Chile: the balanced view : a recopilation of articles about the Allende years and after

THE "INVISIBLE BLOCKAOE" ANO THE OVERTHROW OF ALLENOE(*) By PA UL E. SIGMUND A striking aspect of the world reaction to the military coup that overthrew Salvador Allende as President of Chile in September 1973 has been the widespread assumption that the ultimate responsibility for the tragic destruction of Chilean democracy lay with the United States. In a few quarters, the charge includes an accusation of secret U.S. participa– tion in the coup. However, a subcommitte.e ofthe Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, headed by Senator Gale McGee, has just investigated this accusation and concluded that there is no evidence of any U.S. role whatever. More commonly, however, the bill of particulars relies on what President Allende himself, speaking before the United Nations in Oecember 1972, called the "invisible financial and economic blockade" exercised by the United States against his government. Articles taking this line have appeared, for example, in The Washington Post, the National Catholic Reporter and The New York Review ofBooks. On the other hand, The Wall Street Journal has been critical of what it calls a "simplisHc plot" theory espoused by members of the academic community-lhat "Washington by simply turning off the spigot of low-interest loans" was able to bring down Allende. Was there in fact an undeclared economic war between the Nixon administration and Salvador Allende-lo use Allende's own words, "an oblique underhanded indirect form of aggression... virtually imperceptible activities usually disguised with words and state– ments that extol the sovereignty and dignity of my country"? Oid this warfare have a direct relationship to the bloody events in Santiago? A critical examination of the considerable evidence on this subject available in this country and in Chile can help to answer these questions, and possibly suggest whether wider conclusions are in order about the relaHons between capitalist nations and a democratic Socialist regime. 11 Even before Allendewon a 36.2 percent plurality in a threeway popularelection forthe Presidency on September 4, 1970, American business interests in Chile, including the International Telephone and Telegraph Company (ITI), which owned 70 percent of the Chilean Telephone Company, had been concerned over the possible efect on their invest– .ments of Allende's accession to power. The Chilean constitution provided that in the event that no presidential candidate received an absolute majority, the Chilean Congress was to choose between the top two candidates 50 days after the popular election. Unquestionably Allende's election produced an immediate financial panic and run on the banks in Chile. Is there persuasive evidence that Id.S. interests or the U.S. government deliberately contribu– ted to the panic, or otherwise attempted to prevent Allende's election by use of their financial and economic influence? The most important available evidence on this question appears in the confidentiallTI papers published by Jack Anderson in March 1972, and in the hearings on these papers conducted by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee ayear later. This material establis- (')Aeprinted with permission liom Foreign Affairs, January 1974. Copyright bythe Couneil on Foreign Aelations Ine. 1974. 111