The American Spectator : The Last Chilean Myth

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From the May, 2007 issue: Far from a friend to the United States, Michelle Bachelet is the latest in a long line of far left leaders in the tradition of Castro and Chavez. Read up on the Chilean president our president celebrated at his press conference yesterday.

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After only a few months there, at the behest of a boyfriend, Michelle traveled to East Germany, joined by her mother shortly afterwards. She continued in that “gopher” role during the four years she spent in East Germany, the nerve center of rebellion for Chile’s far-left parties. There, she was again deeply involved in the party’s conspiratorial, underground activities. Indeed, in 1977, she traveled—obviously on party business— to Vietnam, a fact she let drop during her official visit to Hanoi for the Asian-Pacific Cooperation conference in November 2006.

She continued as an underground operative when she returned to Chile in 1979, moving in for a time with a high official of the Communist-sponsored, Manuel Rodriguez Patriotic Front (FPMR) terrorist organization. She herself was heavily involved with the radical wing of her party—a wing so radical, to quote two puff piece biographers, “it had no real problem with the policies of the armed wing of the Communist Party.” Until 1995, when she was elected a member of the party’s Central Committee, at no time was she ever given an executive post of any kind (in other words, taken seriously). While in the outskirts of Berlin, she likes to say that she resumed the medical studies interrupted by the 1973 revolution in Chile, but in point of fact, what she did was start (but not finish) a German language course that was a prerequisite to medical school. (She frequently fudges in the stories she tells.) She also married a would-be revolutionary like herself, and gave birth to the first of her three children. (The other two would be born out of wedlock in Chile, one of them fathered by a right-wing doctor.)

• She undoubtedly is smart—she graduated (in 1983) from Chile’s leading medical school, later specializing in pediatrics and public health medicine. But she is neither brilliant nor a strong leader. Nor a commanding presence: How could she be when she measures a mere 5 feet 2 inches—and is decidedly pudgy (indeed, a former finance minister raised her dander when he referred to her as “my fatso”). There is some real question as to how much of a leader, period, she is. As indicated, the party waited 25 years before naming her to a leadership role. In her only other try for public office before winning election as president last year, she ran for the city council of a suburban community in 1995 and won all of 2.35 percent of the vote.

• Her closest friends and advisers all come out of the hard left of Chilean politics. So, too, do her predilections: She recently sent shock-waves through the economy when she wondered aloud whether maybe the time had not come to “humanize” the market economy model that has made this country the envy of all of Latin America—indeed, of much of the world. (“Humanize,” in socialist parlance, means enlarge the role of the state, and shrink that of the private sector.)

AS IT IS, THE CHILEAN ECONOMY SLID in 2006, its growth rate falling from 5.7 percent in 2005 to 4 percent. That, despite sky-high prices for Chile’s principal export product, copper. In surveys of business leaders, confidence in her declined for four straight months, reaching a record low midway through her first year. She has a first-class economic team, and mainly defers to them, but in general has a reputation for leaning far more on her palace inner sanctum, a group that features two hard-core women Communists, bypassing her cabinet.

So it is, too, with her international outlook. Ever since girlhood, she has been an admirer of Fidel Castro, the longest-serving dictator in the history of the hemisphere (and the only totalitarian dictator). Inasmuch as she also claims to be a champion of human rights, her support for the hemisphere’s worst abuser of human rights requires fancy footwork. But, then, she chose to live in East Germany—the ugliest of the Soviet satellite states—and has never been heard to utter a single criticism of that ghastly regime—nor, for that matter, of the savage North Vietnamese regime. By contrast, though she never met the longtime dictator of East Germany— Erich Honecker, who lived in Chile the last two years (1992-1994) of his ghoulish life—she did meet his widow.

“I thanked her,” Bachelet said, “because while I was in East Germany, I had the chance to work in a hospital and study and form a family. They gave us much material support. For those of us who left Chile during difficult times, there we were welcomed and supported.” Bachelet did not mention that at that same time, life for East Germans was very hard—for those who escaped prison or death. Indeed, her very leftist mother, Angela, in another interview, was candid enough to observe that the Chilean revolutionaries in general fared better there than ordinary Germans. Angela toughed it out in Germany for only two years, before leaping at an opportunity in Washington. (Many, many other “Red” refugees—discovering the harsh reality of Communism—bailed out from the Iron Curtain countries. Michelle evidently had no such qualms.)

It needs be remembered—although she waffles on this, as she does on so many other subjects—that Michelle did not have to live there. She had already settled in Australia, and Belgium had also offered her a visa. There is, in fact, no doubt that many other countries would have welcomed her—Canada, Sweden, Spain, France—as they did thousands of other Chilean revolutionaries.

Until her Christian Democrat partners gave her a tough ultimatum, she leaned toward throwing Chile’s support behind Hugo Chavez in the Venezuelan’s high-powered campaign last fall for the Latin American seat on the UN Security Council. Chavez has, of course, made U.S.-bashing the centerpiece of his oil-funded international style. Though forced to back off, Bachelet continues to make plain her affection for Chavez. Gravitating to the Soviet orbit was, in fact, doing what came naturally for a woman who, from her earliest days, was immersed in propaganda portraying the U.S. as evil and predatory, and who spent years in terrorist organizations dedicated to hating the U.S. and all it stood for. Some of that venom was bound to stick.

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topics:
Chile, Michelle Bachelet

About the Author

James R. Whelan's books include Out of the Ashes: Life, Death and Transfiguration of Democracy in Chile, 1833-1988. He has reported on the country since 1958, and served 1992-1995 as visiting professor at the University of Chile. He presently lives in Santiago.

Letter to the Editor View all comments (11) | Leave a comment

Bhaskar Sunkara| 6.24.09 @ 9:06AM

Given how long traffic is on this site of yours, it's not even worth mentioning how many flat out falsehoods are paraded as facts in your article.

Let's start with the fact that you claim Allende was a "Marxist-Leninist" (nice grammar!).

Bachelet is mildly center-left and actually adheres to large chunks of neoliberal dicta. Read more before you write more.

Bram| 6.24.09 @ 9:06AM

So, she is a hard-core leftist and her first year is “a comedy of errors, omissions and improvisations.” ... came to the presidency “without clear ideas, or well-defined programs, nor qualified people.”

No wonder Obama likes her - they have so much in common.

Michae Tomlinson| 6.24.09 @ 11:06AM

Mr Sunkara when Salvador Allende became President of Chile (with a 36% plurality of the vote) he declared himself a Marxist President. Like Barack Obama he thought he could borrow and spend Chile’s way to prosperity. He was wrong. When his oligarchy was toppled in a hail of gunfire the country was suffering from 500% inflation (a potential harbinger of what might be coming under Obama). This was exacerbated by his government illegally seizing farms and factories without Congress’ approval to collectivize Chile – a very Marxist-Leninist policy that Obama seems eager to duplicate, but with the Democrat Congress cheering him all the way.

As Chile began to spiral out of control forces across the land (the center-left to the right) demanded the Army end the chaos and remove Allende. They did so with a tragic cost in life of roughly 4,000 souls, but a coup far less bloody than the typical socialist/Marxist revolution. Ultimately, under General Pinochet’s free market government the economy of Chile thrived and ultimately (thank God) democracy was restored. Unfortunately, Bachelet seems determined to undo Chile’s successes and lead it into another socialist inspired nightmare of economic despair and chaos.

That she possibly detests the United States is what may endear her to Barack and Michelle Obama since loathing America is in style in the Obamanation.

Joseph| 6.24.09 @ 2:40PM

Socialism is an euphemism for communism, or as my father used to say, a communist is nothing more than a socialist taking a break. Allende was a well know socialist and the Chilean communist party's candidate upon his being elected president. He was a self-avowed communist and agent for the Soviet Union, and had it not been for his overthrow in 1973, he would have made of Chile what his good friend Fidel Castro did with Cuba. His daughter, Beatriz, upon the communist takeover of Cuba in 1959, used to roam the of the halls of the University of Havana, decked out in Castro's blue and green militia garb and red beret, ferreting out and expulsing any and all non-socialist students. My mother was one of those expulsed for refusing to be cowed. So Bhaskar Sunkara, before you go on criticizing this website or those who offer their comments and their views, grow up and read up real history yourself, for it is obvious that you are living in a fantasy world. My opinions, consistent with most of those herein contained, is empirical, not fiction-based as yours are. Ms. Bachelet is well left of center, make no mistake about it. Just give a few years more and see what she will do to the most succesful economy in South America. See Venezuela, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia, and finally, Cuba, if you lack the foresight to see what's about to afflict the poor Chileans, again.

Marc Jeric| 6.24.09 @ 4:37PM

It is incomprehensible how the marxism still infects so many "minds" - a 160-year history of mass murder, poverty, terror notwithstanding.

Mark Sanford| 6.24.09 @ 6:22PM

Chili is good, but Argeniner is finer!

I couldn't pass it up, guys.

Benjamin Witte| 6.24.09 @ 8:40PM

As her presidency winds down (elections will take place in December) Bachelet's approval rating is at an all time high. Although this author would like to paint her as incompetent and losing popularity, the perception of the vast majority of Chileans is something else entirely. Even though Chile, like the rest of the world, is feeling the effects of the global financial crisis, with the economy contracting and joblessness rising, she's polling over 70 percent.

Vicente| 6.24.09 @ 10:34PM

According to the Chilean Truth and Reconciliation Commission (1990/1991), General Bachelet, the current President's father, was tortured by the Pinochet-led Junta leading to his death. I noticed this omission in Mr. Whelan's article.

j b munoz| 6.25.09 @ 10:52AM

Is the something possitive about President Bachelet? This article is far away from being obejective and serious! There are many qualities that your can see of Bachelet by observation and her way of governing.

Richard Ranger| 6.25.09 @ 11:32AM

One of the problems in holding any rational discussion about Chile is that so often discussion about Chilean history is hostage to competing metaphors and competing narratives. From my experience -- which is far, far smaller than Mr. Whelan's -- I've come to believe that Chile is a story where the set-piece ideological battles of the late 20th Century founder on rock shoals.

To those of the left: Yes, Salvador Allende was a Marxist-Leninist, committed to the Marxist vision, but choosing to pursue it in a way he believed to be tactically achievable within the historical, cultural and political context of his country. He was no "social democrat". In fact, many "social democrats" opposed him. But more than ideology, what undid the credibility of the Allende regime was its lack of competence, and the anarchy that emerged in much of the country as various radical groups took la revolucion into their own hands, with neither sanction nor opposition from the Allende government. But, to the right, in the brief years of the Allende government, and in the years of the Frei government that preceded it, real change and the beginnings of real empowerment of Chile's hitherto disenfranchised urban working class and rural peasantry began to occur -- and there has been no turning back. Mr. Whelan might argue, but taking the long view, a case might be made that the Frei-Allende years were a necessary purgative to break the lock of oligarchy that had held Chile back.

But purgatives bring their own problems. A majority of the country desired a change away from both Allende's government and the trajectory it was taking the country in the Chilean winter of 1973. The military junta took power with the approbation -- if not the full endorsement -- of many Chileans. But then in short order it became the Pinochet junta. To those on the right: yes, the Pinochet years brought (or perhaps it could be said, force fed) a variant of laissez-faire economics to Chile, from which, in large measure, Chile still benefits. But the Pinochet government's thugs broke heads, caused or encouraged the exile of tens of thousands, and expanded its retribution well beyond identifiable Marxist gangsters to labor organizers, teachers, medical professionals, social workers whose "crime" was that they shared the vision and the objectives of the broad left. Some on the right quibble that the death toll attributable to the Pinochet regime was actually rather modest, as if this were an argument for calibrated use of the tools of the police state. The shadow of intimidation that the Pinochet government cast across Chile lasted for years -- and it was through intimidation that the Pinochet regime enforced its cold "peace". But, beginning with the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church, then the leadership of a few, then with the recognition of many in Chile's emerging middle class, came the recognition that Chile could not truly enjoy the benefits of economic freedom without the benefits of political freedom. A Chile without justice was not a Chile worth living in, no matter what goods one's slowly growing bank account could buy. And, to the right: make no mistake about it. Pinochet did not exit his former place of power "voluntarily". He was forced out, by a combination of forces and behind-the-scenes efforts that -- ironically for those of the left -- included the Reagan Administration.

Since that time, Chile has remained closely divided politically, but the left has prevailed in every election. Yet the left - President Bachelet included - has consistently sought to govern from the center.

I hope some day to read Mr. Whelan's book "Out of the Ashes" for a more sustained perspective that I am sure he must have on Chile's history (but I can never seem to find copies available for less than $100!!). I wish he did not appear so often to serve as an apologist for the Pinochet regime, whose excesses and evils are well documented. I also wish that so many of my friends on the left were not apologists for the Allende regime, whose shortcomings nearly bankrupted the country, and nearly left it ungovernable.

Chile today is a remarkable country, a product of a difficult history, and the achievement of a resilient and talented people. Michelle Bachelet may be no Lincoln, but she is assuredly no Evo Morales or Hugo Chavez. She is a democrat in a society that has earned its democratic place in the family of nations through privation, blood and fire -- and, I think, through blending some of the left's understanding about justice with the right's understanding about opportunity in a way that should offer hope to the rest of the hemisphere it shares.