Augusto Jose Ramon Pinochet Ugarte also known as Augusto Pinochet was born on November 25, 1915 in Valparaiso, Chile, and died on December 10, 2006 in Santiago, Chile. He was a murderous Dictator who ruled in Chile from 1973 to 1990. He was Commander-in-Chief of the Chilean Army from 1973 to 1998 and president of the Government Junta of Chile between 1973 and 1981. Pinochet managed to attain full power by overthrowing Salvador Allende, a socialist government, by using military force. His years in power were defined by inflation and poverty leaving behind a legacy of abuse that took successive government years to catalogue. Numerous years after Pinochet stepped down, he was charged with several crimes from the time when he was president, but he died before he could be convicted of anything.
Pinochet family was descendents of French settlers who had come to Chile more than a century ago. He was the eldest of six children and his father was a middle-class government worker. He entered military school when he turned 17 in the midst of being rejected three times. Finally after four years he graduated as a Sub-Lieutenant. One of the reasons why Pinochet rose above so quickly was due to Chile not being at war. In fact, its been said Pinochet has never sought any types of action in combat during his entire military career. According to his biographer, James Whelan, Pinochet lived a quiet childhood, with his mother who played a very important role in the formation of his character. Pinochet worked his way through the office corps and became involved in politics around the 1950s. The difficult thing to understand is that it was his apparent lack of political ambition that advanced him as a commander under chief Allende, who considered P...
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... several counts of murder, torture and unlawful kidnapping”. In fact he was unfit to stand trial, the charges were dismissed in 2002. Further charges were brought up in 2006, but Pinochet died before he could be convicted of anything. Pinochet suffered a heart attack on the morning of December 10, 2006 at the age of 91. He died of congestive heart failure and pulmonary edema. Chileans have divided Pinochet’s legacy. Some see him as a brutal dictator who ended Democracy and tortured many innocent people and favored towards the wealthy. While others believe he saved the country from communism and led the transformation of the Chilean economy into Latin America’s most stable economy today.
Works Cited
Minster, Christopher. "Biography of Augusto Pinochet." . About.com, n.d. Web. . .
The relationship between the working class and Allende is definitely a difficult to understand because it's hard to understand how a political party is supported by the same group who contributes to their downfall. The working class was not the only reason Allende lost power, but was a heavy contributor. The working class seemed to only use Allende as a reason to enforce reform, and Allende used the working class as a group of supporters. The two groups could only agree on the fact that Chile needed serious social change, and Allende was the best shot they had.
Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina is without a doubt one of the most known figures within the Dominican history. The “Era de Trujillo” (The Trujillo Era) occupied the Dominican Republic for the long period of thirty-one years. His dictatorship started in 1930 and ended with his assassination on May 30, 1961. Trujillo’s Career began with the occupation of the United States in 1916. During this time he was trained in a military school, and became part of the National Police, a military group made by the Unites States to maintain order in the Dominican Republic . Trujillo stood out during his military career and rapidly ascended within the military ranges. Under the government of Horatio Vasquez Trujillo received the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and was put in charge of chiefs and assistant commanders of the National Police . This new position gave him the opportunity to be part of the overthrowing of Horatio Vasquez. Trujillo was sworn into presidency on August 16, 1930. Marking the beginning of what is known as the cruel, violent and controversial part of history in the Dominican Republic.
Manuel Noriega, the former dictator of the Central American country of Panama, rose to power through the art of destruction deception and detail. Manuel Noriega was able to profit and flourish as Panama’s new leader because of the Cold War environment. Due to the Cold War, its geographical positioning, and financial liberties, Noriega was able to manipulate all parties involved while making him very wealthy, powerful, a political asset, and finally a threat to the United States National Security.
Salvador Allende promised to redistribute Chile's income (only two percent of the population received forty-six percent of the income), nationalize major industries (especially the copper companies), and to expand relations with socialist and communist countries. Allende's presidency presented a threat to the United States; a man with such aspirations would have to stray from United States policies and the policies of all other countries. Allende would neither respect nor consider the work the United States had done for them in the past. The United States would no longer be able to act as a parasite, sucking the money out of Chile. The U.S. decided it must stop this man from rising to power as soon as possible.
Years before the United States went after Saddam Hussein, the White House had General Manuel Noriega, who had been on the CIA’s payroll over the 20 years prior to the invasion, in its sights. Noriega was actually taken off the CIA payroll by President Jimmy Carter's CIA Director Mansfield Turner back in 1978, but immediately put back on the CIA payroll by the Reagan Adminstration at double Mansfield’s salary. Placed at the head of the CIA to do the government’s bidding, Noriega was basically manipulated into becoming a tyrannical arms and drug kingpin.
In the year 1939 the formidable General Francisco Franco rose to power during a time of government and economic struggle in Spain. He contained an ability that he began to develop and strengthen, allowing him to easily and efficiently take control of a situation, all while growing into a natural, very influential leader. His striking tactics of manipulation and articulate speech were cultivated from a young age, transformed into what would become mechanisms of terror. Due to a life that was submerged into the military and the path taken because of his specific division of the army, Franco developed these characteristics of a dictator, using them to accomplish a complete takeover of Spain’s civilization by whatever means necessary; the country was then plunged into a whirlwind of political, economic, and social struggles but also improvements that would continue to alternate until his death.
Francisco Franco was the dictator of Spain from 1939 to 1975, including the time of WW2. Perhaps he was better known as “El Caudillo,” translated into English as The Leader. He was born and raised in Spain. He was a very brilliant military general who led Nationalist rebels in defeating the Spanish government during the Spanish Civil War. Although he was viewed as a Fascist Dictator, he strongly opposed communism. He was an extremely important figure in the course of world history.
It all began with Jose Efrain Rios Montt, the president/dictator of the time. Rios Montt was born on June 16, 1926, in the small town of Huehuetenango, Guatemala (The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica). In 1943, Rios Montt joined the Guatemalan army where he rose to the rank of a brigadier general (1). After serving as director of the Inter-American Defense College in Washington, D.C., in 1973, he returned to Guatemala and ran unsuccessfully for president as the candidate of the National Opposition Front (Frente Nacional de Oposición;...
The Associated Press. Key dates for ex-Panama dictator Manuel Noriega. 27 April 2010. 7 April 2012 .
Benito Mussolini was born on July 29, 1883 outside the village of Dovia di Predappio in the Northeastern Italian province of Forli. He had one sister and one brother. They always fought and argued over little petty things with each other. His sister name was Edvige and his brother’s name was Armaldo. His mother Rosa Malteni was a well respect and appreciated schoolteacher. His father Allesandro Mussolini was both a blacksmith and a committee socialist. He received his name "Benito" from the Mexican Revolutionary Juarez. Benito grew up as a delinquent, disobedient, and did not have any manners. He was a bully to the other children around him. He would get into numerous of fights with other children.
Augusto Pinochet was the president and dictator who ruled Chile. He overthrew Salvador Allende government with the coup September 11, 1973. Of course, Pinochet was very brutal and he was a well-known destroyer. This didn’t stop his rampages and he continued to make his territory spiral downward at a fast pace. His 17 year dictatorship was covered with murder, torture, and abuse. He had over 200,000 political assassinations on his record, which is more than any other dictator contributed.
Despite his mischievous conduct, he was a self-disciplined student and had a great deal of Spanish pride which he learned from his teachers as well as his priest (Source F). Political uprising was a well accepted idea of Castro’s, on July 26, 1953 he formed the twenty-sixth of July movement and led one hundred and sixty revolutionaries on a “suicidal“ attack on the Moncada Military Barracks to spark popular uprise (source F &D). Many factors led to the rise of Castro’s power, but finally after popular up-rises and other communistic approaches like the overthrowing the military dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista, led to him being sworn in as Cuba’s prime minister and took power in the winter of 1958 (source A & F).
The “No” campaign had many obstacles to overcome in order to win the plebiscite. Many Chileans were afraid of Pinochet, which may have led to a low voter turnout. Some people were content with the dictatorship while others thought the plebiscite was fixed. The 1981 Constitution still allowed Pinochet immense power by naming him commander of the armed forces in case he loses the plebiscite. Lastly, there was a divide between the hard liners and the soft liners in the opposition. Because of the challenges the opposition had to overcome, the “No” campaign decided to use happiness as its tactic against Pinochet. Using happiness as a tool to promote freedom and unity helped the opposition to win the 1989 plebiscite.
Later leaders emphasized more social spending for education and antipoverty measures. They also pursued closer economic ties with North and South America and constitutional reforms to reduce the military's political influence. Under these reforms, Chilean presidents are no longer permitted to serve two consecutive terms and they are allowed to fire military commanders. In 2006, Chile elected its first female president, Michelle Bachelet, whose father died in prison during the Pinochet era and who, as a Socialist Party leader, was temporarily imprisoned herself. Her government continued the work of previous center-left governments to expose the fate of and compensate the families of those who disappeared or had been tortured during the Pinochet regime. Pinochet died in 2006 without acknowledging his alleged role in the disappearances. Bachelet was reelected in December 2013, after three years of right-wing rule by President Sebastián
Third world countries became the perfect battleground for cold war proxy battles during the early 1940’s to late 1990’s. United States wanted to flex its political muscle and try to curtail the spread of Soviet Communism in the developing nations. Most of the nations in developed world had already made their political and socio-economic stand regarding the form of governance and leadership pursued. Underdeveloped nations in Asia, Latin America and Africa were still vulnerable and easily influenced in terms of ideologies and political direction. Most nations in Latin America like Chile were recovering from colonialism and thus logistic, economic and political aid from powerful nations to propel their economies which made it easy for Americans and Russians to act as their “saviors’”. The quest for global dominance had intensified between United States and USSR and the shift was focused to developing nations like Chile. Both Americans and Russians used different mechanisms to enhance their propaganda and support the regimes which were friendly to them and used any means necessary to topple hostile regimes. CIA used covert operations in Chile and most of the Latin nations to plant their puppet leaders in order to safeguard their foreign policy interests and maintain dominance. Military coups and social unrests were planned, orchestrated and executed with the assistance of CIA. The research paper tries to critical analyze the impact of the cold war on Chile and influence of United States.