la aristocracia nacional. Una vez más la constituyente dejará fuera no solamente al pueblo, sino a una incipiente clase media integrada por artesanos, funcionarios del estado y profesionales.

El segundo grupo, abarca sólo 5 años, caracterizándose por una mirada liberal de la burguesía progresista de la época. Esto se reflejará en dos constituciones, la de 1823 que incorporará el voto a la clase media integrada por letrados pobres, sacerdotes, oficiales de bajo rango, empleados públicos, mineros y otros empresarios (3). La constitución de 1828, bajo sello liberal / Democrático, va más allá de su predecesora instaurando en la práctica el voto universal para el género masculino, casados mayores de 21 y solteros mayores de 25 años (4). La falta de unidad del patriciado nacional para concebir un modelo de desarrollo institucional, generó profundas divisiones entre sectores liberales y conservadores, lo que precipitará la derrota del progresismo dando origen al tercer grupo.

El tercer grupo abarca un período de 176 años hasta hoy día, bajo el dominio de tres constituciones, la de 1833, la de 1925 y la de 1980. La primera, se origina fruto del levantamiento armado de un sector del patriciado mercantil chileno, en contra del patriciado liberal, el cual se toma el poder después del triunfo en la batalla de Lircay. Estamos en presencia de un golpe de estado, en el cual el general que encabeza el bando pelucón estanquero, asume como presidente de la república después de derrotar militarmente a sus enemigos; será este bando, el que pasando a llevar la constitución de 1928,vigente todavía, promulgará la Constitución del 33. La discusión del proyecto y su posterior promulgación, se dará en un clima de represión, exilio y encarcelamiento del bando derrotado, con guardias civiles que operaban como policía política en contra de la disidencia (5).

Para comprender el nacimiento de la constitución de 1925, debemos tener en consideración dos elementos que determinaran el cambio del parlamentarismo al presidencialismo. El primero, es el que se conoce con el nombre de La Cuestión Social, “fenómeno que consistió en la aparición, y correspondiente reconocimiento social, de una nueva forma de pobreza asociada a la vida urbana y a la consolidación de la producción capitalista” (6); que hacía 1920 producto de sangrientas luchas había logrado enfrentar a la oligarquía financiera atrincheraba en el parlamento, posibilitando devenir la cuestión social en cuestión política. Al triunfo del socialismo en la Rusia zarista, se agregaba que trabajadores, artesanos y pequeños propietarios contaban a la fecha con periódicos para difundir sus ideas, partidos políticos, federaciones obreras y de empleados, que empezaban a manifestarse por cambios profundos en la arquitectura institucional, “… diversos grupos de ciudadanos se movieron para ‘generar’ la política desde la propia bese civil. Eso fue lo que impulsó la Liga de Acción Cívica, desde 1912, exaltada por Roberto Huneeus. En la misma dirección se movía la Federación Obrera encabezada por Luis Emilio Recabarren, llamando a una Asamblea Constituyente para refundar el Estado al margen de los políticos. Al margen de los políticos se movía también la sección chilena de IWW. Las ligas de arrendatarios (conventilleros) y las primeras asociaciones de profesores descartaban ‘la pretendida virtud de los medio políticos’” (7). El segundo elemento para entender la crisis institucional, está signado por la denominada Crisis de Representatividad del Régimen Parlamentario, la que se vio incrementada por las desastrosas consecuencias que trajo para nuestra economía el fin de la primera guerra mundial y el descubrimiento del salitre sintético, todo esto en el marco de la elección presidencial de 1920. En palabras de Gabriel Salazar, era una “crisis combinada de representatividad y de legitimidad, unida a la demanda por ‘la Constituyente’, indican que la coyuntura tenía, hacia 1920, un inconfundible carácter cívico pre-revolucionario. Lo que era, por cierto, mucho más que una agitada ‘campaña electoral’” (8). Es en este contexto social donde resulta electo Arturo Alessandri, quien provenía del patriciado aristocrático del parlamentarismo chileno, y que llega premunido de un conjunto de propuestas que pretendían aminorar la grave carga social que enfrentaba la mayoría de la población; propuestas que “pretendían armonizar las relaciones entre le capital y el trabajo mediante una legislación adecuada que abarcara contratos laborales, previsión social, organización de sindicatos y derecho a huelga” (9). Estos planteamiento, si bien necesarios, fueron torpedeados contumazmente por el parlamento que, encerrados en su burbuja se negaban a ver la crisis a la que se enfrentaban. Esta situación no fue ajena a un grupo de oficiales jóvenes, que azuzados por el caudillo de Tarapacá realizó en los primeros días de septiembre de 1924 un golpe blanco al acudir a una reunión del parlamento y hacer sentir su malestar haciendo resonar sus sables contra el piso, episodio conocido en nuestra historia como el ruido de sables. Si bien el “episodio militar” logró destrabar las leyes que se encontraban en el parlamento y abrir una puerta a la reforma de la Constitución, Alessandri sintió vulnerada su autoridad y, con la autorización de sus pares en el parlamento, se tomó un permiso para viajar a Europa. El 10 de septiembre Alessandri hace abandono del país y, al día siguiente, el 11 de septiembre, un grupo de oficiales conservadores se toman el poder, instaurando una Junta Gobierno cuya primera medida será el cierre del Congreso y convocatoria a elecciones presidenciales y parlamentarias. Esta situación no dejará conformes a la oficialidad joven, herederos del ruido de sables, la que originará un nuevo golpe que depondrá a la Junta Militar y pedirá el regreso de Alessandri para iniciar los pasos de una Asamblea Constituyente. Vuelto al país, el caudillo, con todo el poder en sus manos, el congreso cerrado, con la oficialidad joven y el pueblo apoyándolo acometió a la tarea de dictar una nueva Constitución. El problema recaía en cómo hacerlo, si Alessandri optaba por una Asamblea Constituyente el resultado se veía confuso para la clase política a la cual pertenecía el presidente. Más, contrario a las promesas que había realizado a su vuelta del autoexilio Alessandri no convocó a una Constituyente, tan sólo “designó un Comité formado mayoritariamente por políticos y no por representantes directos de la ciudadanía. Y ese comité redactó la Constitución de 1925” (10). La Constitución fue sometida a plebiscito el 25 de agosto de 1925, con los abiertos llamados a abstención por parte de los partidos Conservador, Comunista y Radical. De los 302.304 inscritos en los registros electorales, votaron sólo 134.421, de los cuales 128.381 lo hicieron por el proyecto alesandrista, lo que deja una abstención de un 50% de personas que teniendo derecho a voto, por alguna razón no hicieron.

La actual Constitución, la de 1980, viene a ser el corolario de nuestra historia Constitucional, vale decir, la imposición forzada de las normas que regirán el Estado. En efecto, valga decir que en el momento mismo del golpe de Estado se deja sin vigencia la Constitución del 25. Pero, el proyecto que se plebiscitó el año 80 tuvo su génesis pocos meses después del pronunciamiento golpista del 1973,  cuando la Junta militar nombra una comisión a cargo del jurista Enrique Ortúzar (11) para estudiar una nueva Constitución. Cinco años después, se entregó a la comisión Ortúzar, como se le conoció, las indicaciones de Jaime Guzmán para que se elaborara el proyecto de Constitución (12). Un año más tarde, 1978, la comisión Ortúzar evacuó el anteproyecto constitucional, el que fue enviado al Consejo de Estado integrado por personeros designados por el gobierno de facto, entre los que se encontraban los ex presidentes Jorge Alessandri (13) y Gabriel González Videla (14). El 26 de junio de 1980, el “flamante Consejo” entregó la nueva Constitución, la cual pasó a un grupo de estudio encabezado por la Ministra de Justicia y sobrina del dictador, Mónica Madariaga, ella fue asesorada por cuatro auditores militares que, en forma minuciosa introdujeron 175 cambios que daban cuenta de las distintas visiones al interior del régimen (15). Realizado el trámite de corrección la Constitución pasó a la Junta de Gobierno, integrada por los tres Comandantes en jefes de las diferentes ramas castrenses y el Director Gral. de Carabineros (16). La “honorable” junta evacuó el proyecto con fecha 10 de agosto, para un día después, mediante cadena nacional comunicar que la Constitución se plebiscitaria el 11 de septiembre de 1980. Demás está decir, a esta altura como de costumbre, que la votación se llevó a efecto con estado de emergencia, sin partidos políticos, sin libertad de prensa y asociación, en un clima de terror y amedrentamiento por parte de la policía política a los detractores. El resultado obvio fue el siguiente: votos por el “Sí” a la nueva Constitución, 4.204.879 (67,04%); por el “No” (rechazo), 1.893.420 (30,19%); nulos, 173.569 (2,77%).

A manera de conclusión, nos parece interesante entregar la opinión del Premio Nacional de Historia 2006, Gabriel Salazar, quien dice:

“Al hacer un el balance de los procesos de construcción de Estado en Chile, resta un saldo neto de anomalías, que denotan ilegitimidad. Son entre otras las siguientes”.

“En primer lugar, en cada uno de dichos procesos, se observan intervenciones de rasgo dictatorial por parte de las Fuerzas Armadas. Se observa también que, en el contexto de esas intervenciones, los miembros de los Comités Constituyentes (en Chile no ha funcionado jamás una Asamblea Constituyente elegida por el pueblo) fueron designados por la autoridad, no electos por la ciudadanía. Los proyectos de Estado que esos comités, a puerta cerrada, discutieron y acordaron, fueron finalmente impuestos a la nación sin deliberación informada, y dentro de una atmósfera militarmente controlada”. (17)

La doctrina moderna en derecho político, define al pueblo como titular del Poder Constituyente no de ahora, sino de 1787 con la promulgación de la Constitución Norteamericana y, refrendada después por la Revolución Francesa. Las Constituciones que se establecen reconociendo la titularidad del pueblo en el ejercicio del Poder Constituyente, son denominadas democráticas, en palabras de Thomas Paine “Una Constitución no es el acto de un gobierno, sino de un pueblo que constituye un gobierno, y un gobierno sin una Constitución es un poder sin derecho” (18).

A la luz de lo expresado, me pregunto cuál sería el mejor regalo que podríamos entregarle a esta ya adulta nación, claro, estarán los edificios elefanticos, carreteras y otras obras públicas. Pero, no será necesario pensar en hacerle un regalo cívico a la patria, un regalo que nos permita revertir el drama de legitimidad de estos últimos 200 años, no será necesario crear, por primera vez en nuestra historia una Asamblea Constituyente que de origen a un Estado legítimo… puede ser un buen regalo.

Notas

1.- Constituciones de 1811, 1812 y 1814, corresponde a la denominada Patria Vieja. Las de 1818 y 1822 inauguran la Patria Nueva.

2.- Ver en Historia de las instituciones políticas y sociales de Chile, Jaime Eyzaguirre. Editorial Universitaria, 1992.

3.- Ver en Construcción de Estado en Chile (1800-1837), Gabriel Salazar. Editorial Sudamericana, 2005.

4.- Íbid., op. cit.

5.- Para un análisis más detallado ver en “Construcción de Estado en Chile…” (op. cit) y “El peso de la noche: nuestra frágil fortaleza histórica”, Alfredo Jocelyn-Holt. Ariel, 2000.

6.- ¿Revolución Proletaria o querida chusma?, Julio Pinto, Verónica Valdivia. LOM Ediciones, 2002.

7.- Historia Contemporánea de Chile I, Gabriel Salazar, Julio Pinto. LOM Ediciones, 1999.

8.- Ibíd. Op. Cit.

9.- Historia del siglo XX chileno, Sofía Correa, Consuelo Figueroa, Alfredo Jocelyn-Holt, Claudio Rolle, Manuel Vicuña. Edt. Sudamericana, 2001.

10.- Historia Contemporánea de Chile I, op. Cit.

11.- Enrique Cornelio Ortúzar Escobar (1914 – 2005), abogado constitucionalista, ministro del Gobierno de Jorge Alessandri Rodríguez en las carteras de interior, justicia y RR. EE.

12.- La historia oculta del régimen militar. Memoria de una época 1973 – 1988, Ascanio Cavallo, Manuel Salazar y Óscar Sepúlveda. Editorial Randomhouse-Mondadori, 2004.

13.- Jorge Alessandri Rodríguez (1896 – 1986), hijo de presidente Arturo Alessandri, gobernó Chile entre los años 1958 a 1964.

14.- Gabriel González Videla (1898 – 1980), gobernó Chile entre los años 1946 a 1952.

15.- Ibíd. Op. Cit.

16.- La integraban Augusto José Ramón Pinochet Ugarte (ejército), Fernando Jorge Matthei Aubel (fuerza aérea), José Toribio Merino Castro (armada), César Leonidas Mendoza Durán (carabineros).

17.- SALAZAR, Gabriel. “Construcción de estado en Chile: la historia reversa de la legitimidad“. [Artículo]. En  Proposiciones Vol.24. Santiago de Chile : Ediciones SUR, 1994.  Obtenido desde: http://www.sitiosur.cl/r.php?id=578. [Consultado en: 15-10-2009]

18.- Los Derechos del hombre, Thomas Paine. Aguilar, 1963.

I have decided that it would actually be very interesting to have a legitimate and engaging debate/talk/discussion/whatever you want to call it in which admirers and lovers of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet (known colloquially as “Pinochetistas”) tell me (as someone is a flaming socialist who hates Pinochet and everything he ever stood for and did) why they admire him, what their reasons are, etc. I added a lot of tags because I want people to find this and answer. Truly. And I might translate it into Spanish and post it on Facebook in a few groups as well.

A few questions to start off with:

1. This should be easy. Pinochetistas, tell me why Augusto Pinochet is awesome. Give reasons. And don’t bash “communists” here either. Stay positive.

2. Human rights. It has been proven by numerous credible sources that the Pinochet regime was a systematic and gruesome violator of human rights (la DINA, Villa Grimaldi, these are all proven facts). Do you believe that the “ends justify the means” with regarding human rights? Do you believe that the Pinochet regime was justified in using torture, disappearance and murder against any political opponents, real and percieved? Do not talk about Fidel Castro/Che Guevara and how they’re murderers too here–this isn’t about them (and just as a side note, I’m not a fan of Castro or Che either for those same reasons). This is about Pinochet. How do you reconcile the gross human rights abuses of the Pinochet regime with love and admiration for it?

3. Pinochet is often credited with the “Economic Miracle of Chile,” yet graphs and charts now show that the real economic pickup came after the return of democracy in 1990 and the subsequent years of center-left Concertacion government. In your opinion, can Pinochet still be credited with the “economic miracle?” Remember that during the seventeen years of Pinochet’s dictatorship, the economy crashed twice, once around 1976 and again around 1982.

4. If Allende really was as terrible as Pinochetistas think he was, was a military coup justified in deposing him and subsequently ending democracy for seventeen years? Is a military coup a justifiable action against any leader one personally disagrees with? Also, prove to me quantitatively (i.e. no opinion) that continued rule by Allende would have been somehow “worse” for the country than Pinochet’s dictatorship.

En Espanol:
He decidido que lo que realmente sería muy interesante tener un debate legítimo y la participación / / charla debate o lo que quieras llamarlo en el que los amantes y admiradores del ex dictador chileno Augusto Pinochet (conocido coloquialmente como “pinochetistas”) me dicen ( como alguien que es un socialista que odia a Pinochet en llamas y todo lo que cada vez estaba a favor y lo hizo) por las que admiro, cuáles son sus razones, etc He añadido un montón de etiquetas, porque quiero que la gente a encontrar este y respuesta. De verdad. Y yo podría traducir al español y la publicaremos en Facebook en unos cuantos grupos también.

Algunas preguntas para empezar con:

1. Esto debería ser fácil. Pinochetistas, dime por qué Augusto Pinochet es impresionante. Motivación. Y no bash “comunistas” aquí tampoco. Manténgase positivo.

2. Los derechos humanos. Se ha demostrado por numerosas fuentes fidedignas de que el régimen de Pinochet era un violador sistemático y horripilante de los derechos humanos (la DINA, Villa Grimaldi, todos estos son hechos probados). ¿Cree usted que el “fin justifica los medios” con respecto a los derechos humanos? ¿Cree usted que el régimen de Pinochet se justifica en el uso de la tortura, disapperance y el asesinato en contra de cualquier oposición política, real y percibida? No hablar de Fidel Castro / Che Guevara y la forma en que son asesinos también aquí no se trata de ellos (y sólo como una nota al margen, no soy un fan de Castro o el Che o bien por las mismas razones). Se trata de Pinochet. ¿Cómo se reconicile de las flagrantes violaciones de los derechos del régimen de Pinochet con el amor y admiración por ello?

3. Pinochet es reconocido con el “milagro económico de Chile”, pero los gráficos y diagramas muestran ahora que la reactivación económica real se produjo después de la vuelta de la democracia en 1990 y los años siguientes del gobierno de centroizquierda Concertación. En su opinión, Pinochet todavía puede ser acreditado con el “milagro económico?” Recuerde que durante los diecisiete años de dictadura de Pinochet, la economía cayó dos veces, una en 1976 y nuevamente en 1982.

4. Si Allende era realmente tan terrible como pinochetistas que él era, fue un golpe de estado justificada en deponerlo y, posteriormente, que termina la democracia durante diecisiete años? Es un golpe de Estado una acción justificable en contra de cualquier persona de un líder no está de acuerdo con? Además, probar a mí en términos cuantitativos (es decir, sin opinión) que siguió la regla de Allende hubiera sido de alguna manera “peor” para el país que la dictadura de Pinochet.
Respuestas en Español o Inglés son apreciadas/Answers in Spanish or English are appreciated

Gracias/Thank You.

Hitler & Himmler, Leaders of the World’s Greatest Racial Mass Murder Cult

“Man is becoming God. Those who see in National Socialism nothing more than a political movement know scarcely anything of it. It is more even than a religion. It is the will to create mankind anew”. Adolph Hitler

If you are Black, you need to understand the “BEAST”. Adolph Hitler of Nazi Germany is one of the most prolific figures in history. He is the subject of innumerable photographs, movies, documentaries, books, articles, and essays; yet the Nazi State and the forces of hate that created him is one of the most neglected areas of study from the Black Perspective. Hitler was not created out of a vacuum. Hitler was molded, nurtured and created to lead Germany into one of world’s greatness homicidal campaigns of racial human annihilation in human history. 

“National Socialism is nothing more than applied biology.” Rudolph Hess, Deputy Reichsfuhrer

“Only the SS was equal to the task of exterminating the Jewish people. Others talked          about it but had too many reservations. To have completed such a mission is an unwritten page of honor in the history of the SS.” (Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler)

The Nazis belief system was racial-biological mystical geopolitical. The Nazis asserted that the far-skinned predominantly blue eyed blonds of Nordic descent were heralded as the masters of the world while all others were considered subhuman species. The Nazis aggressive warfare strategy was not solely military, political or economic campaigns, but geological mystical battles to expand the living space of Aryans and clear the earth of what charged were sub human species, particularly Black people.

Of all of the Nazis under Hitler, Heinrich Himmler is one of the least understood of Nazi Germany’s henchmen. Himmler was behind the instrument most noted responsible for the wholesale slaughter of the Nazi’s theoretical European sub human species, such as the Jews, and non Aryans. Nazi Germany’s instrument of death, destruction and annihilation of their professed sub human species was the SS, the Knights of the Black Sun, the Masters of Death.  The leader of the SS was Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler, and Himmler did not die on May 23, 1945 by suicide.

At the time of Himmler’s alleged suicide in the hands of the British Allied Forces, he was one of the highest ranking Nazis and one of its most powerful officials. He essentially became one of the richest men in the world from billions he amassed from the war and booty of plunder. It is inconceivable that Himmler would be found aimlessly wandering Germany’s countryside with a small escort and in company of obviously dressed SS men. As Hitler, Himmler had an able air force and futuristic u-boats (submarines), billions of booty, and an underground network available to him for escape to Spain, South Africa, Antarctica, and both South and North America. The man found suicided was not Himmler, but his double, a well-established Nazi trick play, a “doppelganger.”  To this date, Himmler’s fate remains one of the world’s greatness closely guarded secret. The British has sealed its Himmler’s files from public view until 2045. [1]

The mission of Himmler’s SS was world domination and annihilation of non Aryans by a secret and select group of an Aryan vanguard for the coming of a master root race of Germanic blood. The vanguard is made-up of the Blood and Elite of the Germanic race, and their mission did not end after World War II or the death of the Nazi State. At least two years before the official end of World War II, the SS went underground to continue their mission. Here lies one of the most neglected subjects of Twentieth and Twentieth-First century. Generally, people of color aren’t fully aware of them. The media, and surprisingly, most of the left will not talk about it.      

Heinrich Himmler enlisted in the SS in 1925. At that point the SS was a group of 200 men who acted as Hitler’s bodyguards. In 1929, Himmler took complete control and with him at its helm, the SS became the world most extreme occult masters of death.

In most cases, the order of the SS was immune from criminal prosecution and civil liability. They carried out the Nazi extreme human extermination policy in which as many as 6 million Jews and 4 million others were murdered in cold blood.

Towards the end of the war in 1945 the Gesamt-SS had over 840,000 members. From these 48,500 were members of the Allgemeine SS. Much of the remainder was comprised of 18,000 officers, 52,000 NCOs (non commissioned officers), and 600,000 enlisted members of the Waffen-SS and 130,000 police. SS membership numbers were formally lent to the members of the Waffen-SS of all ranks, while SS membership was also automatically lent to police officers.

SS: THE MYTHICAL KNIGHTS OF THE BLACK SUN

The SS is generally translated as the “Schutzstaffel”, a special staff or military unit. There was another meaning of the “SS”, a meaning with roots deep in secrecy, dualism and the occult of ancient Sumerian, Babylonian, and Egyptian mythology. The letters “SS” also referred to die Schwatze Sonne, the Black Sun. 

The secret doctrine of the Black Sun is that there are two suns, the “white” sun at the center of the physical solar system, and the “black” sun, a “hidden” sun of (spiritual) illumination. The myth of the Black and White Sun encompasses the ancient doctrine of dualism, the two realms of good and evil, light and darkness, order and chaos as independent principles.

In some versions of Black Sun mythology, the Black Sun lies at the center of our galaxy. One attribute of the Black Sun is that it is the cause of the immortality, “EVIL”, and the reincarnation of the soul. In Babylonian mythology, it was also associated with the coming of the “King of Kings” and the establishment of a New Babylon. Finally, theosophical mythology associated the Black Sun with uttermost “Hyperborea” and “Thule”, the legendary stellar home and celestial origin of the Aryan race. [2]

SS: THE BLOOD AND ELITE

“Our concern, our duty is our people and our blood. It is for them that we must provide and plan, work and fight, nothing else. We can be indifferent to everything else. I wish the SS to adopt this attitude to the problem of all foreign non-Germanic peoples…. All else is vain…” (Reichsfurhrer Heinrich Himmler)

“A new faith is arising today; the myth of the blood, the faith, to defend with the blood of the divine essence of man. The faith, embodied in clearest knowledge that the Nordic blood represents that mysterium which has replaced and overcome the old sacraments.”  (Reichsleiter Alfred Rosenberg)

The original draftsman of and spokesman for the Nazi program was Alfred Rosenberg. In January 1934, Hitler designated and deputized Rosenberg as Reichsleiter for the spiritual and philosophical education of the NSDAP, the German labor front and all related organizations”. Rosenberg repudiated Christianity completely. Instead, Rosenberg, Hitler and Himmler wanted to set up a pagan cult of “blood, race, and soil.”

They would go back to the dark ritual of dramatic rites of their ancestors. The New Pagans resurrected Odin, Thor, and the old gods of primitive Teutons before Christ’s time. Instead of the Old Testament they adopted Nordic sagas and fairy tales. They set up a new trinity for worship—bravery, loyalty, and physical force. They even created a hymn for the new German Faith Movement:

The time of the Cross has gone now,
The Sun-wheel shall arise,
and so, with God, we shall be free at last
and give our people their honor back.

The fundamental principle of selection of men of the SS was what Himmler called, “The Blood and Elite.” The selection was absolutely and completely racial. It was based on the Nazi romantic dream of a race of Nordic-Germanic blue-eyed, blond superheroes conquering the World.

“We have developed according to the law of selection. We have chosen the elite from among a cross-section of our people… We have gone partly by external appearance and then have … tested appearance against continually new requirements, continually new tests, physical and mental, of character and of spirit. We have again and again sought out and cast off what doesn’t meet these requirements… We are pledged whenever we come together to remind ourselves of our fundamentals, race, selection, hardness.” (Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler, IMT, XXIX, 1919-PS)

In theory, the SS practiced a mystic belief of the predominance of the Nordic race over all others and that Nordic blood is the only creative power in the world. According to Reichsfuhrer Himmler, “The SS man would represent a new human type–warrior, administrator, “scholar” and leader, all in one – whose messianic mission was to undertake a vast colonization of the East. This synthetic aristocracy, trained in a semi-closed society and superimposed on the Nazi system as a whole, would demonstrate the value of its blood through ‘creative action’ and achievement.” [3]

The SS was deliberately conceived and organized by Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler to be a mystic and occult male order and a version of King Arthur’s Knights of the Holy Grail and Round Table.

“After the SS recruit had passed his training and taken the oath, if he was an officer he was then given the SS dagger which was a sort of hunting knife with a black handle, the SS runes on it, the swastika and a wreath and a German eagle. This was a very prized possession.” [4]

Engraved into the dagger were the words “my honour is called trust.” SS men received the dagger in a solemn ceremony. Every member of the SS wore the SS signet ring, but for his inner circle, the elite of the elite, Himmler personally handed out the death’s head ring. A former high-ranking SS officer, Wilhelm Hoetl, still remembers the ceremonious occasion. (Hoetl) “The ring was engraved with your name. Mine for example, ‘To my dear Hoetl, Heinrich Himmler.’ That was inside the ring around a death head that was supposed to symbolize the close connection to the SS and to Himmler.” [5]

In a speech given to SS officers stationed at Dachau, Himmler stated: “Never forget. We are a knightly order from which one cannot withdraw, to which one is recruited by blood and within which one remains body and soul.” [6]

WEWELSBURG: THE SS SATANIC TEMPLE 

According to Walther Schellenberg’s memoirs [7]:

“Each member had his own armchair with an engraved silver nameplate, and each had to devote himself to a ritual of spiritual exercises aimed mainly at mental concentration.  The focal point of Wewelsburg, evidently owing much to the legend of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, was a great dining hall with an oak table to seat twelve picked from the senior Gruppenführers. The walls were to be adorned with their coats of arms.”  Underneath this dining hall there was kept a so-called “realm of the dead”, a circular well in which these coats of arms would be burnt and the ashes worshipped after the “knight” had died. (There are tales of Himmler using the severed heads of deceased S.S. officers to communicate with ascended masters.) In addition to this, each knight had his own room, “decorated in accordance with one of the great ancestors of Aryan majesty.” Himmler’s own room was dedicated to a Saxon King Henry the Fowler, whose ghost Himmler sometimes conversed with. [8]

The SS belief system has a direct connection to the medieval Templars, and Lanz Von Liebenfels’ “New Templars”, for whom he believed the Holy Grail or sang real, was the “royal bloodline” itself and its “container” or “chalice” of the Germanic Aryan Race.

In 1934, a year after Hitler came to power, Von Liebenfels wrote that the Order of the New Templars was the “first manifestation of the [Nazi] Movement, which now, in accordance with the law of God, is most powerful in history and unrestrainedly sweeping over the world.” [9] The SS was the vanguard of the Nordic-Germanic race, the prophetic forebears, of a new religion and new age.

The headquarters and temple of the SS Cult was situated at the 17^th century medieval castle of Wewelsburg, near the towns of Paderborn and Defmold in the German province of Westphalia, close by the site in the Teutoburg Forest where Arminius made his stand with its famous Stonehenge-like monument known as Externsteine. A 12,000 volume library of the occult was available in the castle. [10]  

NEW PAGAN CULT, THE AHNENERBE AND THE NEW AGE RELIGION

"Let none who fears
The spear of Wotan
Adventure across this fire!" (Richard Wagner, Die Walkuere) 

The Ahnenerbe was part of Himmler’s greater plan for the systematic creation of a secret intellectual “Germanic” culture that would replace Christianity in the Greater Germany to exist after the war, a kind of SS-religion that would form the basis of the new world order. To that end, Himmler inducted a number of reputable academics into the Ahnenerbe.

The Ahnenerbe incorporated the membership of Aliester Crowley’s Templar Order, the Vril, and the Thule Gesellschaft into the SS. [11] This new culture was also based on the volkish beliefs of the Nazis, and it was the role of the Ahnenerbe to marshal scientific research in an interdisciplinary program to support the “development of the Germanic heritage”.

The Ahnenerbe was a Nazify motivated academic association with enough funding to go beyond mere lectures and publications to include wide-scale expeditions and experimental research.

Himmler himself served as the “chairman of the Kuratorium” of the Ahnenerbe, and held the real power within the Ahnenerbe. As Reich Manager of the Ahnenerbe, Wolfram Sievers was responsible for all administrative tasks, with day-to-day business matters handled by the deputy “Kurator”, Dr. Herrman Reischle. [12]

The Ahnenerbe was funded by the Ahnenerbe-Stiftung, the German Forschungsgemeinschaft, member fees, and “from funds of the Reich and from contributions of industry” (including a group of financiers called the Circle of Friends led by Wilhelm Keppler that included bankers of New York Wall Street[13], Henry Ford[14], and William Randolph Hearst[15]. The budget of the Ahnenerbe was as much as over one million German marks (400,000 American dollars).

The Ahnenerbe was not only devoted to finding the basis of genetic and ethnic “purity” of the Germanic race it involved top secret medical experiments at concentration camps that were done to advance the Nazi world conquest mission. The Ahnenerbe became involved in horrific medical experiences in the areas of treatment of extreme conditions- high pressure, low pressure, and so on- that were encountered in extreme climates or, eventually outer space, which caused the deaths of thousands. [16]

Temple of Set (Satan) Founder Lt. Colonel of the US Army Michael Aquino [17] visited Wewelsburg several times during the early 1980’s. He performed a ritual in the North Tower to resurrect the energies of Wewelsburg on the world and incite a “Satanic renaissance: to jump-start the next phase of human evolution. Certainly, this theme is to be found all through Nazi writings and speeches from the very earliest days.”

Lt. Col. Michael Aquino is directly linked to the CIA’s MK-Ultra mind control programs, and directly involved in the programming of children as sexual zombies for counterintelligence purposes. [18]

THE MYTHICAL KNIGHTS OF THE BLACK SUN ON THE U.S. PAYROLL

“We swear to you, Adolf Hitler, loyalty and bravery as leader and chancellor of the German Reich. We vow to you and to the principles laid down by you obedience to the point of death. So help us God!”

During the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal in Germany, the SS was declared to be a war crimes organization, but very few these mass murderers at least 600,000 people [19] were never prosecuted as war criminals or denazified. After the war, most of the hierarchy of SS was bankrolled by taxpayers of the United States in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). [20]

Many of the Himmler’s Ahnenerbe “esoteric scientists” were secretly brought into the United States under the aegis of Operation Paperclip. [21] They were clandestinely recruited into America’s top corporations, universities, headed NASA [22]and important governmental agencies necessary to the well-being and security of its citizens, particularly Black people. 

STURMHAUPHTFUHRER SS OTTO VON BOLSCHWING, THE BAY AREA’S RESIDENT BEAST SS

“I am experienced.” “I have a ring operating”. “If you give me a paycheck, I’ll make you very happy.” – 1945, Otto Albrecht Alfred von Bolschwing-

In March 1969, Sturmhauptfuhrer SS Otto Albrecht Alfred von Bolschwing (BEAST of Bucharest) and his deep cover shadow counterintelligence and repression ring moved right into Sacramento, CA, the seat of state power under to collaborate with the fascist state republican administration of Governor Ronald Reagan.

Bolschwing had joined the National Socialist Party (Nazis) at the age of 23 in 1932, and became a top SD (Gestapo) informer by 1939. Bolschwing became a Middle East spy and counterintelligence expert, where he worked undercover in Jerusalem as an importer and banker. He had served on Adolf Eichmann’s staff and was one of the chief masterminds behind the final solution to exterminate the Jewish people. [23]

In Austria, Bolschwing worked with Eichmann to expropriate Jewish property. In 1941, Bolschwing was the top SS control officer in Bucharest, Romania under the Iron Guard, and instigated a pogrom [24] in the city during which hundreds of people were murdered. Some of those killed were hung on meat hooks at a meat-packing plant, had their throats cut, and then were branded “kosher meat” with red-hot irons.           

In 1945, Bolschwing was recruited under deep cover by the U.S. Army Counterintelligence Corps (CIC) as an informer and agent of Wild Bill Donovan and Allen Dulles’ OSS in Austria. By 1949, Bolschwing and the SS were officially deep cover agents of the United States Central Intelligence Agency under CIA director Allen Dulles. [25]           

In February 1954, Bolschwing under cover of displaced Romanians and the CIA immigrated to the United States, and his ring of spies and assassins followed him. When the Gehlen Org became Germany’s official state intelligence arm, Bolschwing became Gehlen’s agent-in-place in the United States, [26] and became one of the most dangerous and powerful men in the body of the Nazi Hydra in America.         

The Gehlen Org was the military industrial-congressional complexes’ secret shadow group of international Nazi and SS spies, drug dealers, gun runners, agent-provocateurs, torturers and assassins.        

In mid-1960, for two years Bolschwing was a chief financial officer of Cabot Manufacturing’s German subsidiary based in the State of Maine. He became closely associated and employed by the late Elmer Bobst at Warner-Lambert Pharmaceutical (1955-1963) [27], a godfather of Richard Nixon’s political career, which brought him inside Nixon’s 1960 campaign for the presidency. He developed close ties with Alfred Driscoll, former governor of New Jersey, and honorary board of chairman of Warner Lambert. [28]          

Bobst is an awfully significant connection. Bobst was one of the primary founders of the American Cancer Society (ACS) in the 1940’s. Bobst later became president of Rockefeller Family’s holding Hoffman LaRoche and Warner-Lambert. “Bobst is further credited for having brought Richard Nixon to power, and because of his wealth and power influence, persuaded Nixon to wage his “War on Cancer.” It was during this “war” that cancer viruses, many functionally and descriptively identical to the human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV’s) associated with AIDS, were produced, cultured, and tested by Bionetics…” [29]          

Bobst’s ASC included OSS Chief, William “Wild Bill” Donovan, and extreme Germanic racialist right-winger and CIA/FBI anti-communist consultant, Dr. Alton Ochsner of New Orleans. [30] Dr. Ochsner’s footprints are all over Lee Harvey Oswald, the conspiracy to assassinate President John F. Kennedy[31], and the development of the AIDS Virus. [32]           

In Sacramento, the Bolschwing setup shop as Vice President of Business Affairs of TCI, Trans International Computer Investment Corporation[33], a Hydra Head CIA front and a den of international intrigue. He helped form TCI with notorious CIA terrorists and contractors Frank Terpril, Edwin Wilson; and Helena von Damm.          

In Sacramento, von Damm became Ronald Reagan’s secretary, and then personal secretary to President Reagan. The Bolschwing Ring controlled most all of Reagan’s cabinet level appointments in both state and federal government.[34]      

TCI was part of Nixon’s U.S. Defense Department and Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) under Secretary Melvin R. Laird. AIS, Advanced Information Systems and IIS, International Imaging Systems were subsidiaries of TCI. As early as 1967, TCI had been used to monitor the 1967 Arab-Israeli Conflict. [35]           

Some of the individuals on TCI’s board were J. Paul Getty, Jr.; Emanuel Fthnenakis, a Greek with direct ties to Aristotle Onassis (Associate of Nazi Financer Hjalmar Schacht); and Judge William A. Newsom, father of San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. Fthenakis was associated with Ford Aerospace, Philco. He was a former VP of ITT and Fairchild Industries of Germantown, Md. [36]

In 1972, Bolschwing’s protégé and a body of the American Nazi Hydra Sturmbannfüehrer SS Dr. Wernher von Braun retired from NASA and joined Fairchild Industries. [37]

The Bolschwing Ring sold the largest subsidiary of TCI to Albert Hakim and Richard Secord. And that subsidiary became Stanford Technology Trading Group, and Stanford Trading Group International (STGI).            

STGI became a notorious CIA front that germinated the Iran-Contra conspirators and operatives of the Phoenix Assassination and Counterintelligence Program of Vietnam. It included hydra heads Oliver North, Theodore Clines, William Casey, Admiral J. Pointdexter, Edwin Wilson, Frank Terpil, Theodore Schackley, Chilean General Augusto Pinochet, and the Nugan Hand Bank. At some point, STGI moved to Chile under Pinochet, then to Saigon.

Most significantly, the Bolschwing Ring was Gehlen’s part of Permindex headquartered in Montreal, Canada, Switzerland [38]and South Africa.[39] Parallex Corporation? Permindex was an international cabal funding and directing political assassinations, counterintelligence insurgencies, and coup de tats around the world. Permindex has been generally implicated in the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy, Dr. Martin Luther King, and among others, the attempts on the life of French President Charles de Gaulle. [40]             

The five groups under Permindex and their supervisors were: 1. Nazis, the SS [41], Czarist Russian, Eastern European and Middle East exile organization called SOLIDARISTS, headed by Ferenc Nagy, ex-Hungarian Premier, and John DeMenil, Russian exile from Houston, Texas, a close friend and supporter of Lyndon Johnson for over thirty years.[42] 2. A section of the AMERICAN COUNCIL OF CHRISTIAN CHURCHES headed by H.L. Hunt of Dallas, Texas. A Cuban exile group called FREE CUBA COMMITTEE headed by Carlos Prio Socarras, ex-Cuban President.  An organization of United States, Caribbean, and Havana, Cuba gamblers called the Syndicate headed by Clifford Jones, ex-Lieutenant Governor of Nevada and Democratic National Committeeman, and Bobby Baker of Washington, D.C. This group worked closely with a Mafia family headed by Joe Bonnano. The SECURITY DIVISION of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) headed by SS Wernher Von Braun, head of the German Nazi rocket program from 1932 through 1945. Headquarters for this group was the DEFENSE INDUSTRIAL SECURITY COMMAND at Muscle Shoals Redstone Arsenal in Alabama and on East Broad Street in Columbus, Ohio. [43]           

In shadow of the SS Bolschwing’s Ring in Sacramento, the California Department of Corrections formally recognized and incorporated The Black Cultural Association (BCA) as an official inmate group at the California Men’s Medical Facility at Vacaville.        

The BCA was really an illegal CIA domestic behavioral modification experiment being run on black inmates out of CIA’s Technical Services Division (TSD) under Dr. Sidney Gottlieb.           

Dr. Louis Joylon (Jolly) West of UCLA was senior technical consultant. BCA was a bizarre monster factory producing mind controlled Black counterintelligence-insurgency agents and zombie assassins for the military industrial congressional complex’s war against Black Nationalist and the panthers. One of which appeared at Merritt Jr. College in 1969 with exploding (dum-dum) bullets to assassinate most likely H. Rap Brown, (Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin ).

[2] Id. Schellenberg served as major general (Brigadeführer) in the Waffen-SS and held a high post in political secret service.

[3] Roudledge’s Who’s Who in Nazi Germany, www.mega.nu:8080/ampp/routledge/himmler.html

 3. Notes on Revelation Nazis: The Occult Conspiracy, The Discovery Channel 2/22/98 www.metrocast.net/~moza/nazis.htm

[5] id.

[6] Id.

[7] Walter Schellenberg served as major general (Brigadeführer) in the Waffen-SS and held a high post in political secret service.

[8] THE ILLUMINATI – PETER LEVENDA AND THE MAGICKAL ROOTS OF NAZISM, interview by Tracy R. Twyman , www.whale.to/b/levenda.html

[9] Swastika and the Nazis, www.intelinet.org/swastika/swascont.htm#anchor147219

[10] Id.

[11] The Spear of Destiny by Trevor Ravenscroft, 5th Printing, 1988

[12] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfram_Sievers

[13] http://reformed-theology.org/html/books/wall_street/chapter_09.htm

[14] http://reformed-theology.org/html/books/wall_street/chapter_06.htm

[15] http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Fascism/Support_Hitler_US.htm

[16] Reich of the Black Sun, www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/reichblacksun/chapter11.htm

[17] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Set

[18] DeCamp, John, The Franklin Cover-Up, AWT, Inc., Lincoln, NE (2005), pgs. 328-30

[19] www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/proc/judorg.htm

[20] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/06/AR2006060601555.html

[21] http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/reichblacksun/chapter11.htm

[22] http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/Holocaust/nasa-nazis.html

[23] http://alexconstantine.blogspot.com/2007/06/otto-bolschwing-file.html

[24] Generally defined as a planned campaign of persecution or extermination sanctioned by a government and directed against an ethnic group. http://encarta.msn.com/dictionary_1861738343/pogrom.html

[25] http://alexconstantine.blogspot.com/2007/06/otto-bolschwing-file.html

[26] Id.

[27] Id. at footnote 20, pg. 243

[28] Id. at footnote 40

[29] Horowitz, Leonard, Death in the Air: Globalism, Terrorism & Toxic Warfare, Tetrahedron Publishing Group, 2001, page 5

[30] http://www.whale.to/b/acs1.html

[31] http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKochsner.htm

[32] http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKhaslamE.htm

[33] Id. at footnote 20, pg. 243

[34]http://raenergy.igc.org/usnazis.html

[35] Id. at 13.

[36] Id. at 13.

[37] http://history.msfc.nasa.gov/vonbraun/bio.html

[38] http:// Mae%20Brussell%20Articles/Nazi%20Connection%20to%20JFK%20Assass.html

[39] http:// goochinfo.homestead.com/shaw.html

[40] Id. at 13.

[41] http:// maebrussell.com/Mae%20Brussell%20Articles/Conspiracy%20Digest%20Interview.html

[42] It Was Johnson, http:// http://freemasonrywatch.org/LATimes.html#I.%20%20Permindex%20and%20Its%20Five%20Subsidiaries

[43] It Was Johnson, http:// http://freemasonrywatch.org/LATimes.html#I.%20%20Permindex%20and%20Its%20Five%20Subsidiaries

the headline on the united nations website reads: “un mission finds evidence of war crimes by both sides in gaza conflict.” here is the news brief in full and if you want to read the full 575-page report download this pdf file:

The United Nations fact-finding mission on the Gaza conflict at the start of this year has found evidence that both Israeli forces and Palestinian militants committed serious war crimes and breaches of humanitarian law, which may amount to crimes against humanity.

“We came to the conclusion, on the basis of the facts we found, that there was strong evidence to establish that numerous serious violations of international law, both humanitarian law and human rights law, were committed by Israel during the military operations in Gaza,” the head of the mission, Justice Richard Goldstone, told a press briefing today.

“The mission concluded that actions amounting to war crimes and possibly, in some respects, crimes against humanity, were committed by the Israel Defense Force (IDF).”

“There’s no question that the firing of rockets and mortars [by armed groups from Gaza] was deliberate and calculated to cause loss of life and injury to civilians and damage to civilian structures. The mission found that these actions also amount to serious war crimes and also possibly crimes against humanity,” he said.

The 575-page report by the four-person mission was released today, ahead of its presentation to the UN’s Human Rights Council in Geneva on 29 September.

“The mission finds that the conduct of the Israeli armed forces constitute grave breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention in respect of wilful killings and wilfully causing great suffering to protected persons and as such give rise to individual criminal responsibility,” the report’s executive summary said. “It also finds that the direct targeting and arbitrary killing of Palestinian civilians is a violation of the right to life.”

It went on to criticize the “deliberate and systematic policy on the part of the Israeli armed forces to target industrial sites and water installations,” and the use of Palestinian civilians as human shields.

On the objectives and strategy of Israel’s military operation, the mission concluded that military planners deliberately followed a doctrine which involved “the application of disproportionate force and the causing of great damage and destruction to civilian property and infrastructure, and suffering to civilian populations.”

On the firing of mortars from Gaza, the mission concluded that they were indiscriminate and deliberate attacks against a civilian population and “would constitute war crimes and may amount to crimes against humanity.” It added that their apparent intention of spreading terror among the Israeli civilian population was a violation of international law.

The report recommended that the Security Council should require Israel to take steps to launch appropriate independent investigations into the alleged crimes committed, in conformity with international standards, and report back on these investigations within six months.

It further called on the Security Council to appoint a committee of experts to monitor the proceedings taken by the Israeli Government. If these did not take place, or were not independent and in conformity with international standards, the report called for the Security Council to refer the situation in Gaza to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC).

It also called on the Security Council to require the committee of experts to perform a similar role with regard to the relevant Palestinian authorities.

At today’s briefing, Justice Goldstone said the mission had investigated 36 incidents that took place during the Israeli operation in Gaza, which he said did not relate to decisions taken in the heat of battle, but to deliberate policies that were adopted and decisions that were taken.

As an example, he described one such incident: a mortar attack on a mosque in Gaza during a religious service, which killed 15 members of the congregation and injured many others. Justice Goldstone said that even if allegations that the mosque was used as sanctuary by military groups and that weapons were stored there were true, there was still “no justification under international humanitarian law to mortar the mosque during a service,” because it could have been attacked during the night, when it was not being used by civilians.

Justice Goldstone added that the report reflected the unanimous view of the mission’s four members.

The other members of the team are Christine Chinkin, Professor of International Law at the London School of Economics and Political Science at the University of London; Hina Jilani, Advocate of the Supreme Court of Pakistan and former Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Human Rights Defenders; and retired Colonel Desmond Travers, member of the Board of Directors of the Institute for International Criminal Investigations (IICI).

of course, i have a huge problem with the notion that there are two sides as reported in this document. you have the fourth most powerful military in the world against an inadequately armed palestinian resistance–the disparity with respect to casualties in the savaging of gaza tells that story quite well. angry arab offered an important observation on this report in response to an article in the economist this week:

I was rather most disappointed with this article about Judge Goldstone’s report on Israeli war crimes. It was not typical of the Economist’s coverage of the Middle East. As if the reporter was pained by the findings. Look at this sentence: “Unlike Syria, say, Israel is a democracy that claims to live by the rule of law. It needs to make its case by moral force as well as by force of arms.” Clear propaganda. But I like how Goldstone’s daughter defended her father: “Mr Goldstone’s daughter, Nicole, who lived in Israel for many years but now lives in Canada, vigorously defended her father’s report in an interview on the army radio. “If it hadn’t been for him, the report would have been even harsher,” she said, speaking in Hebrew.”

richard falk offers his analysis of the report as well as the zionist entity’s response to it thus far:

Richard Goldstone, former judge of South Aftica’s Constitutional Court, the first prosecutor at The Hague on behalf of the International Criminal Court for Former Yugolavia, and anti-apartheid campaigner reports that he was most reluctant to take on the job of chairing the UN fact-finding mission charged with investigating allegations of war crimes committed by Israel and Hamas during the three week Gaza War of last winter.

Goldstone explains that his reluctance was due to the issue being “deeply charged and politically loaded,” and was overcome because he and his fellow commissioners were “professionals committed to an objective, fact-based investigation,” adding that “above all, I accepted because I believe deeply in the rule of law and the laws of war,” as well as the duty to protect civilians to the extent possible in combat zones. The four-person fact-finding mission was composed of widely respected and highly qualified individuals, including the distinguished international law scholar, Christine Chinkin, a professor at the London School of Economics. Undoubtedly adding complexity to Goldstone’s decision is the fact that he is Jewish, with deep emotional and family ties to Israel and Zionism, bonds solidified by his long association with several organizations active in Israel.

Despite the impeccable credentials of the commission members, and the worldwide reputation of Richard Goldstone as a person of integrity and political balance, Israel refused cooperation from the outset. It did not even allow the UN undertaking to enter Israel or the Palestinian Territories, forcing reliance on the Egyptian government to facilitate entry at Rafah to Gaza. As Uri Avnery observes, however much Israel may attack the commission report as one-sided and unfair, the only plausible explanation of its refusal to cooperate with fact-finding and taking the opportunity to tell its side of the story was that it had nothing to tell that could hope to overcome the overwhelming evidence of the Israeli failure to carry out its attacks on Gaza last winter in accordance with the international law of war. No credible international commission could reach any set of conclusions other than those reached by the Goldstone Report on the central allegations.

In substantive respects the Goldstone Report adds nothing new. Its main contribution is to confirm widely reported and analyzed Israeli military practices during the Gaza War. There had been several reliable reports already issued, condemning Israel’s tactics as violations of the laws of war and international humanitarian law, including by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and a variety of respected Israeli human rights groups. Journalists and senior United Nations civil servants had reached similar conclusions.

Perhaps, most damning of all the material available before the Goldstone Report was the publication of a document entitled “Breaking the Silence,” containing commentaries by thirty members of the Israel Defense Forces who had taken part in Operation Cast Lead (the Israeli official name for the Gaza War). These soldiers spoke movingly about the loose rules of engagement issued by their commanders that explains why so little care was taken to avoid civilian casualties. The sense emerges from what these IDF soldiers who were in no sense critical of Israel or even of the Gaza War as such, that Israeli policy emerged out of a combination of efforts ‘to teach the people of Gaza a lesson for their support of Hamas’ and to keep IDF casualties as close to zero as possible even if meant massive death and destruction for innocent Palestinians.

Given this background of a prior international consensus on the unlawfulness of Operation Cast Lead, we must first wonder why this massive report of 575 pages has been greeted with such alarm by Israel and given so much attention in the world media. It added little to what was previously known. Arguably, it was more sensitive to Israel’s contentions that Hamas was guilty of war crimes by firing rockets into its territory than earlier reports had been. And in many ways the Goldstone Report endorses the misleading main line of the Israeli narrative by assuming that Israel was acting in self-defense against a terrorist adversary. The report focuses its criticism on Israel’s excessive and indiscriminate uses of force. It does this by examining the evidence surrounding a series of incidents involving attacks on civilians and non-military targets. The report also does draw attention to the unlawful blockade that has restricted the flow of food, fuel, and medical supplies to subsistence levels in Gaza before, during, and since Operation Cast Lead. Such a blockade is a flagrant instance of collective punishment, explicitly prohibited by Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention setting forth the legal duties of an occupying power.

All along Israel had rejected international criticism of its conduct of military operations in the Gaza War, claiming that the IDF was the most moral fighting force on the face of the earth. The IDF conducted some nominal investigations of alleged unlawful behavior that consistently vindicated the military tactics relied upon and steadfastly promised to protect any Israeli military officer or political leader internationally accused of war crimes. In view of this extensive background of confirmed allegation and angry Israeli rejection, why has the Goldstone Report been treated in Tel Aviv as a bombshell that is deeply threatening to Israel’s stature as a sovereign state?

Israel’s president, Shimon Peres, calling the report “a mockery of history” that “fails to distinguish the aggressor and a state exercising the right of self-defense,” insisting that it “legitimizes terrorist activity, the pursuit of murder and death.” More commonly Israel’s zealous defenders condemned the report as one-sided, biased, reaching foregone conclusions, and emanating from the supposedly bastion of anti-Israeli attitudes at the UN’s Human Rights Council. This line of response to any criticism of Israel’s behavior in occupied Palestine, especially if it comes from the UN or human rights NGOs is to cry “foul play!” and avoid any real look at the substance of the charges. It is an example of what I call ‘the politics of deflection,’ attempting to shift the attention of an audience away from the message to the messenger. The more damning the criticism, the more ferocious the response. From this perspective, the Goldstone Report obviously hit the bullseye!

Considered more carefully, there are some good reasons for Israel’s panicked reaction to this damning report. First, it does come with the backing of an eminent international personality who cannot credibly be accused of anti-Israel bias, making it harder to deflect attention from the findings no matter how loud the screaming of ‘foul play.’ Any fair reading of the report would show that it was balanced, was eminently mindful of Israel’s arguments relating to security, and indeed gave Israel the benefit of the doubt on some key issues.

Secondly, the unsurprising findings are coupled with strong recommendations that do go well beyond previous reports. Two are likely causing the Israeli leadership great worry: the report recommends strongly that if Israel and Hamas do not themselves within six months engage in an investigation and followup action meeting international standards of objectivity with respect to these violations of the law of war, then the Security Council should be brought into the picture, being encouraged to consider referring the whole issue of Israeli and Hamas accountability to the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in The Hague. Even if Israel is spared this indignity by the diplomatic muscle of the United States, and possibly some European governments, the negative public relations implications of a failure to abide by this report could be severe.

Thirdly, whatever happens in the UN System, and at the Human Rights Council in Geneva, the weight of the report will be felt by world public opinion. Ever since the Gaza War the solidity of Jewish support for Israel has been fraying at the edges, and this will likely now fray much further. More globally, a very robust boycott and divestment movement was gaining momentum ever since the Gaza War, and the Goldstone Report can only lend added support to such initiatives. There is a growing sense around the world that the only chance for the Palestinians to achieve some kind of just peace depends on the outcome over the symbols of legitimacy, what I have called the Legitimacy War. Increasingly, the Palestinians have been winning this second non-military war. Such a war fought on a global political battlefield is what eventually and unexpectedly undermined the apartheid regime in South Africa, and has become much more threatening to the Israeli sense of security than has armed Palestinian resistance.

A fourth reason for Israeli worry stemming from the report, is the green light given to national courts throughout the world to enforce international criminal law against Israelis suspects should they travel abroad and be detained for prosecution or extradition in some third country. Such individuals could be charged with war crimes arising from their involvement in the Gaza War. The report in this way encourages somewhat controversial reliance on what is known among lawyers as ‘universal jurisdiction,’ that is, the authority of courts in any country to detain for extradition or to prosecute individuals for violations of international criminal law regardless of where the alleged offenses took place.

Reaction in the Israeli media reveals that Israeli citizens are already anxious about being apprehended during foreign travel. As one law commentator put it in the Israeli press, “From now on, not only soldiers should be careful when they travel abroad, but also ministers and legal advisers.” It is well to recall that Article 1 of the Geneva Conventions calls on states throughout the world “to respect and ensure respect” for international humanitarian law “in all circumstances.” Remembering the efforts in 1998 of several European courts to prosecute Augusto Pinochet for crimes committed while he was head of state in Chile, is a reminder that national courts can be used to prosecute political and military leaders for crimes committed elsewhere than in the territory of the prosecuting state.

Of course, Israel will fight back. It has already launched a media and diplomatic blitz designed to portray the report as so one-sided as to be unworthy of serious attention. The United States Government has already disappointingly appeared to endorse this view, and repudiate the central recommendation in the Goldstone Report that the Security Council be assigned the task of implementing its findings. The American Ambassador to the UN, Susan Rice, evidently told a closed session of the Security Council on September 16, just a day after the report was issued, that “[w]e have serious concerns about many recommendations in the report.” Elaborating on this, Ambassador Rice indicated that the UN Human Rights Council, which has no implementing authority, is the only proper venue for any action to be taken on the basis of the report. The initial struggle will likely be whether to follow the recommendation of the report to have the Security Council refer the issues of accountability to the International Criminal Court, which could be blocked by a veto from the United States or other permanent members.

There are reasons to applaud the forthrightness and comprehensiveness of the report, its care, and scrupulous willingness to conclude that both Israel and Hamas seem responsible for behavior that appears to constitute war crimes, if not crimes against humanity. Although Israel has succeeded in having the issue of one-sidedness focus on fairness to Israel, there are also some reasons to insist that the report falls short of Palestinian hopes.

For one thing, the report takes for granted, the dubious proposition that Israel was entitled to act against Gaza in self-defense, thereby excluding inquiry into whether crimes against the peace in the form of aggression had taken place by the launching of the attack. In this respect, the report takes no notice of the temporary ceasefire that had cut the rocket fire directed at Israel practically to zero in the months preceding the attacks, nor of Hamas’ repeated efforts to extend the ceasefire indefinitely provided Israel lifted its unlawful blockade of Gaza.

Further it was Israel that had seemed to provoke the breakdown of the ceasefire when it launched a lethal attack on Hamas militants in Gaza on November 4, 2008. Israel disregarded this seemingly available diplomatic alternative to war to achieve security on its borders. Recourse to war, even if the facts justify self-defense, is according to international law, a last resort. By ignoring Israel’s initiation of a one-sided war the Goldstone Report accepts the dubious central premise of Operation Cast Lead, and avoids making a finding of aggression.

and here is sherine tadros’ al jazeera report from gaza about the findings in which she asks the most important question of all: what happens next?:

indeed what to do next? well it is quite the no brainer that the war criminals responsible for this latest savagery from the zionist entity should be tried for war crimes. in an article in ha’aretz the context of goldstone’s report–and his own frame of reference in relation to his judicial philosophy comes from war crimes tribunals from world war ii:

Judge Richard Goldstone, the head of a United Nations commission that this week charged Israel with committing war crimes in the Gaza Strip during its offensive there last winter, believes bringing war criminals to justice stems from the lessons of the Holocaust, according to a lecture he delivered in Israel in 2000.

Goldstone spoke about the subject at Jerusalem’s Yakar: Center for Tradition and Creativity, at a lecture attended by former Supreme Court president Aharon Barak. The Israeli jurist introduced Goldstone as “a dear friend” with “very deep ties to Israel.” Goldstone, in turn, said Barak was his hero and inspiration.

In the lecture, concerning international efforts to bring war criminals to justice, Goldstone said the Holocaust has shaped legal protocol on war, adding that it was “the worst war crime in the world.”

He also said the perception of war crimes against humanity should resonate differently to Jewish ears, in light of how the Holocaust shaped conventions relevant to the subject.

Goldstone added that as a jurist, he viewed the Holocaust as a unique occurrence because of how it affected judicial protocol on war, as well as international and humanitarian judicial approaches.

The laws that had been in place before the Holocaust were not equipped to deal with crimes of the Holocaust’s scale and therefore sought to define a new crime, which they labeled a crime against humanity, he said.

These crimes were so great, he explained, they went beyond their direct victims or the countries in which they were perpetrated, to harm humanity as a whole. This definition, he said, meant that perpetrators were to be prosecuted anywhere, by any country.

This rational, he went on to say, constituted the basis for the concept of universal jurisdiction, which is being applied by some countries where Israel Defense Forces officers are charged for alleged violations during their command in the West Bank and Gaza.

The formative event of the universal jurisdiction concept, Goldstone told listeners, was the trial that Israel gave the high-ranking Nazi officer Adolf Eichman in 1961.

The international tribunals that judged Serbian war criminals for their actions in Bosnia, and the establishment of tribunals to review the actions of perpetrators of the Rwandan genocide – in which South Africa-born Goldstone served as chief prosecutor – also relied on lessons drawn from the Holocaust, he said at the lecture.

He noted that no similar courts were set up to look into the Pol Pot regime in Cambodia in the ’70s or Saddam Hussein’s acts against Iraqi Kurds.

The first time such tribunals were set up were for Bosnia, Goldtone said, because this was the first time after the Holocaust that such occurrences happened in “Europe’s backyard.” The war in Bosnia led to the formation of tribunals on crimes against humanity, he said, because European men with “blue eyes and light skin” again carried out actions similar to those observed in the Holocaust.

Israel, he added, was one of the first countries to support the formation of permanent court of law for crimes against humanity – a proposal that came up following the successful performance of the special tribunals on Bosnia.

However, that changed, he said, after Egypt insisted at the Rome conference that the mandate of this permanent court include occupied territories. This prompted Israel to join the six other countries that voted against the formation of the International Court of Justice, including the United States, China and Libya.

of course the united states’ response was typical in spite of all that is said about goldstone and his allegiances to the zionist entity and the lessons of the nazi holocaust listed above:

After several days of reticence, the Obama administration said Friday that a United Nations report accusing Israel of war crimes in Gaza was unfair to Israel and did not take adequate account of “deplorable” actions by the militant group Hamas in the conflict last winter.

The report, issued by a commission led by a South African judge, Richard Goldstone, said Israel had used disproportionate force in Gaza, resulting in the death of about 1,400 civilians.

It also described the firing of rockets by Hamas at Israeli towns and villages as a war crime.

The Israeli government quickly rejected the findings of the report. But the United States waited several days before speaking out.

“Although the report addresses all sides of the conflict, its overwhelming focus is on the actions of Israel,” a State Department spokesman, Ian C. Kelly, said.

could this be because zionist thomas friedman now has obama’s ear? regardless, the reaction to this report should not only be war crimes tribunals, but also sanctions. if only there would be a credible leader in power somewhere on this planet to lead the way on this…

Qué bonita ocasión.

Sonrisas Nerviosas, sobre todo en un tímido Eduardo Frei que pareciera no controlar la situación.

Uma coisa que percebi quando falo com pessoas que foram ao Chile, é que pela capital chilena tiveram uma breve passagem ja que preferiram passar mais dias em outras partes do país como Atacama, Valparaiso, aos lagos dos Andes ou para esquiar, claro que são lugares que valem muito a pena, não digo que não, mas como sempre digo a capital de um país quando realmente é seu principal estado fala muito sobre o país.

Um tour por Santiago é um banho de cultura e historia, construções ao estilo europeu, ruas limpas, ver os guardas, estar em lugares onde tiveram acontecimentos históricos como no Palacio de la Moneda onde sofreu o golpe de estado Salvador Allende pelo general Augusto Pinochet. Ou que tal um passeio pela zona Nice de Santiago, o moderno e o tradicional se misturam nessa cidade cheia de atrações e o povo chileno gosta muito de brasileiros.

www.royal-holiday.com

11.september er en dato jeg husker på, men ikke av angrepene i USA i 2001. Jeg sikter til Chile.

Det andre 11.september vi skal huske på er årsdagen for fascistkuppet mot den folkevalgte Salvador Allende, ledet av Augusto Pinochet – støttet av USA. Kuppet i Chile førte til et blodig amerikansk-støtta diktatur som varte fra 1973 til rundt 1990. Pinochets regime var et borgerlig terrorregime, støttet av USA, som undertrykte arbeiderklassen. Makta til borgerskapet lå trygt.

Dette regimet er skyld i titusenvis av henrettelser av venstreorienterte opposisjonelle, og alle de menneskelivene som gikk tapt er langt flere enn angrepene mot USA i 2001. I USA læres man at en skal gråte over tapene av de 3000 amerikanere som døde i 2001, men deres skyld i titusenvis av drap i Chile er ikke noe problem. Dette forklarer at USA-imperialismen ikke verdsetter livet til menneskene i den tredje verden, og at forbrytelser mot dem kan benyttes i kampen for mer profitt.

Selv om regjeringen til Salvador Allende var revisjonistisk og lente seg mot Sovjetunionen, så foretrakk det pro-sovjetiske regimet en annen linje enn underkastelse for de vestlige imperialistmaktenes dominans. Men den sovjet-revisjonistiske linja om ”fredelig overgang til sosialismen” skulle vise seg å ende med undergang for de revolusjonære mot det USA-støtta kuppet. Arbeiderklassen var ikke væpna.

Den kommunistiske bevegelsen må lære av hendelsene i Chile i 1973.

For some peoples , September 11 will mark the memory of the military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet at the head of war dogs trained by the CIA and NSA, and will mark the first political assassination of the Chilean combatants for freedom Salvador Allende September 11, 1973

Salvador Allende holds a unique place in history, as he was the world’s first democratically-elected Marxist leader of any nation. Sadly, President Allende of Chile’s election sent a shiver down the spine of the West who were in the middle of a Cold War, whose egos were reeling from the failure to topple communism in Vietnam and who still felt the threat posed by the Cuban Missile Crisis1. Allende was elected to power with 36.2% of the vote in 1970 – his term was to be cut short less than three years later by General Augusto Pinochet. Both Allende and Pinochet were dogmatic men, each believing his cause was the right one and neither left room for compromise – when two men of this disposition clash, tragedy is the only outcome. This entry chronicles the events of the day that democracy died in Chile.

From mid-August 1973 there had been rumblings of a coup brewing in Chile – the economy was suffering due to the withdrawal of foreign investment in the democratically-elected state. At 4am on 11 September, a date that is now synonymous with strikes against democracy, military units stationed throughout Chile reported for action to the leaders of the coup, led by Augusto Pinochet2. By 7am, these troops were being deployed, their aim to wrest the urban centres of Chile from local politicians. The most effective operation was carried out in Concepción, the country’s third largest city – the military had cut all the phone lines of governmental personnel and had rounded everyone up and placed them on an island to keep them from communicating what had happened to the rest of the world. Once these key players had been removed, the city slipped into military hands. The whole operation took less than 85 minutes to execute.

Valparaíso, Chile’s major port, was taken in stages. The navy had seized the port by 7am but they were unsure at this time whether or not the Chilean army was on their side or not. However, it became clear that all the armed forces were in cahoots and the city and port fell in a matter of hours. While two of the country’s largest cities fell, the nation slept, blissfully unaware of the turmoil about to erupt.

The Day Unfolds

At 6.20am, President Allende was alerted to the fact that the navy were trying to capture the port of Valparaíso and on hearing the news, he immediately removed himself to La Moneda, the presidential palace in the heart of the nation’s capital, Santiago – surely the next target on the military’s list. Allende was given the opportunity to leave the country by plane in an offer made by a military aide-de-camp General von Schowen. Allende declined the offer saying:

Tell General von Schowen that the President of Chile does not flee in a plane. As he knows how a soldier should act, I will know how to fulfil my duty as President of the Republic.
By 8.30am, Radio Agricultura, an anti-Allende broadcast station, relayed the news of the coup to the nation and demanded Allende’s resignation. Allende, never one to shirk confrontation, retorted in a broadcast:

I am ready to resist by whatever means, even at the cost of my life, so that this may serve as a lesson to the ignominious history of those who use force not reason.

By the time the broadcast had ended, the police, army and navy had mobilised against the Allende government. One by one, those great voices of democracy, independent radio stations, were switched and were replaced by military justifications for the coup. After his announcement, Allende, for some unknown reason, made a brief appearance on the balcony. What he would have seen was the city’s population hurrying home to their families, and preparing themselves for a long siege.

At 9.30am, Allende made his last address to the nation and the ensuing hours were filled with reports of other towns and cities falling and it was during these hours that first news came in that people were being herded into stadiums and onto islands. During these hours, the staff at La Moneda started to leave the palace to be with their families or to join in the fight against Allende. By mid-morning, the palace was surrounded by tanks and the Chilean President was under siege.

It was at this point that the military started negotiations with the President from the base across the street in the Ministry of Defence, opposite La Moneda. For next few hours, desperate calls and random sniper fire flew between the two buildings. At 11.55am, two Hawker Hunter jets launched 18 rockets at the palace and each one struck home with impressive accuracy (this in the days before smart bombs). Why send in the planes when the tanks would have sufficed? The planes were a clear indication to Allende and the Chilean population that the armed forces were 100% behind the coup – the navy had captured the ports, the army the towns and now the air force was taking La Moneda. The air strikes would have also actively discouraged resistance from the factories whose workers were the staunchest supporters of Allende and his Marxist beliefs. By the time the last rocket had hit, democracy in Chile was teetering on the brink of oblivion.

The Storming of La Moneda

At 1.30pm, a group of people were seen waving the white flag of surrender at a side door of La Moneda. Among them was Patricio Guijón who was to give the most controversial and hotly debated accounts of the last moments of President Allende. He said that as he was leaving the palace:

I saw the President, seated on a sofa, fire a submachine gun that he held between his legs. I saw it, but I did not hear it. I saw his body shudder and the roof of his skull fly off.

The suicide was announced via a photo taken by a press photographer, invited in by the military. Allende’s body was subjected to a rudimentary and private autopsy and his cadaver was flown to Viña del Mar and placed in the family tomb. The headstone was desecrated by removing all mention of the Allende family name. Thus the man who had risen to international prominence as the world’s first democratically elected Marxist leader was laid to rest in an anonymous grave.

The documents, including minutes of meetings between Henry Kissinger, Kissinger capital falcons, vultures Zionist Behemoth Americans, with CIA officials of the antenna of Santiago, and summaries of covert action undertaken in 1970, provide compelling evidence that the destabilization directed by Washington have been conducted on the spot against the Allende government.

There has been much conjecture as to whether or not Allende was murdered or took his own life. the photos were never published and stories abound of chest and abdomen wounds that would indicate murder – and then there is Guijón’s dubious testimony (how could he be close enough to see the skull blow off but not hear the shot?). However President Allende died, one thing remains – by mid-afternoon on 11 September, 1973, Chile had lost its President, Democracy had been dealt a blow that it would take 25 years to recover from and the world was about to witness one of the worst cases of political cleansing.

Reports of dissident killing in this stadium comes from multiple sources .

Nobody knows how many people died during the coup, but it goes without saying that many more died in the ensuing weeks and the military dictatorship that followed. Chilean liberals of all walks of life were rounded up and were either executed or ‘disappeared’. One such example is Victor Jara, the celebrated folk singer, who was executed in the very stadium where he had played to great critical acclaim.

Source ;

http://www.hellblazer.com/2003/09/remembering-911—1973.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/chile/history/0,,1025953,00.html

http://foia.state.gov/Reports/ChurchReport.asp

http://www.geocities.com/socialistparty/chile.htm

http://www.iisg.nl/collections/chile/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_Junta_of_Chile_(1973)

El pasado día 11 de Septiembre se conmemoró el 36 aniversario de la muerte del presidente de Chile, Salvador Allende debido al golpe de estado del general Augusto Pinochet, durante el cual bombardeó el palacio de la Moneda, sede del gobierno chileno, Allende murió desgraciadamente en el palacio presidencial defendiendo la democracia en Chile y su propia vida.

Salvador Allende, presidente de Chile entre 1970 y 1973

Político chileno, líder del Partido Socialista Chileno, del que fue cofundador en 1933,  presidente de Chile desde 1970 hasta el golpe de estado de 1973, antes de ser presidente Allende participo de forma decisiva en la vida política chilena ya que fue diputado, ministro de Salubridad del gobierno de Pedro Aguirre Cerda, y senador desde 1945 hasta 1970, se presentó hasta en cuatro ocasiones a les elecciones a la presidencia, pero hasta en su última ocasión no logró obtener los votos necesarios para serlo, tiene Salvador Allende el honor de ser el primer presidente marxista en acceder de forma democrática al poder.

Palacio de la Moneda, sede del gobierno chileno siendo bombardeado

Desde la fecha de comienzo del mandato (el 3 de noviembre de 1970), las dificultades políticas, sociales y económicas que el nuevo gobierno debió enfrentar fueron inmensas. Ya antes de la asunción presidencial se realizaron intentos por abortar el proceso, el más grave de los cuales terminó con el asesinato por parte de un comando de ultraderecha apoyado por la CIA del Comandante en Jefe del Ejército, general René Schneider, que era un decidido partidario de la subordinación del poder militar al civil, afortunadamente no ocurrieron estos golpes de estado contra el gobierno de Allende.

Allende durante el bombardeo

Su plan de Gobierno en Chile llamado socialismo a la chilena consistía en los siguientes puntos: una considerable estatización de las áreas «claves» de la economía chilena, la nacionalización del Cobre, sin pago de indemnizaciones a las empresas de EEUU, lo cual significó el enfrentamiento con el gobierno de Richard Nixon, quienes a partir de ese momento los EEUU apoyaron a todos los grupos opositores al gobierno socialista, una reforma agraria, un aumento de los salarios a todos los chilenos, etc.. En definitiva quería aumentar el nivel de vida de todos los chilenos, cosa que me parece muy positiva pero tuvo la mala suerte de toparse con una gran oposición en el parlamento ya que la gran mayoría de diputados eran de la oposición con lo que tenía grandes dificultades para llevar a cabo sus proyectos, en la calle era un gran ídolo sobretodo de las clases populares que se veían beneficiados por sus políticas sociales.

En el plano exterior Allende al iniciar estas medidas sociales se ganó la confianza del Bloque soviético y de Cuba que le apoyaron durante todo su mandato mandándole ayuda material y asesores industriales sobre todo, aunque se ganó la enemistad de los EEUU que por medio de la CIA apoyaban a todos los medios subversivos al régimen de Allende financiándolos económicas y logísticamente, en el plano interior el gran problema que tuvo Salvador Allende fue la economía que se vio muy debilitada ya que los gastos del Estado aumentaron drásticamente, la inflación se hizo incontrolable  ya que el incremento de las gastos del sector público, la expansión de los subsidios a las empresas publicas y el deterioro de la recaudación tributaria generaron un déficit público de magnitud impresionante haciendo que la economía chilena cayese en quiebra en 1973 y haciendo que la población chilena estuviera desabastecida de alimentos y bienes haciendo que el nivel de vida fuese  malo antes del Golpe de Estado.

Finalmente la derecha chilena y algunos sectores de la Democracia Cristiana consideraron la situación difícil de sostener, por lo que decidieron, recurrir al recurso del golpe de estado militar contra el presidente Allende. El golpe fue iniciado el 11 de Septiembre de 1973 al mando del general Augusto Pinochet y ayudado económicamente por la CIA y varios sectores ultraconservadores de la sociedad chilena. Este golpe hizo que en Chile cambiase la democracia por la dictadura militar durante 16 años, en este periodo se cometieron muchas violaciones de los derechos humanos y asesinatos en masa a todo el que se opusiese al régimen militar, se calcula que perdieron la vida unas 2279 personas, la gran mayoría, gente que no pertenecía a partidos políticos o habiendo pertenecido a partidos políticos se les acusaba de estar ayudando al régimen de Allende.

General Augusto Pinochet, lider del Golpe de Estado contra Allende

Las violaciones sucesivas de los derechos humanos fueron una práctica sistemática durante el Régimen Militar, la cual fue posible dada la gran concentración de los distintos poderes del Estado en manos de la Junta Militar de Gobierno, la renuncia del poder judicial a algunas de sus funciones, a la creación de organismos represivos (DINA y CNI) y a la ausencia total de libertad de prensa, se puede decir y es correcto que en el Chile de Pinochet se cometieron delitos contra la humanidad, y es cierto que se cometieron, solo hay que ver la gran cantidad de niños que robaron los militares a los que asesinaban o a simples familias que les quitaban a sus hijos, el régimen militar aparte de asesinar a todo elemento subversivo al régimen que imperaba en Chile, se hizo habitual la práctica de torturas concretamente hacia los prisioneros políticos con el fin de obtener información y datos, todas estas atroces torturas que muchas de ellas llegaban a matar a las víctimas, las cometieron los cuerpos de seguridad del Estado que supuestamente tenían la obligación de salvaguardar la vida de los civiles en Chile. Fue casi como una guerra civil lo ocurrido en Chile ya que no es comprensible que los militares asesinaran, secuestraran y torturasen a miles de personas que eran inocentes, todo esto se cometió gracias a la política exterior nefasta de los EEUU de Nixon que veían como el régimen de Allende podría convertirse en una nueva Cuba, vamos una tremenda tontería de Nixon y su parafernalia, ya que los EEUU en todo el siglo XX han apoyado a todos los regímenes dictatoriales de derecha de Sudamérica, mientras que los de izquierda los intentaba quitar por todos los medios.

Allende no era un Fidel Castro ni nada parecido como fueron los dirigentes comunistas de aquellos años, fue uno de los grandes presidentes que ha tenido Chile en el siglo XX, sólo quería cambiar el nivel de vida de los chilenos pero no lo consiguió por problemas económicos como la inflación, EEUU que fue junto con los miliares el culpable de la Dictadura Militar en Chile debería aprender más de lo que fue Salvador Allende y quitarse ya de una vez esa mentalidad de que si hay un gobierno que no me gusta, lo intento echar por la fuerza, hay otros medios pacíficos y diplomáticos para conseguir las políticas internacionales que uno quiere o desea, con esto que escribo le doy mi particular homenaje a quien ha sido uno de los grandes políticos de Sudamérica.

written by GA Pasha

In the last few weeks a sudden increase has been seen in news, internet activity and blogs related to the issue of security costs for General (retd.) Pervez Musharraf. The instance a news is put up giving the details of the costs on Musharraf’s security, in minutes up to ten comments appear all not only criticizing the exercise but all saying nearly the same thing. Also, up to two of these comments are seemingly from Muslims who demean Musharraf for not relying on God’s protection but on humans.

If one reads the news and comments below the news, he/she quickly comes to the conclusion:

i) Musharraf=Saddam/Augusto Pinochet;
ii) Musharraf has looted untold amounts of money which he is not using but instead making British tax payers pay for his security;
iii) Musharraf is too scared to go out in open without British security; and
iv) Musharraf is having a life of luxury and pleasure in his “three bed-room flat” in a not so posh area of London where no millionaires or politicians live.

Some Other Facts

No one talked about the security details provided to Prime Ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif. No British news paper ran the story nor does the public know how much it costed the British tax payer.

Although it is indirectly well propagated that Musharraf has looted untold amounts of monies from Pakistan but he is unwilling to use any of his money to buy his protection, i.e. he is willing to die rather than use the money he has “looted”. Also, this person who has looted billions is living in a middle class suburb of London in a simple three bed room flat. All this implies that Musharraf has looted billions but does not want to spend a single penny of these looted on himself – and has safely stashed them away (for who and what reason no one knows). Contrast this to two former Prime Ministers of Pakistan who looted billions from the poor public and bought palaces in every country they visited.

Comparing Musharraf’s security with other political figures in London, we need to highlight another fact. If one of them is given a security detail of 1 pound, in return he/she usually spends 100 or 1000 pounds (from the looted money). This is not the case with Musharraf. In fact he is the first such personality who is givin the British a “net loss”, i.e. British Government is spending a lot more on him than he is spending in London. This must be one of the causes of sleepless nights for some.

Currently, there are many others who are recipient of similar British courtesy; Altaf Hussain to name one. But how much he is getting from British Government/MI6 or how much he is giving them no one knows.

The case of Salman Rushdie is purposely not discussed here. However, this much would be said: There have been numerous deadly assassination attempts on Musharraf from which he had barely escaped alive, but none so far on Rushdie. Dectractors who have announced to kill Musharraf are still alive and at large – the only person who declared Rushdie to be eligible for murder is dead.

The Hidden Truth

Musharraf never asked the British Government for his current security detail. When he was offered in the beginning he politely declined. After which he was deemed a public security risk and round the clock monitoring of his activities was initiated on the premise that he is a public hazard.

To be short and simple, the British Government needs to keep a “very” close eye on Musharraf’s activities. If it uses normal espionage techniques it would lead to a disgrace on international level if it ever comes out (which would eventually come out). There are two reasons (which are purposely not discussed here) for which the British aka US needs a close eye on Musharraf. Seeing no other way, they opted for this unconventional yet somewhat effective approach. Seeing the media raising its eyebrows over the amount being spent on keeping Musharraf’s activities in check, the government purposely released the figures and is trying to take the story in a completely different direction.

Food for Thought

One last food for thought for all Musharraf haters. If he has looted billions from Pakistan then:
i) why doesn’t he spend any of that on himself or his family (including son and daughter)?
ii) why doesn’t he use his looted money to buy his security if he feels threatened?

No one wants to answer these two questions.

Taken from: http://www.isb.pakistanleague.org/index.php/component/myblog/blogger/GA%20Pasha/

Salvador Allende, da Unidade Popular ( aliança de socialistas , comunistas e cristãos de     esquerda ) elegeu-se presidente do Chile em 1970, com 34% dos votos.

Seu governo nacionalizou mineradoras, algumas companhias multinacionais, entre elas mineradoras norte-americanas, e passou a ser alvo de uma campanha de desestabilização promovida pelos Estados Unidos (EUA).

Um golpe militar , há exatos 36 anos , poria fim ao seu governo, ele foi deposto após um ataque ao Palácio Presidencial de la Moneda em 11 de setembro de 1973.

“Versões sobre a morte de Allende são paradoxais”

Há duas versões aceitas sobre a morte de Allende: uma é que ele se suicida no Palácio de La Moneda, cercado por tropas do exército, com a arma que lhe fora dada por Fidel Castro; a outra versão é que ele foi assassinado pelas tropas invasoras. Sua sobrinha Isabel Allende Llona é uma das que acreditam que seu tio foi assassinado. A filha do Presidente, a deputada Isabel Allende, declarou que a versão do suicídio é a correta. Allende foi inicialmente enterrado numa cova comum, num caixão com as iniciais “NN”. Com o término da ditadura de Pinochet, Allende teve um funeral com honras militares, em 1990.

O general Augusto Pinochet assumiu o poder , chefiando uma junta militar que dissolveu os partidos políticos e iniciou um período de censura à imprensa e de repressão aos oposicionistas. A violência da ditadura deixou milhares de mortos, desaparecidos e exilados.

Mais sobre 11 de setembro de 1973 , em um paralelo aos atentados de 2001 , nos EUA , podem ser vistos neste documentário do ano de 2002.

( legendado em português )

]]> http://baruda.net/2009/09/11/11-settembre-1973-11-settembre-2009-mai-dimenticare/ Fri, 11 Sep 2009 07:51:15 +0000 baruda http://baruda.net/2009/09/11/11-settembre-1973-11-settembre-2009-mai-dimenticare/ http://caouivador.wordpress.com/2009/09/11/11-de-setembro-de-1973/ Fri, 11 Sep 2009 04:05:12 +0000 Rodrigo Cardia http://caouivador.wordpress.com/2009/09/11/11-de-setembro-de-1973/

Há 36 anos, um brutal golpe militar derrubava o presidente do Chile, Salvador Allende, que dizem ter cometido suicídio. O país, que era um dos mais estáveis politicamente da América Latina, começava a viver a cruel ditadura do general Augusto Pinochet. Foi o último regime militar a cair na América do Sul: Pinochet deixou o governo (mas não o poder, já que seguiu comandando o Exército até 1998) apenas em 11 de março de 1990.

Seguramente, esta será a última oportunidade em que poderei dirigir-me a vocês. A Força Aérea bombardeou as antenas da Rádio Postales e da Rádio Corporación. Minhas palavras não têm amargura, mas decepção. Que sejam elas um castigo moral para quem traiu seu juramento: soldados do Chile, comandantes-em-chefe titulares, o almirante Merino, que se autodesignou comandante da Armada, e o senhor Mendoza, general rastejante que ainda ontem manifestara sua fidelidade e lealdade ao Governo, e que também se autodenominou diretor geral dos carabineros.

Diante destes fatos só me cabe dizer aos trabalhadores: Não vou renunciar! Colocado numa encruzilhada histórica, pagarei com minha vida a lealdade ao povo. E lhes digo que tenho a certeza de que a semente que entregamos à consciência digna de milhares e milhares de chilenos, não poderá ser ceifada definitivamente. [Eles] têm a força, poderão nos avassalar, mas não se detém os processos sociais nem com o crime nem com a força. A história é nossa e a fazem os povos.

Trabalhadores de minha Pátria: quero agradecer-lhes a lealdade que sempre tiveram, a confiança que depositaram em um homem que foi apenas intérprete de grandes anseios de justiça, que empenhou sua palavra em que respeitaria a Constituição e a lei, e assim o fez.

Neste momento definitivo, o último em que eu poderei dirigir-me a vocês, quero que aproveitem a lição: o capital estrangeiro, o imperialismo, unidos à reação criaram o clima para que as Forças Armadas rompessem sua tradição, que lhes ensinara o general Schneider e reafirmara o comandante Araya, vítimas do mesmo setor social que hoje estará esperando com as mãos livres, reconquistar o poder para seguir defendendo seus lucros e seus privilégios.

Dirijo-me a vocês, sobretudo à mulher simples de nossa terra, à camponesa que nos acreditou, à mãe que soube de nossa preocupação com as crianças. Dirijo-me aos profissionais da Pátria, aos profissionais patriotas que continuaram trabalhando contra a sedição auspiciada pelas associações profissionais, associações classistas que também defenderam os lucros de uma sociedade capitalista. Dirijo-me à juventude, àqueles que cantaram e deram sua alegria e seu espírito de luta. Dirijo-me ao homem do Chile, ao operário, ao camponês, ao intelectual, àqueles que serão perseguidos, porque em nosso país o fascismo está há tempos presente; nos atentados terroristas, explodindo as pontes, cortando as vias férreas, destruindo os oleodutos e os gasodutos, frente ao silêncio daqueles que tinham a obrigação de agir. Estavam comprometidos.

A historia os julgará.

Seguramente a Rádio Magallanes será calada e o metal tranqüilo de minha voz não chegará mais a vocês. Não importa. Vocês continuarão a ouvi-la. Sempre estarei junto a vocês. Pelo menos minha lembrança será a de um homem digno que foi leal à Pátria. O povo deve defender-se, mas não se sacrificar. O povo não deve se deixar arrasar nem tranqüilizar, mas tampouco pode humilhar-se.

Trabalhadores de minha Pátria, tenho fé no Chile e seu destino. Superarão outros homens este momento cinzento e amargo em que a traição pretende impor-se. Saibam que, antes do que se pensa, de novo se abrirão as grandes alamedas por onde passará o homem livre, para construir uma sociedade melhor.Viva o Chile! Viva o povo! Viva os trabalhadores! Estas são minhas últimas palavras e tenho a certeza de que meu sacrifício não será em vão. Tenho a certeza de que, pelo menos, será uma lição moral que castigará a perfídia, a covardia e a traição.

(Salvador Allende, em 11 de setembro de 1973)

September 11, 2009, marks the 36th anniversary of the brutal overthrow of Salvador Allende, the democratically elected socialist president of Chile. Allende was overthrown in a military coup, led by General Augusto Pinochet, that had the full backing of the United States government.

Allende’s beginnings
Salvador Allende was born on July 26, 1908, in Valparaíso, Chile. His petty bourgeois (middle class), radical-liberal family had a history of involvement in social struggles. His grandfather was a founder of the reformist Radical Party and the first public school in Chile (at a time when the Catholic Church controlled education). His father and uncles also belonged to the Radical Party.

Besides the influences of his family, Allende was also influenced by an anarchist shoemaker named Juan Demarchi. He became even more conscious while attending medical school, during which time he lived in very poor conditions with a group of students who often read and discussed books by revolutionaries like Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky.

Salvador Allende

During his time at college, he became an outspoken leader of the Chilean Student Federation, and participated in a number of protests against U.S.-backed dictator Carlos Ibáñez. This activity resulted in numerous arrests for the young Salvador.

After graduating from college in 1932, Allende had a difficult time finding work as a doctor because of his reputation as a radical. He finally found a job preforming autopsies on the corpses of the poor. Seeing so many dead as a result of curable diseases, simply because they could not afford treatment, further affected Allende.

Allende married Hortensia Bussi, who was herself related to Marmaduque Grove, a military general who lead a 1932 coup that resulted in the formation of the short lived “Socialist Republic of Chile” (June 4 – 16, 1932). Grove was also a founder of the Socialist Party of Chile, which was formed in 1933. Allende was one of its first members.

Entering government

In 1937, Allende was elected to the Chilean National Congress. Soon after taking office, he introduced a number of bills on public healthcare, welfare and the rights of women.

He served as Minister of Health in the “Popular Unity” government (made up of the Socialist Party, Communist Party, Radical Party, Social Democratic Party and the Popular Unitary Action Movement) in both 1939 and 1941.

While serving in this position, he released a book entitled “The Chilean Socio-Medical Reality.” This book explained how certain health issues (infant and maternal mortality, tuberculosis, infectious diseases, etc.) prevalent among the working class were caused by their poor living conditions, and argued for serious steps to be taken to rectify the problem. Instead of a strictly medical approach, he proposed social changes (redistribution of housing and land, income redistribution, improving workers’ wages and workplace safety, etc.) that could get to the root of the problem.

In 1942, Allende became the leader of the Socialist Party and was elected to the Chilean Senate. Not long after, he introduced legislation that would create a national health care service. After its approval, Chile became the first country in the Americas to make health care available to all of its citizens (something most of the countries in the Western Hemisphere still haven’t done).

He remained in the Senate (reelected several times), while running for president in 1952, 1958 and 1964. After his three unsuccessful bids for the presidency, he joked that his head stone would read “Here lies the next president of Chile.”

But Allende was gaining popularity. In each election, he gained more votes than he had in the last. The imperialist U.S. government was becoming worried. In 1959, a year after almost winning the presidential election in Chile, Allende traveled to Cuba, where Fidel Castro, Ernesto “Che” Guevara and others had recently lead a revolution that ousted U.S.-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista. While there, he befriended Fidel and Raul Castro, and received a copy of Che’s book “Guerrilla Warfare” which contained an inscription that read: “To Salvador Allende, who is trying to obtain the same result by other means, Affectionately, Che.”

Allende, a socialist, friend of the Cuban Revolution, and supporter of communist guerrilla movements across Latin
America as well as Che Guevara, who was murdered while leading a guerrilla war in Bolivia in 1967, looked like he may become the next president of Chile.

Allende speaks to supporters.

If that happened, the U.S. government feared, several of the capitalist exploiters it represented, such as the owners of the ITT, Anacoda and Kennecott corporations – who were heavily invested in the country – might have their factories nationalized. On top of this, the election of Allende would interfere with the U.S. government’s attempts to isolate Cuba, and turn back its revolution.

Furthermore, if the events lead to a socialist revolution in which the local capitalist rulers and imperialist lackeys were overthrown by the working class, it would open the doorway to similar events throughout Latin America.

Preemptive strike

The U.S. government, through its various agencies, went into full gear to prevent the election of Salvador Allende in the 1970 elections.

Through, and with the cooperation of ITT and other channels, the CIA illegally funded the election campaign of  right-wing capitalist Jorge Alessandri, the incumbent who Allende was running against. (This was nothing new. In 1964 they had done the same thing, funneling large sums of money to Allende’s then-opponent.)

The CIA launched a program called “FUBELT,” aimed at preventing Allende from becoming elected, or failing that, bring his time in office to a rapid conclusion.

In a document dated September 17, 1970 (now available in the U.S. National Security Archives) describing the results of a meeting between CIA chief Richard Helms and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger, instructions for CIA operatives were laid out. “President Nixon had decided that an Allende regime in Chile was not acceptable to the United States.. The President asked the Agency to prevent Allende from coming to power or to unseat him. The President authorized ten million dollars for this purpose, if needed.”

Despite all of this, the Chilean voters elected Allende in a three-way race (a liberal candidate from the Christian Democratic Party was also running). A section of the opposition to Allende argued for a run off election since Allende got less than 50 percent of the votes, even though there was no mention of the need for such in the constitution. In response, the National Congress took up the question.

In the meantime, the capitalist media went to work trying to whip up opposition to Allende’s soon-to-be presidency. The cover of TIME magazine’s October 19, 1970 issue (published only days before Allende’s election was to be made official) read “Marxist Threat In The Americas – Chile’s Salvador Allende.”

A threat to whom?

Still, not everyone was fooled. One reader, in a letter to the editor published in the next issue, wrote: “Sir: Intrigued by your marvelous cold war headline, MARXIST THREAT IN THE AMERICAS, I read on to see who is being threatened. Apparently it’s some U.S. copper firms, the telephone company, and assorted juntas. Somehow, I’m not alarmed. I am, however, irritated by your persistent assumption that any form of Marxism enjoying any form of success in any part of the world is, ipso facto, a threat. This kind of thinking gave us Viet Nam. And it ignores the obvious: non-Marxist politicians have generally failed to meet the needs of the masses. I suggest we let our humanity transcend our cold war reflexes and hope that the people of Latin America are finding some kind of solution to their problems. We haven’t been much help.”

The CIA’s work continued as well. Another secret CIA document dated October 16, 1970 read in part, “It is firm and continuing policy that Allende be overthrown by a coup. It would be much preferable to have this transpire prior to 24 October [the date Allende's election would be ratified] but efforts in this regard will continue vigorously beyond this date.”

Chile’s workers and farmers were outraged by the delay and the idea that the man they had elected may not take office. Allende himself warned “Santiago (Chile’s  capital) will be painted red with blood if I am not ratified as President.”

Finally, and in spite of all the maneuvering on the part of the imperialists and their representatives and agents, the National Congress was forced by popular pressure to declare Salvador Allende President of Chile on October 24, 1970.

Imperialist aggression in full effect
Allende took office on November 3. Twelve days earlier, General René Schneider, Commander in Chief of Chile’s army, was killed while resisting a kidnaping attempt by another group of soldiers under the leadership of Roberto Viaux. The kidnaping attempt was a part of a plan promoted by the CIA to carry out a coup before Allende could take office.  Schneider had to be removed because he was fully opposed any violation of the constitution, such as a coup; but he wasn’t supposed to be killed. Schneider’s murder drew popular outrage, and forced the Viaux clique to abandon their plans.

With plans for a coup temporarily defeated, and the workers and farmers emboldened, Allende went to work. Diplomatic relations were immediately established with Cuba (in spite a U.S.-pushed Organization of American States convention forbidding countries in the Western Hemisphere from doing so) and the USSR, the People’s Republic of China was recognized (for the first time by any country in South America), and a number of social programs were established.

The first steps were taken on the “Chilean road to socialism.”

Foreign owned banks, copper and coal mines, and steel and iron mills were nationalized.

In the nationalized industries and public works projects which were launched, employment was made available for the poor and unemployed. As a result, the unemployment rate was cut in half.

The healthcare and education systems were put taken over by the government and opened to the public.

Free milk, which many could not afford previously, was provided to each child to prevent malnutrition.

Large estates were broken up and redistributed to those without land.

Prices on essential products were frozen, while at the same time workers were given raises.

Taxes were reformed so that the poorest of the poor wouldn’t have to shoulder the burden.

Workers march in support of Allende.

Hundreds of thousands of retirees had their pensions raised.

A state of the art networked of telex machines and computers was installed that allowed factories to communicate with each other in real time, thus facilitating planned production.

Workers and farmers were mobilized. Landless farmers began to occupy land, and industrial workers began to take over their workplaces. Industrial output increased by 14 percent.

In 1971, Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro was invited to Chile. He spent several weeks there, holding a number of public rallies, which drew huge crowds, and giving the socialist members of Chile’s government advice.

Allende and Castro greet supporters.

In response to the events in Chile, the U.S. imperialists began a campaign of economic warfare, just as they had (and continue to do) with Cuba. President Richard Nixon demanded that his foot soldiers “make the [Chilean] economy scream.” In line with this, U.S. Ambassador to Chile, Edward M. Korry, proclaimed, “Not a nut or bolt shall reach Chile under Allende. … we shall do all within our power to condemn Chile and all Chileans to utmost deprivation and poverty.”

What about the “democracy” that the U.S. government has always claimed to uphold? Henry Kissinger made their position on that clear, saying “I don’t see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its people. The issues are much too important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves.”

This should come of no surprise. The same thing happened in Viet Nam. When the U.S. government realized that communist leader Ho Chi Minh was sure to win upcoming elections in that country, they canceled them! In the same vein, they sponsored a coup against democratically elected Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez just a few years ago (though a mass mobilization prevented its success).

Besides cutting off trade, credit and aid to Chile, the U.S. government sponsored publications, television and radio broadcasts that slandered Allende and worked to destabilize the country. Among other things, they claimed Allende and the Popular Unity government were puppets of the USSR (just as they had done with Cuba), even though this was clearly not the case. Although Allende maintained friendly relations with the Soviet Union, he didn’t take orders from its leadership. This was made obvious during his time as a Senator, during which he openly denounced its invasions of Hungary and Czechoslovakia.

Of course, like democracy, the U.S. government is only concerned with the truth when it serves the interests of the capitalist ruling class.

Problems arise
Things were far from perfect under Allende, though the imperialists had as much to do with that as anything.

The imperialists and local capitalists had begun withdrawing their investments from the country as soon as Allende was elected. This only increased as it became clear that the oppressed and exploited were on the move.

The moves by the U.S. government and its agents to “make the economy scream” began to take their toll. Aid from the U.S., which had amounted to $1 billion (US) during the six-year presidency of Alessandri alone, disappeared after Allende took office.

Trade was limited or refused by the U.S. and its puppets, causing exports to fall by 24 percent. At the same time, a
slight drop in agricultural output (which was expected for a short period while land was redistributed) made it  necessary to increase imports by 26 percent.

Shortages and inflation led to the creation of a black market, leading to even more problems.

On top of all this, the price of copper, Chile’s main export, which was set internationally, fell from $66 (U.S.) per ton in 1970 to $48 in 1972. This meant a major loss of funds for the country.

Often with direct U.S. assistance, and always with its backing, the capitalists and their agents in Chile launched a serious of “strikes” and lockouts. Through intimidation, blackmail and deception, they were able to get teachers and other workers to walk off the job, bringing the economy to a halt. Elements of the petty bourgeoisie, like private physicians (who were angry about the Socialist government’s programs of public health, which meant less money for them), truck owners, and store owners followed suit.

Through all this, Allende’s popularity continued to grow. In the March 1973 elections, the Popular Unity coalition gained more votes that it had when Allende came into office.

Still, the economic crisis facing the country, and the failure of the Popular Unity government to arm the country’s workers and farmers, led to conditions favorable to the imperialists and their allies.

On June 29, 1973, another coup attempt, known as el Tanquetazo (the tank putsch), was launched. Under the leadership of leading members of a right-wing fascist group called “Fatherland and Liberty,” a force made up of several tanks and dozens of soldiers made its way toward La Moneda (the presidential residence), with the aim of overthrowing Allende and installing a military dictatorship.

Early in the morning hours the coup plotters began firing on La Moneda and the Ministry of Defense. Several workers were killed during the attack.

Allende gave a radio broadcast in which he promised to defend the constitution to the end, while calling on workers to occupy the factories “and be ready in case it is necessary to fight alongside the soldiers of Chile.”

General Carlos Prats, along with others in the military, drew up a plan to counter the advance. Within an hour, they began to move in.

When his group reached the area around La Moneda, Prats made a bold decision. Instead of waging all out warfare, he, along with two others, simply marched up to the tanks outside and commanded those in them to come down and surrender. This process continued to work until one tank operator shouted “I will not surrender General,” while pointing the tank’s barrel at Prats and his group. While the two went back and forth, Major Osvaldo Zabala snuck up behind the tank operator and pointed a rifle at his head, forcing him to give up. More units began to arrive on the scene, including one under the command of Augusto Pinochet himself, future leader of yet another coup. The soldiers that had taken part in the plan to overthrow Allende ran away as fast as they could.

During these events, a large crowd had come to La Moneda to show their support for Allende. He delivered a speech to them, in which he explained what was going on, and asked them to remain calm and continuing to trust in the government.

The coup was smashed, but the threat of another still loomed.

At this time, Allende made a fatal error. He brought leading members of the armed forces into his Cabinet, hoping to win their support.

Allende and Pinochet.

Soon after, a strange incident involving a traffic incident and protests by military officers pressured General Prats, who was then Interior minister and as Commander in Chief of the Army, to resign. In his place, he recommended Augusto Pinochet, then a General Chief of Staff of the Army.

On August 22, 1973, the Christian Democratic Party – which had earlier campaigned on a “socialist” platform, only to ally with right-wing forces after Allende’s election – didn’t wait long to make a move. In control of the Chamber of
Deputies (after forming a bloc with the right-wing National Party), they were able to push through a resolution (though they lacked the two thirds majority required by the constitution to convict a president of abuse of power) which  formally called for another military coup.

The resolution, entitled “Declaration of the Breakdown of Chile’s Democracy,” claimed that Allende had “the goal of establishing a totalitarian system.”

So, to “save democracy,” they called on the Military to overthrow a democratically elected president; and that’s exactly what happened.

The other 9/11
On the morning of September 11, 1973, sections of the Chilean Navy seized the port city of Valparaíso, marking the beginning of a third coup.

As soon as Allende found about the morning’s events, he rushed to La Moneda. With a handful of aides and members of the presidential guard by his side, he prepared for yet another showdown.

It wasn’t long before members of “the Carabineros,” Chile’s national police, were surrounding La Moneda. Allende got to work trying to reach some of the generals of the various branches of the armed forces; but he was unable to get in contact with any of them.

“No one is answering. I think that this time all of them are involved,” he remarked to his aides. He was right.

Soon after, President Allende broadcast a message to the people of Chile over the radio.

“Confirmed reports indicate that a sector of the Navy has rebelled and is occupying Valparaíso. Santiago is normal and [the soldiers are] in their barracks. I’m here defending the government that I represent by the will of the people. Be alert and vigilant… I wait for the soldiers of Chile to respond positively and defend the laws and the Constitution.  Workers must go to their workplace and wait for new instructions,” he said.

Allende also got in touch with Rolando Calderón, Secretary General of the CUT (Central Única de Trabajadores), one of the largest unions in the country. He asked Calderón to mobilize the workers in his union to shut down the radio stations broadcasting messages in support of the coup; but this was not done.

Instead, the coup leaders acted first, seizing and shutting down all radio stations supportive, or even neutral, towards Allende.

At 8:40 AM, a radio broadcast was made announcing the coup and its supposed intentions. Augusto Pinochet Ugarte, Commander in Chief of the Army; José Toribio Merino, Commander in Chief of the Navy; Gustavo Leigh, commander in Chief of the Air Force, and César Mendoza Durán, Director General of Carabineros attached their names to the broadcast, signaling their aim to set themselves up as a new ruling junta.

Soon after the broadcast was made, the Carabineros began to withdraw from their positions around La Moneda, and an offer was made to Allende by the coup plotters. There was an airplane ready to take Allende and his family out of the country and to safety; but he’d have to resign as president. He flatly refused.

“I will not surrender, nor resign,” he said.

The last picture taken of Salvador Allende.

Allende then made a final radio broadcast, through the one pro-Allende station that had not yet been shut down. “This will surely be the last time I speak to you,” he said. “Magallanes Radio will be silenced, and the reassuring tone of my voice will not reach you. It doesn’t matter. You will continue hearing it. I will always be with you. At the least, your memory of me will be that of a man who was loyal to the country… The people ought to defend themselves, but not sacrifice themselves. The people ought not let themselves be subdued or persecuted, but neither should they humble themselves… I have faith in Chile and its destiny. Other people will be able to transcend this sad and bitter moment, when treason tries to force itself upon us…I’m sure that my sacrifice will not be in vain… Long live Chile! Long live the people! Long live the workers!”

While the president’s message was broadcast, a number of tanks began to approach, then attack, La Moneda.

Allende threw on an army helmet and grabbed the AK-47 rifle given to him by Fidel Castro. By his side stood just over a hundred supporters, many who were workers. They had a few small weapons, and a handful of bazookas and 30 caliber machine guns; but they were no match for the military forces descending on the building.

The attack on La Moneda.

The soldiers fired tank and machine guns at La Moneda, shattering windows and destroying whole walls. A team in a helicopter patrolled the surrounding area, taking out workers and farmers who had acted as snipers, firing from buildings in defense of the president.

After a short while, there was a cease fire as Allende asked his supporters to lay down their weapons and surrender. Most of those by his side, including his two daughters, left the building. As the end of the evacuation drew near,
fighter jets approached. They proceeded to bomb La Moneda, blowing doors off the hinges and smashing the few windows that were still intact. Helicopters then moved in on the building, firing tear gas canisters.

This was followed by a renewal of the ground attack. As tanks fired, a group of soldiers stormed the door of La Moneda and took the first floor. When Allende learned of the events, he ordered those remaining by his side on the second floor to put down their weapons and leave. Allende proceeded to Independence Hall, where he sat down, put his rifle between his legs, and fired two shots into his brain. This was the end of the democratically elected president of Chile, Salvador Allende. It was also the beginning of a vicious reign of terror that would last close to two decades.

Pinochet’s reign of terror
Once the coup plotters were in full control, Augusto Pinochet declared himself chairman of the junta. He moved quickly to consolidate his rule.

All parties that belonged to the Popular Unity government were banned, along with all leftist and labor organizations.

Augusto Pinochet (center) upon taking power as chairman of the newly formed military dictatorship.

On September 12, 1973, one day after the overthrow of Allende, thousands of Chileans were rounded up and taken to the Chile Stadium in Santiago. For their support of Allende they were tortured and beaten.

Victor Jara, a beloved musician, had every bone in his hands broken by Pinochet’s thugs. As he lay on the ground, his captors mockingly suggested he play them a song. In response, he sung a song supportive of the overthrown Popular Unity government. He was immediately beaten, and then killed by machine gun fire.

A similar fate was shared by at least 3,000 other Chileans over the next seventeen years. More than 30,000 were tortured by Allende’s military and secret police (known as DINA). Several thousands more were forced into exile to escape the repression.

Some of those who were able to escape were tracked down and murdered by DINA, which cooperated with the military dictatorships in Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina and the United States government through “Operation Condor,” a plan to wipe all opposition to imperialism in Latin American off the face of the earth.

Some 30,000 people were “disappeared” under the Operation, which went as far as assassinating Orlando Letelier, a former foreign minister under Salvador Allende, while he was on his way to his new job at the Institute of Policy Studies in Washington, DC, the capital of the United States.

Victim of the Pinochet dictatorship.

In another particularly bloody incident in 1985, leftist professor José Manuel Parada, journalist Manuel Guerrero, and another Chilean named Santiago Nattino were beheaded by uniformed police at the behest of the military dictatorship.

Along side the repression instituted by Chile’s new military regime came unrestricted capitalism. Guided by University of Chicago trained economists, Pinochet instituted a number of “reforms” that spelled disaster for the millions of Chilean workers and farmers.

Pinochet sold nationalized industries, banks and even the pension system to the highest bidder, abolished minimum wage, abolished union rights and seriously reduced taxes on the rich.

The result? Unemployment, which had fallen to 4.4 percent under Allende, jumped to over 30 percent, marking the highest increase ever in Latin American history.

The price of exports fell, as did real wages for workers, while poverty, homelessness, starvation and infant mortality rose dramatically.

This is the “democracy” the CIA-backed coup of 1973 brought to Chile.

In place of the democratically elected Allende, who had allowed his political opposition to participate in government, stood a military dictator who bellowed “not a leaf moves in Chile if I don’t know about it!”

Augusto Pinochet remained in power until 1990, when he stepped down after popular resistance forced him to hold a plebiscite, which he lost, in 1988. The brutal dictator remained Commander-in-Chief of the Army for another ten years and became a “Senator-for-life,” under a clause created in the constitution which was rewritten under his rule, after that.

Pinochet the butcher died of congestive heart failure and pulmonary edema in December, 2006.

Allende’s legacy & lessons for today
The events of September 11, 1973, were tragic, but not inevitable.

In order for us to move forward today, we must draw the lessons of events like these. From these lessons we must develop new strategies and tactics, to better enable us to defeat the handful of capitalist exploiters that run the world once and for all.

From the beginning of Allende’s presidency and before, when the class struggle came out into the open, confrontations between the working class and the local capitalist ruling class and foreign imperialists steadily increased.

While the Popular Unity government’s reforms most definitely benefited the working class, small farmers and women, and gave them more room to maneuver, they weren’t enough.

The Popular Unity Government’s “Chilean path to socialism” was based on a supposed “gradual transformation” of capitalism into socialism; but as Karl Marx, the “father” of communism who first discovered the laws of evolution in human history, pointed out, this is simply not possible.

Speaking of the Paris Commune, the revolutionary uprising in France in 1871 in which workers took power for the first time in history, Marx wrote, “One thing especially was proved by the Commune, viz., that ‘the working class
cannot simply lay hold of the ready-made state machinery, and wield it for its own purposes,”

In other words, you can’t elect socialism, a classless society in which the needs of all are met.

In order establish socialism, the working class must rise up, smash the capitalist state apparatus and take control of the tools and technology used to satisfy the wants and needs of humanity.

While supporting the gains made by workers under the Paris Commune, Marx was also critical of its errors (some of
which have since been duplicated).

For instance, Marx criticized the Communards’ refusal to respond to attacks by the capitalist rulers of France with attacks of its own: “In their reluctance to continue the civil war opened by Thiers’ [leader of the rest of France] burglarious attempt on Montmartre, the Central Committee [elected leadership body of the Paris Commune] made themselves, this time, guilty of a decisive mistake in not at once marching upon Versailles [another major city in
France where Theirs and his forces had gathered after being driven from Paris by its workers], then completely helpless, and thus putting an end to the conspiracies of Thiers and his Rurals.”

Here, Marx was saying that when workers take power, they shouldn’t, and can’t, be afraid to fight back when attacked by the capitalists seeking to restore their control.

Indeed, as a result of the gains they had made under Allende, the Chilean workers were not afraid to respond to such attacks. When the capitalists called strikes, workers organized manufacturing and transportation without them. They also took over workplaces and even formed workplace and farm councils.

But while these bodies should have been strengthened and supported as the basis for a new, workers’ state, they were not.

In fact, the workers were often disarmed in the face of attacks by leaders who told them put their faith in the government, instead of relying on their own power.

Recent demonstration by Chilean workers.

So, while the efforts of the imperialists and local capitalists played a major part, we must admit that the main cause of the defeat of the movement in Chile was its leadership’s “reluctance to continue the civil war opened by” the bourgeoisie and imperialists. This was not solely the fault of Allende, but also other socialists, communists, union leaders, etc., who promoted the non-existent electoral path to socialism.

The best way for us to remember the defeat of the Chilean movement, the overthrow of Allende, and the deaths, tortures and “disappearances” of thousands of our class brothers and sisters which occurred as a result of the U.S.-
backed coup in Chile on September 11, 1973, is to continue to fight.

Today, we must join our Chilean brothers and sisters in the fight for world revolution, to bring an end to exploitation, wage-slavery, oppression, sexism, racism and all the other ills and miseries which result from the outdated capitalist system.

We are spending the day with the prolific poet and human rights activist Marjorie Agosin.

Dunreith, Aidan and I are heading to Ogunquit today to see Marjorie Agosin and to meet her mother.

I don’t know if you are familiar with Marjorie’s work, but she is an incredibly prolific author, poet and human rights activist.

I mean, we are talking close to 100 books and counting, folks.

Born to a Jewish family in Chile, she was outside of the United States when the military, led by General Augusto Pinochet and backed by the C.I.A., overthrew the democratically-elected regime of Salvador Allende. 

Marjorie writes in Spanish, which is her native tongue and which she has said feels best depicts her feelings, and she works closely with the translators who present her work in English. 

I’ve probably read a dozen of her works.

The subjects have ranged from a literary analysis of Pablo Neruda’s work to a collection of letters exchanged with her dear friend Emma Sepulveda to a number of works about the arpilleristas-the women in Chile who wove tapestries of their loved ones who had been “disappeared” by the Pinochet regime to a travelogue of family trips that included a chapter about the home in Ogunquit we will be visiting. 

She also collaborates actively with artists, on a book about the murdered women in Juarez, for example, and works hards to promote the work other writers, poets and artists.

In short, she’s a gem, and a rare one.  I look forward to spending the time with her, to meeting  her mother and for Aidan to get exposed to some more Spanish speakers.