State Of Crisis In Chile Essay

Under the leadership of Salvador Allende from 1970 to 1973, Chile faced a great deal of economic issues which put them into a state of crisis. Allende’s initial intensions to better the lives of workers, and improve the economy did not proceed as planned. He spent a huge chunk of money on health care, education and housing, while giving land to the lower class (peasants) leaving him bankrupt. Besides this, his idea of expropriating the U.S owned copper companies in Chile lead to the huge failure as copper, one of the most important exports in the Chilean economy dropped drastically in price. This was due to the fact that foreign investors did not have the trust they once had in Chile as they feared lack of profit. This also caused much discontent from the U.S government regarding the relationship with Chile. Digging deeper into issues, industrial production fell, while the economic price tag increased day to day. This led the nation to fall into a food crisis as there were food shortages everywhere that destroyed the idea of small businesses. While trying to repair this, Allende set forth a plan to increase wages while freezing prices. As if it couldn’t get any worse, he overprinted currency

The U.S. did not want Allende to win, rather his opponent General Rene Schneider of Chile. They wanted to overthrow Allende with a military coup, but General Schneider didn’t want to involve the military in overthrowing Allende. He had a strong belief in the military serving as protection, not as a political weapon. The CIA then tried to kidnap General Schneider but failed, although he would go on to be shot and killed just a few days after the election. Around 3 years later, there was a military coup run by Augusto Pinochet, bringing death upon Allende. There was no confirmation on his death, whether it was suicide or