Salvador Allende y Augusto Pinochet

Augusto Pinochet was born on November 25, 1915 in Valparaiso, Chile. He became the dictator of Chile in 1973. His military government reigned from 1974 - 1990. He died on December 10, 2006 before he could be tried for human rights abuses that occurred during his reign.

Augusto Pinochet was born into an upper-middle class family. He graduated from the Military academy in Santiago, Chile in 1936. After graduating he went to the University of Chile in Santiago to study law and social sciences. He became an instructor at several different military academies and even was an author on different texts on Chile's geography and history. He was assigned as a military attache in Washington D.C. and Quito, Ecuador.

Augusto Pinochet was actually appointed to the position of army commander in chief 18 days before the coup was staged. Pinochet was the head of the junta's governing council and planned to get rid of all opposition. 130,000 people were arrested and lots of those who were arrested were tortured or killed. He even tortured the current president of Chile, Michelle Bachelet, alongside her mother. For 7 years he was the head of the military junta, then he enacted a constitution that made him president for 8 years in 1980.

Augusto's goals were to restore free-market trade and get rid of all the Leftists in Chile which were introduced when the socialist party of Chile came into power of Chile. He opposed all forms of communism and orthodox democracy because democracy was to easy to take control of. He was successful in restoring the economy of Chile as the inflation rates were low between 1976 and 1979. But Chile went into a recession in 1980-1983. Many of his followers still believed that he made Chile's economy the strongest in the region, but this belief was turned off when it was revealed that he had several overseas bank accounts under his name. One held ten tons of gold.

His first time running for president in Chile was in 1958, but he was temporarily suspended from the Socialist Party because he took the help of Communists, who were outlawed. His next time running for president was in 1964. Since Allende was Leftist, America tried making sure he did not become president. This was bad because American businesses such as the International Telephone and Telegraph had major investments there. Keep in mind that all this is happening beginning post World War II, which means the communist and noncommunist countries are engaged in the Cold War. Salvador Allende's plan for his presidency was to nationalize the country's major industries, redistribute income through tax and land reform, and establish connections with other socialist countries.

In 1970 Salvador Allende became president because he was supported by mostly the working class and peasants. Since Chile was democratic at this time, they were able to elect and the Chilean congress even him. The government of Chile faltered under him. He started to ruin his ties with America, which weren't great to begin with, by taking away copper mines owned by American companies without paying them back.

Two years after Pinochet's term ended in 1988, a new president was elected. Pinochet was able to remain in office for two years after the constitution ended his reign because the president had not been elected. Even after he was done being president in 1990, he remained the commander in chief. In 1998, he was arrested while visiting London because Spain requested. Spanish citizens were tortured in Chile. This arrest attracted the attention of many countries and the human rights organizations in Chile. Some countries including the United States were told to release formerly classified documents that had a connection with the Chileans who had "disappeared."

In 2000 he was allowed to go back to Chile because he was physically unable to continue trial because he was already old. He was also stripped of his immunity to prosecution which he had when he was president. He was ordered to stand trial for humans rights abuses, but those charges were dropped in 2002. His immunity for prosecution for financial crimes was removed in 2005. He was supposed to be tried for killing 119 people whose bodies were found in Argentina, but he died a year later. So, Augusto Pinochet never was tried for all the violations of human rights he has done.

Salvador Allende was the first socialist president of Chile, and was a Marxist. He was born on July 26, 1908. He was a co-founder of Chile's socialist party, and he became the president of Chile in 1970 after two failed attempts at running for president previously. He committed suicide on September 11, 1973 after a military coup led by Augusto Pinochet took over.

Salvador Allende was born into a upper-middle class family. His grandfather was one of the founders of the Chilean Radical Party, and his father and uncles were radicals. Salvador Allende went to medical school, and this further radicalized him as he was attracted to the writings of Marx and Lenin. He was arrested twice and expelled when he was a student activist for socialism. Since he had a history of being a radical, he could not find work as a physician.

He also established connections with North Korea, Cuba, and Vietnam which was bad news for America. He started authorizing wage increases and froze prices in order to initiate the redistribution of incomes. Then he allowed the printing of large amounts of currency that wasn't approved to make it seem like the government was not financially in danger because of buying the industries. Chile's economy was terrible by 1972. Salvador Allende's plans to redistribute incomes led to stagnant production, decreased exports and private-sector investment, exhausted financial reserves, widespread strikes, rising inflation, food shortages.

The United States was still planning on ways to take out Allende's regime, but there was a slight problem. Since Allende came into power democratically, the United States could not simply launch a Bay of Pigs type of attack. But soon enough, a military coup led by Augusto Pinochet invaded and took over the government, which led to the suicide of Salvador Allende on September 11, 1973. The United States was aware of the military coup beforehand but did not get directly involved in it.