The other Sep 11 that tore Chile apart

September 11 was a notorious anniversary long before the events of 2001.

It is etched into the memory of America and the wider world as the date when dark times descended on the United States 15 years ago. It is the anniversary of the infamous terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

But there is the other Sep 11 – a dark and terrifying day that happened 43 years ago when jets rained bombs on the presidential palace and unleashed nearly two decades of repression.

So, for the people of Chile, much of Latin America, and democratic reformers at large, it marks another significant anniversary.

On this day in 1973, socialist President Salvador Allende was overthrown in a violent coup led by army chief Augusto Pinochet and backed by the United States, through the CIA.

It ushered in more than 15 years of military dictatorship under Gen Pinochet in the South American country that had boasted a long and stable democratic tradition in a politically fragile region beset by civil war and dictatorship.

The 64-year old Allende, the world's first democratically elected Marxist head of state, was found dead under mysterious circumstances as troops surrounded the presidential palace, La Moneda.

Salvador Allende. Photo: Reuters

Augusto Pinochet. Photo: Reuters

But officially, it was a suicide by Allende who was elected to power a year before Bangladesh earned its independence from Pakistan whose military regime the same Nixon administration had supported.

Despite the army’s threats that it would blow up the palace, the president refused to surrender; instead, he gave a farewell speech, broadcast on the last radio station still broadcasting.

“I will pay for my loyalty to the people with my life. And I say to them that I am certain that the seeds that we have planted in the good conscience of thousands and thousands of Chileans will not be shrivelled forever,” Allende had said.

Since that time, the CIA has acknowledged knowledge of—but not involvement in—the plot.

The agency "was aware of coup-plotting by the military, had ongoing intelligence collection relationships with some plotters, and—because CIA did not discourage the takeover and had sought to instigate a coup in 1970—probably appeared to condone it," the CIA writes in a history of its operations in the South American country.

Pinochet went on to consolidate power and ruled Chile with an iron fist until 1990. But Chile is still recovering from the effects of Pinochet's brutal rule.

According to an official report, 40,018 people were imprisoned, tortured or slain during the 1973-90 dictatorship.

Chile’s government estimates that of those 3,095 were killed, including about 1,200 who were forcibly “disappeared”.

In 1988, in a nationwide referendum on Pinochet, a majority of the people voted to deny him another term as president. A year later, elections were held, and the opposition candidate won.

Protesters demand punishment for Augusto Pinochet. Photo: Reuters

Pinochet stepped down as President in 1990, although as a former president he remained a senator-for-life and kept his position as commander-in-chief of the armed forces.

In October, 1998, his opponents brought charges against him in a Spanish court while he was visiting the United Kingdom for medical reasons. He was arrested in London and charged with several counts of murder, torture and unlawful kidnapping.

The charges were dismissed in 2002, on the grounds that Pinochet, by then in his late 70s, was unfit to stand trial. Further charges were brought in 2006, but he died in December that year, just before they could proceed.