PART TWO
Chapter One

Political Context

This chapter consists of two sections, both dealing with ideas and events in the political life of the nation which the Commission believes are related to its task.

The first section discusses the situation leading up to September 11, 1973. It is not the role of the Commission to take a stand on the events that took place on that date and immediately thereafter, that is, on whether they were justified or not, or whether there was or was not some other way out of the conflict that led to those events. There can be, and indeed are, various opinions on these issues, and quite legitimately so.

The state of the country at that time can be fittingly described as one of acute crisis in our national life. That crisis led to the destruction or deterioration of numerous points of consensus among Chileans on a series of institutions, traditions, and shared assumptions concerning social and political coexistence, which served to safeguard respect for human rights. Hence it is absolutely essential that we understand the crisis of 1973, both in order to understand how the subsequent human rights violations we were charged to investigate came about and to prevent their recurrence. In no way, however, is this examination of the crisis to be understood as implying that the 1973 crisis might justify or excuse such violations in the least.

Our study of the crisis will deal basically with its immediate causes, especially with those of a political and ideological nature. The Commission is well aware that the crisis had deeper social and economic roots, but to explore them any further than simply mentioning them would have meant going beyond its task and beyond the direct object of the present chapter. Nevertheless, we must point out that the ultimate source of the crisis is to be sought in the struggle between different and opposed social interests throughout the present century within the context of representative government. However, clashes over doctrines and attitudes which have a bearing-directly or indirectly, but almost immediately-on the issue of human rights take place in the realm of politics and ideology.

With regard to the second section, it is almost unnecessary to point out that the events of September 11, 1973 brought about a profound change in the country's political system-in principles, structures, and institutions, as well as in both pro government and opposition ideologies-and in its individual and collective actors.

The basic features of the change remained in place until 1988, for although the Constitution went into effect in 1980, it established an eight-year transition period over which it would fully enter into effect. This period was governed by a number of transitory articles which generally and indeed in many specific features are a faithful reflection of the 1973-1980 system.

The issue of concern to the Commission, which is discussed in the second section of this chapter, is how the political system between 1973 and 1988 could be conducive to the serious human rights violations that are the subject of this report. It is not our role to take a stand on other positive or negative features of that regime, nor on its accomplishments or failures. On these matters there can be, and indeed are, legitimate disagreements.

1. SITUATION IN CHILE LEADING UP TO SEPTEMBER 11, 1973
   
   The 1973 crisis may be generally described as one of sharp polarization in the political positions of the civil sphere into two sides-government and opposition. Neither side was able (and probably did not want) to arrive at a compromise with the other, and there were sectors on both sides that believed armed confrontation was preferable to any sort of negotiation.
   
   This is not to say that all Chileans were so polarized, nor that there were not to be found on both sides those who favored negotiation over confrontation. Nevertheless, there seems to be no doubt that whatever may have been the reasons, polarization became the dominant feature of political language and interaction, and the more violent sectors in that polarization gradually came to the fore.
   
   
   1. ORIGINS OF POLARIZATION
      
      As has been pointed out already, the ultimate source of this crisis is naturally very complex and is open to a number of interpretations. It is not the role of the Commission to judge such interpretations or delve further into them, but it should point out those factors which it believes were most important in generating the polarization and crisis, and hence its painful and usually unnecessary consequences as well.
      
      
      1. Starting in the 1950s, Chile, like many in countries in Latin America, witnessed the insertion of its domestic politics into the superpower struggle, the so-called "Cold War," which, given the impetus of the contending interests and ideologies around the world, by its very nature entailed a polarization. Chile felt the impact of the Cold War, perhaps only slightly at first, but very forcefully in the 1960s with the Cuban Revolution, which sought to resolve the problems which it believed to be common to all Latin America as a result of military dictatorships and serious economic and social inequities. As will be observed below, the Cuban Revolution overflowed the borders of its own country and became a chapter in the "Cold War," pitting Cuban-Soviet "insurgency" against North American "counterinsurgency"-each with its localallies-throughout Latin America. The result was an extreme polarization, in which the two superpowers were actively intervening in the political life of the various Latin American countries. Our country was no exception, nor was any sector in our national political life entirely free of such influences.
         
         
      2. Almost simultaneously, this polarization received a second impulse when parties and movements became heavily ideological under the influence of worldwide intellectual trends. A sign of that ideologizing was the fact that parties and movements to a greater or lesser extent proposed complete models for society, and they were unwilling to admit any but the most minimal modifications, postponements, or negotiations of those models. Since, however, these movements and parties did not actually have enough political power to impose such models, the practical result of their becoming more ideologized was a heightened polarization.
         
         
      3. Nevertheless, political life continued to make its way within at least an apparent shared adherence to the democratic rules of the game. Most of the population supported democracy, despite the numerous and varied issues in dispute. Over the course of the 1960s this adherence began to wane.
         
         
      In certain political sectors the notion that force was the primary and indeed only way either to change or maintain-as the case might be-the favored model was gaining ground. By the same token, these same sectors criticized and lost faith in democratic procedures, namely the electoral route to power, and in its institutions, such as parliamentary rule. Such tendencies were to be found on both the "left" and the "right," as they were conventionally called.
      
      For some sectors of the left, embracing a policy of armed struggle was largely related to the Cuban Revolution, which made the "armed path" paramount in the struggle to take power. Indeed, one of its most outstanding figures, Ernesto Guevara, whose ideological influence and personal following was enormous throughout Latin America, declared and argued that armed struggle was the only path. In his view, any other routes, such as democratic or electoral ones, political proselytizing, organizing to pressure for change, parliamentary approaches and so forth, were merely complements of armed struggle; otherwise they were sheer illusion.
      
      The first Chilean political group to accept Guevara's ideas was the MIR (Revolutionary Left Movement) which was founded in 1965 and in 1968 went underground. It carried out armed actions from underground and was working toward taking power through insurrection. It did not join the Popular Unity, and it underestimated the 1970 electoral campaign which was to end with the victory of the Popular Unity.
      
      Significant sectors within the Popular Unity held to the same ideology as that of the MIR or similar to it. Certainly the Socialist party officially adopted it at the Congress of Chill n (1967) and reaffirmed it in the Congress of La Serena (1971) when it was in power as part of the Popular Unity. The majority elected to the Central Committee and the General Secretary firmly believed that armed conflict was inevitable.
      
      It is true that for more than thirty years the Socialist party had been fully involved in democratic politics. Moreover, even after 1967 there were strong tendencies within it in this direction. It is also true that its members were far less engaged in political violence than were those of the MIR. Yet it is also true that the political language and actions of the party brought it closer to the latter than to the old Socialist party. The official wing of MAPU (United Popular Action Movement) and the Christian Left gradually took similar positions during the 1970-73 period.
      
      The picture would be neither complete nor fair if we failed to note that on the left and particularly in the Popular Unity there were other sectors that rejected the armed path either on principle or in view of the political and social conditions at that time (the "objective conditions"). Such was the case of the Communist party, the Worker and Peasant MAPU, most of the Radical party, and President Allende personally, whose "peaceful way" or "Chilean way," a new kind of Marxism-Leninism, as he saw it, absolutely ruled out the use of violence. However, during the later stages of the crisis (1970-1973), these sectors found themselves pushed aside, overwhelmed, and sometimes seduced and drawn in by those who argued that armed conflict was inevitable.
      
      Likewise some groups on the right either officially or in their actual behavior supported the use of weapons as a way of resolving the crisis, at least toward the end. One of these, the so-called "Tacna" group, which published a newspaper under that title, openly advocated a military coup. The same was true, in practice if not in theory, of leaders and activists of the Fatherland and Liberty Nationalist Movement, who were involved in the failed effort at a military uprising called the "tanquetazo" [abortive tank attack on La Moneda] on June 29, 1973. Later that year they were still preparing for a further attempt when the events of September 11 occurred. The remaining sectors of the right were not involved in any similar military action, including the decisive one. Nevertheless, within the right-although not all of it-there was always a mindset favorable to resolving certain problems (those of a social nature, for example, or the problem of communism) by means of force. Moreover, an incident such as the so-called "Schneider plot" in 1970 [murder of army commander-in-chief General René Schneider intended to provoke a coup and prevent Allende from taking office] and the post-September 11 behavior of most right-wing leaders seem to indicate that a considerable proportion of them and of their followers likewise favored a violent solution, at least in the final moments of the 1970-1973 crisis. To a lesser extent the same can be said of centrist sectors.
      
      Whatever the relative weight of these confrontational groups within the right and the center, they became increasingly important in the final period, as was the case on the left. We should also mention the regrettably unsuccessful efforts made by more moderate sectors to encourage compromise between the government and opposition, such as contacts sponsored by the Catholic church.
      
      
   2. FINAL PHASE OF POLARIZATION AND CRISIS
      
      Starting in 1970 such phenomena took a sharp and violent turn, partly out of their own natural thrust-it was logical that those who argued that armed conflict was necessary would tend to provoke it or at least not flee from it-and partly due to new factors, all of which were related to the Popular Unity's rise to power and government.
      
      
      1. The Cuban Revolution and the "Cold War" again contributed indirectly to hastening our crisis. In that context the victory of the Popular Unity and President Allende in 1970 was regarded as the triumph of one of the contending superpowers, the USSR, and as a defeat for, and threat to, the other, the United States. Hence the United States immediately planned and engaged in a twofold policy of intervention in Chile's internal affairs: in October 1970 to prevent Salvador Allende from coming into power (the so-called "track one"), and when that failed, to destabilize the new government economically ("track two").
         
         
      2. These developments are directly related to the devastating economic crisis Chile underwent starting in 1972, which was an integral and very important part of the broader crisis culminating in 1973. The economic crisis brought unprecedented levels of inflation, the breakdown of production and acute shortages of basic goods, a disastrous situation in foreign trade, and a gradual paralyzing of the whole economy.
         
         It is not the Commission's role to analyze these events, but we will note that the economic crisis involved an interplay of factors of economic management, and others of a more political and social nature. These latter included the poor performance of companies and lands under state ownership or in the process of being taken by the government, the United States pressure already mentioned ("track two"), which was aggravated by the dispute between the two countries over the nationalization of copper, and the strikes organized by the opposition, especially in October 1972.
         
         Whatever the reasons for the economic crisis, it seems beyond question that it played a key role in bringing about the situation that led to the events of 1973.
         
         
      3. Although, as we have noted, the opposition political parties were not so clearly on the side of the "armed path" as were some sectors of the government, they used their political bodies (parties and the congress) and social organizations (business and professional associations) to try to force the Popular Unity to negotiate, postpone, or give up its model of society, forcing it to choose between doing so or facing an ungovernable country.
         
         "Armed path" and "ungovernability" thus came to symbolize mutually exclusive notions of society; neither could prevail over the other democratically, and yet neither was willing to negotiate with its adversary and thus open the way to a peaceful solution.
         
         
      4. Nevertheless, the political emotions of that period do not constitute a sufficient explanation for the fact that business, occupational, and professional organizations as well as opposition parties-the grassroots more than the leadership-came to such a point of extreme rebellion: strikes intended to make the country ungovernable. Moreover, these sectors felt abandoned by the mechanisms of the state whose purpose was to protect their rights. They felt that these institutions, the National Congress, the General Comptroller's Office, and the judiciary, were entirely unable to halt the violation of those rights.
         
         Was that truly the case? The Commission would like to point to some circumstances that could seem to justify such fears. Such circumstances expanded and intensified after 1970:
         
         
         • There were repeated violations of property rights in the form of "takeovers" (illegal occupations) of rural, urban, and industrial properties. In most of these cases the owners received no help in recovering their ownership nor were the perpetrators punished. Administrative authorities very often failed to comply with court orders of restitution.
           
           
         • In these "takeovers" and "recoveries" (the owners' violent reoccupation of properties that had been usurped) it became common to see the armed strength of private citizens replace the public police forces and to do so with impunity. The official forces found themselves administratively blocked from acting during the "takeovers" and tended to take a deliberately passive stance toward "recoveries."
           
           
         • The events just described became more and more frequent throughout the 1970-1973 period, creating an overall picture of disorder in which the rights of private citizens and the specific function of the police were ignored.
           
           
         • These developments often led to bloodshed affecting both sides: killings, serious wounds, and suicide, as well as kidnappings and ill treatment. Such crimes were handled politically, however, rather than in the court system. Indeed at least one such case, the murder of a MIR student by a Communist student on the campus of the University of Concepción, was publicly declared to be a political problem rather than a criminal one and in fact no sanction was applied.
           
           
         • In the process of nationalization or of the establishment of the "social area" of the economy (in farming, industry, and large-scale trade) the Popular Unity, lacking the legislation required and the parliamentary strength that would have enabled it to make it a law, used existing legislation to the fullest, distorting the meaning of the text and even going beyond it. Those affected regarded this as an abuse and a way of getting around the will of the majority of the electorate and of the Congress.
           
           
         • The government claimed that this situation was simply the fruit of resistance to change by entrenched interests.
           
           
         The Commission understands that all these points can be interpreted in diverse and contradictory ways. It also understands that no side had a monopoly on violence, and that violence flared up because the extent of polarization already underway encouraged each individual to believe he or she was overstepping the bounds of the legal framework only in response to, and defense against, someone else who had already done so. In practice, however, the cumulative effect of these circumstances was that all sectors directly harmed by the prevailing disorder and illegality came up with a common and unvarying explanation: that the administration was not protecting their rights and that when these rights were violated they could not find support in the police, the judiciary, the General Comptroller's Office, and so forth. They concluded that the only defense was self-defense, and thus spread the idea of irregular pressure on the government (strikes) and likewise the idea of irregular armed groups in both city and countryside to defend the ownership of properties and companies and their own personal security. Such ideas unquestionably sank deep roots in small and medium property owners in rural areas and the cities, and also in modest business people in industry, trade, transportation, and so forth and in professional associations. However, such private opposition militias were inevitably seen as leading to a coup, and so they sparked the formation of pro-government paramilitary groups. Moreover, extreme groups of any sort do not need a reason or pretext for becoming armed, and so the fever to do so spread throughout Chile.
         
         
      5. Finally, in describing the final phase of the 1970-1973 crisis, we cannot ignore the role of the media. Some media, especially certain widely read newspapers on both sides, went to incredible lengths to destroy the reputations of their adversaries, and to that end they were willing to make use of all weapons. Since on both sides political enemies were being presented as contemptible,it seemed just, if not necessary, to wipe them out physically, and on a number of occasions there were open calls for that to happen.
         
         
      All these factors taken together, before and after 1970, led to a climate that by 1973 was objectively favorable to civil war. Both the climate and such a war entailed accepting the possibility and perhaps the inevitability that innocent adversaries would be subjected to physical and moral suffering. Such was seemingly the price to be paid for what in that climate of civil war was assumed to be at stake: a model of society which each side claimed was the only one acceptable; the preservation of basic and inalienable rights; life itself. "It's us or them"; "Kill or be killed"; "The cancer has to be rooted out"; "You can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs." Such common expressions at that time reflected deep feelings which could do nothing to aid peaceful coexistence. Instead they were paving the way for fear which engenders hatred and hence brutality and death.
      
      As September 11, 1973 drew near, these fruits were already being harvested. Every new bomb set off, every political murder or armed clash for political or social reasons resulting in death and injury had a twofold effect: it further exacerbated the climate of civil war and it made violence and death ever more routine. Consequently the moral dikes of society gave way, and the path was opened to further and greater excesses.
      
      
   3. ROLE OF THE ARMED FORCES AND THE POLICE
      
      Until they stepped in decisively in September 1973, the armed forces and police, notwithstanding the ideologies and arguments that were stirring in their ranks, stayed out of the crisis and remained within the role of professionalism, discipline, obedience to the civilian power and political neutrality assigned to them in the Constitution. Nevertheless, the very exacerbation of the crisis-slowly but surely, continually and increasingly-drew them away from this role. We list some of the basic reasons why that was the case.
      
      In addition to these causes, it is quite likely that the ideological current present within the ranks of the armed forces and police which we are about to discuss was impelling them toward taking power. An authoritarian regime would be useful to this tendency, in order to pursue its distorted notions of counterinsurgency and national security. Circumstances favored the officers who subscribed to that doctrine and were unfavorable to those, probably the majority, who would have preferred to continue in the traditional and constitutional role of military institutions.
      
      Such reasons were:
      
      
      • The intensification of the crisis brought the dispute raging within civilian circles into the midst of the officers, threatening to divide them just as civilian circles were now divided, and thereby to split the armed forces and police.
        
        It was only such a division that could transform the "climate" of civil war into actual war. It is widely accepted that civil war does not break out as long as it is only civilians who are clashing with one another, since they do not have the weapons needed if a simple armed confrontation is to escalate to the level of a war. In order for that to happen, substantial sectors of armed forces and security forces, that is, professional soldiers, must be present on each side, and hence the military and security forces have to split. They therefore had to consider the possibility that their failure to act might entail a greater evil, civil war, as a result of their own division.
        
        By hindsight, it is easy to point out the alternative route: to have remained both united and within the bounds of the Constitution. Nor can the practical feasibility of that alternative be simply ruled out. At that moment, however, the top leaders had to weigh the consequences of failure and whether the lower and mid-level officers could have maintained a unity that the civilian world had shown itself unable to maintain.
        
        
      • The magnitude of the crisis and particularly the possibility of civil war, which revealed the country to be weakened and divided, was whetting foreign appetites [a reference to longstanding territorial claims by Argentina and Peru]. The very security of the country that the army and police are specifically enjoined to protect was in jeopardy. Over the next few years and until the end of the decade, it became unquestionably clear that the possibility of conflict with neighboring countries was not merely hypothetical.
        
        
      • The "armed path" and "ungovernability" furthermore meant, as was demonstrated every day, an ongoing and increasing disturbance of public order, internal security, and the functioning of the economy in its most fundamental aspects, such as basic food supply. The armed forces and security forces regarded much of this-indeed all of it, when viewed within a very broad notion of national security-as their responsibility.
        
        
      • The "armed path" and "ungovernability" led to a proliferation of paramilitary groups, as we have already mentioned. These tended to be presented, or to present themselves loudly, as having many members, and being well equipped and well trained, and quite effective. The armed forces and security forces could not verify such claims and out of prudence had to accept them as true.
        
        By hindsight, it seems clear that these groups did not have the military capability they claimed, but of course that could not be taken for granted before September 11, 1973. It is possible that by infiltrating these groups military, naval, and other intelligence bodies could have come to a more realistic assessment of the danger they represented, but other information suggests that would not have been the case.
        
        Moreover, besides claiming to be ready for military struggle, some of these groups criticized the armed forces and police forces directly; they urged that they be dissolved or radically changed; they declared that they planned to infiltrate them or even that they had already done so; they urged lower ranking officers and troops to disobey orders.
        
        Certainly they were doing so in a context in which it was assumed that a military conspiracy was already underway. This is simply one more indication that in a crisis as broad as ours in 1973 the fact that both sides may be partly correct only stokes the fires of contention and leads to the self-fulfillment of each side's gloomy prophecies, even though a good portion of the population does not sympathize with such extreme positions. In any case it would have been illusory to expect that the armed forces and security forces could see in these circumstances anything but a threat to break their monopoly on weapons and their internal unity, once more conjuring up the specter of division and civil war.
        
        
      • We must also recall that our armed forces and police forces had a continual and longstanding tradition of anticommunism, dating practically back to the Russian Revolution. This anticommunism was deliberately reinforced for the sake of the "Cold War" in the training the United States systematically provided to Latin American officers in its own country and in Panama within the framework of inter-American bodies and treaties. After the Cuban Revolution, military anticommunism was directed at the extreme left political groups which looked to that Revolution for inspiration. These were the very groups that seized and spread in Chile an ideology of armed struggle; of showing repugnance for the armed forces and security forces by identifying them with the bourgeoisie and the oppressive state; of proclaiming that they were to be destroyed or transformed through revolution; of boasting that they intended to infiltrate them or indeed had already done so; and of calling officers and troops to mutiny.
        
        
      • Moreover, it is important to keep in mind that for complex reasons that cannot be developed here, the armed forces and security forces were isolated from the rest of society. It is therefore likely that the proposals and invitations from the revolutionary left that we have just mentioned and the information about uprisings, and about weapons being gathered and hidden and so forth, prompted in them an anger and a fear that such isolation only intensified.
        
        
      • Finally, as the crisis gained momentum, many civilians were more and more insistently calling on the armed forces and security forces to intervene, even though to do so would have been unconstitutional. Obviously that call came primarily from the opposition and assumed all kinds of forms, both open and covert, and even insinuations that such forces were cowardly for not acting. Such exaggerations aside, we should recall that even within the more moderate opposition and among political figures with a long and distinguished tradition of democracy, one commonly heard the notion that the country needed a brief but authoritarian military "interregnum" in order to reorganize its political life. Furthermore, neither the Popular Unity government nor President Allende (except the Socialist party and groups related to it) were opposed to a political and institutional intervention by the armed forces on their own behalf. Their position could hardly be reconciled with the Constitution, no matter what norms or precautions might be adopted.
        
        
      Thus
      
      
      • With the support of the opposition, the Chamber of Deputies approved the well-known solemn agreement of August 23, 1973, which served notice that unless the government stopped committing its alleged constitutional and legal violations, the military ministers would resign their posts.
        
        
      • On two occasions (October 1972 and August 1973) the government, and indeed the president himself, issued an invitation to important representatives of the four branches of the armed forces and security forces to join the cabinet. On the second occasion, the fact that the four ministers were the four commanders-in-chief of those branches left no doubt of the president's intention, namely that they should join the government and institutionally share the administration of the country. The implications were not lost on the Socialist leaders and on the extreme left which harshly criticized the head of state. Some of them said that such a ministry would amount to an implicit "soft coup."
        
        
      • In 1970 the Congress had passed a Weapons Control Law that offered the military institutions very sweeping and even dangerous powers to search public and private places, independently of civilian authorities.
        
        
      • Nevertheless, it cannot be said that these various factors which led the armed forces to intervene in September 1973, but which were largely not their doing, were the only causes of that intervention. No doubt for most of those forces they were the only reasons. However, the subsequent events to which we now turn leave no doubt that there was also an ideological tendency within the armed forces and security forces. Alongside some rather vague and simple notions about how the country should be organized politically, socially, and economically, that tendency emphasized an extreme and mistaken idea of antisubversive war for the sake of national security.
        
        
2. THE 1973-1990 POLITICAL FRAMEWORK AND HUMAN RIGHTS
   
   On September 11, 1973, a "military regime," as even its creators were quick to call it, came into being in Chile. Its juridical structure is the topic of the next chapter. Here we will look at its collective actors, the ideologies from which they took their inspiration, the political structures (or structures related to politics) they set up, and the impact of all of these matters on human rights.
   
   
   1. THE ARMED FORCES AND POLICE FORCES AS COLLECTIVE ACTORS IN POLITICS
      
      The government junta, which represented the armed forces and police as institutions, first took over the executive power (Decree No. 1) and then the constituent and legislative powers (Decree Law No. 128). The judiciary formally retained its legal functions and independence, but that appearance hid a very different reality because: a) most members of the Supreme Court sympathized with the new regime, and b) it was almost idle to supervise the legality of those who could change it at will even in constitutional matters. This latter circumstance became clear in the rapid legal reforms which tended to dissuade the courts from really examining anything related to the freedom of persons.
      
      The fate of the other monitoring agencies in the country on September 11, 1973, was similar to that of the judicial branch. The General Comptroller's Office was retained at first simply in order to register laws and later to play its traditional role. It shared, however, the same crucial defect as that of the courts, namely, that those "controlled" could change at will the rule they were being accused of not observing. In actuality, the Comptroller General's Office never had problems with the military regime, and the only time its highest official rejected a ruling of vital importance to the military (the 1978 "national consultation")^e that highest official was quickly persuaded to resign. Congress had been closed and dissolved at the very moment the junta assumed power (Decree Law No. 27). Finally the media (press, radio, and TV channels) were subjected to a very thorough censorship which later became self-censorship. No new media could be created without the express approval of the government.
      
      Thus the military regime, that is, the armed forces and police as political actors, came into being with extremely broad powers, such as had been unknown in Chile except during those periods when they themselves had played a similar, albeit lesser, role: 1924-1925 and 1927-1931.^f In exercising this power, the armed forces had the obvious advantages of the unity that they had just shown in their political and military action, and their top-down command structure, which enabled them to move quickly, decisively, and firmly. Finally, the armed forces and police forces enjoyed a good deal of public support. That support came from their convinced and enthusiastic supporters, from those who believed there was "no other way out," and from those who had no clear ideas of their own but wanted to "live in peace," free of the shocks and hardships of the final days of the regime that had been overthrown.
      
      However, as they became a "political regime," the armed forces and police were also beset with serious internal contradictions, which prior to September 1973 had not been so obvious or important:
      
      
      1. They were not clear on just what their course of political action was to be. It had been one thing to overthrow a regime they saw as inviable; replacing it was something else. Everyone, or almost everyone, had agreed on the former, but the latter prompted different questions and different kinds of answers. What was the aim of the military regime?: to rapidly restore Chilean democracy, to carry out a deep restoration, or to establish a new democracy in Chile, as defined in various ways? One clear sign of such doubts was the initial justification given for September 11. The overthrown regime was criticized for violating the constitution; and yet there was talk of an entirely different country, one whose Chilean identity was to be restored.
         
         
      2. All of this was connected to how long the military regime was to last, a topic much discussed by top military officers. Some saw the period as short, quite short (two, three, or four years); others saw it as medium term; for others it should be as long as necessary, and as required by the deep changes that had to be carried out ("goals, not deadlines"); yet others saw the military regime as permanent, and regarded it as a planned and definitive involvement of the armed forces and police in governmental and administrative functions.
         
         
      3. Nor was it clear who was to represent the military in the new regime. Would all branches of the military be equally represented? Or would the most powerful and oldest branch, the army, dominate? Would collective government in the form of the junta continue, or would it move toward one-person rule? If the latter was to be the case, would it rotate among the various branches of the military and the police, or remain fixed?
         
         
      4. Finally, the officers differed widely in their political ideas. Some had never been concerned about "these matters," and looked upon politics and politicians with a mixture of mistrust, distance, and impatience. Among such officers there was a good deal of inclination toward authoritarianism and nationalism, vaguely referred to as the Portales creed,^g often very imprecisely expressed. Others sympathized with the right, or with the centrist Radicals and Christian Democrats. There were even some who harbored Socialist ideas, although they were almost never connected to the Chilean political parties that upheld such ideas. No doubt a very large portion still subscribed to the norms of non-involvement in politics as contained in the so-called "Schneider doctrine," named after the former commander-in-chief, but they were not influential at that moment, given the situation of the nation and of the military before and after September 11.
         
         
      Within this confusing ideological panorama, however, there was one group in the military, basically made up of army officers, which acted in secret and had to intention of seeking the spotlight. This group made its presence felt through its actions rather than its words-although the members of the group often denied hose actions. It was remarkably coherent in ideology and action, and had a decisive impact on human rights.
      
      This group was reflected in the "colonels' committee" which functioned in the Military Academy for a few weeks after September 11, 1973, in the "DINA Commission" (November 1973), and in DINA itself, which was formally created in June 1974. When the DINA was abolished in 1977 the group lost power and influence, but not entirely. We cannot say, however, that it was only this group that subscribed to this underlying ideology, since other sectors of the armed forces and police also subscribed to it before and after 1973.
      
      What was the ideology from which this group drew inspiration? We can only deduce it from their behavior and from the influence they received from outside the country, since it was never formulated theoretically, or at least no such formulations have come to light thus far.
      
      To begin with, let us note that some believe this ideology derives to some degree from the war of decolonization in Algeria but that it took definitive shape as a result of the Cuban Revolution and of the call to extend this revolution throughout Latin America. The main exponent of that call was Ernesto Guevara, who said that it should be extended by establishing guerrilla focos, ["pockets," literally foci] which were to be highly trained in political doctrine as well as military matters. These focos were to be established in rural areas. Followers of Guevara, especially Brazilians and Uruguayans, added that such focos could also be urban. Actually some were of the first type (such as that of Guevara himself in Bolivia) and others were of the second (those of Marighella in Brazil and of Sendic and the Tupamaros in Uruguay).
      
      Word concerning such focos, and their actual appearance on the scene, together with the idea that they were designed and planned for all of Latin America-which was generally true-led a number of governments, and especially that of the United States, to start a counterinsurgency drive. Just like the focos, such counterinsurgency was both local in nature in each country and centralized through a degree of coordination between all Latin American countries. The United States took charge of the overall coordination, and to that end it took advantage of the fact that generations of officers from the various Latin American countries were passing through its military training schools year after year.
      
      Counterinsurgency was certainly a technique, that of armed struggle against the urban or rural enemy guerrilla fighter. Underlying it, however, there seems to have been hidden an implicit doctrine or philosophy, one that was not necessarily shared by all the instructors, let alone all the students, although events prove that it influenced many of the latter.
      
      Within that counterinsurgency doctrine or philosophy, the following points are relevant to the topic of human rights:
      
      
      • Guerrilla warfare is not a minor matter as its name implies [guerrilla = diminutive of guerra, "war"] but is a genuine war;
        
        
      • This war is not just that of each country against its own insurgents, but is likewise a continental war led from Cuba, and more remotely from the USSR, aimed at destroying the institutions of the free world and the West, and making all of Latin America a satellite of the Soviet empire;
        
        
      • This genuine war, guerrilla warfare, is also hypocritical because it is undeclared and where necessary is even explicitly disavowed; moreover the governments that promote it deny that they are in any way responsible for it;
        
        
      • Guerrillas show no respect for any laws of war nor of morality: they kill treacherously, kill prisoners, torture and hurt innocent people through terrorism, and senselessly and uselessly destroy productive property, and so forth;
        
        
      • Governments must understand how dangerous the guerrillas are and respond to that danger by means of counterinsurgency on the continental as well as the local level.
        
        
      • Counterinsurgency must confront guerrilla warfare with its own methods lest it place itself at a disadvantage, for the fundamental values of the nation, the state, society, and so forth are at stake.
        
        
      Counterinsurgency doctrine was to one degree or another reflected in the information and practice received in training sessions for antiguerilla warfare, such as the secret nature of operations; "interrogation techniques"; education in "special" forms of fighting and killing and in how to lay ambushes; and "survival" training sessions, which often included actions that were cruel or degrading to one's own dignity. All this gradually accustomed the students to the fact that ethical limits were receding and diminishing, sometimes to the vanishing point. Paradoxically, however, counterinsurgency had been devised to save the very ethic which its actions-intended to respond to purported similar actions by the guerrillas-denied. Hence two new justifications were employed to round out the doctrine. One was the notion that the counterinsurgent, the one combatting the guerrillas, was a kind of hero who was sacrificing not only his physical life, if necessary, but his moral integrity so that others might enjoy that integrity and the benefits provided by a free society.
      
      The other justification was a distorted concept of national security, which as a supreme value was regarded as being above ethics. This amounted to a revival of what used to be called raisons d'etat: once again in extreme cases (which government authorities could themselves appraise) the rights of individuals could be violated by reason of an alleged general interest.
      
      Armies, police, and security forces in a number of Latin American countries were engaged in this kind of counterinsurgency during roughly the same period. Thus it is clear that such counterinsurgency campaigns had a common origin. Moreover, connections between the various counterinsurgency operations were unusually strong, and they had organizations and operations in common. The details, insofar as they related to the DINA, will be found in Part Three, Chapter Two ("Overview 1974-August 1977") of this report.
      
      
   2. THE ARMED FORCES, THE SECURITY FORCES, AND THE DINA GROUP
      
      By the "DINA Group" we mean the group of army majors and colonels that began operating in the Military Academy on September 11, 1973 (and perhaps previously in embryonic form in the Military Engineers Regiment in Tejas Verdes). The group later became the DINA Commission, which in turn became the DINA itself, as has already been stated and will be studied in greater detail in Part Three, Chapter Two.
      
      From the outset this group demonstrated a great deal of cohesion and boldness on the part of some of its more outstanding members, as will be clear further on when we look at the journeys a high level military delegation made up and down the country in September and October 1973, leaving in their wake a high number of merciless clandestine executions that were utterly illegitimate and unjustified.
      
      Such are the general features of this group; they are the same as those of all extreme or perverted counterinsurgency programs throughout Latin America, whose origins it shares. Before considering the DINA's relationship with the rest of the armed forces, we would do well to pose a question previously raised: did the DINA Group have any particular features of its own, and did it have a political doctrine?
      
      This twofold question may be answered as follows:
      
      
      • The DINA Group showed the ability, as proven by its subsequent history, to both circumscribe its activity and carry it to extreme limits. It circumscribed that action insofar as it set for itself the basic task of eliminating what it regarded as the ultraleft, particularly the MIR and other groups or persons connected to it. Having thus designated the "enemy," the group set out to utterly destroy it, identifying, locating, and killing its leadership teams, or members regarded as especially dangerous;
        
        
      • Insofar as can be determined, the group does not seem to have held any significant political doctrine except for a particularly virulent anticommunism (which in turn links it to counterinsurgency continent-wide). As will be noted later, the Commission was able to document facts pointing to a link between the DINA and right-wing groups from other countries who were true terrorists, but there is no indication that the DINA saw it as anything more than an expedient working relationship that served its own goals.
        
        
      We now turn to the question of relationships between the armed forces and police and the DINA group.
      
      It was the armed forces who were in the best position to neutralize the DINA, both because it belonged to the armed forces and because those forces themselves were or constituted the regime, as we have explained above. They did not do so, however. Why was that the case?
      
      One possible answer would be that the armed forces agreed with the group, and went along with the doctrine and practices of the most extreme forms of counterinsurgency. Although, as we have seen, such an outlook was shared by others besides the DINA group, the Commission knows that a good number of officials did not agree with the group, its activities, or its justifications, at least in 1973 and 1974, and expressed their disagreement to their superiors on a number of occasions both orally and in writing. Nevertheless, the group prevailed for a number of reasons:
      
      
      1. The group was very skilled in keeping matters secret, in compartmentalization, and in disinformation techniques. Hence it may be that a large number of officers, especially in the middle and lower ranks, was unaware or had only a partial knowledge of the problem and its magnitude.
         
         
      2. There probably were some officers who, without approving of the group, thought the ultraleft was only getting "what it deserved." They perhaps believed that leftist activists were being killed in real armed clashes, although admittedly in such clashes the DINA group's compliance with the law, including the laws of war, left much to be desired. It should be kept in mind that the social isolation of the officers made them more vulnerable to disinformation or partisan versions of events.
         
         
      3. The self-justification used by the armed forces and the police that they were "at war" was also quite important during the first few months, and perhaps until the end of 1974. Besides "hypocritical and ongoing war" as presented in counterinsurgency doctrine, the propaganda of the contending civilian sides prior to September 11, 1973, had convinced the military and police (for it was continually being repeated) that opposing powerful and well-trained armies, well-supplied with weapons, were ready for combat. For months after September 11, the armed forces and police were immersed in their own climate and mindset resulting from this supposed war. This mindset and climate and the way they (wrongly) downplayed "excesses" could have contributed to the consolidation of the DINA group as a "necessary evil."
         
         
      4. We should also mention the fear that confronting the existence of this group and its increasing violation of fundamental rights would hurt the reputation of their own institution. Worse yet, it would damage Chile's "image," at a time when its military action had met with no internal resistance but was encountering a stormy and negative reception outside the country (for various reasons which would need lengthy analysis, one of which was, however, precisely a concern for human rights).
         
         
      5. The Commission has discovered that the officers, who were presumably "at war" with extremists, lacked an adequate knowledge of the laws and morality of war for dealing with matters such as the treatment of prisoners, torture, interrogation, executions, war tribunals, and so forth. The indications are that such issues were insufficiently studied at that time. That lack of knowledge may also explain why the DINA group's activity and human rights as a whole did not receive enough attention.
         
         
      6. Another fear that may have played a role in consolidating the group and assuring its impunity was the very efficient way it maneuvered within the branches of the military and especially the army, halting or cutting short the professional careers of those who stood in their way (whom they called "soft"). At the same time, top officers who were "soft" were abruptly summoned, accused, relieved of their commands, suffered abuse, and even saw their careers destroyed. For months, especially in the provinces, intelligence officials acquired a power disproportionate to, and independent of, their rank, enabling them to supersede even higher ranking officers in their own units. Finally, we should not forget that at this point career promotions depended exclusively on one's superior officers, since there was no civilian authority in place which could play the role the Senate once played in such matters.
         
         
      These observations are not meant to excuse the armed forces and the police for the fact that what we have called the DINA group continued to operate within them, nor to blame them for it. Rather the Commission has tried to make this fact understandable as part of the study of human rights violations it was mandated to conduct.
      
      
   3. THE TOP-DOWN NATURE OF POLITICAL RULE
      
      We must likewise note that the armed forces and police as a collective group soon ceased to be directly in charge of the junta when political rule passed into the hands of top military leadership (and specifically of the army, whose condition as primus inter pares was given legal status) and when both bodies were unified in a single institution.
      
      The idea of a presidency of the junta rotating between the commanders-in-chief, which was being openly discussed during the first three weeks after September 11, 1973, was dropped. An order of rank was established, with the result that the commander-in-chief of the army became head of the junta. He was given the title of Supreme Head of the Nation (Decree Law No. 527) which was subsequently replaced by the more traditional President of the Republic (Decree Law No. 806). Actually however, what emerged was a new institution endowed with powers unprecedented in Chile: the President of the Republic/Commander-in-chief. The person holding this position not only ruled and administered the country but also presided over the government junta, and hence without him no laws could be passed nor could the constitution be amended; he also commanded the entire army. The use of states of emergency during practically the whole period of military rule further deepened and extended such power.
      
      Once again the Commission's task is neither to criticize nor praise such developments and laws. It does, however, want to point out that what was supposed to be the regime of the armed forces and police escaped from the collective control of these institutions and even from the control of their top leaders. Instead it became rigidly centralized around the president/commander-in-chief. By the time this process was complete at the end of 1974, only that president/commander-in-chief could have neutralized the DINA group (and that was not done until a specific measure at a later date, as will be indicated below). Certainly these collective bodies went their way and did not express the least interest in controlling the DINA group. Thus Decree Law No. 521, which created DINA as an independent public agency, made it depend directly on the junta, but in practice the junta did not exert any such control. Actually the DINA was directly under the presidency of the republic, perhaps on the basis of Decree Law No. 527 and the powers it granted the presidency. Moreover, even though the DINA was in place, other branches of the armed forces and police organized or maintained their own agencies for repression. While there may have been some rivalry between these agencies and the DINA, in their spirit they were indistinguishable. This issue is taken up elsewhere.
      
      
   4. CIVILIANS AS POLITICAL ACTORS UNDER MILITARY RULE
      
      With the single exception to be noted below, the September 11, 1973 military action took place without the aid or even the knowledge of any civilian group, whether organized or semiorganized. Indeed before September 11 only a very few civilians were needed to provide the kind of help that would entail such prior knowledge; those required were generally not political leaders but communications experts, journalists, and so forth.
      
      After the events of September 11, the very presence of the DINA group and its growing influence inevitably and almost immediately created a contradiction. On the one hand, the regime was calling the nation to come together and to join in a common effort at rebuilding the country and advancing development, an effort from which no one was to be excluded. Naturally this invitation was appealing to many people, even to disenchanted supporters of the previous government. At the same time and secretly, the DINA group's activity was an absolute negation of the unity to which all Chileans were being called. However, since that activity was secret and since in principle there was no freedom of information and such freedom would continue to be very limited, awareness of this contradiction spread only very slowly. Hence within civilian circles the many changes of opinion on military rule were likewise slow in developing.
      
      The armed forces and police had a low opinion of political parties of any sort and thus, as will be seen more fully in the next chapter, those of the Popular Unity were disbanded immediately (Decree Law No. 77) and the others were suspended (Decree Law No. 78, which stated that they were "in recess"). In 1977 this suspension also turned into a dissolution (Decree Law No. 1697). Political party activity was banned, and penalties for violations were even specified.
      
      Of the pre-September 1973 parties, those belonging to the Popular Unity and others like-minded (such as the MIR) managed to survive underground but just barely, not so much because of the legal prohibition, but because of the repression unleashed against them by the security agencies, as noted in this report. Other parties simply disappeared.
      
      The situation of the parties that had fought against the now-overthrown regime which were united in the CODE (Democratic Confederation) and other like-minded groups which were first suspended (1973) and then dissolved (1977) was as follows:
      
      
      • From the outset the National party understood the "recess" as a disbanding and it disappeared. The Fatherland and Liberty Nationalistic Movement took the same position. Thus the organized right vanished. Many of its former leading figures served in the military regime as ministers, diplomats, high officials, economic advisors, and so forth; they did so, however, as individuals and did not maintain their former organizational connections either publicly or privately. A smaller number gradually distanced themselves from the regime and ended up in the opposition. Members of extremist groups joined the repressive agencies or worked with them.
        
        
      • The Christian Democrat party, on the other hand, accepted neither the recessnor the subsequent disbanding and continued to operate in a semiunderground existence, which was tolerated, sometimes more openly, sometimes with more restrictions. While a small number of top and midlevel leaders cooperated with the military regime just like the former right-wing leaders, and consequently resigned from the party, the party itself moved more and more into opposition. There were a number of reasons for this development, especially the official confirmation that the military regime was going to last a long time and that it would severely restrict the exercise of democracy; human rights problems also played a role.
        
        
      The remaining former parties, whether underground or semiunderground, had no place within the regime to express their human rights concerns. This explains why, through no fault of their own of course, they managed to develop a better campaign around human rights outside the country than within Chile itself.
      
      Meanwhile, other civilians who supported the regime sought to influence it politically. The most important among them were younger (under forty years old), belonged to the upper class or upper-middle class, and were professional people who were very well trained in their particular disciplines. Most of them had been involved in the "associational"^h struggles that had taken place in the universities during the tumultuous "reform" starting in 1967. Their differing ideologies flowed together around these points:
      
      
      • A first wave was very strictly Catholic in background and took its inspiration from authoritarian traditions from both Chile (Portales) and Spain. This group was also assisted by some older nationalistic civilians. This first wave produced the Declaration of Principles of the Chilean Government (October 1973), an ambitious document which sought to lay down the doctrinal foundations for the actions of the military regime.
        
        While that declaration accepted and announced that power was certainly to arise out of a "universal, free, secret, and well-informed vote," at the same time it called for a state based on the principles of Portales; the formation of a civilian/military movement; a democracy more in substance than in form; and armed forces and police who were to safeguard national security understood in very broad terms and even beyond the military regime itself. According to the declaration, this was not to be merely an administrative hiatus between two political party governments. Rather by means of a "deep and prolonged action" it was to rebuild Chile morally, institutionally, and materially, and to "change the attitude of Chileans." Hence these forces did not specify a fixed period for the junta to remain in power. Finally, it is worth noting that the Declaration was presented as irreformable, thus accentuating its foundational character.
        
        The Declaration could not attain its objectives, however, if the president/ commander-in-chief, who stood at the center and had a monopoly hold on power, did not really adopt it, as he in fact failed to do. It is not our task to determine why and, indeed, it may no longer be possible to do so. Nevertheless, this "first wave" continued to collaborate with the regime, although it severed its ties with the nationalistic figures, who either left the government or continued to serve it but without any real influence.
        
        
      • The "second wave" had actually entered into contact with the military before the first group. It was made up of young people very similar to those of the "first wave" but with some features of its own: they were economists who had done postgraduate work in prominent universities in the United States and were liberal or neoliberal both in their discipline and in their idea of society and of human nature.
        
        Before September 11, 1973, these professional people either contacted the navy or were contacted by it, and they prepared a complete economic plan which could only be put into effect from a position of power. After September 11 and under navy sponsorship they gained some-but not all-government positions crucial for managing the economy. They began to spread and defend the ideas behind their plan within the regime, although they sometimes encountered considerable opposition and difficulty.
        
        Their moment of triumph came when the president/commander-in-chief adopted their plan and imposed it against all those who resisted, granting its authors the power, support, and time they said they needed to apply it. There was one very murky moment during the economic crisis of 1981 when some of the most representative figures in this "second wave" resigned their key posts. Nevertheless, their successors, who shared their basic ideas and with whom they had always made up a like-minded and disciplined body, rode out the storm and managed to preserve these ideas in the Chilean economy.
        
        A decisive factor, we repeat, in the long continuity of the economic line has been the fact that the president/commander-in-chief, contrary to what he had done with the "Declaration of Principles," fully accepted the plan of the economists.
        
        
      • At this point the "first" and "second" waves of civilians working with the military regime had come together around the new economic ideas whose influence had been broadened to include related areas such as health care, social security, labor law, and even relatively unconnected areas, such as education, professional associations, and TV channels. Certainly the sector we call the "first wave" had evolved to the point of adopting the economists' ideas and expanding them into the notion of a "free society," in which the role of the state would be as small and that of private initiative as large as possible.
        
        Moreover, the now united group had put all its energy into the preparation of a complete new constitution, abandoning the method of "acts" (which is described in greater detail in the next chapter). This method was very much in tune with the spirit of the "Declaration of Principles" in the sense that constitutional norms were to be introduced gradually and would be tested in practice and by observing how they worked, so as to lead to a constitution guaranteed to work. However, in 1980 a completely new and untested constitution was presented to the voters in the plebiscite. Its features retained little or nothing of the 1974 "Declaration of Principles"; they were traditional liberal and democratic principles, albeit with a strongly authoritarian slant. They set a date for the military regime to end, however, and enshrined in the Constitution economic freedom, the primacy of private initiative, and the diminishing of the state's role.
        
        Again, it was absolutely necessary that the president/commander-in-chief make the plan his own. The fact that he did so may indicate that he thought he would have sixteen more years in which to rule and consolidate his position.
        
        
      It is not the Commission's role, let us repeat, to make value judgements on these developments. It has described them as a framework for understanding the role of the civilians who were politically connected to the military government vis-á-vis the issue of human rights and the DINA group. They were no doubt somehow aware of the problem and of how harmful the group was, but in general they did not have the means to deal effectively with the situation, and so they thought it would do more harm than good for them to cease supporting the military regime. Moreover, given the degree of disinformation, it is possible that at some moments they may have sincerely (though incorrectly) believed that human rights violations had ended, or that they were declining to such an extent that they would soon no longer constitute any threat. Other civilians argued that their responsibilities were technical rather than political, and that concern for human rights was a matter for those holding political responsibilities. Some furthermore asserted that it was better and more productive to work silently through persuasion on a case by case basis rather than drawing attention publicly and so breaking off communication with the regime. Finally some denied that there were any violations at all and regarded them as propaganda, or contrariwise invoked the heated arguments of the pre-September 11 period which we have already examined to "justify" any violation (although to be sure they were often unaware of the true situation).
      
      The Commission simply notes that these different and quite dissimilar aspects of civilian activity with regard to human rights did not bring about any significant positive effect noticeable today, except the rescue of a few dozen people who were being persecuted. These actions were certainly worthwhile, but they were minimal compared to all those who were executed, disappeared, and so forth.
      
      An equally laudable yet wholly unsuccessful effort was that of some jurists who supported the military regime. Aware of its weakness in the area of human rights, they tried to provide constitutional protection for the rights of the person which were then being violated. Such an effort was made on three occasions, more elaborately each time: in the "Declaration of Principles" (1973), in the Constitutional Acts (1976), and in the new Constitution (1980). However these norms proved impotent against all the forces thwarting them: the whole web of repressive legislation, which was as crafty as these standards; the ongoing states of emergency; judicial apathy; and the boldness, secretiveness, and systematic disinformation practiced by the DINA group and its like-minded followers.
      
      In closing let us note that the political activity of those civilians who supported the regime, whether on behalf of human rights or anything else, was stymied from the outset: despite their ties of generation, ideas, and friendship, they were powerless to form an organization that could promote such action by uniting, coordinating, and representing them. Whatever label might have been given to such an organization, in practice it would have been a party, and the regime simply did not trust any parties that might be formed, even those that might be set up to support it. This was yet another circumstance favoring the activity of the DINA group and human rights violations.
      
      
   5. POLITICAL FRAMEWORK AFTER THE DISBANDING OF THE DINA
      
      The downfall of the DINA group and of the DINA itself began with the murder of Orlando Letelier and Ronnie Moffit in 1976 in Washington, D.C., a crime discussed later in this report. When it became clear that the DINA had been involved in the crime, and the United States government sought the extradition of some of its main leaders, top level officials of the regime began to comprehend the power and audacity of the group and of the secret organization. Although previously they may not have been aware of the matter or given it much thought, they now saw the immense harm it might cause, not so much to its victims as to the regime and to the country. Thus the regime's civilian supporters drew up a design and obtained the required approval of the president/commander-in-chief for what was intended to be a real chance to bring about a substantive improvement in human rights observance-although in practice that effort was frustrated.
      
      The DINA was dissolved and replaced by the CNI (National Center for Information) (Decree Laws Nos. 1876 and 1878 of 1977), which was put under the supervision of a top army officer who had opposed the DINA group. The group never returned to what it had been. Moreover, the human rights situation, both quantitatively and qualitatively, never regressed to its state when the DINA was controlled by what we have called the DINA group. Indeed, during the 1977-1979 period many people thought that the situation was on its way to substantial improvement.
      
      Starting with what was known as the COVEMA (Avengers of the Martyrs Squadron, 1980), which this report analyzes further on, repressive activity flared up again, not as systematically nor with as large a number of victims but uninterruptedly and punctuated with shocking incidents. To close this section we note some further possible reasons for this development, some based on evidence and others on conjecture.
      
      
      • Many of the key men of the disbanded DINA occupied important positions in the new CNI (National Information Center) and thus the supposedly expelled group continued to be very influential;
        
        
      • While the DINA was very disciplined, the CNI seems to have resisted such discipline, possibly as a result of what has been said before. This lack of discipline is believed to have facilitated "independent" operations, the emergence of satellite groups and so forth, resulting in activities that were out of control.
        
        
      • The fact that the CNI now answered to the Ministry of Defense rather than the Interior Ministry meant that it was not under the control of those sectors of the government that were more sensitive to the potential political impact of human rights violations.
        
        
      • The persistent neglect and inefficiency of the police and security services in clarifying human rights violations encouraged their continuation and increase; o Finally, it should be noted that some of the political adversaries of the regime, primarily the Communist party and the MIR, reinitiated insurrectionary activity and both selective and indiscriminate terrorism.
        
        
      The Communist party (probably as a result of pressure by activist members and leaders who were underground in Chile and in opposition to its veteran representatives, all of whom were of course in exile) gave up its policy of seeking to reach power through peaceful means, and opted to use violence against the military regime. This policy was sketched out in several official documents beginning as early as 1980. It was explained in 1982 on the grounds of the party's need to have an organic and independent military power and organization, which was to be made up of Communists: this force, however, was not to be made up entirely of Communists, nor were all Communists to be members, although it was to remain under the political and military direction of the party. The following year this decision seems to have led to the formation of the FPMR (Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front) whose deadly actions are described elsewhere. Nonetheless, the party has never acknowledged that it directs or controls the FPMR. The FPMR reached its high point in 1986 when it carried out two very elaborate but failed operations: the smuggling of an arsenal of weapons hidden in Carrizal Bajo and the assassination attempt against the president. The Communist party gave up the insurrectionary strategy in 1987, provoking a split in the FPMR into two factions, a so-called "autonomous" faction persisted with the same strategy, while the other abandoned it.
      
      As of 1978 the MIR, whose cadres had suffered frightful casualties at the hands of the DINA, tried to resort again to its classic armed path, with "Operation Return" from Cuba. Its various efforts once more ended in defeat, especially in the guerrilla infiltration in the southern area of Neltume, described elsewhere, where many MIR members were killed in violation of their human rights. Their armed actions and acts of terrorism also led to loss of life, as described in this report. From 1986 onwards the MIR underwent a process of internal divisions over the very question of whether or not to continue the "armed path."
      
      During the 1980s other less important violent groups opposed to the regime, such as the MAPU Lautaro, which split from MAPU around 1983, were active. Such groups infiltrated the "national protests" (considered in a special section in this report) trying to lead them to violence so as to bring the country and the regime, they said, to the point of "ungovernability."
      
      The actions of the FPMR, MIR, and the other groups we have described led government officials to pressure the CNI to "get results" through repression, thus causing new human rights violations. At the same time, the old DINA group was insisting that the CNI was "ineffective" in comparison with its own horrifying history of wiping out insurrectionary and terrorist efforts and organizations.
      
      Many of the reasons we have listed are largely conjectural, we repeat. However, it can be stated with certainty that, during the final years of the military regime, the political structure that had been established by the enactment and implementation of the 1980 Constitution did not eliminate the national problem of serious and constant violations of human rights (although the frequency and numbers of victims admittedly declined). Indeed, the 1978 amnesty, which its civilian promoters may well have regarded as the closing of the book on a now superseded problem, ultimately seemed to entail impunity for the past and to promise impunity for the future. [See explanation of 1978 amnesty law-Decree Law No. 2191-on page 89 of Volumn One.]
      
      

e) National Consultation of 1978: The military government held a plebiscite to reject the United Nations General Assembly resolution of December 16, 1977, which condemned Chile for its violation of human rights, and to endorse President Pinochet. The government stated that the referendum was supported by 75 percent of the voters; however, it was discounted by most of the center and left-wing political sectors.

f) 1924-1925 and 1927-1931: In 1924 the Chilean military toppled the civilian government of Arturo Alessandri. During the latter period, military officer Carlos Ibañez assumed power and acted in an authoritarian manner similar to that of Portales a century earlier. Ibañez showed little tolerance for liberalism and subordinated the National Congress.

g) Portales creed: Diego Portales was a decisive figure in establishing a strong, centralized presidential state. His influential thinking followed the chaos and anarchy of the post-independence period. The "Portalian State" was institutionalized in the Constitution of 1833.

h) "Associational" struggle: This student movement, referred to as gremialista, which literally means "guild," was well established in the Catholic University in the late 1960s. Initially it rejected the politicization of "intermediate bodies" such as professional associations, unions, and student organizations. Closely associated with the Pinochet government, the group was headed by Jaime Gózman, and in the late 1980s the Union Democrática Independiente (UDI) political party was founded. The UDI is now generally characterized as being right-wing.

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Posted by USIP Library on: October 4 2002
Source: Report of the Chilean National Commission on Truth and Reconciliation
(Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1993), vol. I/II, Part Two, Chapter One, 47-71.
Note: Digitized and posted by permission of the University of Notre Dame Press, February 22, 2000.