From détente to Revolution: Soviet Solidarity with Chile after Allende, 1973–79

Czechoslovakia and its Position within the Solidarity Network of Chilean Communism: A Reflection on the Coup and Resistance against Pinochet from a Country with Worn‐out Revolutionary Ideals

“…In the end, after heated debates, on 21 September, ten days after the coup, the USSR broke its diplomatic ties with Chile, which did not happen with the dictatorships in Brazil, Uruguay or Argentina. The decisive factor why the Soviet leadership decided to take this step was the relatively low profile of the economic relations and the low geopolitical importance of this Latin American country (Ulianova, 2000: 112–114; Yordanov, 2019: 74; Paranzino, 2021: 6–8). Another relevant aspect was the attitude taken by communist China when it recognised the military government.…”

“…Apart from the fact that the USSR had its own interests in the Chilean cause, the arrival of exiles helped to make the discourse adopted by communist countries more radical. Chileans exerted pressure on their Soviet counterparts so that they could express a more aggressive opposition to the United States (Paranzino, 2021). Therefore, part of the mass campaign that took place the following years consisted of portraying Chile as an iconic country within the bipolar framework of the Cold War, where the coup was directly related to the imperialist policy of the USA, and Augusto Pinochet was presented as the greatest representative of modern fascism (Andrewa and Mitrochin, 2008: 94).…”