No Olvidar Jamás / Never Forget · 11:27pm Sep 10th, 2016
Once de Septiembre. September eleventh.
This is a date of tragedy. A moment that will go down in history as the turning point when a country was shot in the spine and its people suffered the consequences. We remember this day bitterly as the moment when a foreign force thought we deserved punishment for the high crime of thinking, acting and living differently from them.
We remember this day as the beginning of more than a decade and a half of darkness. A day that started not so different from many others and quickly became a nightmare of death and destruction. Seventeen years of pure terror when every time someone walked out of their homes, it could as well be the last time they would ever see it. Graveyards full of people and many more who could never be found, leaving only the sad memory in their families as a proof they ever existed.
I could go on, but I believe images can do more than any words, for images can not be denied as the truth.
La Moneda, Chile's house of government, being bombarded by it's own air force.
A tank about to roll over a group of civilians for the crime of being in the streets.
A group of students being arrested for interrogation. If any of them is under suspicion of being a communist, he will die.
Soldiers shooting their weapons in the streets of Santiago, Chile's capital.
And we have the US government to thank for that. Please, people, don't lose time denying it. The documents proving the CIA's involvement in the coup d'état. Weapons, planning, intelligence, money. The US caused and supported a dictator, Augusto Pinochet (may his soul burn in every circle of hell) from the beginning and only retired the public support when the bodies were too many to ignore. Even then, he stayed in power from 1973 to 1990.
Now, it is my understanding that the US government did all of this out of fear of the communism, the usually called Red Scare. I still struggle to understand how a little country at the end of the map, with less inhabitants than the city of New York would ever be a real menace. But, in case some people still think the US did what they had to do, then I thank the Unites States (who have no right to be part of America) for saving Chile from communism by euthanasia.
However, I don't post this to denounce the us for their crimes, but to warn everyone who can read this. Do not ignore history, because the moment you do so, it will happen again.
A great reminder of a terrible time for all of south america ; here on the other side of the Andes we share and understand your pain, we lived in fear of our own goverment as well, all of them killed democracy under pretense of proteccion yet they were no better than the comunist and insurgents they claimed to fight against.
We will always remember the bravery of Salvador allende : "sólo me sacarán muerto de aqui"
4203875
Each time a USAer says the CCCP was worse I tell him that at least they never bombarder our house of government.
"El pueblo unido jamás será vencido."
This is the best 9/11 blog ever.
4204484
Thanks for the support and for sharing your experience. Although I say to you to not lose hope. You guys still have one of the best places to live in. Keep holding on.
4204563
I was trying to call attention to the fact that the US is not the only one who has suffered this date and, while their loss is still a great one, it can be eclipsed by a seventeen years long dictatorship.
4205291
Oh, I get it. I was being completely serious there, really. This was well-written, informative, and not even slightly as full of the self-important sappiness that the average 9/11 blog by US-Americans has.
It's especially grating because so many people on this site weren't even born yet at the time, or at the very least not old enough to even remember it, but they still go on about it as if it had been some kind of slight against them personally. Me, I saw it happen live on TV - as in, I was on TV at the time and we watched it on the studio screens - and the fact that 2000 people died in the collapse of the towers is no doubt a tragedy. A hundred thousand Iraqi civilians died as a direct consequence of the callous foreign policy doctrine that has ruled the USA ever since, though. It's pretty clear who has been the greater source of suffering in the world at this point and that in the face of reality, this is a drop in the bucket. Not that anyone ever acknowledges it, though. It is one of the reasons I don't have a lot of respect for the US these days on either a personal or a political level
4205303
Thank you. It's good to know that a voice can be heard overseas.
On the respect part, all the one I have for the US is the same basic respect I have for any other country.
4205412
No doubt. As a place, it's perfectly nice and there are lots of good people there. If only it would actually behave like that to the rest of the world more often.