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Is the US Responsible

Is the US Responsible It has long been said that the United States was responsible for bringing down Salvador Allende’s government in Chile but this paper will argue that the Allende government was brought down by its own doing. It is true that Salvador Allende was elected in 1970 by means of a democratic election, although only with 36.6% of the vote. Nevertheless, it is equally true that his government lost its democratic character by having repeatedly violated the Constitution. In effect, President Allende became a tyrant when he broke his solemn oath to respect the Constitution and the Chilean laws. This was not just obvious to the great majority of Chileans in their daily lives, but was also established by almost two thirds of the House of Deputies (the Lower House of the Chilean Congress) in its momentous Agreement of 23 August 1973 (there was also a statement to the same effect from the Supreme Court). In this Agreement, is presented a list of the legal and constitutional violations of President Allende's government and it decided to “make representations” of this “grave breach of the legal and constitutional order of the Republic” to, among other authorities, “the Armed Forces”. At the same time it decides to “make representations to those that, by virtue of their function, of their oath to remain faithful to the Constitution and the law, ... it is up to them to put immediate end to all the situations referred to above, which infringe the Constitution and the law.” Since no feasible mechanism existed in the Chilean Constitution to remove a President who had lost his democratic nature, the House of Deputies, with the support of all the representatives of the Christian Democratic Party, “made representations” to the Armed Forces whom it was up to “to put immediate end” to this grave situation. This was, in fact, an inequivocal call to remove President The Armed Forces, led by the person who was then the Commander in Chief of the Army, General Augusto Pinochet, complied with the Agreement of the House of Deputies eighteen days later, on September 11, 1973. Therefore the origin of that government is that of any revolutionary one, in which only the use of force was When a President elected by a third of the population is removed, and especially if his government has caused the creation of armed militias, it is inevitable that a civil war should ensue. In some countries conflicts of this nature have produced hundreds of thousands of victims. For example, the Spanish Civil War caused one million deaths. Even the U.S. Civil War, also the product of a Constitution which was not clear concerning the right for a state to seceed from the Union , resulted in While it is important to grieve for each one of the victims, Chileans and foreigners, who fell in Chile, and condemning each one of the abuses which both sides committed in the civil war which lasted for years, it is also important to point out that the Chilean revolution produced a minimal number of deaths when compared to any historic standard. Even the Report of the Commission which President Aylwin's government, antagonistic to President Pinochet's, set up (the so-called “Rettig Report”), concluded that in the 17 year period around 2,000 In addition to the successful economic transformation carried out by his government, the momentous achievement which meant avoiding a war with Argentina, and the voluntary transition to a democratic government, the historical truth demands recognition that President Pinochet led a legitimate rebellion against tyranny and that during his government the price was a minimal cost in human lives, the majority the result of the quasi civil war. Bibliography:

Word Count: 629