Pinochet and the great neoliberal experiment (including Nazis)
Neoliberalism, an economic doctrine quite alien to Adam Smith's classical liberalism, used Chile as an experimental laboratory. Augusto Pinochet's coup d'état enjoyed the political and military sponsorship of the United States, but in terms of ideology, discounting the typical soldierly and curial mantras, it drew almost exclusively from the so-called Chicago School. That is, from the doctrine formulated by economists such as Friedrich von Hayek and Milton Friedman: the State is a mafia gang, taxes are theft, there is no freedom other than that of the market, solidarity hinders the system, and so on.
All this is well known. And yet, it's worth delving into that dictatorial experience. Those who have read "38 Calle Londres" will know what I'm talking about. Those who haven't should not be discouraged by the full title: "38 Calle Londres. Two Cases of Impunity: Pinochet in England and a Nazi in Patagonia." There are reports on world soybean production with more attractive headlines. But the work, an investigation by British lawyer Philippe Sands, is worthwhile.
The authoritarian vocation is, we said, a characteristic feature of neoliberalism since its first practical embodiment, in Chile. Sands' book offers some new details about Margaret Thatcher's devotion to Augusto Pinochet, and about the fury with which Eduardo Fungairiño (1946-2019), chief prosecutor of the National Court during the government of José María Aznar, fought the extradition request to Spain filed by Baltasar Garzón against the Chilean general.
The central character of "Calle Londres, 38" is Walther Rauff (1906-1984), a former German naval officer who, as part of the SS, provided great services to the Third Reich. He developed the first carbon dioxide chambers (which killed some 200,000 mentally ill people), invented mobile extermination chambers (almost 100,000 additional corpses), and during the war organized systematic exterminations on the Eastern, Tunisian, and Italian fronts. Rauff managed to escape to Latin America thanks to pro-Nazi Catholic networks and eventually settled in Chilean Patagonia. For years, he ran a fishing industry there, at the edge of the world.
People like Rauff are always useful when it comes to torture and/or murder. The Pinochet regime turned to him from the very beginning of the dictatorship: the German-accented voice heard by the tortured (always blindfolded) in the building at 38 Calle Londres, Santiago, Chile, was that of Rauff, an expert in savage interrogations. The trucks used to transport prisoners, alive or already dead, on their way to disappearance, were more than once those of Rauff's company. In short, the neoliberal experiment of the Pinochet dictatorship (1973-1990) had a direct connection with a former Nazi leader. And with quite a few other Nazi fugitives of lesser criminal stature. The fact seems significant.
During the Pinochet era, Chile was an object of admiration for neoliberals, including Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. Chile, a model for the world. Chile, the most orderly economy in Latin America. Now we know what the privatization of everything brought about: retirement based on bank pension funds, for example, led to misery. The average pension in Chile today is 364 euros per month. Slightly less than in 2024, but probably slightly more than in 2026, because profitability is declining.
The Chilean case allows us to interpret and connect certain contemporary phenomena. When Donald Trump deploys the army in the streets of the United States, when the rising Nigel Farage promises mass deportations in the United Kingdom, when the heirs of French collaboration with the Nazis seem to be heading for power, when neo-Francoism competes in voting intentions with the traditional Spanish right, it is worth remembering the hybridization between neoliberalism and Nazism that occurred in Chile. Not because remembering will be of much use. It is simply a matter of knowing which side each one is on.
