In just over 500 pages Jorge Palacios attempts to show that policies and actions of the Chilean Communist party constituted “collaboration” with Chilean rightists and military leaders, thus aiding and abetting United States “imperialists” in commission of “one of the most notorious crimes ever committed”: the 1973 overthrow of President Salvador Allende and the Popular Unity administration he led. Professor Palacios may have trouble convincing all readers that Chile constitutes a case study of what he calls “historic compromise,” i.e., maneuvering by pro-Soviet Communist parties to achieve power by conniving with pro-United States parties.
Palacios was a leader of the Revolutionary Communist party of Chile, a Maoist organization that attacked the Soviet line and opposed ties between Communists and the Popular Unity coalition. He and his followers opposed “la vía chilena,” arguing for a revolutionary break with, and destruction of, bourgeois institutions such as the constitution, congress, the courts, and the armed forces. To Palacios it still is conceivable that socialism might have been achieved in Chile through such a break. This stand is indicative of one of the most important lessons learned from the 1970–73 Chilean experience.
It is clear now that “popular unity” existed in name only. It is equally clear that the organized and latent social-political forces within Chile were as relatively dynamic, if not as powerful in absolute terms, as were opposition forces from outside the country in blocking the Chilean road to socialism. In short, the domestic causes of what happened in 1973 were highly visible and significant. Anyone who does not recognize this is simply ignoring the evidence.
Doubtless it is disconcerting for Chilean Maoists and others to the left of the Allende administration-coalition to watch Mao’s own “heirs” consorting with the same “imperialist” forces they blame for socialism’s setback (socialism did not fail, Palacios insists) in Chile. It may be disconcerting to some readers of this book, merely repetitive to others, to see once again just how much ideological dogmatism and rigidity (some might say “orthodoxy”), and unwillingness to bend in the face of overwhelming opposition contributed to Chile’s present state. This is by no means a scholarly work. There is no pretense to objectivity. This should not deter scholars from using Palacios’s work, however, in order to learn still more of the inside story of recent Chilean political history. As an inside view, it is quite valuable.
