General Gustavo Leigh
Guzman
A great deal has been written about the coup d’etat in Chile which
violently overthrew the democratically elected left-wing government of Salvador
Allende in 1973. Much of the literature has focused -at least from this
writer’s layman’s perspective- on the figures respectively of Allende and
General Augusto Pinochet Ugarte, who led the junta. But little to nothing is
known about the other military leaders who ruled Chile during an era
characterised by violent repression.
Gustavo
Leigh, the Commander-in-Chief of the Chilean Air Force, was an important member
of the junta, and an implacable proponent of dealing harshly with the political
left, but it is fascinating to discover the contrast in the approach to
politics and economics between him and Pinochet; differences which led to his
ouster from the junta in 1978.
Both men owed
their appointments as heads of their respective branches of the armed forces to
Allende. Leigh was in fact one of the primary instigators of the coup plot,
with Pinochet apparently only joining the conspiracy at a late stage and taking
precedence in affairs of state by virtue of the fact that he was the head of
the most important branch of the military.
Both men
were, of course, fervently anti-Marxist and, in their thinking, were patriots
who were carrying out the sacred duty of rescuing the faltering fatherland from
sinking inexorably into a pit of Marxist misery. On the night of the coup, each
member of the junta representing each armed service made a brief statement that
was broadcast to the Chilean people. When compared to the statements of
Pinochet (Army), Merino (Navy) and Mendoza (Police), Leigh’s words are striking
in their venom:
After three
years of suffering the Marxist cancer which led us to economic, moral and
social disaster and which could no longer be tolerated for the sacred interests
of the homeland we found ourselves obliged to take on the sad and painful
mission which we have undertaken.
We are not
afraid. We know the enormous responsibility that will rest on our shoulders .
But we are
convinced, we are quite sure that the vast majority of the Chilean people are
with us. They are willing to fight against Marxism! They are willing to stamp
it down to the final consequences!
While Leigh
claimed in an interview in 1977 that he was unaware of human rights violations
which had occurred during the first years of the dictatorship, he was, on the
contrary, complicit in the uncompromisingly brutal atmosphere that permeated
the rule of the generals. Indeed, on the day of the uprising, he set the tone
that was to come by sending in air force jets to bomb and machine gun La
Moneda, the fortress-like presidential palace in which Allende was holding out;
setting it ablaze.
As a key figure
of the state, Leigh was a co-overseer of the day-to-day policies of internal
repression which were carried out in the name of the junta, and his later
affectation of ignorance did not stand the test of scrutiny. For instance, he
had to have known of the atrocities committed by the Joint Command, a part of
Chilean military intelligence which coordinated the activities of the branches
of the armed forces, because it had been created from the ranks of the
Intelligence Service of the Air Force (SIFA). This body was responsible for the
arrest, torture and elimination of 15 members of Chile’s Communist Party in
1975 and a further 10 between 1976 and 1977.
Also, his
purge of the Air Force of left-wing officers delivered them into the hands of
state-appointed torturers and murderers whose handiwork led to the deaths of
former servicemen such as Brigadier Alberto Bachelet, the father of the future
Chilean president.
Nonetheless,
he fundamentally differed from Pinochet in some key areas. This did not relate
to having any misgivings as to the extreme nature of the terror, a position
which almost certainly cost General
Oscar Bonilla his life in a mysterious helicopter crash, but
was to do with what he felt should be the correct approach to the economy.
Unlike
Pinochet, who readily subscribed to and applied the Libertarian economic
policies theorised by a group of academicians associated with the University of
Chicago, Leigh believed in strong state intervention in the economy. Whereas
the ‘shock treatment’ implemented at the behest of Pinochet was based on a free
market devoid of price controls and uninhibited competition from foreign
concerns, Leigh supported a mixed economy with a substantive presence of the
state in heavy industry, as well as the purposeful regulation of imports and
the financial speculation market.
He also
voiced his concerns over the absence of a timetable through which the regime
would restore democracy; specifically opposing the referendum called by
Pinochet to serve as a ratification of his continued tenure as head of state
until at least 1986.
He restated
his objection during an interview with the Paolo Buagialli, an Italian
journalist working for Corriere della
Sera, which was published on July 18th 1978. Leigh alluded to what he
termed the old tradition of Chilean “freedom and democracy” which could not be
indefinitely denied. He also strongly implied that intransigence on the part of
the military in this matter could precipitate the masses. Leigh further claimed
that he would reconsider his position as a member of the junta if it were
confirmed that the Chilean state had been involved in the assassination of
Oscar Letelier and other misdeeds including torture.
His words
were all the more striking given that indictments were at the time expected to
be brought against General Manuel Contreras, the head of the dismantled secret
police organisation named Direccion de Inteligencia Nacional (DINA), two other
army officers and an American, Michael Townley.
Pinochet
responded by dismissing Leigh on July 24th 1978 (obtaining the consenting
signatures of the other two members of the four-man junta) and removing 18 of
the 20 members of the air force general staff. The New York Times reported that Pinochet had “established unopposed
control over the governing military junta by demolishing his main critic”.
Leigh died in
September 1999 at the age of 79 after surviving and recovering (apart from the
loss of an eye) from an assassination attempt carried out by members of the Manuel Rodriguez
Patriotic Front who burst into his office and opened fire on him.
It is clear
that from the time of his membership of the junta, he had begun working towards
establishing a legacy which would distance him from the Pinochet regime. These
efforts did not end with the public utterances exposing his different outlook
on political and economic issues. It now transpires that Leigh had regularly
taped conversations between himself and other members of the junta with a recording
device placed in his jacket.
He did not
publish the contents of the tapes after the restoration of democracy because he
feared being sued. However, a book written by his widow, Gabriela Garcia de
Leigh, has reproduced much of their content. Entitled Leigh: El General Republicano, the book is clearly presented with
the objective of dissociating Leigh from the excesses of the Pinochet regime.
One example relates to Leigh’s thoughts after reading a letter addressed to him
from Mariana Callejas, the wife of
Michael Townley, the American agent of DINA who carried out the assassinations
of General Carlos Prats and Orlando Letelier.
The import
here was that Leigh did not initially believe that Pinochet was capable of
orchestrating such crimes and that he confronted him about the matter, even
though he himself was implicated in the disappearance of leaders of the
communist party and was detained under the orders of an investigating judge. He
did not face any sanction owing to an amnesty.
El General Republicano, also
attempts to place Leigh thinking as one who had considered the military
intervention of 1973 to be a corrective measure that would be a brief one
before a return to “normalcy”. Hence the reference to the term “republican”,
implies that he fundamentally believed in democratic constitutionalism, albeit
that he had not felt bound by General Rene Schneider’s doctrine of non-interference
by the army and partook in the overthrow of the Chilean constitution. For
Leigh, who once called the coup the “gravest defeat suffered by international
communism”, the ends justified the means.
The book
seems unlikely to change much in terms of the way the Chilean public view their
past. The divisions between those who feel that the coup saved Chile from a
civil war and laid the basis for its present relative economic prosperity on
the one hand, and those who feel that that it inaugurated the darkest epoch in
Chilean national history is as clear as ever.
Leigh will
remain a hero to some and a villain to others for the foreseeable future.
© Adeyinka
Makinde (2019)
Adeyinka
Makinde is a writer based in London, England.
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