Allende's 9/11

If calendar dates hold special significance of any kind, then September 11th would be associated with death, destruction and the first implementation of what's called The Washington Consensus. On September 11, 1973, Salvador Allende died, and 4 decades of Chilean democracy died with him, when his democratically elected government was overthrown in a violent military coup.

We all know what we did on September 11 2001 when the attacks happened. And we all know what followed; years of endless wars and regime-change in the Middle East, culminating in the election of a president of America who openly admits that it's all about the (sp)oil(s), that since we're there, we should claim our just booty. And let's not forget to implement that Washington Consensus in every country we "liberate" (from their resources):

The Washington Consensus is a set of 10 economic policy prescriptions considered to constitute the "standard" reform package promoted for crisis-wracked developing countries by Washington, D.C.-based institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank and United States Department of the Treasury.
_{source: Wikipedia}

These 10 economic policy prescriptions boil down to the enforcing of the neoliberal ideology, by the privatization of state enterprises, massive deregulation, trade liberalization and legal security for property rights. Some of you might have already recognized this dynamic as the Shock Doctrine described in Naomi Klein's bestselling book, in which she argues that neoliberal free market policies (as advocated by the economist Milton Friedman) have risen to prominence in some developed countries because of a deliberate strategy of "shock therapy". This centers on the exploitation of national crises to push through controversial policies while citizens are too emotionally and physically distracted by disasters or upheavals to mount an effective resistance. In Iraq we applied a little Shock and Awe to later administer the socioeconomic shock-therapy that gave away the country to western oligarchs, like Dick Cheney's involvement with Halliburton. The shock can be delivered by a natural disaster too, like in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina where public schools and public housing projects were replaced by by their private counterparts, leaving the poor behind.

So much attention has been claimed by this September 11 event and its aftermath, that it's easy to forget that this is nothing new. The Washington Consensus was tested in South America first, and Chile became patient zero, its first proving-ground. Salvador Allende was democratically elected in 1970. It will come as no surprise that he was a socialist who wanted to use the country's wealth (Chile had many valuable copper mines for example) for his people, in a time when many preceding governments let rich foreigners control and profit from the nation's industry. Not only did he nationalize the copper mines, he even demanded reparations for all the wealth that had been extracted from his people during the previous decades. If you're under the illusion that the American Empire only installs puppet-regimes where there's oil, think again and watch the list of Latin American countries where the U.S. were involved with regime change; Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, El Salvador... the list goes on. Ever heard about the term banana republic? That term was invented to describe a politically unstable country with an economy dependent upon the exportation of a limited-resource product, such as bananas or minerals.

In the early 20th century, the United Fruit Company, a multinational American corporation, was instrumental to the creation of the banana republic phenomenon. Together with other American corporations, such as the Cuyamel Fruit Company, and with occasional support from the United States government, the corporations created the political, economic, and social circumstances that established banana republics in Central American countries such as Honduras and Guatemala.
_{source: Wikipedia}

From 1970 until the military coup on September 11 1973, the C.I.A. has been organizing the opposition against Allende. Unlike in many other occasions, the C.I.A. will not admit to actively assisting the military coup, but they do admit having knowledge of it, and not doing anything about it; as you can deduct from the below linked interview with ex-undercover agent Jack Devine, it's only a question if this was organized by the C.I.A. itself or by direct orders from Washington. Watch the above linked video for an in-depth examination about the coup and the horrible aftermath. Whatever the case, democracy died that day in Chile, and America got its wish; socialism was stopped once again and neoliberal policies were implemented again by Augusto Pinochet who ushered in 15 years of brutal dictatorship, with repression, torture, forced disappearance, fear and for many Chileans, exile. Milton Friedman described the free market reforms under the dictatorship as the Miracle of Chile. These reforms were implemented by a large group of Chilean economists who collectively came to be known as the Chicago Boys, having studied at the University of Chicago where Friedman taught.

That model, first introduced in Chile, has now taken over the world, and we've had new 9/11's to shock us into accepting it, bit by bit, country by country, state by state. Let 9/11 remind us all of the fact that imperialism is alive and well, that it operates under the name of neoliberalism, that it's propagandized as the "miracle of the free market economy", that this is what it really means when "The Free World" wants to export freedom and democracy (at gunpoint). Economy is war by other means, war is politics by other means, and they're all designed for the rule over the powerless, all over the planet, be it the poor, homeless, middle class or working poor in your own country or refugees from far away places. Let 9/11 remind us, not just of "normal" terrorism, but especially of the economic terrorism that hits us all, and is aimed at shocking us into perpetual servitude. Remember Allende's 9/11.

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