Guatemala is going to enter a new era
in which there will be
prosperity for the people,
together with liberty for the people,
The question is,
why are we supporting El Salvador?
No, the question was,
why are we killing priests in El Salvador?
The answer is, we're not,
Now, you be quiet,
President Christiani
is trying to do a job for democracy
and the left-wing guerrillas
must not take over El Salvador,
(George W Bush) America will not impose
our own style of government on the unwilling,
Our goal instead
is to help others to find their own voice,
attain their own freedom,
and make their own way,
This film is about the struggle of people
to free themselves
from a modern form of slavery,
Richard Nixon,
president of the United States,
once said of Latin America,
"People don't give a shit about the place,"
He was wrong,
The grand design of the United States
as a modern empire
was drawn on the hopes
of an entire continent
known contemptuously
as "the back yard",
The extraordinary witnesses in this film
describe a world
not as American presidents like to see it,
as useful or expendable,
they describe
the power of courage and humanity
among people with next to nothing,
They reclaim noble words like democracy,
freedom, liberation, justice,
and in doing so, they're defending
the most basic human rights of all of us
in a war being waged against all of us,
This is Caracas, capital of Venezuela
one of the richest countries
in Latin America
thanks too huge deposits of oil
The rich in Venezuela
live in leafy suburbs
with names like Country Club
Their spiritual homes
are Miami and Washington
The majority
live in what are known as barrios
on hillsides in breeze-block houses
that defy gravity
In the past
these people had been invisible -
excluded from their own society
Today they display the confidence of those
who know an extraordinary change
has come too their lives
This is Hugo Chavez president of Venezuela
the voice of the barrios
Chavez and his supporters
have won ten elections in eight years
(Cheering)
He's the symbol of an awakening
of people power
driven by great popular movements
that are unique too Latin America
The days of the old bosses
and barons are over,
That false, elite democracy
is over in Venezuela,
It's no surprise that Chavez, with the help
of an aggressive media coverage
has become a hate figure
in the United States
because what he represents
is another way
and a threat too American domination
(# Rock music)
All right, now, Hugo Chavez,
the criminal - speaking of criminal -
government of Venezuela,,,
- The criminal?
- It's a criminal government,
My opinion and that of
a lot of people in our government,
Hugo Chavez represents an extreme threat
not only to our nation, but to our hemisphere,
- He should've been killed long ago,
- By whom?
- Anyone who blames other,,,
- By whom?
By anyone,
(Speaking Spanish)
You want a cup of coffee?
Yes, Yes,
That was one of my English lessons
in secondary school,
Do you want a cup of coffee?
Do you want a glass of milk?,
Do you want a glass of water?
English lesson one!
Let me ask about you,,,personally,
I mean, travelling with you
for the last couple of days,
I've seen a man
who's clearly deeply committed
to what you want for the Venezuelan people,
Could you describe where that came from?,
I was born in a very poor home,
a peasant home, so I experienced poverty,
I was a poor child, barefoot,
My father was a teacher
at a rural school, and my mother too,
I had a beautiful grandmother,
She was Indian, She filled me with love,
My grandmother taught me a lot,
and I learned from her
about solidarity with other people,
about sharing the bread
even when there's little to eat,
Later, I went into the army,
the military academy, and I became a soldier,
And there I found out about Bolivar
and started to realise what the truth was,
Simon Bolivar
is venerated in Latin America
as the liberator
from Spanish colonialism
Bolivar believed that freedom only came
when people united against all invaders
no matter their disguise
Today the people of Latin America
are again rising up
against an empire
built on an extreme form of capitalism
known as the Washington Consensus
Whole countries have been privatized
put up for sale
their natural wealth sold
too foreign companies. for peanuts
In Venezuela they said "No more"
This is La Vega
a barrio of a million people
(Speaking Spanish)
Mariela Machadoo
has lived here most of her life
(Speaking Spanish)
She knows what it's like
too be excluded in her own country
I can give you a very specific example
on the maps,
All these hills and houses did not figure -
they were shown as green spaces,
That was before Chavez's government,
Before Chavez,
we did not feel a part of this society,
This is called a mission
It's a kind of parallel government
designed too bypass
the old bureaucracy
and deliver real benefits
too ordinary people
This is raw democracy -
a triumph of the grass roots
Today they're discussing the dream
of owning their own homes for the first time
We don't want the deeds
just for their own sake,
More important
than the deeds themselves
is that we own the property
in order to develop our cities,
and obtain the rights
that have been denied us for so long,
This is the most important thing,
This is not a matter of getting the deeds
and saying, "I'm sorted now, I can go,"
and stop coming
to the parish assemblies,
because after the deeds,
there are better things to come,
Like the development of our barrios,
Soon after Chavez was elected in 1 999
Venezuelans voted on a constitution
and this little blue book
has become a bestseller ever since
This is one of a chain of supermarkets
set up in the barrios
funded by the proceeds of oil
Here prices are kept low
and on the back of every rice
and soap powder packet
are printed people 's rights
under the constitution
Does it really mean something to you
to see it there?
Of course, because I didn't know
we had rights like everyone else,
but this one, article 23,
tells us about national politics,
and this makes us feel included,
Democracy, as I said recently,
before our people,
as Lincoln said, has a simple definition -
the difficulty is making it a reality,
We are making it a reality -
government of the people,
by the people and for the people,
A society where people are included
and equal, where there is no exclusion,
there is no poverty,
where human values reign,
For some of his supporters
Chavez has not gone far enough
Familiar obstacles remain from the past -
a stifling bureaucracy
and widespread corruption
And although poverty has fallen dramatically
in recent years, it's far from eradicated
When you drive in
from the airport at Caracas,
the one thing that shocks a first-time visitor
are the barrios,
the numbers of poor people,
Why is it, in Venezuela, which earns
so many billions of dollars in oil money,
that there still is this poverty,
in spite of all the changes you've made?
The poor of Venezuela
carry on being poor, yes,
I always say that we don't want to be rich,
Our aim is not material wealth,
It is to live with dignity,
of course to come out of poverty,
and to come out of extreme poverty
above all,
And to live, to live with dignity,
this is the objective,
Not to become millionaires,
the American way of life, No, that is stupid,
I'm telling you this because the issue of poverty
affects us deeply,
It's most of our daily struggle,
The daily struggle is made easier here
Ten years ago
this clinic would not have been dreamed of
Now, all over Venezuela
ordinary people have free health care -
many seeing a doctor
for the first time in their lives
(Speaking Spanish)
For the first time, children of the poorest
have a full day at school
and at least one hot meal a day
They're learning history and music and dance
often for the first time, and all of this is free
Under the constitution the poorest housewives
are now paid as workers
(Speaking Spanish)
There is now close too full literacy
thanks too classes like this
catering too those like Mavis Mendez, aged 95
now reading and writing for the first time
This means an enormous amount to us,
The only thing I wish is that I was younger
so that I could keep learning more,
We never had a government
that looked after the poor before,
or taught us to read and write,
There was none of that before,
I think its never too late to better yourself,
(Barks)
This is East Caracas, home too some of
the wealthiest people on earth
and what they call here the middle class
I dropped in on John Vink
who agreed too show me around
his grand house
Wow, this is such a striking house,
- Thank you,
- My goodness,
- Thank you,
- Yes,
You've been here long, have you?
This is the family home?
My family home, We grew up here,
John Vink has travelled the world
collecting objects d'art
Have you collected all the silverware?
- The chandelier, is that,,,
- Yes, That one I brought from Spain,
Wow,
This is a collection of Delft Blue,
I have them over there so they don't break.
This is from Peru, this silver,
Mm,
- But you're thinking of leaving,
- Yes,
Why is that?
Well, the situation of the country,
It's getting day by day worse, so, um.,,
- In what way?
- In a political way,
We thought that this gentleman
that's now in power,
that he would change the whole situation,
- because it was a mess,
- Yeah,
But now it's a whole mess,
John Vink's view is echoed
by Venezuela's powerful media
Mostly privately owned, it combines banality
with hard-line anti-Chavez politics
Coming up, more dangers
in the latest official decisions,
Venezuela is moving towards
a very similar regime
to that which prevails in Cuba,
For the government, what 21st-century socialism
means is simple -
the total control of society by the state,
A number of journalists now say,
"Well, there is censorship,"
they have been censored,
How can that be?
They speak. out every morning,
They have their shows every day,
They speak. out constantly
against the government every day,
How can they say this?
I don't know if you have seen
the programs that they have,
Anybody that comes to Venezuela
and spends two days looking at these channels,
knows there is no censorship in Venezuela,
You just have to sit down
and see those opinion programs
between six and eight in the morning,
Hugo is evolving from a fascist to a Nazi,
What's the difference
between a Nazi and a fascist?
Basically, Nazis murder people,
I don't think in any part of the world
you hear the things that they say
about President Chavez, about his cabinet,
his ministers, the governors, the policies,
It's even obscene in some ways,
It seems to me
that everything, including the weather,
is being blamed on Mr. Chavez,
Nobody blames Mr. Chavez for the weather
because it's the only thing left which still works,
OK?, All the other things fell apart entirely,
We're talking here 1 91 4,
Bolshevik revolution, Russia -
this is what's taking place here,
- If you go out,,,
- Eh,,, Eh,,,
Wait a minute,
Look., we're sitting here in your
wonderful apartment,,,
- Thank you very much,
-,.overlooking Caracas,,,
In Venezuela they say "es su casa",
this is your home,
,,and you're comparing this
with the Bolshevik revolution -
there are no revolutionaries
banging on your door
and none of your companies
have been invaded,
Your good life hasn't really changed,
It hasn't changed, has it?
Yeah, but as I said before
it is now on a wait and see position,
If I had come today on a two-year contract,
as I did in 1 976,
I would fulfill my contract,
pack my luggage and go,
because I don't see any more future,
His critics accuse Chavez
of building another Cuba
of being another Castro
And although he recently announced temporary
presidential powers that bypass parliament
he maintains that his aim
is solely too speed up reform
The irony is that, unlike Cuba
capitalism has never had it better here
At the Caracas motor show
Ferraris and other luxury cars are sold
Smart restaurants and private golf courses
and weekends in Miami are booming
What this class has lost is political power
over a huge oil economy
I think Venezuela,
because it is an oil economy,
its middle and upper classes are very much,,,
biased towards the US
and the American way of life,
In a way, they think they are cosmopolitan,
They don't feel that they are from this country
or that country, they belong to the world,
They belong to this
kind of privileged people of the world,
- Miami?
- Miami, New York, Paris,
We adore Miami,
Miami is our second home,
We discovered Miami, because Miami
formerly was, you know, it was a village,
And we were so rich, you know,
we went to Miami and we bought houses,
apartments, bungalows, boats, cars -
everything we got in Miami,
We were the owners of Miami,
And so we are very US-minded,
In the old Venezuela the United States
played the part of a mafia godfather
The deal was simple -
for supplying endless cheap oil the
Venezuelan rich kept a large slice of the profits
The election of Hugo Chavez
ended the deal
Obviously Venezuela is important
because they're
the third-largest supplier of petroleum.
I would say that Mr. Chavez,
and the State Department may say this,
probably doesn't have the interests
of the United States at heart,
We have been concerned with some of the
actions of Venezuelan President Chavez
and his understanding of what
a democratic system is all about,
I assure you that we tried to avoid
the clash with the empire, but it was inevitable,
I went to the White House,
I shook hands with Clinton,
Even on the phone, "How are you, Mr. Clinton? "
"How are you Mr. Chavez? "
We were trying to do the impossible,
To have a revolution without crashing
against the empire - it's impossible,
In Washington and Miami
and the country clubs of Caracas
getting rid of Chavez became an obsession
In early 2002, secret plans were laid
by the Venezuelan opposition
with the media leading the attack
Do you think the president is mad?
It's time for all of us
to start discussing the transition
without Chavez, needless to say,
Anti-Chavez protesters took too the streets
their anger inflamed by the media
There has never been someone
so ugly and bad as this,
Hugo Satan Chavez is the Antichrist,
Is the demon, the devil, the dragon, Lucifer,
He should leave immediately,
The campaign too overthrow Chavez
came to a head on April 1 1th 2002,
An anti-Chavez protest march
was called in the centre of Caracas
Out! Out!
Chavez, the die has been cast,
What they didn't know
was that there were two marches that day -
the other one was led by Chavez supporters
outside the presidential palace
known as Mirafloores
The two rallies were supposed to be kept apart
but then an extraordinary series of events
unfolded
Without warning the opposition marchers
were redirected to the presidential palace
by one of the organizers
He announced that the march would be
diverting towards the Miraflores Palace,
People tried to stoop the march
from changing course
but the organizer was having none of it
He responded "I'm in charge here,
so you can mind your own business,"
"This has already been planned
and we are going to Miraflores,"
The opposition marchers were suddenly herded
towards government supporters
As they approached the palace
shoots rang out
(Gunfire)
They were being fired upon by snipers
who shoot them one by one
many with a bullet to the head
Soon afterwards these pictures
began appearing on anti-government TV
blaming the shooting on Chavez supporters
on a city bridge
They kept shooting -
aiming and unloading
their automatic weapons,
This will go down in history,
Thank God there's this evidence,
They're shooting at the people
marching below,
This is an unspeakable act of savagery,
Is this what they call revolution?
However, as this camera angle reveals -
there were no opposition marchers
on the street below the bridge
What the TV pictures did not show was this -
the people on the bridge
are clearly trying too protect themselves
crouching down too avoid the bullets
of unknown snipers above them
and anti-Chavez police units below them
The people on the bridge
were actually defending themselves
It was like a war zone
that they had planned and were controlling,
Within hours these military chiefs
appeared on television
They too blamed Chavez
and his supporters for the killings
Venezuelans,
the President of the Republic
has betrayed the trust of his people,
He is massacring innocent people with snipers,
So far,,,
six people have been killed
and dozens wounded in Caracas,
This is intolerable,
We cannot accept a tyrant
in the Republic of Venezuela,
It was all a set-up
The CNN correspondent in Caracas
Otto Neustald, later revealed
that the generals had recorded their statement
before the shooting
On the evening of the 1 0th,
they phoned me and said,,,
"The march will go towards Miraflores Palace,
There will be deaths
"and 20 high-ranking officers will appear
speaking against the Chavez government,
"and demanding the president's resignation,"
This proves that they were talking about deaths
when there hadn't been a single death yet,
It was all planned,
Soon the presidential palace
was surrounded by renegade army officers
Inside, Hugo Chavez was delivered
an ultimatum - resign or be bombed
One of his cabinet ministers broke the news
It is finally clear this is a coup,
The president has refused to resign,
He is being taken prisoner, this is a coup,
Let the world know,
It's a coup,
A coup against the people who love him.
The plotters announced
that Chavez had resigned
He hadn't, He was kidnapped
The following morning
an unelected dictator was sworn in
He was a leading businessman
called Pedro Carmona
(Cheering and applause)
They were all celebrating,
I watched the whole programe
when they were on television,
You can't imagine how much I cried -
as if my children and my mother had died,
and they are what I hold most sacred
in the world,
Just seeing how they said,
"A new dawn has risen in Venezuela,"
In one amazing proclamation
democracy was demolished piece by piece
We suspend the members
of the National Assembly,
(Cheering)
We suspend the president
and all the members of the supreme court,
(Cheering)
And also the Attorney General,,,
(Cheering)
,,and the head of the Central Bank.,,
(Cheering)
,,and the Ombudsman,,,
(Cheering)
,,and the members
of the National Electoral Board,
(Cheering)
(All) Democracy! Democracy!
You can't possibly imagine what that decree
did to us, It was such a terrible situation,
because we saw the past,
the repression coming back.-
the need to struggle for everything,
In the United States the broadcast media
carried the same pictures
and the same story used to justify the coup
The Bush administration made it clear
it is happy with the change in leadership
in the country responsible
for 1 5% of America's oil imports,
Anthony Mason has our report,
(Mason) In the end, this is what triggered
the overthrow of Hugo Chavez,
Armed gangs
loyal to the Venezuelan president,
firing on thousands
of anti-government protesters,
After 1 6 people were killed
and hundreds wounded,
Last night
soldiers surrounded the presidential palace,
At the White House the spokesman
of President Bush rubber-stamped the story
Let me share with you
the administration's thoughts
about what's taking place in Venezuela,
We know the action encouraged by
the Chavez government provoked this crisis,
The Chavez government
suppressed peaceful demonstrations,
fired on unarmed peaceful protesters,
resulting in ten killed and 1 00 wounded,
That is what took place and a transitional
civilian government has been installed,
Back in Venezuela three years of modest
democratic reform had been overturned
Fortunately, we have a great weapon
which is the media,
As you and the people saw today,
neither the army nor the armed forces
fired a single shot,
Our weapon was the media,
The plotters and their friends
had everything to celebrate
or so they thought
The next morning
distraught people began phoning
one of the independent radio stations
still broadcasting
(Woman) My soul aches for my son
and daughter and all the young ones
who will be adrift, at the mercy
of all these corrupt people
who have thrown this country into total chaos,
It's immoral,
(Man) The hope of a people is gone,
The constitution's gone,
Democracy's gone,
The hope of the children is gone,
But hope had not gone
The truth began to emerge
that the resignation of Hugo Chavez
had been faked
His wife Maria confirmed this
in a call to the radio station
He told me, "Let a handwriting expert
check that alleged signature -
"if it exists, because I never signed,"
And the people in the barrios
started to fight back.
Down from the shanties they came
too rescue their president
# The farther you take my rights away
#The faster l will run
(Chanting) Chavez, Chavez, Chavez,
# You can't deny me
# You can decide to turn your face away,,,
This is a dictatorship,
Chavez is the rightful president,
The people love him
and they will defend him.
# No matter,
cos there's something inside so strong
#I know that l can make it
# Though you're doing me wrong, so wrong
# You thought that my pride was gone
Oh, no!
#Theres something inside so strong...#
(Cheering)
Hundreds of thousands surrounded the palace
demanding the return of Chavez
Faced by such people power
the army turned
have re-sworn their pledge of allegiance
to the constitution
and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela,
(Cheering)
Roared on by huge crowds
the presidential guard, whod gone into hiding
retook the palace
and the plotters fled
The young men, the military police who were
inside the palace, started to hoist the flag,
That made us feel stronger
as we realized that we were not alone,
We stayed there until we saw a helicopter -
it arrived in Miraflores at midnight,
Then we all knew Chavez was on board,
It was a glorious moment, seeing him arrive,
Just 48 hours after being kidnapped
Chavez was back in power
I think the supreme test
was the coup dtat of 2002,
I was made a prisoner, They took me away
and I thought I was going to die,
Now, the Venezuelan people,
the poor without weapons, went in,
Hundreds and thousands went onto the street
to ask for my life,
asking for Chavez to return,
And so, I have nothing left to do,
especially after that,
but dedicate all the life I have left
to those people,
and above all the most deprived,
the poorest,
As ordinary Venezuelans celebrated
the defense of their democracy
some of the leading plotters fled too Miami
and within days it was clear that Washington
had cast its shadow over the failed coup
The Bush administration had gone along
with the lies of the plotters
We know the action encouraged by
the Chavez government provoked this crisis,
As these CIA documents show
it was fully warned
and knew all about their conspiracy
Washington claims
that it warned Chavez about the coup
This is denied
by the Venezuelan government
Washington not only knew what was going on
it was backing and funding the coup indirectly
Documents recently released
show that the Bush administration
channeled millions of dollars
too the Venezuelan opposition
in the months leading up too the coup
The money was handed out
by its principal aid agency USAID
and an organization called
the National Endowment For Democracy
During the six-month period
prior to the coup in April 2002,
the US government invested more than
$2 million into financing these organisations
that they knew, at least six months before,
were planning to overthrow the government,
You're essentially saying
post hoc ergo propter hoc.
- Because,,,
- What was that again?
- Post hoc ergo propter hoc.
- I don't think our viewers will understand that,
Because,,, Just because it happened
after we provided support to these groups
doesn't mean it happened
because we supported these groups,
Of course,
- It is a logical fallacy,
- Right,
We,,, We would be very open and transparent
about what kind of support we provided
through the National Endowment
For Democracy and other institutions,
In fact
the National Endowment For Democracy
handed out money too groups
whose leaders were given cabinet positions
in the short-lived illegal regime
An official in Washington explained
that this was merely
"Part of President Bush's freedom agenda"
But I wanna just be very explicit about this
because there is,,, I think its very important,
in the interest of fairness,
to understand that the United States
did not support that coup,
President Bush
has promised to rid the world of evil
and to lead the great mission
to build free societies on every continent,
To understand such an epic lie
is to understand history -
hidden history, suppressed history,
history that explains why we in the West
know a lot about the crimes of others,
but almost nothing about our own,
The missing word is empire,
The existence of an American empire
is rarely acknowledged,
or it's smothered in displays of jingoism
that celebrate war
and an arrogance that says
no country has a right to go its own way,
unless that way coincides
with the interests of the United States,
For empires have nothing to do with freedom,
They're vicious, they're about conquest
and theft and control and secrets,
Since 1 945, the United States
has attempted to overthrow 50 governments,
many of them democracies,
In the process, 30 countries
have been attacked and bombed,
causing the loss of countless lives,
In my lifetime the following countries
in Latin America
have been assaulted by the United States
directly and indirectly
their governments replaced by dictators
and other pro-Washington leaders
One of the first too be attacked was Guatemala
one of the small countries of Central America
known dismissively as banana republics
(# Light orchestral theme)
(Male narrator) This is Guatemala City
as seen from the air,
People who live in the city dress very much like
the people in our own southern states,
There are many churches,
and people go to church regularly,
They speak. Spanish, of course,
as most of them are of Spanish descent,
In fact, most of the people of Guatemala
are not of Spanish descent -
they're indigenous Mayan people
and very poor
In the 1 950s
two per cent of the population of Guatemala
controlled the natural wealth
in collusion with giant US corporations
Like the United Fruit Company
which dominated banana growing
On the board of United Fruit
was John Foster Dulles
who happened to be US Secretary of State
His brother Alan happened too run the CIA
Booth were Christian fundamentalists
who regarded any opposition
as the work of communism and the devil
In 1 950, this man, Jacobo Arbenz
became the first Guatemalan leader
too be democratically elected
by a majority of his people
who saw in him the hope of social justice
He was the Hugo Chavez of his day
What was going on in Guatemala
is that there was a democratically elected
president in 1 950, Jacobo Arbenz,
who sought to institute a series
of New Deal style reforms
in which the state had a greater role
in both developing the economy
and redistributing wealth,
The centerpiece of that was a land reform,
Arbenz was far from radical
His land reform policies were modest
But Washington was having none of it
Howard Hunt was then working
for Alan Dulles's CIA
So they said, "A decision has been made
at the highest levels of our government
"to rid Guatemala of the Arbenz regime,
"and we would like you to participate in it,
"You'll be the chief of propaganda
and political action,"
In Guatemala, what the CIA did
was mobilize every facet of American power,
It didn't just isolate Guatemala militarily
and diplomatically,
but it used the techniques of social psychology
in a nearly year-long campaign
which created a sense of crisis in Guatemala,
What we wanted to do
was have a terror campaign,
uh, to terrify Arbenz particularly,
terrify his troops,
much as the German Stuka bombers
terrified the populations
of Holland, Belgium and Poland
at the onset of World War Two,
And that's what they did
so that the United States could control
the economy of Guatemala
destroying the dreams of its people
We sowed confusion through the countryside
and of course by this time
we had aircraft flying over dropping leaflets
and doing a little,,,harmless bombing,
A little harmless bombing and a CIA
terror campaign cost thousands of lives
Arbenz the democrat
now branded a communist
was humiliated, stripped naked and
photographed before being forced into exile
Richard Nixon
then Vice-President of the United States
flew in too congratulate the new dictators
(Nixon) Guatemala is going to enter a new era
in which there will be
prosperity for the people
together with liberty for the people,
General Rios Montt was too be
one of Washingtons faces of liberty
During his time as president in the 1 980s
thousands of people
were murdered by death squads
most of them indigenous men
women and children
His guns and helicopters
came from the United States
President Reagan flew in
too warmly endorse the general
whom he described
as a man of great personal integrity
In the CIA, we didn't give a hoot
about democracy,
I mean, it was fine if a government was elected
and would cooperate with us,
but, if it didn't,
then democracy didn't mean a thing to us,
and I don't think it means a thing today,
The crushing of Guatemala
was Washingtons blueprint
Four years later
Cuba, just 90 miles from Florida
threw down the first direct challenge
ending Cuba's humiliation
as a North American colony -
a playpen for drug barons and the mafia
They now know that the Cuban revolution
knows how to fight and win battles,
Washington would never forgive Fidel Castro
Under the government aegis we had the,,,
,,taskforces
that were striking at Cuba constantly,
We were attempting to blow up power plants,
we were attempting to ruin sugar mills,
we were attempting to do all kinds of things
during this period,
This was a matter of American
government policy, This wasn't the CIA..
Cuba's achievements in health care
and education are widely respected
However, for not bowing
too the greatest power on earth
the Cuban revolution has paid a high price -
a 45-year economic war
waged by the United States
and the loss of vital democratic freedoms
How dare you, 90 miles from my country,
Last 45 years
with a different form of government,
How dare you haven't allowed
American corporations to buy you out,
How dare you continue this arrogance
that says you will never succumb to us,
Don't you know who we are?
Don't you know who these corporations are?
Don't you know your life would be better
if you could drink. Coca-Cola every day?
What justified the attacks on Cuba
and other Latin American countries
was the so-called red menace
(Male narrator) We all know
the atomic bomb is very dangerous,
Since it may be used against us,
we must get ready for it,
First, you duck and then you cover,
And very tightly you cover
the back of your neck and your face,
Propaganda like this
excused every American invasion
every toppling of a government
every assassination
every act of terrorism
The real threat was an orchestrated paranoia
in the United States
that became a super cult
called anti-communism
The true goal of the United States government
is control,
They feel that if the United States did not control
the governments of Latin America,
then somebody else would,
and the principle of government by the people,
for the people, of the people,
that is, uh, just,,, that's just silly,
This is Santiago the capital of Chile
In 1 973, the National Stadium
was turned into a concentration camp
as a military coup
backed by the United States
overthrew the democratically elected
government of Salvador Allende
The leader of the coup was a fascist
General Augusto Pinochet
who rounded up Allende's supporters
and brought them here
A young medical student, Roberto Navarrete
was one of them
These changing rooms were used as what
when you were imprisoned here?
They were used as places where people
were kept inside here, 50 or more,
You can see that there was actually
no room to move around here,
Even all these places
were full of people sleeping here
and there were no blankets or anything,
Even some people actually slept here,
There was very little room.
When they started to torture you all,,,
- Yeah,
-,what did they do to you then?
The techniques they used
were beating you,
especially in sort of places
where it could become very painful,
with a rubber truncheon,
Especially the genitals
and the soles of the feet,
and, you know,
the arms and various places,
Over 2,00000peoople were confined here
many of them never too be seen again
Victor Jara was Chile's greatest balladeer
His songs had celebrated
the popular democracy
of the government of Salvador Allende
He was taken to the stadium, where he was
a source of strength for his fellow prisoners
singing for them until soldiers beat him
too the ground and smashed his hands
In his last poem smuggled out of the stadium
he wrote.
"What horror the face of fascism creates
"They carry out their plans
with knife-like precision
"For them, blood equals medals
"How hard it is too sing
"When I must sing of horror
"ln which silence and screams
"Are the end of my song"
After two days they killed him
How old were you?
I was 1 8,
- 1 8?
- Yeah,
The fear that you experienced then,
is that something that imprints itself
on the rest of your life?
Yes, but we felt it was part of,,,
what we were trying to build in this country,
What they were trying to build
was a just, equitable democracy
that took control of Chile's economy
from the United States and its proxies
For the invisible people of Latin America
Chile under Allende became an inspiration
In Washington, President Nixon
secretly plotted too destroy the Chilean economy
"We're gonna make the economy scream"
said Nixon
(Bang)
In Santiago
General Pinochet, America's man
sent in his British-made bombers
against the presidential palace
It was September 1 1th, 1 973-
a date that held an infamy and irony
(Bang)
My wife and our children were at the house
and they had a marvelous view
of these planes winging over
and then dipping down
and sending their bombs into the Moneda,
From inside the palace
Allende refused to leave -
true to his promise
not too surrender the government
for which the ordinary people of Chile
had voted
He broadcast this last message
then he shoot himself
With General Pinochet in power
Washington again denied
it had destroyed another democracy
We had no contact with any of the people
that carried out the military coup
and therefore the coup
that overthrew Allende was done,,,
uh, without conduct,,, contact
with the United States,
A very different story is told
by these secret documents
In October 1 970,
the CIA cabled its man in Chile
"it is firm and continuing policy
that Allende be overthrown by a coup"
When that happened three years later
a US official cabled back to Washington
"Chile's coup dtat was close to perfect"
Fascism is a word that's often misused,,,
but you've experienced it, the real thing,
Yeah, I think so,
When,,, When did you realize
that you were,,,ensnarled by fascism?
When did it manifest itself?
I think it was evident from the very beginning,
Just the ferocity,
the sheer brute force that they used,
The disregard for any kind of human dignity,
I mean, their aim
was really to make you into a thing,
I think., in order to protect themselves
because if they made you into a thing,
then they didn't have to have
human feelings towards you,
They dehumanized you,
from the very beginning,
Once again, a Latin American elite
was delighted to be rescued by fascism
A country has to be well set,
has to be well run, well worked,
and see that everyone does the work.
cos if they don't,
then that country goes to the dogs,
This is the one man
that's been able to hold them.
I don't believe there's any torturing done
in this country,
Because, you understand one thing,
why torture somebody
when you can shoot them?,
This is where they tortured and killed them
Villa Grimaldi was once a palatial home
in a suburb of Santiago
Under Pinochet, it became a place of horror
Today, it's a memorial to its many victims
Sara De Witt then a student activist
was a survivor
What was the date that you were arrested?
Do you remember?
Oh, yes, I was picked up on 3rd April, 1 975,
seven oclock.,. on the dot,
(Pilger) So, the junta had been in power
for about 1 8months?
Yes,
So when I realize, you know,
someone had put what
I imagine was a gun in my back and saying,,,
and said to me, "Don't make any noise,
don't try to run, because we will shoot you,
"You are coming with us,"
In a strange wooden tower like this
in spaces the size of a dogs kennel
people were tortured to death
(De Witt) They took me to this room, you know,
they were punching me, hitting me,
grabbing my nipples,
telling me that I was a whore,
So, they asked me to take off my clothes
and they tied,,,they tied me up,
And then they started giving me electricity,
Now, the electricity was all the time
inside my vagina, in my breasts,
and then it was going round, you know,
round my body, my legs, my arms,
And when they did that, they would stop,
asking me questions, you know,
and then touching me everywhere
and shouting, abusing,
And then they would go -
they continue with electricity,
Duane Clarridge was head of the ClA's
Latin American division in the early 1 980s
Chile, the only reason it exists,
is because of Pinochet,
At a huge human price,
What human price? Gimme a break!
The thousands who were disappeared
and murdered,
Thousands? You count 'em,
What thousands?
And don't talk to me
about Truth Commissions,
I've seen their names
in the cemetery in Santiago,
- You're saying they're fakes?
- There aren't thousands,
- Well,,,
- There aren't thousands, sir,
There are thousands, each name documented
by human rights organizations
some of them remembered here
on the memorial wall at Villa Grimaldi
(Pilger) You have a couple of friends there?
(De Witt) Yes, yes,
I have friends,
Mainly people from my training,
I got,,, There is a girl there, Jacqueline Rigi,
Another one Cecilia Larrain,
She was pregnant, Cecilia,
three months pregnant, when they took her,
They took another woman, Elizabeth Recas
who was seven months pregnant,
She went missing as well,
Doesn't bear thinking about, does it?
No, because, erm.,, sometimes, you know,
I think about,,, what were they feeling,
you know, when they were being killed?
And why, you know, and whether they,,,
Sometimes, I think too much,
and I start feeling, you know, like the pain,
What do you feel when you are being killed?
And in such a way that I find it,,,
- Well, I find frightened, really,
- Yeah,
Because you wish, you know, that you
could have done something for them.
Such,,, The isolation, You must feel totally,,,
I don't know, I don't know, What do you think?,
- Alone,
- Very, very much alone,
It was a period in which almost everybody
in the present situation
regards as a dark time,
in which the CIA played a major role,
That's right, They played a major role
in overthrowing whatshisname,
Whatshisname was Salvador Allende,
- Yeah, fine,
- He was democratically elected,
Right, OK
Is that OK to overthrow
a democratically elected government?
It depends
what your national security interests are,
Are you denying that Pinochet
caused huge suffering in that country?
I don't,,, l,,, l,,, Huge, I don't buy,
That he committed crimes, I agree,
- But it's worth it? Is that what you're saying?
- Yes,
- Those crimes are worth it?
- Yeah,
Sometimes, unfortunately, things have to be
changed in a rather ugly way,
By the late '70s, most of Latin America
was controlled by dictators
including those, like Pinochet
who are openly fascist
All of them were backed directly and indirectly
by the United States
They sent their henchmen too be trained here
at the School of the Americas in Georgia
Officially, it was described
as little more than a boy scout camp
teaching American values
such as respect for human rights
In fact, from these manuals were taught
interrogation and torture techniques
Major Joseph Blair taught at the School
of the Americas in the early 1 980s
The doctrine that was taught
was that if you want information,
you use physical abuse,
you use false imprisonment,
you use threats to family members,
you use virtually any method necessary
to get what you want,
- Torture?
- And killing,
- Killing?
- Killing,
If there's someone you don't want,
you kill them.
If you can't get the information you want,
if you can't get that person to shut up
or stop what they're doing,
you simply assassinate 'em,
and you assassinate 'em
with one of your death squads,
(Rapid gunfire)
This is a death squad in action
in El Salvador
Actually, it's the national police
many of whom were trained
at the School of the Americas
Here on the steps of San Salvador cathedral
they're gunning down mourners attending
the funeral of Archbishop Romero
who was murdered as he said Mass
on March 23rd, 1 980,
This man, Robert D'Aubuisson
gave the order to kill the archbishop
Major DAubuisson
was Washingtons dirty secret in El Salvador
He was trained
at the School of the Americas
According to the Truth Commission,,,
- Oh, please!
-,,and a whole swathe of,,,
Come on, John! If this is where we're going,
you're wasting my time,
That's all bullshit,
Those people all had agendas,
So, it was bullshit that the Salvadorian military
were murdering tens of thousands of people,,,
No, I bet you can't count more than 200
in the whole ten or twelve years,
We can count 200 in this one village alone
They were mostly women and children
systematically murdered
in just one day and night in December 1 981
in the village of El Mozote
The killers belonged to a special battalion
of the El Salvador army
trained by the United States
There were few survivors
(Woman) I saw the women
clinging to each other,
crying and screaming at them not to kill them.
I fought for my children,
I didn't want to let them go,
I said I would die with them,
but they wrenched them from my arms,
We heard them killing the children,
They killed them at night,
You could hear their screams
for their mothers and fathers,
You're taking the stuff from these
propaganda mills, and I'm not interested,,,
What are the propaganda mills?
All this Truth thing and all of that -
they're nothing but propaganda mills,
- Do you really think..,,
- I know so, You,,,
Are they all conning us, lying to us -
Amnesty international?
Amnesty internationals right in the middle of it,
During the 1 980s
the years of Ronald Reagan in the White House
a trail of carnage and grief
was blazed across Central America
I reported America's war against Nicaragua
which had the temerity to overthrow
a Washington-backed dictator, Somoza
The CIA attacked Nicaragua
with death squads known as the Contra
Why did Washington attack
such tiny countries?
Because the weaker they are
the greater the threat
People who can free themselves
against all the odds
are sure to inspire others
What right have you,
and I mean you, the CIA, the United States
government or any foreign power,
what right do you have
to do what you do in other countries?
National security interests,
But that's a divine right, isn't it?
Because the people that you do it to
have no say,
Well, that's just tough,
We're gonna protect ourselves
and we're gonna go on protecting ourselves,
cos we end up protecting all of you,
and let's not forget that,
Right, Right, no, I won't,
We'll intervene whenever we decide it's in
our national security interests to intervene,
and if you don't like it, lump it,
Get used to it, world -
we're not gonna put up with nonsense,
If our interests are threatened,
we're gonna do it,
In Guatemala the United Nations described
the Washington-backed campaign
against the Mayan people as genocide
An American Roman-Catholic nun
Sister Dianna Ortiz
experienced this at first hand
as a missionary
In 1 989, after speaking out about the
brutal treatment of the indigenous people
she was kidnapped
In,,,1 989, November 2nd,
I,,,
OK.
I was,,,
,,abducted and,,,
,,l was put in a police car,,,
,,blindfolded and taken to a military installation
in Guatemala City
known as the Politecnica,
which still exists today,
I was,,,
,,taken to a basement, and,,,
I still remember to this day,,,
,,upon entering the building,
the clandestine prison,,,
,,hearing the screams
of people being tortured,
Can we stop?
For 24 hours, she was tortured
and gang-raped
During her ordeal
she identified the leader of the gang
as a fellow citizen of the United States
I came out a totally, um.,,
,,different person,,,
,,but also with new eyes,,,
and,,,more attuned to the hurting,
the brokenness,
the oppression, the deceit
of my government,
I've heard people say that what happened
in Abu Ghraib is an isolated incident,
and I have to just shake my head and say,
"Are we on the same planet? "
You know, "Aren't you aware of our history? "
You know, "isnt history taught in the classroom,
"about the role of the US government
in human rights violations? "
By the late 1 980s
Washingtons policy changed
Dictators like Pinochet are seen as
an unnecessary embarrassment
A new and innovative way
of controlling nations was launched
Good morning and welcome,
It's good to have you all here to help celebrate
the launching of a programe
with a vision and a noble purpose,
The National Endowment For Democracy is,
just as we've been told, more than bipartisan,
The establishment of the national endowment
goes right to the heart of America's faith
in democratic ideals and institutions,
It offers hope to people everywhere,
Like any new brand, it had a snappy name -
democracy
It was largely fake
an illusion of marketing and spin
This brand of democracy meant
that whoever you voted for
the policies would be broadly the same
and your countrys economy would be in step
with the United States
Washington would be your closest friend.
or else
In the 1 990s these democracies in name
replaced dictatorships in Latin America
with Chile providing the model
This is the commercial centre
of Santiago, Chile
On the surface today
everything seems normal, modern prosperous
Too the Bush administration
Chile is the very model of economic success
"a laboratory experiment"
according to the magazine Business Week.
Much of life has been privatized
There are now billionaires
and the rich are getting richer
Pinochet fixed the country,
- Who says?
- He,,, Oh!
- The United States says?
- No!
The World Bank says,
The lnter-American bank says,
Everybody says it,
He brought about an economic miracle
in Chile,
I'm not saying he had the brains for it,
but he had the brains to hire all these people,
Chileans, who had studied
at the University of Chicago,
who knew something about real economics,
Real economics
were advocated by Milton Friedman
an extreme right-wing economist
at the University of Chicago
Friedman was invited too perform
his "laboratory experiment"
on the economic life of Chile
The families of the tortured and disappeared
were silent witnesses
Without irony, he called his experiment
"shock treatment"
Please be seated,
Thank you all very much, It's, uh,,,
an honor for me to be here to, um.,,
pay tribute to a hero of freedom -
Milton Friedman,
He has used a brilliant mind
to advance a moral vision,
We have seen Milton Friedman's ideas
at work in Chile,
where a group of economists called the
Chicago Boys brought inflation under control
and laid the groundwork
for economic success,
This is the other side
of the economic miracle
Chile today is a deeply unequal society
This shanty town
is just minutes from Santiagos smart hotels
There are so many unemployed,
There are thousands of unemployed,
And those who work,
their money isn't enough,
So how can they pay for electricity?
How can they pay for water?
They have to buy gas -
everything must be paid for,
Every day a mother asks,
"How am l going to feed the children? "
How can I afford it?
We found this couple
living and freezing in the shanty town
They're homeless
and have a week-old baby
(Woman) What's it like
to live in these conditions?
The cold at night is hardest for the baby,
Do many people live like this in Chile?
There are plenty, and worse off than we are,
They don't get any help from anyone,
Where will you go?
Back to the streets,
We've slept rough before,
Abroad, in Europe and the USA, it's said that
life in Chile is rich and comfortable - is that so?
It's true for the well off, but not for us,
Chile is a democracy now, in theory
A complicated voting system splits the vote
and discourages real reform
It's a product of General Pinochet
based on a constitution
that's also a product of Pinochet
The general may be dead
but the power of the military remains
It's all very modern the media is safe
and many believe it's wise to be silent
Like the graves of their forgotten compatriots
It's Washingtons ideal democracy
The dictatorship was a great success in Chile
in that it established
the political, economic and social model
that prevails to this day,
Basically, the constitution imposed in 1 980
has not been changed,
We don't belong to a democracy
because that word has been so badly used,
It's not understood,
Here there is a persecution against the poor,
and not just in Chile,
but this is happening all over Latin America,
I think. educated people realize
that this is reaching a breaking point,
I believe the people will wake up
and say, "That's enough,"
This is Bolivia
another laboratory experiment
The majority of the population of this spectacular
brutalized country high in the Andes
have also been invisible until recently
The indigenous people
the Aymara and Quechua
carry memories of a culture
and civilization and wealth
Iong before the Spanish arrived
They remember how a single hill of silver
underwrote the entire Spanish empire
while they became the poorest
This is the National Congress of Bolivia,
Until recently,
the faces here were almost all white,
the descendants of a tiny Spanish elite
which plundered the nation's riches
and reduced the indigenous majority
to serfdom.
It was a pattern of control
repeated all over Latin America,
The pattern has been broken in Bolivia
with the rise of social justice movements
of a kind never seen before,
and whose democratic home
is not Westminster or Washington,
or any other so-called model,
but in the streets, the minds,
the barrios, the fields,
Governments that defy this popular power,
this true democracy,
do so at their own peril,
This is El Alto the highest city on earth
and perhaps the poorest
The occupants of this cemetery
on the roof of the world are mainly children
Protected they say
by the sacred mountain, Illimani
El Alto overlooks Bolivia 's capital La Paz
Juan Delfin, a priest and a taxi driver
has lived here for most of his life
This is Villa lngenio,
It's the cemetery of northern El Alto,
There is a sorrowful bitterness here,
Our brothers, our children,
our grandparents
are dead and buried here,
There was one family
that poisoned themselves,
the whole family,
because of lack of work and lack of money,
First the husband poisoned his wife
and children, and then he poisoned himself,
We have seen cases like this,
(Car horns)
When I first came too Bolivia in the 1 960s
El Alto barely existed
The million people living here
are peasants run off their land
and miners made redundant by policies
similar to those imposed in Chile
Infrastructure that didn't make a quick buck
was privatized
The message was clear -
sell it, strip it or scrap it
The indigenous people were scrapped
(Juan Delfin) We wonder why,
If I am Bolivian, born rich,
why am l begging?
We had the sea, silver and gold,
We had everything, Why are we still suffering?
And yet the people here have held together
their sense of identity their community
(Singing)
In the year 200000, the people
of Bolivias second city Cochabamba
fought an epic struggle to win back
their most basic resource, water
from a foreign consortium dominated
by the American corporation Bechtel
and they won
Three years later, in 20003,
Bolivia 's power brokers
were about to get another shock.
This is Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada
Known as Goni
he was brought up in Washington
His English is better than his Spanish
They knew him here as El Gringo
I saw him as a fat man
sitting on a golden chair,
Arrogant,
Perhaps he was arrogant because of
the power he had, which was his wealth,
When Goni was elected president of Bolivia
in 20003,
he backed a law that amounted too
a fire sale of the countrys resources
Almost everything was up for grabs
including Latin America's
second-biggest gas reserves
We know we have gas
and it's being sold abroad to the almighty US,
yet still I use wood for cooking,
This is why the war starts,
We will block, strike and demonstrate
until we get a response,
The people of El Alto fought back.
blocking the roads leading into La Paz
(Atencio) There were calls to start blockades,
Not even a fly would move,
We stopped traffic and so on, but it gradually,,,
What's the word?
It gradually intensified,
Gooni's response
was the traditional Latin American way
He sent in the army too crush dissent
(Shouting)
(Screaming)
Scores were shoot dead
(Gunfire)
Many were brought too Juan Delfin's church
The tables were here,
The bodies were here,
They removed the bullets with nails even,
It was sad to see this,
The place was full, There were doctors
everywhere, The smell of death was intense,
All the orphans were crying and shouting,
"Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!
Tens of thousands of people
poured down into La Paz
Like the people of Venezuela's barrios
demanding the return of their president
they demanded their country back.
If the rich and powerful of Latin America
had a nightmare
this was it
Suddenly we heard
that Goni was about to resign,
With one down, we felt inspired,
It gave us strength,
That was the aim. To make him resign,
Goni fled to the United States
and is today living in a smart suburb
of Washington
In October 20004
the Bolivian Congress ordered his arrest
on charges of bloody massacre
George Bush has said
"Governments that harbour terrorists
"are as guilty as they are"
(Speaking Spanish)
This extraordinary mural
was painted by Juan Delfin
It's a cry of freedom
from an entire continent
They killed us all, but we defend
the Aymara people with the pututo horn,
with our voice, with our fist, with the flag,
We wave the Whipala
against the United States,
This is the United States flag,
We are against this,
because they have put us
in the situation we are in,
The fist is very important,
That's how we are,
That's us,
In 20005 the people of Bolivia
took an historic step
For the first time ever, an indigenous person
was voted president in a landslide
Like Chavez in Venezuela
Evo Morales offered
a new democracy and a new beginning
We ask. everyone to start working,
The party is over,
The honeymoon is over,
And it's over forever, for a new Bolivia!
There is no doubt that it is growing,
It is propagating itself,
over the whole continent of Latin America,
of the Caribbean too,
but mainly in South America,
I go around Latin America
and to Montevideo, La Paz,
There is a fervor sparking off everywhere,
There is a fervor,
In Latin America there's now a host of leaders
offering new beginnings
Of course, history is crowded with heroes
who offer new beginnings
The respectability of great power and its games
and deals and plunder always beckon
If these new leaders succumb their biggest
threat may not be from Washington
but from the people on the hillsides
# I was born by the river
#In a little tent
#Oh, and just like the river
#I been running ever since
#Its been along
#A long time coming
# But I know a change gonna come
#Oh, yes, it will
#It's been too hard living
#But I'm afraid to die
# Cos I don't know what's up there
# Beyond the sky
#It's been a long
#A long time coming
#But l know
# A change gonna come
#Oh, yes, it will...
The future is for my children,
for our young people,
This isn't just Chavez's struggle,
it's our struggle,
What Chavez has unleashed
is a recognition of this struggle,
and we are in it together
and we'll carry on fighting,
So the empire's struggle isn't with Chavez,
it's with us,
The great awakening has arrived,
And I think Victor Hugo, let's end with him.
I'm with him on this,
Victor Hugo wrote this - "There is nothing
so powerful as an idea whose time has come,"
The American empire has reached its end
and the world must now be governed by
the rule of law, of equality, justice and fraternity,
Muchas gracias, John,
I want to see you again,
What happened here
at the National Stadium in Santiago, Chile,
has a special place in the struggle
for freedom and democracy
throughout Latin America and the world,
The vow is - never again,
And yet it has happened again
at Guantanamo Bay
and all the other secret places
where imperial power,
regardless of its democratic pretensions,
hides and tortures its perceived enemies,
The questions raised in this film are urgent,
Are the lives and dreams
of the ordinary people of Chile,
Like the people of Venezuela,
Like the people of Bolivia,
Like the people of Nicaragua,
Like the people of Vietnam,
and lraq, and lran, and Palestine,
expendable - worth only a few seconds
on the news if they're lucky?
The answer is no,
and those who see the world
through the eyes of the powerful,
should be warned,
People are rising
from the tyranny and oblivion
to which we in the West
have consigned them.
Indeed, their resistance is well under way
as this film has shown,
I would say it never stopped
and is unbeatable,
#I go to the movie
# And I go downtown
# Somebody keep telling me
don't hang around
#Its been a long
#A long time coming
# But I know a change gonna come
#Oh, yes, it will
#Then I go to my brother
# And I say, "Brother, help me, please"
# But he winds up
#Knocking me
# Back. down on my knees
#Ohhh
# There been times that I thought
I couldn't last for long
# But now I think. I'm able to carry on
#Its been a long
#Along time coming
#But l know
# A change gonna come
# Oh, yes, it will #