MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Soviet Union warned Allende of impending military coup

Former Chilean president Salvador Allende was warned by the Soviet Union, East Germany and Cuba that Chilean military officers were preparing a military coup against him, which was being encouraged by United States.

A book by British historian Jonathan Haslam, recently launched in United States, "The Nixon administration and the death of Allende in Chile: an assisted suicide case", reveals details of events leading to the violent ousting of the elected Socialist government and President Allende's suicide in September 1973.

Haslam who lectures History and International Relations in Cambridge also points out that Mr. Allende's personality and his indifference towards the violent actions of radical groups belonging to the Chilean hard left helped the United States government incite the Chilean military to organize and execute the bloody coup of 1973 which opened the way for General Augusto Pinochet's 17 year iron fisted dictatorship.

Advances of the Spanish version of the book were published this week in the Mexican political events magazine "Proceso".

Haslam bases his findings in declassified documents from United Status, Chile, Soviet Union and East Germany, as well as press reports and testimonies from several actors of one of the most sinister chapters of recent Chilean history.

According to the 255 page book, since becoming chairman of the Socialist Party in 1943, Mr. Allende immediately turned into an irritating figure for the political and business interests of United States in Chile.

Furthermore President Nixon in March 1970 authorized Committee 40 (responsible for US undercover operations overseas) the appropriation of a "one million US dollars budget to block the electoral aspirations of Allende", who together with his left wing coalition just managed to squeeze in with 34% of the vote, defeating the conservative and Christian Democrat candidates each collecting over 30%.

The election was followed by a political agreement with the Christian Democrats which enabled Mr. Allende to have sufficient votes in Congress for his confirmation as head of the Chilean Executive and the first elected Marxist inspired leader in Latinamerica.

President Nixon's Secretary of State at the time was Henry Kissinger.