The other 9/11 America must remember

The US has never officially been willing to concede that recent history encompasses not one but two 9/11s.

- MAHIR ALI

There’s the one 22 years ago that everyone is supposed to remember, overlooking the disastrous consequences of the US reaction that continues to bedevil several nations.

There’s even more to overlook, though, in what happened in Santiago on 11 September 1973, when Chilean armed forces thwarted a democratic experiment in socioeconomic justice. That’s because the US was inextricably implicated in the military coup it had been seeking to instigate for over three years.

The intervention had begun even before the 4 September 1970, election that potentially elevated Salvador Allende to the presidency after decades of effort. The Socialist Party candidate was prone to joke in preceding years that his epitaph would read: “Here lies … the future president of Chile.”

Even before the election, there were indications which way the wind of change was blowing. “I don’t see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its people,” declared Henry Kissinger, foreign policy head honcho in the Nixon administration.

Once the voters gave Allende a plurality, US efforts were dedicated to ensuring that the Chilean parliament did not support his presidency. The best bet was a military coup, but army chief René Schneider was a constitutionalist. A CIA-assisted attempt to kidnap him resulted in his assassination by far right elements, and in October the Chilean congress endorsed Allende by 153 to 35.