[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Chile & Pinochet (Page 1 of 2)
Posted: 2/1/2012 1:56:41 PM EDT
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The man, his politics, his reforms in Chile, he had a strong dislike for unions, liberals, and socialists, but he helped turn Chile around into a country, that to this day, is pretty nice.
For starters, I spoke with a friend who lived in New Zealand for a few years as a missionary for his Church. He said he had met people from Chile that had moved there in the 1970's, my comment was "socialists?", a little surprised, he said "yea - political refugees". I wasn't too surprised when he said the "refuges" weren't too friendly. Personally, I was kind of shocked that New Zealand let the socialist trash into their country. The conversation got me thinking about Chile and Pinochet. The Pinochet chapter in history is thought provoking. Here is a quick link for those interested: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augusto_Pinochet 
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He is an interesting character in history. Sometimes the lesser of two evils is indeed a better outcome. Communist takeovers usually end up very bad, and he stopped it. He seems to be the lone dictator that was not flat out bonkers, nor a complete control freak. However don't make the mistake that he was a good guy and/or protector of civil liberties. The whole state of affairs in South America in the 19XXs should make all Americans glad to live under our constitution... Instead, some choose to wear Che shirts. |
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He is an interesting character in history. Sometimes the lesser of two evils is indeed a better outcome. Communist takeovers usually end up very bad, and he stopped it. He seems to be the lone dictator that was not flat out bonkers, nor a complete control freak. However don't make the mistake that he was a good guy and/or protector of civil liberties. The whole state of affairs in South America in the 19XXs should make all Americans glad to live under our constitution... Instead, some choose to wear Che shirts. The difference isn't the Constitution. We haven't followed ours since the 30s or 40s anyway. The issue is culture. Recall that the Texas Revolution occured when Santa Ana suspended the Mexican 1824 Constitution and declared himself dictator. The resulting Republic of Texas had actual freedom and rule of law. It is the culture that matters. |
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They had a choice,facism or communism. A western democracy would not have been strong enough to defeat the communists. Does it make me think he's a role model for all? Nope but it would have been an epic shithole with Allende. From what I have read, he was really a pragmatist. Typically, Latin American strongmen on the "right" are not inclined towards free markets. From what I understand, Pinochet realized what they were doing wasn't working and decided to try something else. As an aside, it is claimed Allende was killed by his Cuban bodygaurds. Ponder that, Hugo. |
| Easiest thing to do is compare them to the rest of South America now. Even with Kirchner,Morales,Dilma,Correa and Chavez currently making the continent overwhelmingly socialist things would have been far worse had communism been allowed to flourish under Allende during the Cold War. |
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Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. How many killed there by Pinochet? Pinochet put in place free market reforms that have, in fact, made Chile a better place. |
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I had an exchange student from Chile (high school) stay at my place when I was in high school. This was 2002-2003 when the Pinochet thing was in the news. She and her family thought he was a hero who was being wrongly persecuted. They loved him and thought he saved Chile. She said that only criminal thugs hated him.
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Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. Yea, it seems its all love and hate with the Chile people I have met as well. All my friends that travel or are from there, have said Chile is like the US in many (positive) ways and modern. If Pinochet had failed, I am sure it would not be as nice, or could even be like Cuba today. Pinochet will always be controversial, but I guess that's what is so intriguing. 
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Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. How many killed there by Pinochet? Pinochet put in place free market reforms that have, in fact, made Chile a better place. Depedning upon who you talk to, it ranges from 3k-8k. There were also thousands jailed and tortured. For those that lived through the times, it is an interesting topic. My experience with Chile came after Pinochet was no longer in power. |
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Pinochet is a hero to all mankind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rettig_Report |
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I had an exchange student from Chile (high school) stay at my place when I was in high school. This was 2002-2003 when the Pinochet thing was in the news. She and her family thought he was a hero who was being wrongly persecuted. They loved him and thought he saved Chile. She said that only criminal thugs hated him. I have met many people from Chile that feel this way as well. Of course, if someone is a "socialist" or a "liberal", they are going to hate Pinochet and everything he did, the Pinochet cup for them will always be half empty. |
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Fascism, fuck yeah. Well, their pension system is much more free market then ours. Social Security is the more fascist system of the two. And theirs won't bankrupt their nation. I have heard the same thing. Its a tragedy that the United States's Social Security has become a a ponzi scheme enforced by the barrel of the gun (literal and figuratively) |
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My son just got back from Chile. He didn't talk politics much while he was there, but from what it sounds like opinions on Pinochet in Chile are pretty similar to what you'd hear about George Bush today: The leftists hate him with a passion, while those on the right think he generally did the right things. There is one big thing about Pinochet that his critics ignore: Very few, if any, dictators institute democratic reforms and then voluntarily resign their dictatorship. Pinochet was probably the only South American strongmen from the 1970's to leave his country better off than it was before. The country today has arguably the most free economy in Latin America, and is currently experiencing around 6% economic growth. That wouldn't have happened under Allende. |
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Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. What Pinochet did was to kill alot of socialists/communists and they had it coming. |
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Quoted: Quoted: Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. What Pinochet did was to kill alot of socialists/communists and they had it coming. When the government slaughters, tortures, and terrorizes its citizens, most of the time people in the majority say "they had it coming." Doesn't make it right. |
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Pinochet is the 20th century's most interesting dictator. He was not a fascist. Fascism generally involves an authoritarian government with socialist policies that seeks to nationalize many areas of industry. Pinochet correctly mirrored the authoritarian government by killing the communists, but in turn hired economists from the University of Chicago to essentially build the economy as they saw fit. The University of Chicago professors, at that time, were heavily influenced by Milton Friedman and free market, Laissez-Faire economics. The result was almost unrestricted capitalism. It took their economy awhile to get the systemic inefficiencies out of the country, but once that happened, the Chilean Miracle occurred. Chile went from being a 3rd world craphole to the strongest economy in South America in arguably every metric. |
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My wife is Chilean. From my experiences in Chile and in speaking with Chilean family and friends and from quite a bit of reading, my conclusions are:
The Pinochet regime isn't spoken of in polite conversation Many believe that Pinochet hung the moon Many people believe that Pinochet was the devil incarnate Many believe that Pinochet was a boorish thug but he got positive results I personally believe that, while I don't approve of Pinochet's methods, Allende was leading Chile down a much more dangerous path. |
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Quoted: My wife is Chilean. From my experiences in Chile and in speaking with Chilean family and friends and from quite a bit of reading, my conclusions are: The Pinochet regime isn't spoken of in polite conversation Many believe that Pinochet hung the moon Many people believe that Pinochet was the devil incarnate Many believe that Pinochet was a boorish thug but he got positive results I personally believe that, while I don't approve of Pinochet's methods, Allende was leading Chile down a much more dangerous path. Pretty much this. Pinochet was kind of like Stalin to Hitler. He was atrocious, but he got the job done. Had Allende continued with his Marxist ambitions, Chile would probably be about as strong as Cuba is today. |
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He was the lesser of two evils. This. It's unfortunate for the Chilean people that they had to suffer under such a brutal dictator, but when viewed the the context of the Cold War we didn't really have much choice WRT to who we backed. Backing Pinochet itself and the subsequet coup was really a desparation move on our part anyway. Allowing Cuba and the Soviets to establish another Latin American client state was not acceptable. |
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When the government slaughters, tortures, and terrorizes its citizens, most of the time people in the majority say "they had it coming." Doesn't make it right. The problem with dealing with foreign nations is that most of them won't act nice like we do. There is no perfect choice. It is almost always a choice between bad actors of one sort or another. And it isn't simply the fault of the leaders, the fault leads back to the people themselves and the culture. It is common for Latin American leaders to flee the nation with a bag of cash, but damn, if I was El Presidente of one of those countries I'd want a Swiss account and a plane ready to go on the tarmac, too. The problem isn't just the leadership and the government. In the '80s, Reagan fought communism in Central America by supporting various governments as well as groups like the Contras. On balance, he did the right thing and made the right choices, but the left here went nuts. Even as their Sandista heros murdered indians, etc. Before Reagan, Carter decided to ditch Samoza and the Shah, while empowering Mugambe. Carter made bad choices all around. |
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Quoted: Quoted: When the government slaughters, tortures, and terrorizes its citizens, most of the time people in the majority say "they had it coming." Doesn't make it right. The problem with dealing with foreign nations is that most of them won't act nice like we do. There is no perfect choice. It is almost always a choice between bad actors of one sort or another. And it isn't simply the fault of the leaders, the fault leads back to the people themselves and the culture. It is common for Latin American leaders to flee the nation with a bag of cash, but damn, if I was El Presidente of one of those countries I'd want a Swiss account and a plane ready to go on the tarmac, too. The problem isn't just the leadership and the government. In the '80s, Reagan fought communism in Central America by supporting various governments as well as groups like the Contras. On balance, he did the right thing and made the right choices, but the left here went nuts. Even as their Sandista heros murdered indians, etc. Before Reagan, Carter decided to ditch Samoza and the Shah, while empowering Mugambe. Carter made bad choices all around. Wait long enough here...I think you'll be surprised as to how willing people are to see the "other side" get "whats coming to them". We see a little bit of it here when we talk about hippies getting beat or the "shoot the illegals" threads. And make no mistake, I know lefties in the US think the same way about us (those teabaggers, those rich people...etc). |
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When the government slaughters, tortures, and terrorizes its citizens, most of the time people in the majority say "they had it coming." Doesn't make it right. The problem with dealing with foreign nations is that most of them won't act nice like we do. There is no perfect choice. It is almost always a choice between bad actors of one sort or another. And it isn't simply the fault of the leaders, the fault leads back to the people themselves and the culture. It is common for Latin American leaders to flee the nation with a bag of cash, but damn, if I was El Presidente of one of those countries I'd want a Swiss account and a plane ready to go on the tarmac, too. The problem isn't just the leadership and the government. In the '80s, Reagan fought communism in Central America by supporting various governments as well as groups like the Contras. On balance, he did the right thing and made the right choices, but the left here went nuts. Even as their Sandista heros murdered indians, etc. Before Reagan, Carter decided to ditch Samoza and the Shah, while empowering Mugambe. Carter made bad choices all around. Wait long enough here...I think you'll be surprised as to how willing people are to see the "other side" get "whats coming to them". We see a little bit of it here when we talk about hippies getting beat or the "shoot the illegals" threads. And make no mistake, I know lefties in the US think the same way about us (those teabaggers, those rich people...etc). better them than us. 
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Wait long enough here...I think you'll be surprised as to how willing people are to see the "other side" get "whats coming to them". We see a little bit of it here when we talk about hippies getting beat or the "shoot the illegals" threads. And make no mistake, I know lefties in the US think the same way about us (those teabaggers, those rich people...etc). The key difference is that in most of the world, they fail at establishing rule of law and making democracy work. I'm not talking about the "get the other side" in the literal sense that you are talking about, but more generally. When Santa Ana's troops put down a revolt in a Mexican state after he suspended the 1824 Constitution, he rewarded them with several days of open rape and pillage. Nothing like that has ever happened here, and it is hard to imagine it happening here. It is in fact a sequence of events which would not have happened here at any time in our history. Perhaps in the future such a thing could happen. Certainly we have some individuals who are willing. |
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Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. What Pinochet did was to kill alot of socialists/communists and they had it coming. When the government slaughters, tortures, and terrorizes its citizens, most of the time people in the majority say "they had it coming." Doesn't make it right. It was the communists that took over the government. Pinochet led a revolt against the government. |
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I had an exchange student from Chile (high school) stay at my place when I was in high school. This was 2002-2003 when the Pinochet thing was in the news. She and her family thought he was a hero who was being wrongly persecuted. They loved him and thought he saved Chile. She said that only criminal COMMUNIST thugs hated him. IIRC, he stepped aside for elections after the country was stabilized. See below. As far as history goes, anti-communists are never painted as heros. Che Guevara, on the other hand. "According to the transitional provisions of the 1980 Constitution, a referendum was scheduled for 5 October 1988, to vote on a new eight-year presidential term for Pinochet. Confronted with increasing opposition, notably at the international level, Pinochet legalized political parties in 1987 and called for a plebiscite to determine whether or not he would remain in power until 1997. If the "YES" won, Pinochet would have to implement the dispositions of the 1980 Constitution, mainly the call for general elections, while he would himself remain in power as President. If the "NO" won, Pinochet would remain President for another year, and a joint Presidential and Parliamentary election would be scheduled." and... "On 5 October 1988, the "NO" option won with 55.99%[55] of the votes, against 44.1% of "YES" votes. Pinochet complied, so the ensuing Constitutional process led to presidential and legislative elections the following year." Hardly sounds like a power-hungry despot. |
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Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. What Pinochet did was to kill alot of socialists/communists and they had it coming. When the government slaughters, tortures, and terrorizes its citizens, most of the time people in the majority say "they had it coming." Doesn't make it right. lol MIR was a Russian sponsored Communist front organization. Pinochet hated Commies. Try to take over a country run by a badass and getting tortured/killed might be your reward. |
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Pinochet was supported and funded initially by the US thru the CIA. the communists were moving up the hemispheric ladder and our leaders found the excuse they needed when Allende took over industry. If my memory serves me correctly, Allende nationalized the corporate properties, to include multitudes of property owned by the United Fruit Company, and this led the US interdiction thru Pinochet and his band of merry men.
The rest as they say, is history... |
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Pinochet was supported and funded initially by the US thru the CIA. the communists were moving up the hemispheric ladder and our leaders found the excuse they needed when Allende took over industry. If my memory serves me correctly, Allende nationalized the corporate properties, to include multitudes of property owned by the United Fruit Company, and this led the US interdiction thru Pinochet and his band of merry men. The rest as they say, is history... Fascinating isn't it that the "old school" US govt. supported a Pinochet, but the "new liberal" US govt. allows a communist like Chavez to nationalize US companies in Venezuela and start "socialist inroads" back into Central America, all the while making moves to obtain nuclear weapons from Iran. I have a hard time believing that past presidents except for Carter, and Clinton, would have allowed this to happen. For reference regarding Venezuela: http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/06/24/us-venezuela-nationalizations-idUSTRE65N0UM20100624 http://articles.latimes.com/2010/oct/27/world/la-fg-venezuela-nationalize-20101028 http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/feb2008/db2008028_610672.htm |
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Quoted: Pinochet is the 20th century's most interesting dictator. He was not a fascist. Fascism generally involves an authoritarian government with socialist policies that seeks to nationalize many areas of industry. Pinochet correctly mirrored the authoritarian government by killing the communists, but in turn hired economists from the University of Chicago to essentially build the economy as they saw fit. The University of Chicago professors, at that time, were heavily influenced by Milton Friedman and free market, Laissez-Faire economics. The result was almost unrestricted capitalism. It took their economy awhile to get the systemic inefficiencies out of the country, but once that happened, the Chilean Miracle occurred. Chile went from being a 3rd world craphole to the strongest economy in South America in arguably every metric. Yep, not a Fascist. It can seriously be argued that true fascism was never implemented outside of Italy. I think a lot of people confuse military rule or a dictatorship with fascism, same for authoritarianism (which didn't always have a negative connotation). Pinochet, for all of his faults, was in most respects quite liberal, especially in the economic realm, which is the direct opposite of fascism, which is a variation upon national socialism, being inspired by the Czech national socialists and adapted to Italian social and cultural issues (such as the anarchic nature of the Italians). A true fascist would have had more in common with Allende than Pinochet. Franco is another military ruler that is wrongly portrayed as a fascist. Like with Pinochet, without him, Spain would have gone red. And like Pinochet, he put free marketeers in key positions to liberalize the Spanish economy. The unfortunate thing is that within a few years of Franco's death, King Juan Carlos democratized Spain and basically handed everything over to the damn socialists. |
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Pinochet is the 20th century's most interesting dictator. He was not a fascist. Fascism generally involves an authoritarian government with socialist policies that seeks to nationalize many areas of industry. Pinochet correctly mirrored the authoritarian government by killing the communists, but in turn hired economists from the University of Chicago to essentially build the economy as they saw fit. The University of Chicago professors, at that time, were heavily influenced by Milton Friedman and free market, Laissez-Faire economics. The result was almost unrestricted capitalism. It took their economy awhile to get the systemic inefficiencies out of the country, but once that happened, the Chilean Miracle occurred. Chile went from being a 3rd world craphole to the strongest economy in South America in arguably every metric. Yep, not a Fascist. It can seriously be argued that true fascism was never implemented outside of Italy. I think a lot of people confuse military rule or a dictatorship with fascism, same for authoritarianism (which didn't always have a negative connotation). Pinochet, for all of his faults, was in most respects quite liberal, especially in the economic realm, which is the direct opposite of fascism, which is a variation upon national socialism, being inspired by the Czech national socialists and adapted to Italian social and cultural issues (such as the anarchic nature of the Italians). A true fascist would have had more in common with Allende than Pinochet. Franco is another military ruler that is wrongly portrayed as a fascist. Like with Pinochet, without him, Spain would have gone red. And like Pinochet, he put free marketeers in key positions to liberalize the Spanish economy. The unfortunate thing is that within a few years of Franco's death, King Juan Carlos democratized Spain and basically handed everything over to the damn socialists. I really enjoyed my time there. Beautiful country. |
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Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. What Pinochet did was to kill alot of socialists/communists and they had it coming. When the government slaughters, tortures, and terrorizes its citizens, most of the time people in the majority say "they had it coming." Doesn't make it right. Considering how many people the communists have killed in the last century they indeed "had it coming". I know what you are saying but some groups, idealogies, etc do have it "coming" due to their history of killing people. |
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Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. What Pinochet did was to kill alot of socialists/communists and they had it coming. When the government slaughters, tortures, and terrorizes its citizens, most of the time people in the majority say "they had it coming." Doesn't make it right. Considering how many people the communists have killed in the last century they indeed "had it coming". I know what you are saying but some groups, idealogies, etc do have it "coming" due to their history of killing people. So because commies killed allot of people, different commies deserve to be tortured? Thank you (and others) for proving my point. No one ever says "hey, these people are really good, lets kill them for no reason." Again, my point still stands. People will always justify whatever they want by pointing out how bad the other side is. I mean this is just a fact of history. Do you think the Germans killed the Jews because they were good? No, they were demonized and blamed for all sorts of bad shit, and people believed it. Do you think terrorist kill US soldiers because they think that the US is good? No, they'll point out all the bad things we supposedly did as justification. |
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Pinochet.. a strong leader that pushed torture and murder of anyone that spoke against his regime. I don't remember anyone speaking kindly of him. The country is a great place, but I didn't hear a single person saying Pinochet was the reason. What Pinochet did was to kill alot of socialists/communists and they had it coming. When the government slaughters, tortures, and terrorizes its citizens, most of the time people in the majority say "they had it coming." Doesn't make it right. Considering how many people the communists have killed in the last century they indeed "had it coming". I know what you are saying but some groups, idealogies, etc do have it "coming" due to their history of killing people. So because commies killed allot of people, different commies deserve to be tortured? Thank you (and others) for proving my point. No one ever says "hey, these people are really good, lets kill them for no reason." Again, my point still stands. People will always justify whatever they want by pointing out how bad the other side is. I mean this is just a fact of history. Do you think the Germans killed the Jews because they were good? No, they were demonized and blamed for all sorts of bad shit, and people believed it. Do you think terrorist kill US soldiers because they think that the US is good? No, they'll point out all the bad things we supposedly did as justification. The Jews have not killed around 100 million people the last century. Nor have we killed Muslims in great numbers. So both of those situations cannot be backed with historically accuracy that the jews or we are a threat. Yes, they can try and justify us and the Jews as a threat but it falls short. Communists have a history of killing people in great numbers when they come to power. So, yes historically they are a threat whether they have YET participated in slaughtering people. History shows that more than likely when they come to power they start killing groups that differ from their viewpoints. So the logical thing to do is to prevent them from coming to power and stop them before they start killing. Some take it to extreme like Pinochet in stopping the commies from coming to power. But unfortunately sometimes you have to committ evil deeds to prevent worse evil from coming to power. That is just the way it is sometimes. The world is not always perfect. |
