Remembering Salvador Allende and the Chilean Counterrevolution

The reality, however, was that, contrary to the prevailing explanations of the coup, which attributed Pinochet’s success to U.S. intervention and the CIA, the counterrevolution was already there prior to the U.S. destabilization efforts; that it was largely determined by internal class dynamics; and that, even without the help of Washington, the Chilean elites found a formidable ally in the middle-class sectors terrified by the prospect of poor sectors rising up with their agenda of justice and equality.  In short, U.S. intervention did take place, but it was successful because it was inserted into an ongoing counterrevolutionary process that had its base in the middle class. CIA destabilization efforts were just one of the factors that contributed to the victory of the right, not the decisive one.  And the irony is that it was not only the workers and peasants that were devastated by the economic policies of the Chicago Boys but the middle class that had mobilized against Allende as well.