President Salvador Allende's downfall and the end of democracy

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THE DOWNFALL OF SALVADOR ALLENDE

The small number of rich families (30% of the population) had an enormous amount of money and influence in Chile. Pinochet, the leader of the military therefore didn’t have to do much to get into power. With the help of the CIA? he stopped paying the truck drivers (who have a lot of power in Chile) so they no longer brought food to the people in Chile. This gave rise to the black market and riots began to break out over food. There were apparently 50% Allende supporters and 50% Pinochet supporters in Chile at the time and riots began to break out between the two groups. When social unrest broke out President Allende was about to call a referendum to see if the people still wanted him in power as they did when the majority democratically voted him in, but he wasn’t given a chance by Pinochet.

On 11 September 1973 he received a message telling him to go to the Palacio Moneda as chaos was breaking out. He set off with his briefcase and shotgun rifle and went to the Palace to find it was surrounded by the military’s tanks. Pinochet gave him the chance to go into exile and provided a plane but he refused and wanted to uphold the will of the people and be with them to the end. The palace was bombed by Pinochet and the military. Under the command of Pinochet, the military went into the Palace and took his friends out one by one, and killed them. Meanwhile, Allende was found dead after supposedly commiting suicide using his rifle? But unless he managed to press the trigger with his big toe it is most likely he was also killed by Pinochet. Nobody knows the truth. Pinochet took over the palace, changed the consitution to allow protection to the president (which is still written today) and removed any opposition. He never faced trial for his war crimes as when he was ill he went for hospital treatment in the UK where Thatcher sheltered him and delayed him facing trial. By the time the UK decided to send him back to Chile after his treatment, to stand trial and face his war crimes, he was considered too ill to go to court. He then died without facing any trials.



ALLENDE SUPPORTERS SIDE



3,000 people went missing and 45,000 people were either imprisoned or tortured and everything else I mentioned shown in the Human Rights Museum







PINOCHET SUPPORTERS SIDE



Pinochet’s take over was the Chilean miracle, the end to social unrest and prevented Chile from falling into Marxism. People became rich, got cars and food was brought in. Pinochet was a hero who saved Chile from the evil grip of communism.

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