Thursday, January 2, 2014
Cold War Legacy in Chile
After reading the concluding section of the chapter, we should all be able to evaluate (at least in a general sense) how much the US was involved in shaping Chile's political history from the end of World War II until the present day. How much do you think Chile was directly influenced by the US, and how much was it playing a tug-of-war game between the East and West by engaging in conversations with the USSR? How did the dissolution of the USSR affect Chilean politics in the late 1980s?
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While US influence was very dominant in Chile, I think much of the chaos was due to this tug-of-game game during the Cold War. Both the US and the USSR would do anything to sway Chile one way or the other whether it was politically, economically or socially. This point is further justified in the way that as the "relations between East and West improved, the threat of revolution in the Americas receded." When the 1980s rolled around and the USSR began to dissolve, competition to "win" Chile onto one side was vastly diminished. Therefore, with less pressure and chaos on both sides, the middle-man, Chile, was able to calm down and ultimately emerge out of a "state of emergency."
ReplyDeleteI think the US was extremely influential in Chile. According to the reading, "The US influence in Chile since 1945 has been profound". In a way, the tug-of-war game did play into the influence to a certain extent. The US ended up 'winning" the game due to the "collapse of the USSR" and that is when Chile saw that it needed 'to exist in harmony" with the US.
ReplyDeleteAmerica had a significant influence on Chile, both positive and negative in its own way, the "tug of war" was probably rather negative and caused a bit of chaos but when the USSR fell and that ended their relations ship became much more positive.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of Chile being the ribbon on a rope being pulled one way by the US and the other by the USSR is not only frightening, but also a little degrading for Chile. Chile's whole life during the time period was based off influence from some other country. I think the US had a more direct influence with Chile then the USSR did, which is the reason the US "won".
ReplyDeleteWell, the very first sentence of the reading is, “US dominance in the Americas frequently influenced Chilean politics after 1945.” They had an impact through trade, world banks, various cultural agencies, etc. But then, it seems to have been more of a “tug-of-war game”, so to speak. Towards the end of the reading, an interesting thought is revealed: “…perhaps this shift to democracy is really a belated expression of Chilean nationalism and a determination to rectify the state’s failed experiment with socialism.”
ReplyDeleteThe US was more involved with Chile than the USSR was, so this was a positive for the US in the sense of being able to monitor activity.
ReplyDeleteThe US was more influential in Chile than Russia was, and more influential than they would like to admit. The US was behind the scenes pulling a lot of political strings in order to secure the US's good relationship with Chile
ReplyDeleteLike everyone else said, the us was much more involved than russia with chile. Jack said that the us was behind the scenes pulling political strings to fall in their favor. This was most likely so the us can be in as good of relationship with chile as possible.
ReplyDeleteI believe Chile was heavily influenced by the US government politically, for example, US encouraged Allende's overthrow, provided assistance to Pinochet's pro-American, anti-communist regime and then actively backed the opposition in its effort to obtain a faire electoral process. Also judging from the description that says"US influence in Chilean domestic affair was equally resented", i assume that
ReplyDeleteUS must have done a lot to get hated. Before the unexpected and Gorbachev's unintentionally triggered the end of Communist Party and the cold war, Chile was totally playing as a child between a divorced couple and taking advantages from it. After the dissolution of USSR the circumstance gets clear and Chile is abandoning it's failed trail of communism regime and exist in harmony with USA like other nations in the Americas.
As the article says:"Direct involvement may have been limited, but th eUS had an effect through trade, including the IMF, the inter-American Development Bank, the World Bank, the OAS, and various cultural agencies."