The Oldest Trick in the Book by Ben M. Debney

Author:Ben M. Debney
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9789811555695
Publisher: Springer Singapore

All involved recalled what happened when the State Department caught wind of covert operations from the Guatemalan experience; such mistakes were not to be repeated. The latter in particular had already been reminded by the US Ambassador to Chile Claude Bowers that Chile was regarded ‘by universal consent … [as] the strongest, most inherent real democracy’ in South America.’ This being the case, felt Bowers, it would, in ‘the great international battle of today … between totalitarianism and democracy’ be ‘rather remarkable’ if the United States made ‘Chile our pet aversion.’168 Characterising Allende as an ‘able and decent man,’ ‘an able man of character and intelligence,’ and an ‘able physician,’ Bowers had convinced the State Department of Chile’s uniqueness as a democracy, the latter concluding on the one hand that ‘It is of the utmost importance that friend be distinguished from foe’ and on the other that it was ‘ideologically … essential that we view Chile’s problems in a sympathetic light.’169 Seeming to be convinced of this fact, Louis Halle of the State Department’s Policy Planning Staff concluded ominously that the problems of Chileans seemed to derive from the fact that they had ‘more fear of U.S. interventionism than of Guatemalan communism.’170

As if to demonstrate, a variety of declassified documents collected by Peter Kornbluh document US imperialism direct from the source, one memorandum advocating ‘providing covert assistance through secret CIA channels to … anti-Allende campaign uses.’171 Despite portraying themselves as victims in the Legitimation stage of communist panic, Nixon was at pains to suppress the role of his administration in Allende’s overthrow—possibly the first ever time in history a victim ever felt the need to hide their possession of the moral right. His involvement ended with the overthrow of the Allende government and the installation of a military dictatorship lead by military general Augusto Pinochet—a ‘subfascist’ who developed a penchant for making desaparecidos (‘disappeared’) out of political dissidents, trade unionists and others whose existence inconvenienced the multinational corporations representing his prime constituency. Foreshowing later terrorisms, Pinochet’s coup was executed 11 September 1973—a freak irony that would, in later decades, haunt his patrons as they indulged their self-pity at the lack of appreciation globally for their civilised values.172

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