Chile
         In Chile, many things have happened over the years. At the beginning Chile had a strong government. Then the elections came up. One of the candidates was Salvador Allende, a communist. Chile had not had a communist leader before, but the people agreed and liked his ideas. So the time to vote came, and Salvador Allende won! He was the new president of the republic. Many people didn't like the idea of Allende being president. They opposed this. One person was, General Augusto Pinochet. He led an army and rebeled against Allende. Allende had the people by his side, but he lacked the army. The War             The war was mainly Pinochet and the army against Allende and the people. Allende was stationed at the national palace, La Moneda. Pinochet surrounded La Moneda. Pinochet told Allende he had to "unconditionally surrender". Allende refused. He would not move from La Moneda, so Pinochet issued an ultimatum. Next thing you know airplanes are in the air, shooting at La Moneda, and on the ground army officers were going in and burning the place down. Smoke filled La Moneda. On the radio it was heard "Mission accomplished. Moneda taken. President found dead." Salvador Allende was dead. To be exact September 11 was the day he died. Many people said he committed suicide while others say he died fighting. Salvador Allende was found dead on the floor, sitting down, with head demolished, hands covered with gunpowder. To his side was a Soviet made automatic rifle inscribed with a gift plaque, " To Salvador from your companion in arms. Fidel Castro." It is still a mystery if Allende committed suicide or died fighting. People were still fighting for communism. Pinochet issued raids. These raids were to "interrogate" the communist. Dictatorship             Pinochet slowly ascended into dictatorship. First he was the president of the Junta. The Junta was composed of four members, General Pinochet, General Leigh, Admiral Medino, and General Mendoza. Together la Junta declared that they had power over the people. They also banned all political parties and the major labor federation, closed down congress, declared all new subjects to censorship, and warned that anyone who kept a "belligerent attitude" would be "executed on the spot".
        Day after day raids continued until almost 45,000 citizens were held for interrogations. General Mendoza said, " Our role was to restore tranquility and give security to the population. Obviously this meant doing disagreeable things."
        By December at least 1,500 civilians were dead- shot in confrontations, tortured to death, haunted down by vigilants, or executed by firing squads. Soon everybody was running away and looking for assylum.
        Basically the Junta had corrupted society. Liberals vacationed at Liberal beaches, Radical sent their kids to Radical schools, and Socialists rooted for Socialist soccer teams. During one of the biggest raids, everybody was put into soccer stadiums. This is where a lot of the Human rights were violated. People were interrogated harshly. Survivors got to see how the soldiers would take the prisoners, and the next thing they heard was gunshots. The prisoners were never seen again.
        One of the most famous prisoners was Victor Jara, a composer/singer. The story that people tell is that the guards asked him to sing after they had imprisoned him. He did sing, being accompanied by his guitar, so they cut his hands. After that the guards asked to sing again and he did sing so they killed him. His wife found his body full of cigarette burns.
        As you can see in these raids the soldiers had power to do as they wanted with whomever they wanted. It has been reported that they raped and whipped many prisoners. Even though all these crimes happened and many people “disappeared” The government denies ever hurting these people. When Pinochet vowed to become president he said, “ I don't want to be an irreplaceable person. I have no aspiration but to serve my country. Today it is me, tomorrow it will be Admiral Medino, then General Leigh, and so on.” Moreover, he pledged that, “ as soon as the country recuperates, the Junta will turn over the government to whomever the people desire.” For a time they all acted as equals. They divided jobs: policy planning/ security- Pinochet, social welfare- General Leigh, Economy- admiral Medino, and agriculture- General Mendoza. Leigh started to get very suspicious and started to distrust Pinochet. Leigh finally confronted Pinochet. This all ended in Leigh getting replaced by General Fernando Matthei. Matthei said that Pinochet liked to say this, “ It is not that I WANT power; I HAVE it, and I will make use of it to give Chile a true normality.” For Pinochet an “enemy” was defined as anyone who represented Chile's traditional order. During the years Pinochet hurt, but also helped Chile. The reason that he lost power was because he lost some elections. On December 15, 1989 he lost to Patricio Aylwin. Now in the present Pinochet is being charged for violation of Human rights. He might be up for bail, and is currently under house arrest. Some oppose him while others support him.
   

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