On September 11, 1973, Chilean military forces led by General Augusto Pinochet overthrew the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende. Declassified CIA documents reveal that the Nixon administration spent three years and at least $8 million undermining Allende's government through economic warfare, propaganda, and support for military opposition. National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger chaired the committee that authorized the operations. This investigation examines the documented evidence of U.S. involvement in destabilizing Chile's democracy.
On September 15, 1970, ten days after Salvador Allende won Chile's presidential election, President Richard Nixon summoned CIA Director Richard Helms and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger to the White House. What transpired in that fifteen-minute meeting would set in motion three years of covert operations against Chile's democratically elected government.
Helms took handwritten notes. Those notes, declassified by the Church Committee in 1975, provide the clearest documentary evidence of Nixon's intentions. The president's directives were unambiguous: "not concerned risks involved," "no involvement of embassy," "$10,000,000 available, more if necessary," and most famously, "make the economy scream."
The meeting launched what became known as Track II — a plan to foment a military coup before Allende could be inaugurated on November 3. Track I, already underway, involved propaganda, economic pressure, and political maneuvering within Chile's constitutional framework. Track II had no such constraints. Nixon specifically ordered that the State Department and U.S. Ambassador Edward Korry be excluded from knowledge of the operation.
Salvador Allende was not the first socialist to lead a government in the Western Hemisphere. But he was the first Marxist elected president in a free election in Latin America. For the Nixon administration, this represented an unacceptable precedent during the Cold War.
Kissinger articulated the administration's view at a June 27, 1970 National Security Council meeting, before Allende's election: "I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist due to the irresponsibility of its own people."
Yet ideology was not the only factor. American corporations had invested over $1 billion in Chile, with copper mining companies Anaconda and Kennecott controlling the industry that generated 80% of Chile's export earnings. ITT owned 70% of the Chilean Telephone Company. When Allende's platform promised nationalization of these industries, corporate executives lobbied aggressively for U.S. intervention.
"The U.S. has no vital national interests within Chile. The world military balance of power would not be significantly altered by an Allende government. But what happens in Chile will have an effect on what happens in the rest of Latin America and the developing world."
National Security Study Memorandum 97 — November 1970Declassified documents show ITT executives met with CIA officials in September 1970 to offer $1 million to fund anti-Allende operations. While the CIA declined the direct contribution, the Agency pursued objectives nearly identical to those ITT advocated in its 18-point plan to create economic chaos.
Track II faced an immediate problem: General René Schneider, Commander-in-Chief of the Chilean Army. Schneider adhered to the "Schneider Doctrine" — absolute military subordination to civilian constitutional authority. He publicly stated the army would respect the outcome of the election and the constitutional succession process.
Schneider had to be removed. CIA officers in Santiago met with Chilean military plotters and identified three groups willing to act. The Agency provided weapons and tactical support. Internal CIA cables, declassified in 2000, show the Agency delivered machine guns and tear gas grenades to coup plotters on October 22, 1970.
That same day, a group led by retired General Roberto Viaux attempted to kidnap Schneider as he drove to work. When Schneider drew his own weapon to resist, the kidnappers shot him. He died three days later on October 25.
The assassination backfired spectacularly. Rather than creating chaos that would justify a coup, Schneider's death rallied Chilean politicians around constitutional procedures. On October 24, the Chilean Congress voted 153 to 35 to confirm Allende as president. Schneider became a martyr, and Track II had failed.
The Church Committee later investigated who gave the weapons to Viaux's group and whether the CIA bore responsibility for Schneider's death. Richard Helms testified that the Agency had withdrawn support from Viaux before the kidnapping attempt because Viaux was deemed too unstable. But the weapons had already been delivered. The committee concluded: "The CIA supported both the kidnapping plan of the group which carried out the attack and another kidnapping plot."
When military action failed, the Nixon administration turned to economic pressure. The strategy had two components: cutting U.S. aid while maintaining military assistance, and blocking international credit to strangle the Chilean economy.
U.S. economic aid to Chile dropped from $35 million in 1969 to $1.5 million in 1971. Simultaneously, military assistance increased from zero to $5.7 million. The message was clear: the U.S. maintained relationships with Chilean military institutions while isolating the civilian government.
The Nixon administration also pressured the World Bank, Inter-American Development Bank, and Export-Import Bank to deny loans to Chile. Between 1970 and 1973, international lending to Chile virtually ceased. The World Bank, which had loaned Chile an average of $46 million annually from 1964 to 1970, approved zero new loans during Allende's presidency.
Simultaneously, the CIA spent $8 million between 1970 and 1973 funding opposition political parties, newspapers, and radio stations. The largest recipient was El Mercurio, Chile's most influential conservative newspaper, which received $1.5 million to maintain anti-Allende editorial coverage and avoid bankruptcy.
Beyond economic pressure, the CIA coordinated propaganda operations and support for groups organizing protests and strikes. Declassified documents show the Agency funded truckers' strikes in October 1972 and again in July 1973 that paralyzed Chile's transportation network and created food shortages in major cities.
The CIA also maintained contact with Chilean military officers throughout Allende's presidency. While no evidence shows the Agency directly planned the September 1973 coup, declassified cables confirm CIA officers were briefed on coup plotting in advance. A September 10, 1973 cable from the Santiago station reported that military action was imminent.
The Church Committee examined whether this advance knowledge created a responsibility to warn Allende or to discourage the coup. The committee found no evidence the CIA attempted either. Instead, the Agency maintained "monitoring" status, gathering intelligence on coup preparations without taking action to prevent the violence that followed.
At 6:20 a.m. on September 11, 1973, Chilean Navy vessels seized the port city of Valparaíso. By 8:00 a.m., military units controlled key positions in Santiago. General Augusto Pinochet, whom Allende had appointed Army Commander-in-Chief just 18 days earlier, led the junta.
Allende refused to resign or go into exile. Instead, he went to La Moneda presidential palace with a small group of supporters. At 11:52 a.m., Air Force jets bombed the palace. Allende died during the assault, officially by suicide with an AK-47 Fidel Castro had given him as a gift.
The junta immediately implemented a systematic campaign of repression. In the first 72 hours, military and police forces arrested over 13,000 people. Many were taken to the National Stadium, converted into a mass detention center. Thousands more were imprisoned at clandestine locations including Villa Grimaldi, Tres Álamos, and Londres 38.
The Rettig Commission, established after democracy was restored in 1990, documented 2,279 deaths and disappearances during the Pinochet dictatorship. The Valech Commission later identified 38,000 victims of torture. The actual numbers are likely higher.
Within hours of the coup, the U.S. government moved to support the new military junta. Nixon and Kissinger quickly authorized economic and military aid that had been denied to Allende. Within eighteen months, U.S. aid to Chile increased to $162.3 million.
Declassified State Department cables show U.S. officials coordinating communications to present the coup as a spontaneous military response to constitutional chaos rather than a violent overthrow of democracy. A September 14, 1973 cable from Secretary of State William Rogers instructed embassies to emphasize that "the Chilean armed forces acted to fill a vacuum and restore order."
"We didn't do it. I mean we helped them. We helped created the conditions as great as possible. I don't mean of course, we didn't do anything illegal, we did what we were told to do."
CIA covert action officer David Atlee Phillips — CNN interview, 1975The relationship between the U.S. and Pinochet's regime remained close throughout the 1970s. The CIA provided intelligence on opposition movements, and U.S. military aid continued to flow. Only after the 1976 assassination of Orlando Letelier in Washington D.C. did the relationship become politically untenable.
Orlando Letelier had served as Allende's Minister of Defense and ambassador to the United States. After the coup, he was imprisoned and tortured at a concentration camp on Dawson Island. Released in 1974, Letelier went into exile in Washington, where he became an effective international spokesman against the Pinochet regime, lobbying Congress to cut aid and organizing opposition to international loans.
On September 21, 1976, a bomb planted under Letelier's car exploded on Embassy Row in Washington, killing Letelier and his colleague Ronni Moffitt, an American citizen. FBI investigation revealed the assassination was ordered by Manuel Contreras, head of DINA, Chile's secret police, and executed by Chilean agents working with anti-Castro Cuban exiles.
Michael Townley, an American expatriate working for DINA, eventually pleaded guilty and testified that Chilean intelligence planned and executed the operation. The assassination marked the first state-sponsored terrorist attack on American soil and fundamentally changed U.S.-Chilean relations.
The Church Committee investigation, supplemented by documents declassified in 2000, established the scope of U.S. involvement in Chile. The evidence shows:
President Nixon personally ordered the CIA to prevent Allende from taking office, authorizing up to $10 million for the operation and instructing the Agency to bypass normal diplomatic channels. The CIA provided weapons and support to Chilean military plotters who killed General Schneider. After Allende took office, the Nixon administration implemented economic warfare designed to create conditions for military intervention. The CIA spent $8 million funding opposition media and political organizations. U.S. intelligence maintained contact with coup plotters and received advance warning of the September 1973 coup without attempting to prevent it.
What the record does not show is direct CIA planning or execution of the September 11 coup itself. No declassified document proves American personnel participated in the actual military action. The Church Committee concluded: "The United States did not instigate the coup that ended Allende's government on September 11, 1973. But the U.S. had mounted a massive destabilization program aimed at Allende, had sought to foment a military coup, and had actually supported one coup attempt before Allende took office."
Henry Kissinger's role remains contested. As National Security Advisor and chairman of the 40 Committee, Kissinger approved all major covert operations in Chile. He was present at the September 15, 1970 meeting when Nixon ordered Track II. Declassified transcripts show he coordinated inter-agency activities and received regular briefings on Chile operations.
In 2001, a Chilean judge issued a summons for Kissinger to testify about U.S. knowledge of Operation Condor, the multinational intelligence network that assassinated political opponents across South America. Kissinger declined. He has consistently maintained that U.S. actions in Chile were justified by Cold War strategic concerns and that any human rights abuses by the Pinochet regime were not foreseeable consequences of U.S. policy.
Critics argue that supporting a military coup against a democratically elected government created direct moral responsibility for what followed. Christopher Hitchens, in "The Trial of Henry Kissinger," argued that Kissinger's documented involvement in Chile operations constituted conspiracy to commit kidnapping and murder.
Pinochet ruled Chile until 1990, when he lost a plebiscite on his continued rule. During his 17-year dictatorship, he implemented radical free-market economic reforms designed by University of Chicago-trained economists, privatized state enterprises, and deregulated the economy. Supporters credit these policies with Chile's subsequent economic growth. Critics note they were implemented at gunpoint, with no democratic accountability.
The human cost is documented. Beyond the 3,200 killed and 40,000 imprisoned, hundreds of thousands of Chileans went into exile. Entire communities were destroyed. The psychological trauma affected generations. Villa Grimaldi, DINA's most notorious torture center, is now a memorial park. The cells where thousands were tortured remain visible.
For U.S. foreign policy, Chile became a case study in the costs of covert intervention. The Church Committee's investigation led to creation of permanent intelligence oversight committees in both houses of Congress. Presidents were required to issue written "findings" before authorizing covert action. The Foreign Assistance Act was amended to require human rights considerations in military aid decisions.
Yet the fundamental question remains: did the United States have the right to destabilize a democratically elected government because its ideology and economic policies conflicted with American interests? The declassified record shows that U.S. officials never seriously grappled with this question. Instead, they assumed the answer was yes.
Despite extensive declassification in 1975 and 2000, significant gaps remain in the public record. The CIA has acknowledged that some documents related to Chile operations remain classified, citing ongoing intelligence methods and protection of sources. Specific areas where documentation remains incomplete include:
The full extent of CIA contacts with Chilean military officers between 1970 and 1973. Details of any advance knowledge the Agency had about the specific timing and planning of the September 11 coup. Complete accounting of all funds spent on Chile operations and their recipients. Any intelligence sharing between the CIA and DINA after the coup. What U.S. intelligence agencies knew about Operation Condor and when they knew it.
In 2020, Chilean voters approved a referendum to draft a new constitution, replacing the one written during Pinochet's dictatorship. The vote was 78% in favor. Fifty years after Allende's election, Chile is still grappling with the legacy of 1973.
The Chile case illustrates how covert intervention operates as a system rather than a series of isolated decisions. Corporate lobbying created political pressure. Presidential authorization bypassed normal oversight. The CIA implemented operations through compartmentalized programs that excluded even senior diplomats. Economic pressure created conditions for political instability. Contact with military officers provided intelligence on coup planning without creating direct participation. Post-coup support consolidated the new regime.
Each component could be described in isolation as limited, defensive, or merely monitoring. Together, they constituted a sustained campaign to overthrow a democratically elected government. The declassified record shows this was not a rogue operation or policy failure. It was intentional, coordinated, and approved at the highest levels.
Richard Helms, testifying to the Church Committee in 1975, was asked whether the CIA bore responsibility for what happened in Chile. He replied: "We were told to do certain things. We did them to the best of our ability." The question of who gave those orders, and whether those orders were justified, is now a matter of historical record.