by RAMONA WADI
Burns’s book brings South American history to the fore, explaining the regional dynamics and economic turmoil that led to Salvador Allende’s downfall and the beginnings of Operation Condor.
“When Salvador Allende was elected president of Chile in 1970, Brazil had been a right-wing dictatorship for over six years.” Mila Burns’s opening sentence in the introduction to her book Dictatorship Across Borders: Chile and the South American Cold War immediately shifts the attention away from the more popular narrative of U.S. involvement in Chile’s coup to regional politics and, more specifically, Brazil’s role in Allende’s downfall. Indeed, Brazil’s right-wing dictatorship, which perceived Chile’s left-wing government as an inroad to communism in South America, worked assiduously to undermine Allende’s government. Brazilian officials participated directly in plots to overthrow Allende, advised Chilean officials on tactics to torture radicals, and repressed and surveilled opponents of their own regime living in exile in Chile.
Instead of foregrounding the role of the United States, Burns looks at the dynamics of the South American Cold War and the anti-communist sentiment in Brazil, which made the country both a U.S. ally as well as a country with its own political and economic reasons for aiding Chile’s military coup. Brazil’s rationale for its military coup against the government of João Goulart was restoring order. The same reasoning was used by the right-wing in Chile to justify the coup against Allende.
Burns relies on both oral history and archival research to build a comprehensive picture of Brazil’s interference in Chile, and the surveillance of Brazilian exiles in the country. Around 1,200 Brazilians were living in Chile at the time of the coup; 123 were detained at the National Stadium and six were executed. Burns establishes three waves of Brazilian exiles to Chile. In 1964, several politicians and professionals left for Chile after the 1964 coup after being classified as enemies of the Brazilian dictatorship. In 1968 and 1969, considered the most dangerous time of state repression in Brazil, several students and activists left the country. When Allende triumphed in the 1970 presidential elections, socialist supporters left Brazil for Chile in the hopes of being part of the socialist revolutionary process and policies.
“While Burns notes that Brazil had started collaborating with the United States to bring down Allende as soon as his electoral campaign started gaining ground, the country played a major independent role, corroborated by both exiles and diplomats.”
While Burns notes that Brazil had started collaborating with the United States to bring down Allende as soon as his electoral campaign started gaining ground, the country played a major independent role, corroborated by both exiles and diplomats. Burns’ book therefore seeks to “reframe the United States as merely one of the countries that influenced Chile, among which Brazil appears as central.” During a meeting with U.S. President Richard Nixon in 1971, for example, Brazilian dictator Emilio Garrastazu Médici made it clear that his country had already been working with the Chilean military to depose Allende.
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