It was 1969, a year of a significant importance in Chile.

After I received my Masters Degree at the University of Georgia in the United States, I went back to Chile and was hired at the University of Chile branch in Chillán, in the south of Chile.

The political situation in Chile was deplorable. There were many social movements and economic challenges that culminated in the election of Salvador Allende in 1970 and the subsequent events leading to the military coup in 1973.

I had gone through a horrible situation as a Public Relations Officer, and professor, at the University of Chile in Chillán. My mind was full of questions.

One of the leaders of the MIR (Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionario or Revolutionary Leftist Movement) had been accused of provoking many disorders in Concepción and was wanted by the police. Concepción is a city which is only one and a half hours from Chillán.

One morning when I drove to my work, I saw several buses full of carabineros, Chilean policemen. I heard a lieutenant shouting: “We can do it, nobody can stop us, we are the law” and many other encouraging words. It sounded like a coach preparing a football team! Little did I know that they were to come a few minutes later to invade the University building.

I had just hidden my purse under my desk when I heard one of the students at the University shouting: “Close the doors, the police are coming.”

One of the janitors rapidly closed the big gates of the main entrance. In what seemed like seconds, we heard the carabineros banging on the door. “Open in the name of the Law.”

The University at that time was going through a reform. Already in 1965, the Christian Democrat President of Chile, Eduardo Frei, had described the main problem as: “Of every hundred children born in Chile, less than one reaches university, and of those surviving, not even two out of a hundred are children of workers or peasants. […] Getting there is a privilege not achieved through a broad and fair selection process, but rather through the small group that can aspire to belong to the university because their family’s financial support and social status allow it.”

The students were asking for more young people to be able to study at the universities, and the right to participate in the election of the university authorities. So, when the police were at our doors for me, as the Public Relations officer, it was not easy to understand what was going on. Why were the police trying to do something that was essentially against university autonomy? Before this happened “autonomy” was mostly understood as remaining independent from what was going on with the political affairs of the country, but the reform was allowing a different interpretation of “autonomy.”

I started asking the students, already filling the big entrance room, if they knew what this was about. One of them came to me and he said: “We think that the leader of MIR, Luciano Cruz, is hidden in the attic of the building.”

That changed the whole situation. If that was true, I could not oppose the entrance of the police. Luciano was a fugitive of the law. I went to the gates, and I slightly open it. A lieutenant asked me who I was and before I could answer a group of policemen pushed the big gates and threw lachrymose gas bombs inside the spacious room.

I immediately started coughing, choking, and crying without control. The burning was insufferable, I was blinded and could not breathe. My eyes wanted to explode, my throat was in pain.

I felt somebody taking my arm and leading me to my office. They brought some water and handkerchiefs, and I was able to recover a little. I came out of the office followed by other professors and students. I manage to find and face the lieutenant. “Why are you using violence when we are not putting any resistance?” I asked. He turned red and said, “Sorry, mam, we have orders.” He turned his back and started up the stairs. At least he had waited until I had recovered a little. As a Public Relations Officer, I was the representative of the university to the authorities and the general public and was not impressed with these actions against the institution.

Luciano Cruz was not found in the attic! However, several students who had tried to resist the carabineros were hurt by police sticks. One of the girls was gravely wounded. We called the hospital. They came and took her. Later we learned that she was the daughter of one of the policemen who had participated in the invasion and that he was devastated.

But I was furious!

During that time, there was a rise in labor activism. Workers continued organizing strikes and protests. They demanded better wages and working conditions. It all was part of the social unrest and demands for change for most Chileans.

The political situation in Chile was also affected by the Cold War, between the United States and the Soviet Union. United States was concerned about the rise of leftist movements in Latin America.

At the end of 1969 I received a letter from the University of the North in Antofagasta, a city and port in the north of the country. They had recently open the School of Journalism and a friend of mine in Santiago had suggested me for a position as a professor there.

I contacted them, and in a brief time, I was driving north in my Citroën 2CV. A family that I befriended in Chillán knew a University of the North professor, and they had contacted him to find me an apartment. The professor told his daughter, Ana Maria, about me, and we both rented an apartment together while I was getting established in Antofagasta.

In a brief time, I got familiarized with a “situation” there. I noticed that every Friday, one, two or three men would arrive and spend all the weekend partying and drinking in the apartment next door. I asked my housemate if she knew what that was about and she told me that they were workers and leaders of a very well-known copper mine near Antofagasta, Chuquicamata. This is the largest copper mine in the world, near the city of Calama and about 3 hours from Antofagasta. It is known for its massive open-pit mining operations, and it was and is a significant contributor to Chile’s economy.

In 1970, the Chuquicamata copper mine in Chile was operated by the Anaconda Copper Company, an American mining company. However, a new Socialist government had been elected in 1969, and it was going to take charge in November 1970. A big reform was promised by the elected new President, Dr. Salvador Allende.

I managed to talk to one of the guys when he arrived one Friday at the apartment. I asked what was going on at the mine. He did not have any problems telling me that the “gringos” or Americans of the Anaconda company were already preparing to leave the country and they did not know if they would have any jobs after Allende takes over. They were drowning their fears with whisky.

He also told me that their major fear was that the Americans would very soon fire all the workers and leave the mine without anybody to work on it.

In fact, in 1969, the Chilean government, still under Presidente Frei, and Anaconda company reached an agreement for a “negotiated nationalization,” which allowed the government to acquire 25 per cent in Anaconda’s operations. Anaconda prepared for the transition, but foreseeing the total nationalization promised by Allende, it began to reduce its workforce. Both skilled engineers and laborers were fired or let go with little compensation. The purpose was to leave the mine in extremely poor operational conditions so the Socialist government would not profit from this most necessary mineral around the world.

At the same time, while I started to teach my courses at the School of Journalism, I noticed that the maintenance employees at the University were having numerous meetings and asking for better salaries. I talked to the man in charge of the Maintenance Department. He told me several employees were in a really bad economic situation. They were not only working at the University but also had other jobs by night to be able to feed their families.

I was disappointed. I had seen something similar happening at the University of Georgia with the people working in maintenance of buildings and dorms. They were black people with a long history of being mistreated. It seemed that even in the US, the Democrat Party that had the most votes of black people, was not doing anything to improve their economic conditions either.

I had studied Marxism when I was at the School of Journalism at the beginning of the sixties. Those ideas were sounding better and better. Several of the other professors at the School of Journalism were already members of the Christian Democrat, Socialist or Communist parties in Chile. I had students who were openly members either of the leftist MIR, or the Patria y Libertad or Fatherland and Liberty, ultra-rightist movement. We got along without problems as a family.

On August 24, 1970, President elect Allende visited Antofagasta. He came to Antofagasta even before taking charge because nationalizing the key copper industry was of major importance for the Chilean economy. Allende met with Joaquín Lavín, the leader of the Anaconda Copper Mining Company in Chile. The purpose of Allende was a smooth transition, but the firing of so many people at the mine was a move met with much resistance, contributing to the political tensions.

In Antofagasta, the President also met with Luis Corvalán, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Chile, and Jorge González, a prominent figure in the Chilean left.

During this visit, I had the opportunity to meet for less than half an hour with my cousin Arturo. He was the aide-de-camp to the President. He was a Captain in the Chilean Navy, selected to this prominent position because of his honest conduct and degree of trust in his previous assignments in the Navy. He managed schedules, facilitated all communications, and assisted during all official events of Allende. Arturo was the liaison between the president and other officials or dignitaries. He was close to Allende and his wife, Hortensia. Mother had been a good friend to Hortensia Bussi when the daughters of Presidente Allende and I were in the same school. Mother and Hortensia used to go to the sports events of my school together.

When I talked to my cousin that day, I did not know it would be the last time I was going to see him alive.
He was killed in 1973 before the Military coup. During our meeting he said he was concerned about his legs because he spent so much time on his feet on this assignment. However, he said he was most concerned about what he was seeing, not only happening among the people opposing Allende but among the people that were supposed to support him. He said, “There is too much ambition for positions and prestige, and most of those asking do not even know how to blow their nose with a handkerchief or hold a fork properly.” He then implied that Allende needed much genuine patriotic support from the Popular Unity which was the coalition of leftist parties that supported his election. After all Allende was the first Marxist to lead a country in the Americas through democratic means.

The coalition “aimed to create a more equitable society” but obviously when they started to redistribute land from large estates to “peasants”, the peasants turned out to be party members, or relatives, that did know anything about cultivating the land. Allende obviously faced opposition from conservative sectors and the business community.

After Allende took charge of the government in November 1970, things started to be increasingly difficult. I had already found a house to rent because Ana Maria had already moved to the capital, and, honestly, I did not want to live next to the apartment of the drunk guys.

Things in Chile started to be very tense. Suddenly food stores were short of food and wine. Prices went up, and inflation took over. Business owners were not happy.

All this situation, my conversation with my cousin, the desperate needs of most of the employees at the University because of inflation, made me look for the address of the Communist Party in Antofagasta. I went one afternoon to sign the papers to become a member. I was assigned to the University’s Communist Party small cell.

To my surprise the cell meetings were concentrated on how to most effectively clean the buildings and the classrooms and the precarious economic situation of each of the members of the cell. No big strategies or lectures about understanding communist ideology, nothing about how to attract other people to become members. Meetings ended by pitching in some money to help the “comrades” that were in deep economic needs.

When the opposition became stronger, a professor at another university that had a radio station asked me if I could help start a radio program to promote what the government was doing at a level that people could understand. We had participated together in some short plays, and she knew that I liked to imitate the way people talk in the countryside. I accepted and began writing scripts. They consisted of a dialog between two women friends, living in an underprivileged community, talking about what the government was doing with political reforms, nationalization, agrarian reform to redistribute land, and social programs like providing free milk for children. The main purpose was to put in a language all people could understand the socialist-oriented measures the government wanted to take. The little 30 minutes radio program was quite successful. Our theme music was The Girl from Ipanema. We had many people calling the station to congratulate us and ask for clarifications on some subjects.

Between 1970 and 1973 Chile saw a booming of cultural expression. Artists and musicians were promoting socialist ideals. The movement of the Nueva Canción Chilena or new Chilean Song emerged. It blended traditional music with political themes. Our parties were filled with this new genre of Chilean traditional and folk music played with guitar, zampoñas (panpipes), quenas (end-blown flutes), bongos, maracas, and various percussion instruments. It was a message of social resistance.

By 1972, Chile’s production was stagnant. Production in all sectors of the economy. Socialism was not working.

On July 27,1973, my parents called me. My cousin Arturo had been assassinated the night before. He was 45 years old. At his residence in Santiago, the capital, he heard a sound and went to his balcony. Rumors blamed the extreme rightist Fatherland and Liberty movement for the assassination because the group had been linked to a rebellion in June in which twenty-two people were killed. His death was going to bring an investigation that lasted for years.

I knew that Arturo admired Allende but not the people that followed him. The truth was that he respected the Constitution and would have opposed the Military Coup, so he needed to be eliminated. I went to see him at the viewing that was at La Moneda, the Presidential Palace, but I did not go to the funeral at the cemetery because I knew that the family was going to do a big deal about it and I could not stand it. He had been a dear cousin to me, and I was not ready for the muttering.

Something told me that something bad was happening. I was totally disappointed with the behavior of the people around the President. I was disappointed with the obvious collusion of the Armed Forces of Chile with the CIA.

I had just bought a piece of land and placed a deposit for a house in Antofagasta. It was going to be beautiful.

September 11, 1973, came and the Military Coup d’Etat happened. This was what Arturo was against and the reason for his death.

The 1973, the Chilean coup d’état was a military overthrow of the democratically elected socialist president Salvador Allende. General Augusto Pinochet led it. This event marked the end of the civilian rule in Chile. It was the initiation of a bloody military dictatorship that lasted until 1990. Over 3,000 people were killed or “disappeared”. Tens of thousands were tortured. The repression targeted political opponents and leftists. It was total human rights abuses and violations.

One of my students and his wife were killed after the soldiers invaded the University. “The student of the school Nenad Teodorovic Sertic (24) was executed along with his wife Elizabeth Cabrera Balarriz (23) and Luis Muñoz Bravo, also a student at the Universidad del Norte, on September 15, 1973, by soldiers of the Antofagasta Regiment, while they were being transferred to the Cerro Moreno Air Base.”
(See https://www.periodismoucn.cl/historia/) (“Historia” 2017)

I was taken to the morgue to identify them. It is impossible to describe what I saw. It seemed to me that an ax had been used at some point. I could not explain it. I was used to identifying corpses at the morgue; that was part of my training as a journalist. This was different.

I was detained and psychologically tortured several times. After two detectives were placed in my classroom, I decided to leave Antofagasta. I told only one of my friends that I was leaving. After something like that happens, it is hard to trust anybody.

The School of Journalism’s current website has some of the history of I lived.
( https://www.periodismoucn.cl/historia/) “Beginning in 1973, the teaching staff was reduced due by the dismissal of several staff members, and the number of students at the School of Journalism at the University of the North decreased considerably. The dismissals continued over time and affected, among others, Walda Aracena, María Beatriz Beltrán, Carlos Rojas Martorell, Osmán Cortés, Manuel Ortiz Veas, Jaime Quezada, Juan Pablo Cárdenas, Marco Antonio Pinto, Sergio Prenafeta, Manuel Vega, Héctor Vera, Dora Vergara, and Cery Toro. (“Historia” 2017)

One of my dear students wrote: “It is amidst all this nebulous event that the UCN (University of the North) School of Journalism weaves together the first stage of its history, a period filled with pleasant moments that its alumni remember today as if they were in the classrooms where they trained as journalists. “I arrived in 1971 to a small but very welcoming school,” says Isidro Morales, a professor at the School, who emotionally transports himself back to those years where he learned from great teachers such as María Beatriz Beltrán, Walda Aracena, Héctor Vera (then a young academic vice-rector), and Andrés Sabella.” (See https://www.periodismoucn.cl/historia/) (“Historia” 2017)

The inflation went up to 900 per cent. I lost my new land and my savings.

After I left Antofagasta and arrived in Santiago, I felt the need to contact the Communist Party leaders and ask for some guidance. It took me time to learn who to contact and where to go. Everything was so somber and tragic. So many dead. So many mothers missing their sons or daughters. Nobody knew where they were. Many people were arrested and taken to the Municipal Stadium or Chile Stadium. One of our most dear singers, Victor Jara, was taken to the stadium, which was used as a detention center during the coup. He suffered, was tortured and killed there. Around 3,000 people were killed during the coup and the subsequent repression. The numbers have not being determined.

Finally, I got a note telling me where to go. It was a complicated route taking different buses and walking long distances, but finally I reached the place in a remote Santiago neighborhood and found one of the leaders of the Communist Party. He looked very tired, he was coughing and drinking some hot tea made up of herbs. He cried when he saw me. We had seen each other in Antofagasta when Allende was there. We had not even talked. He just saw me when I went to meet with my cousin. He said he was so sorry for what happened to Arturo and the “comrade” Luis Corvalán. Luis was the General Secretary of the Communist Party. He was detained by the Junta Government following the coup d’etat. He was sent to various detention centers including the Stadium and later condemned. Rusia worked relentlessly for Corvalán’s freedom. Corvalán was sentenced to long-term imprisonment. He spent several years in prison before being released in 1978 due to international pressure and health concerns.

We talked for a long time about what had happened to several people we knew, especially journalists who were with the government, detained and imprisoned or killed. It was difficult.

He finally asked, “What do you plan to do?” I answered, “I thought you were going to give me some pointers. Where do we go from here?” He said, “There is nothing to do here for now. Leave the country if you can. If some day we recover our freedom from this dictatorship, write about what you saw and lived. Go.”

When I left that place, I remembered that he was rubbing the empty cross hanging from his neck when he told me this.

I never saw the need to talk about my short dance with the Communist Party until I applied for citizen in the United States.

About 200,000 Chileans fled the country after the Military Coup in 1973. Many of us were highly educated. Doctors, academics, teachers, engineers, and artists. We were targeted for our political views or sympathy with the violently ended government of President Salvador Allende. Chile suffered what is called a “brain drain.”