Reply #3: A quick overview of Chile after Pinochet (Nixon's choice) seized control: [View All]

[Judi Lynn]

Nunca Mas

Nunca Mas
By Ali Ansari

The birds were chirping outside. The sky was as blue as Chilean Lapis. The chime of children's laughter crept through the impenetrable walls. The church was busy as usual; the soothing sound of the church bell swarmed in, it was the beginning of another beautiful day. Who would have known, that just across the street, innocent people were being brutally tortured, beaten, murdered and raped, by Chile's secret police, under strict orders from Chile's military dictator, Augusto Pinochet.

Chile's military dictatorship lasted almost two decades and was one of the most brutal and oppressive regimes of the modern era. By the end of 1973, under the command of General Augusto Pinochet, two hundred and fifty thousand Chileans had been detained in camps for political reasons (Under the Dictatorship). The conditions in these camps were unbearable, and the repercussions of the camps and the regime are still felt today. Gabriela Salazar was one survivor of a camp whose story, like all the others, must be heard. Gabriela spent time in Villa Grimaldi, a detention camp in Santiago, Chile.

Ironically, before Villa Grimaldi was a detention camp, it used to be a park where families would come together and spend their free time. A place where many children grew up laughing and smiling, was rapidly transformed into a place of torture and repression. After the military coup, Villa Grimaldi was one of many places used for detention by Chile's secret police (called the DINA) under the watchful eye of the dictatorship. In particular, people affiliated with the communist party were arrested and brought to Villa Grimaldi. After 1976, almost every person brought to the camp had been murdered. Survivors such as Gabriela Salazar provided vivid descriptions of the atrocities that occurred in the camps, and the inhumane treatment of the prisoners. Torturers stuck prisoners' heads in plastic bags and the occasional beating was not uncommon. Many prisoners were stored like luggage in cramped water towers, where they were forced to live in appalling, unsanitary conditions. Children were also victims of this regime. In one instance, the military patrol went to pick up Jose Soto, the president of a local supply and price control junta. They found his fourteen year-old son alone in the house, and left his body pierced with bullets on the doorstep, to leave a message for Soto (The Tortures). Many of the murdered bodies were dumped in the Mapocho River that runs through Santiago. Loved ones lined up wondering if the next body to float down the river was that of their missing husband or child. Over three thousand people have gone missing (presumed dead) or died under Pinochet's regime.

What was very surprising was that the guards and the police did not think what they were doing was wrong. Luis Santibanez, the president of the Parque por la Paz Corporation wrote,""The truth is that Villa Grimaldi was not the result of a few excesses or madness. It was just a system."" Here Santibanez was implying that it was not just a random series of acts of torture, rather, it was a system, that these people believed in and thought was justified.
(snip/...)

http://cf1.cc.lehigh.edu/gc/journalentry.cfm?SID=38&JID=490&code=1





Mapocho River, Santiago, Chile