On the morning of 11 September 1973, the Central Intelligence Agency briefed President Richard Nixon about the Chilean military’s imminent plan to “trigger military action against the Allende government”. By noon, bombs and bullets rained down on Chile’s presidential palace from planes, armored cars and helicopters circling the center of Santiago. By 6.30pm, President Allende was dead, and the military dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet had begun.
Fifty years have now passed since the bloody coup d’etat in Chile. Since then, democracy has returned, after 16 years of courageous resistance and a resounding “No” to military rule in a 1988 national plebiscite. Pinochet has died, following a fatal heart attack in 2006 at the age of 91. And a new generation of leaders has risen to power to secure Chileans’ rights to healthcare, housing and a habitable planet.
