Fuck Henry Kissinger: 40 years later, Chile struggles with legacy of Pinochet coup

[cali]

This is what the vile old war criminal was in up to his neck. No, a U.S. SoS should not be seeking his advice on anything.

The Chilean air force doesn’t celebrate the only combat mission it ever flew. On this day 40 years ago, its jets bombed radio transmitters, the president’s residence, and the presidential palace in Santiago. The strikes were precise, and also effective. Before the fires were out, generals had overthrown Salvador Allende, the world’s first democratically elected Marxist president and replaced him with a military junta led by General Augusto Pinochet.

But as a now democratic Santiago marks the anniversary, the actual planes that did the bombing are scattered to parts unknown. The pilots have never taken credit or responsibility. Instead, on this anniversary, one message rings clear: “Never again.”

But a pledge not to repeat history isn’t enough for some. The division between searing, painful memory and ongoing amnesia remains stark in Chile as the country marks the day that changed everything. There are also deep disagreements over how to ensure that history isn’t repeated -- with some calling for forgiveness, and others still pursuing justice for those killed and disappeared by Pinochet’s 17-year dictatorship.

<snip>
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Americas/2013/0911/40-years-later-Chile-struggles-with-legacy-of-Pinochet-coup-video



Beautiful music from Victor Jara (listen to this!) who was murdered under Pinochet. Kissinger has his blood on his gore stained hands:

<snip>

Shortly after the Chilean coup of 11 September 1973, he was arrested, tortured and ultimately shot dead with 44 machine-gun bullets. His body was later thrown out into the street of a shanty town in Santiago.[2] The contrast between the themes of his songs, on love, peace and social justice and the brutal way in which he was murdered transformed Jara into a symbol of struggle for human rights and justice worldwide.

<snip>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%ADctor_Jara

[gopiscrap]

1. Kissinger should have been in jail for many

reasons, this and Watergate are just a couple of them.

[russspeakeasy]

2. Every day, I wake up and hope his name will be in the headlines. Followed by:

"it was a long and painful death".
.

[Cleita]

6. He should be in The Hague answering for his crimes.

I'm hoping some day another nation does what ours won't and bring him to justice.

[truedelphi]

9. Instead, he got to spend some time

Working as an adviser to the White house. (I know that was true in 2009; don't know if or when he got bumped out.)

[Hydra]

11. Kerry is currently consulting with him per another thread today

As I said there, consulting with Republicans for Repub solutions to Repub created problems.

Crazy world.

[Kolesar]

3. This hour's "hate a Democrat" post is about: John Kerry! ... eom

[cali]

4. that that's your takeaway from this is just pitiful

ODDS is warping your perspective.

[Hydra]

13. If Kissenger is on WH payroll

John Kerry isn't the one to blame.

[truedelphi]

17. Well sure Kerry is!

because Obama!

[2banon]

22. disconnect. don't know your age.. maybe you're unaware of who and what Kissenger is?

sort of kindred spirits with Assad (in a manner of speaking) one could say, and not be too far off the mark.

[Kolesar]

30. Kissenger? eom

[RetroLounge]

23. Really? Fucking Really?

RL

[leftstreet]

5. DURec

[woo me with science]

7. K&R

[malaise]

8. +1,000

Fuck that war criminal

[Waiting For Everyman]

10. Kissinger was part of Tricky Dicky's gang,

who some think is so cool now. The two of them rampaged over large chunks of the world, and here at home too... while the Silent Majority failed to notice that anything at all was going on.

That's a beautiful (the music) and powerful video, cali, thank you!

[Solly Mack]

12. There's absolutely no moral legitimacy in a war criminal.

No integrity. No honor. No decency. No high ground. No high ideals or beliefs. All cut from the same rotten cloth.

[Catherina]

14. Oh Cali, K&R

Three songs are guaranteed to make me cry and that's one of them. Thanks for posting it

I'll know we're serious about justice and war crimes the day dark souls like Kissinger are turned over to a World Court or to the courts of the countries they terrorized.

[jwirr]

15. And our present SOS goes to him for advice. Disaster capitalism in still alive and being used to cut

down the people. Could we have been so wrong about our president and people like they did back then.

[JEB]

16. I suspect Kissinger

feels on the flesh of rotting human corpses. Has Cheney over for dinner.

[kmkleff]

18. I remember that quite vividly

That week Bruce Springsteen was on the cover of both Time and Newsweek. I admire Springsteen a lot, but have always harbored this resentment about him being used to take the spotlight away from our responsibility for this profound tragedy.

[proverbialwisdom]

35. I just read this.

Last edited Sat Sep 14, 2013, 12:29 AM - Edit history (1)

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/videos/bruce-springsteen-honors-chilean-folk-hero-victor-jara-in-santiago-20130913

[WillyT]

19. HUGE K & R !!! - Thank You !!!

[Fuddnik]

20. Kick and Rec!

Fuck Kissinger.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

21. Thought I'd add this...

[Catherina]

24. Today: A thousand Chileans lay on the street as a protest-action 40 yrs after US backed massacre

A thousand Chileans lay on the street as a protest-action 40 years after US backed massacre and coup against the people & Government

[RetroLounge]

25. Fuck Henry Kissinger

He shoulda been hung for war crimes.

RL

[Boomerproud]

26. The assistant pastor at my church was in Chile (for 15 years) during this time.

He has stories to tell. Kissinger has blood on his hands. He can never enter Chile.

[Jefferson23]

27. Chile's coup 40 years on: a Q&A with author of The Pinochet Files

snip* What new documents or evidence have become available since the first release of the book, 10 years ago?

There is a fascinating story that turned into a saga of Henry Kissinger reacting in a very hostile manner to the release of the book. One of the major new additions is an afterword on Kissinger’s response.

That story revolves around his role in the [Orlando] Letellier - [Ronni] Moffit assassination case and Operation Condor — what he did and didn’t do about Condor.

Kissinger was very concerned that he would be tarred and feathered with the idea that he could have detected and deterred this operation to assassinate Orlando Letellier. That is what my book argued and what the reviewer wrote in Foreign Affairs — [Kissinger] really got very upset about this.

We went out in the years that we were debating this with him and filed more FOIAs to get the record out on what exactly had happened and we did get some additional documents which we’ve put at the end of the book. [They] make it clear that he first authorized a demarche to Pinochet before the Letellier assassination and then rescinded the demarche. This is what he denied doing — but we finally found this cable where he did rescind it just before the Letellier assassination took place.

My office, the National Security Archive, was also very forcefully involved in pushing for the retrieval of Kissinger’s telcons — these are 30,000 pages of transcripts of telephone conversations that Kissinger had from 1969-1977, first as national security adviser then as secretary of state.

Kissinger walked away with these 30,000 pages claiming they were personal private papers when in fact he wanted them to be able to write a comprehensive memoir for which he was paid millions of dollars. He basically appropriated the property of the American public and used it for private gain to skew his own version of history. He could write what he wanted, pick out what he wanted from these transcripts but the rest of us wouldn’t be able to verify or see what the real fuller context was.

That’s what he did in the case of Chile. He wrote an amazingly self-serving chapter about his role in the issue of Allende and support for Pinochet in which he completely misrepresented, obfuscated and lied about the history of his own policies. We prepared a lawsuit against the U.S. government for allowing him to steal U.S. property.

They were declassified in stages starting in 2004 and we are still trying to get the most sensitive of them out even though it is almost ten years later. [The documents] include material on Chile. The very first thing that I looked for and the first thing I found was Nixon and Kissinger’s first conversation after the coup in which they pat themselves on the back for this great accomplishment. “The Chilean thing is consolidated,” Kissinger says. And then they complain about the liberal press and how they can’t take credit for overthrowing Allende because the press is like a bleeding lamb over the overthrow of Allende.

http://www.santiagotimes.cl/opinion/question-answer/26706-chiles-coup-40-years-on-a-qaa-with-author-of-the-pinochet-files

[vlakitti]

28. Thank you for starting this thread

I suppose very few people today in this country know of this brutally shameful betrayal of democracy.

But rest assured, everyone in Latin America does.

[HooptieWagon]

29. ahhhh...Victor Jara.

A man of the people. His widow has been able to reassemble his recordings, its taken decades, but they are now available on CD. I have a couple... very beautiful and inspiring songs.

As an aside, a good friend's father was a student at University of Santiago at the time of the coup, Victor Jara was one of his professors. He was able to make it out of Chile to Brazil, where my friend was born, the family later emigrated to the US. The father became a celebrated artist, his son (my friend) is a noted musician. The father never speaks of the coup, I guess its too painful. I hope he'll tell his story one day, though...just so it won't be forgotten.

[Kolesar]

31. I spent the evening cycling through the Metropark and missed the fun

Thirteen miles in 90 degree heat. Very uplifting

[Joe Shlabotnik]

32. Rec

Fuck Kissinger.

[lonestarnot]

33. He's a bloody bastard.

[Starry Messenger]

34. K&R