A Chilean example.

"Sign no new loans and make no more commitments. Retain Chile in Eximbank's Group D [worst risk] category, requiring all decisions to be made in Washington and raising fees on guarantees ... Examine each Chilean request to international financial institutions on its merits and in the context of the political situation at the time. [Do] not encourage private investment in Chile;" declassified CIA documents show Henry Kissinger and his staff ordering American officials to tighten the screw against Salvadore Allende's government in Chile. Zimbabwe now suspects that it is being subjected to the same treatment. Mabasa Sasa reports from Harare.

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Chile has a very short future and after 4 November it will only have a past," wrote America's point man in the country, one Frei, according to declassified CIA documents now being studied in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare. Another American intelligence officer based in Chile added: "There is a graveyard smell to Chile, the fumes of a democracy in decomposition. They stank in my nostrils in Czechoslovakia in 1948 and they are no less sickening here today."

With hindsight, it is safe to conclude that Salvador Allende's Chile did not have a prayer once America's arsenal of resources were deployed against the Latin American country. According to the declassified CIA documents, the wheels of the machine that was to depose and murder Allende were set in motion the day he rose to the helm of Chilean politics and it was only a matter of time for the inevitable to happen.

From day one, senior bureaucrats in Washington resolved that "Chile was on a dead end street" and the removal of Allende was the only way US interests in Latin America could be protected and promoted.

On 15 September 1970, the CIA was "directed to prevent Marxist Salvador Allende's assent to the Chilean presidency on 3 November. This effort was to be independent of concurrent endeavours being undertaken through, or with the knowledge" of the State Department, according to a report issued by the CIA's Chile Taskforce.

"Given the dismal prospects of a political formula being worked out to prevent Allende's designation as president by Congress," the report said, "[the] remaining alternatives centred around overcoming the apolitical, constitutional-oriented inertia of the Chilean military."

The minutes of a meeting of senior intelligence officers on 17 September 1970 read: "The director [of the CIA, Richard Helms] told the group that President [Richard] Nixon had decided that an Allende regime in Chile was not acceptable to the United States ... The president asked the Agency to prevent Allende from coming to power or to unseat him. The president authorised US$10m for this purpose, if needed. Further, the Agency is to carry out this mission without coordination with the Departments of State and Defence."

As is now known, the attempt to stop Allende from rising to the presidency were ill-fated and the focus was now on ensuring his stay at the top would be as brief as possible.

A restricted handling document dated 16 November 1970 and authored by William V. Broe (CIA chief, Western Hemisphere Division) reads in part: "It is firm and continuing policy that Allende be overthrown by a coup ... We are to continue to generate maximum pressure toward this end utilising every appropriate resource. It is imperative that these actions be implemented clandestinely and securely so that the [US government] and American hand (sic) be well hidden."

The document goes on to detail how the CIA advised renegade members of the military when the best time to stage the coup would be. However, in the early days, a military coup looked very unlikely and Washington knew this.

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Among the factors working against a coup were the tradition of military respect for the constitution and General Schneider's (army commander in chief) publicly stated esteem for the constitution. There was also the real fear that non-commissioned officers would side with Allende and the fact that the military simply did not see their president as a threat to democracy.

So, in essence, what the US sought to do was to subvert this respect for constitutionalism within the military and allow anarchy to reign in Chile.

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Kissinger and his staff, therefore, instructed their men on the ground: "Maintain effective relations with the Chilean military, letting them know that we want to cooperate but that our ability to do so depends on Chilean government actions."

The major constraint the US faced was that Allende was a democratically-elected leader working within the bounds of Chilean constitutional frameworks. But this was not going to deter them and their desires.

Another piece of correspondence, also from November 1970 and directed to Kissinger, reads: "Although events in Chile will be determined principally by internal Chilean forces and therefore US influence can only have a marginal effect, the skilful exercise of our influence could be an important factor in complicating Allende's task ...

"The negative use of our influence--e.g. taking measures from the outset to manifest US hostility toward the Allende government--would serve Allende's purpose of rallying the Chilean people around him in the face of the 'foreign devil'. The principal targets of our courses of action with Chile would be the Allende government, the Chilean security and military forces, the non-Marxist political forces, and the Chilean public."

The quickest way to get the public unwittingly onto the side of America's agenda would be to hit them where it hurts most--the pocket. Henry Kissinger had said that the country's "economy must scream", and scream it did, with a rate of inflation that was the worst in world history, companies laying off workers, food in short supply, the collapse of social services and more sinisterly the arming of pro-American groups in Chile.

Economic sabotage

Economic sabotage has historically been the weapon of choice in America's 'how to guide' for regime change. This usually starts with the imposition of indirect sanctions through the unofficial suspension or freezing of credit lines.

In a declassified 'Status report on Restrictions on IBRD lending to Chile', the US government indicated that infrastructure development aid would not be renewed to the country through the simple use of bureaucratic strictures designed to automatically eliminate the credit worthiness of basically any developing country.

The executive director of the International Bank of Reconstruction and Development was instructed by the acting assistant secretary of state for Inter-American affairs to ensure that Chile never saw a dime of aid, but "without the hand of the US government showing in the process".

Kissinger instructed: "Sign no new loans and make no more commitments. Retain Chile in Eximbank's Group D (worst risk) category, requiring all decisions to be made in Washington and raising fees on guarantees ...

"Examine each Chilean request to international financial institutions on its merits and in the context of the political situation at the time. [Do] not encourage private investment in Chile."

There would be no support for rescheduling of Chilean debt either, and the US government was to invoke the Foreign Assistance Act [620(3)(b)] and [107(b)] wherever possible. These sections read: "No assistance to country dominated by international communist movement," and, "No economic assistance to countries trading with Cuba or North Vietnam," respectively.

Another declassified telegram indicates that Washington influenced institutions and other countries to insist on "cash only transactions" when dealing with Chile in addition to encouraging the erosion of the local currency by fuelling a black market dealing primarily in US dollars. America reportedly dumped huge quantities of its copper reserves--Chile's core export--on the international market so as to incite a slump in prices and as a consequence starve the country of foreign currency.

The slump in industry was designed to increase unemployment and as a consequence incite the jobless to take to the streets in violent protests.

NGOs were co-opted in the scheme to hurt the public and force them into uprising against Allende's government. One communication emanating from Kissinger's desk proposes the winding down of aid programmes and maintaining a small and limited presence to people-to-people initiatives, and those "few programmes of technical assistance of interest to the United States, e.g. health and participant training activities".

The media

The propaganda mills were churning out their fare, night and day. In fact, prior to Allende's ascension, some sections of the Western media had already started the disinformation campaign, painting Allende as a maniac who would brutishly rob people of their private property in the name of nationalisation. After his confirmation as president, the CIA set up a "programme of journalists--actual and otherwise--travelling to Chile for on-the-scene reporting".

Declassified information states that: "By 28 September, the CIA had in place in, or enroute to, Chile, 15 journalist agents from 10 different countries. This cadre was supplemented by eight more journalists from five countries under the direction of high level agents who were, for the most part, in managerial capacities in the media field."

What followed was the creation of an underground press, placement of individual news items through agents, CIA financing of newspapers, and the subsidisation of an anti-Allende political group. "Special intelligence and 'inside' briefings were given to US journalists in deference to the international dominance of the US media."

An example is given of how a Time magazine correspondent in Chile, after writing about Allende's assurances of policy moderation, found the thrust of the story totally changed after editing in Washington.

This provoked Allende to complain: "We are suffering the most brutal and horrible pressure, both domestic and international," and further pointing out that Time had openly called for an invasion of Chile.

Kissinger, ever the hawk, urged the publication "on a continuing basis, the restrictions to personal freedom and weakness of the Allende regime." Another option was to ostracise Chile within the Organisation of American States (OAS). Washington also invoked the Rio Treaty barring any members from establishing bilateral ties with Cuba.

White House advisors proposed that the US "continue our present role of discreet leadership in the OAS. This means limiting US visibility in the OAS insofar as practicable, playing our roles behind the scenes as much as possible, but if necessary feeding suggested initiatives to them ..."

In the face of such preponderance of malice, it is no wonder that on 11 September 1973, Allende's government fell, the man himself was murdered, and General Pinochet ascended to the helm of Chilean politics.

That the same scenario is being played out in Zimbabwe vis-a-vis the US and its allies' regime change agenda against President Mugabe and his government, has not been lost on Harare. Like a chess game, government insiders are studying every move that led to Allende's downfall in order to checkmate a repetition in Zimbabwe. The recent attack on the economy has, therefore, not been lost on them. "We are covering every ground," one of them told this reporter.