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

role at every major turning-point in Chile over the past three years, demonstrated outside hls home. The riot police who came to disperse them with tear-gas apparently failed to realise that most of the 300 women present were officers' wives, and that four of them were the wives of serving generals! (There are few countries in the world where you can fire tear-gas into the face of a general's wife and get away with il.) General Prats resigned the following day. He, more than any man, had been the main prop of the Allende government si(1ce the October strikes. Wíth the appointment of General Augusto Pinochet as his succesor, the way was open for direct military interventíon.(4) But the Navy, not the' Army, was Ihe driving force behind the coup. Its officers, drawn from the middle class and proud of their long relationship with the Royal Navy -visible by their "English" uniforms and their fondness for pink gin- were always regarded as the most conservative secHon of the armed forces. Allende's attempts to woo the milítary with decorations, wage increases, and bland flattery made little impression on them. Although Admiral Raúl Montero, the Navy's commander, was a cautious constitutionalist, he was unpopular with many of his subordinates, who felt thal it was his duty to take a firmer stand wíth Allende-especially after the discovery of left-wing plans for a mutiny. Early in July, some young naval officers at Talcahuano detected the first signs of what was afool. Although the Navy is a professional force, left-wing elements had managed to set up "polítical cells" among young petty offícers and ratings. Plans had been drawn up to seize control of the cruiser Latorre and the destroyer Blanco Encalada and then use them to bombard naval shore installations at Valparaiso. The mutiny was lo take place at night; the offícers of the watch were to be eliminated, and lists were drown up of other officers who were lo be attacked ín Iheir homes. If the muliny was successful, the ríng-Ieaders were going lO claim that they had headed off a Righl-wing coup and appeal to Allende lo close down Congress and seize total power. . On 7 August. after more than 400 sailors had been arrested and interrogaled, the Navy demanded Ihat Ihe parliamentary immunily of Iwo leaders of Allende's coalition -Carlos Altamirano 01 the Socialist Party and Osear Garretón 01 the Movement 01 United Popular Action (Mapu)- should be lifted so that·they could be pul on Irial fortheir part in the conspiracy. The Navy also called for Ihe arrest of Miguel Enríquez, the chieftain of Ihe Movement of the Revolutionary Left (Mir). II is now established Ihal all Ihree had mel with the ring-Ieaders of the mutiny. Whether Allende himsel1 was also involved is less clear. I talked shortly after the coup with one officerfrom the cruiser Prat who claimed that the keyorganiser on board his ship, a petty officer called Maldonado, had told him that he had taken par! in a secret meeting with Allende in the high-riseapartments known as the Torres de Tajamar in Santiago. That may well be the kind ofthi~g that a 1rightened man says under pressure to please his interrogators; but whether or not Allende was personally involved in the plo!, it is clear that his government wás. It was with this knowledge thal a group of Val paraíso navy planners put the final touches lo a secret plan for mililary intervention. lis Godename was "Plan Cochayuyo", derived from the name of a kind of seeweed found along the Chilean coast. The series of incidents that finally brought it into effecI will appealto those who favour the "Cleopalra's nose" conception of hislory. In tact, what appeared on the surface to be a petty squabble over promotion -over whelher or not Admiral Montero would resign to make way for Merino as his successor- merely served to ignite the powder-barrel Ihat Allende had been per– ching on uncomfortably tor many months. While the admirals quarrelled wilh the president, truck-drivers crippled the country's land communicalions. Right-wing saboleurs from Pa– tria y Libertad blew up railway-lines:and the extreme Left, through its workers' committees (4)The armed lorces had been made more aware ofthe dimensíons 01 Chile's eeonomie erises by the eonfídenlial monlhly reporls prepared by a group of some 30 young eeonomists (some were Irom the Christian Demoerat and Nalional Parties, bul mos! were independenls) who had been meeting since January. Their work established Ihe lramework for the junta's economie programme. 50