Secret documents reveal that Brazilian newspapers supported Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship and received coordination from the CIA and the United States government
247 — Based on research from the book “Brazil vs. Democracy The Dictatorship, the Coup in Chile and the Cold War in South America” by Roberto Simon, UOL columnist Jamil Chade pointed out that the Brazilian press opposed the coup in Chile Salvador Allende in 1973 and the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, who asks the dictatorship for money in exchange for reports favorable to the country, with the support of the CIA and plans of the United States government.
While in Chile on the eve of the coup, “Chilean journalists could publish whatever they wanted, for or against Allende, in Medici Brazil there was relentless censorship,” says Roberto Simon in the book. “A flood of opinion pieces in the Brazilian mainstream press openly called for a democratic break in Chile a week after the coup, for example, readers of O Globo came across a halfpage article signed by Pablo Rodríguez, the leader of the group “The farright Patria y Libertad (the Rio newspaper could not explain who the author was),” he notes.
According to the book, Washington coordinated this operation in press offices across Latin America. North American intelligence sent a document to White House aides highlighting the involvement of the O Globo newspaper: “Rio de Janeirobased O Globo published a frontpage article calling on Brazil and Argentina to come together to address the situation in Chile .”
The newspaper O Globo played a crucial role in supporting the Pinochet government after the coup. “According to secret Chilean diplomatic documents, the director of the O Globo branch in Brasília, Arnaldo Nogueira, visited Jaime Valdés in mid1975 [adido chileno] with a business proposal. [O embaixador do Chile no Brasil] “Cubillos reported to his superiors in Santiago that the Rio newspaper wanted to sell articles to the Chilean regime, with defined agendas and reports reviewed by ‘friends’ of the Santiago dictatorship,” the book says.
One offer was to publish a special 36page notebook about the new Chile at a price of exactly US$248,000 (almost US$1.2 million in current values, adjusted for inflation in the United States; hence R5.86). $ current). However, the document points out that the ambassador did not consider this to be the best option since it “exhausts the advertising effect in just one case, lacking the subliminal factor desirable to penetrate directly into the public, and precisely for this reason Reason is also the case.” subject to all the reader’s fears and suspicions about a special supplement.” “The other possible route would be to pay almost $6,000 for individual reports. “A package of twenty items would cost less than $120,000 (currently $530,000),” he explained.
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According to the book, the embassy in Brasília would decide itself when journalists would travel to report, while some costs would be borne by the Pinochet government. The guidelines would be set by the Chilean government and all materials would have to be reviewed by the embassy before publication. However, the project failed because Santiago believed that the operation would place too much of a strain on Chilean government coffers. “After all, without a financial agreement, there would be no need to pay for something that is already happening,” recalls Jamil Chade.
Brazilian press In addition to O Globo, the book also highlights the involvement of O Cruzeiro and the newspaper O Estado de S.Paulo. In the latter, Júlio de Mesquita Neto of the newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo, chairman of the Press Freedom Commission of the IAPA (InterAmerican Press Association), had named Mercurio, the newspaper that launched a coup against Allende, as his main collaborator. The company’s president was Manoel de Nascimento Brito, director of Jornal do Brasil.
The author points out that it is above all up to Mesquita to publicly raise the SIP “against the socialist transformation in Chile and in solidarity with the largest voice of the Chilean press, which is under attack by the socialist government”. “In addition to the InterAmerican Society, O Estado and O Globo had direct relationships with Mercurio through Latin, a news agency founded in 1970 in collaboration with several Latin American newspapers that began sharing content,” the book says.
The Chilean daily published articles that were translated and republished in Brazil. According to the author, “a key sector of the Brazilian press became a sounding board for a daily newspaper that was involved in the initial plans of the coup against Allende and was financed by American espionage.”
Furthermore, according to the Estado de S.Pauloallied newspaper, the CIA would attribute to its “Mercurio Project” a “significant role” in the destruction of Allende’s government of popular unity. Mesquita even wrote several letters to the then president of Chile attacking the socialist government’s actions.
Grupo Globo said in a statement that it “does not know the content of this research and feels prevented from issuing a detailed statement.” “If the documents are true and wellcontextualized (and highlight, for example, the draconian restrictions that the press was subjected to during this period), Grupo Globo can now ensure that these attitudes do not coincide with the principles and values it pursues.” practiced for decades. As was said in an editorial about the 1964 coup: “History is the most powerful tool man has to move safely into the future: one learns from the mistakes made and enriches oneself by recognizing them.” The newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo did not comment on the questions raised in Chad’s column.
Pinochet government The dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet was a military regime that ruled Chile with the support of the United States from 1973 to 1990, resulting in a series of human rights violations and an attack on democracy. On September 11, 1973, Chilean armed forces led by Pinochet overthrew the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende in a coup. Allende died during the coup and Pinochet took power as head of the military regime.
- Political repression: Pinochet’s dictatorship carried out brutal political repression and arrested, tortured and murdered thousands of political opponents. Many of them were held in secret detention centers where they were subjected to horrific illtreatment.
- Enforced disappearances: During the dictatorship, many people disappeared without a trace. Family members and human rights organizations estimate that more than 3,000 people were victims of enforced disappearances under Pinochet’s regime.
- Systematic torture: Torture was often used as a means of intimidating and punishing opponents of the regime. Reports of torture included methods such as electric shocks, beatings, suffocation and sleep deprivation.
- Summary statements: In addition to arbitrary arrests and torture, numerous political opponents were summarily executed by the regime. It is estimated that more than 1,000 people died this way.
- Media censorship and suppression of freedom of expression: Pinochet’s regime censored the press and severely restricted freedom of expression. Critical journalists were persecuted and many media outlets were silenced or controlled by the state.
- Economic violence and neoliberalism: In addition to human rights violations, the Pinochet regime implemented neoliberal economic policies that benefited the interests of economic elites and led to significant social inequalities. The military dictatorship in Chile was used by neoliberal theorists in the 1980s as a laboratory for new economic policies that spread to the rest of the world.
In 1988, with the government in crisis, Pinochet called a referendum to decide whether he would remain in power for another eight years. The majority of Chileans voted “no,” ending the military regime and paving the way for the restoration of democracy. The crimes committed during Pinochet’s dictatorship were widely condemned by the international community and have been the subject of investigations and prosecutions over the years. Many former members of the regime have been convicted of human rights violations.