U.S. needs to admit to old faults
COMMENTARY
Josh Deitz

Secretary of State Colin Powell stirred up a hornet’s nest last week when he briefly addressed the involvement of the United States in the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile.

Answering a student’s question about the 1973 military coup, Powell said the incident was “not a part of American history that we’re proud of.”

For a secretary of state to admit something like this is absolutely shocking. It is especially odd given that the United States and Henry Kissinger are currently being sued by a collection of Chilean residents for the deaths and damages caused by U.S. support for the Pinochet regime. For all our talk about supporting democracy and striking out at dictatorships like that of Saddam Hussein, the U.S. record is stained with quite a bit of blood, especially during the time of Kissinger.

While secretary of state, Kissinger brought about a number of U.S. policies that caused immeasurable havoc in the countries targeted. Kissinger supported the Pakistani regime’s attacks on Bangladesh in 1974, authorized the Indonesian dictator Suharto’s invasion of East Timor and set the stage for Pol Pot to arise in Cambodia with the massive and indiscriminate bombings of that country during the Vietnam War.

And that’s just the beginning.

On Sept. 11, 1973, Gen. Augusto Pinochet led a military coup against the popularly-elected president of Chile, a Socialist named Salvador Allende. Before the election, a secret U.S. operation authorized by Kissinger, code-named FUBELT, murdered Gen. Rene Schneider, a supporter of Allende, in an attempt to stir a pre-emptive coup. The specific nature of the involvement of the United States in the actual coup is not known, but the evidence points strongly to Kissinger. Before the election, Kissinger had the CIA draw up a number of plans regarding the desired coup. It is hard to believe that nothing in these plans was ever executed.

Kissinger summarized his viewpoint as the following: “I don’t see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its people. The issues are much too important for the Chilean voters to be left to decide for themselves.” So much for democracy.

After the coup, despite serious human rights abuses including the “disappearance” of more than 3,000 Allende supporters, Kissinger continued to support Pinochet, telling him in a 1976 meeting that the dictator had done “a great service to the West in overthrowing Allende.” Wink wink, nod nod. Kissinger looked the other way while Pinochet’s “Operation Condor” assassinated political opponents throughout South America. Pinochet’s terror even strayed into the United States when his Condor operatives car-bombed a former foreign Minister of Chile who had been working with U.S. congressmen opposed to Pinochet.

Despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the State Department continues to deny any U.S. involvement in the Chilean coup. In response to Powell, William D. Rogers, assistant secretary for inter-American affairs under Kissinger, prompted the State Department to issue a statement contrary to Powell’s comments.

Powell had the right idea. The United States needs to air its dirty laundry and admit the mistakes made by previous administrations. We need more people like Powell to take a stand and concentrate on healing old wounds. It’s time to stop the smokescreens and apologize.

Josh Deitz is a junior political science major from Atlanta. He can be reached at (j.m.deitz@tcu.edu).