“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.
The book devotes ample space to dissecting the politics behind the scenes, the exiles’ experiences in Chile and the ongoing surveillance of the latter through Brazil’s intelligence services, culminating in the coup and the role played by the Brazilian military at the National Stadium. The six chapters discuss Brazil’s growing preoccupation with Chile, the waves of exiles and Brazilian state surveillance, Brazil’s transnational partnership with the United States as it maintained an autonomous scheme mostly based on years of surveillance, the influential individuals and organizations working to destabilize Chile, diplomatic relations between Chile, the United States and Brazil, and finally, the culmination of Brazil’s role in the early violent days of the dictatorship. The latter is substantiated by testimonies of Brazilians who survived detention and torture at the National Stadium, at the hands of Brazilian torturers who participated directly in the coup.
Burns notes that the anti-Allende agenda had already escalated by 1961, during which time the United States was preoccupied with the influence of the Cuban Revolution. Goulart’s stances regarding Cuba did not endear him to the United States, having voted against boycotting Cuba at the Organization of American States (OAS) and opposed President John F. Kennedy’s plans for military intervention during the Cuban Missile Crisis. The tactics used to topple Goulart were later replicated in Chile, increasing social unrest over an economic crisis that would facilitate a military coup.
In 1966, during the presidency of Chilean Christian Democrat Eduardo Frei, Brazil created the Foreign Office’s Intelligence Center (CIEX), which was tasked with the surveillance of Brazilian exiles living in Chile and spying on Chile’s international affairs. While Brazil-U.S. relations were a strategic point, Brazil was conducting surveillance in Chile for its own motives, with its ambassador Camara Canto regularly detailing the influence of the communist party and the rise of the Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR), in a country that held a strong, democratic electoral tradition.
On the civilian side, Brazilian exiles were in Chile for several reasons. In 1970 when Allende became president, Brazil’s dictatorship institutionalized torture. Some left to participate in Allende’s socialist policies, others to find ways of resisting in exile and to fight back for Brazilians democracy when the time came. For some, Ernesto Che Guevara and Regis Debray were points of reference and inspiration. All Brazilian exiles were witnessing Allende’s socio-economic changes, and all were under Brazilian surveillance, having been deemed political opponents by the junta. Despite differences in political perspectives over Chile, all Brazilian exiles considered themselves internationalist because in part of the expectation that “the triumph of Allende’s Chile would be the debilitation of the Brazilian dictatorship.” Yet there was also apprehension over Allende’s fragile political standing. “Chile was a capitalist country with a precarious socialist government,” Wilson Barbosa, a Brazilian exile, is quoted as saying.
“The Commission for the Investigation of Special Activities (CIEX) enabled Brazil to gather its own information about its exiles, opposition and political momentum in Chile before Operation Condor was executed.”
Burns notes that while Brazil was involved in Operation Condor, it was not as active as other participating countries in the Southern Cone. The reason was that the Commission for the Investigation of Special Activities (CIEX) enabled Brazil to gather its own information about its exiles, opposition and political momentum in Chile before Operation Condor was executed. Brazil’s agents had infiltrated among the exiles, and placed their own moles inside the presidential palace La Moneda. For Brazilian exiles, Burns writes, “it was evident that, with the constant monitoring, no matter where they were, they would never be completely safe from the Brazilian authorities.”
The United States admitted to Brazil’s own separate role in influencing the military coup in Chile, albeit partly to exculpate itself from its own role through the CIA. Nathaniel Davis, U.S. Ambassador to Chile at the time of the coup, wrote an account in 1985 of how businessmen, as well as the Brazilian Ambassador to Chile, Camara Canto, were pivotal to the Chilean military coup. Canto was a close friend of National Intelligence Directorate (DINA) agent Sergio Arellano Stark—known for leading the Caravan of Death kill squads in the early days of the Chilean coup—as well as other military personnel, including Chilean Admiral and coup plotter Jose Toribio Merino, Air Force Commander in Chief Gustavo Leigh, and Herman Brady, who became Defense Minister during the dictatorship. Burns states that as the coup took place, “Camara Canto would feel free to identify himself not only as a member of the Brazilian dictatorship but also as a major contributor to the coup.”
Think tanks and academics also played a role in shaping the coup in Chile. Brazilian liberal economists Roberto Campos and Otavio Gouveia de Bulhoes proposed strategies for the Brazilian dictatorship that were similar to the neoliberal program drafted by the Chicago Boys for Chile. The private sector in Brazil, Burns notes, were involved in advising the Chilean right-wing on how to proceed against Allende. “The money spent against the Left is not just an investment; it is an insurance policy,” Glycon de Paiva, vice president of the Institute for Social Research and Studies (IPES), told right-wing Chilean businessmen.
Chile’s military coup exposed CIEX’s ongoing surveillance of Brazilian exiles. Survivors recall Brazilian agents being present during interrogation and torture sessions at the National Stadium in Santiago. Brazilian exiles testified that the Chilean soldiers carried out the interrogations under specific instructions from their Brazilian counterparts.
Brazil’s involvement in bringing down Allende is a subject that has not been treated sufficiently. While U.S. interference should by no means be reduced or marginalized, Burns brings South American history to the fore, explaining the regional dynamics and economic turmoil that ultimately led to Allende’s downfall and the beginnings of Operation Condor. In so doing, she tells a story that adds crucial new details to the picture. Burns shows how certain historical moments, such as Fidel Castro’s visit to Chile, were perceived as detrimental to Chile by the Brazilians. She also shows how, in diplomatic meetings with the United States, Brazil maintained a stance that showed command rather than subjugation or mere compliance with U.S. imperialism. Despite not being a lengthy read, Burns presents a vivid, detailed narrative and an urgency that adds resonance and depth to the individual and intertwined histories of Brazil and Chile.
Ramona Wadi is a freelance journalist and book reviewer. Her writing covers a range of themes in relation to Palestine and Latin America; the latter with a focus on Chile, Argentina and Cuba.