AnarWiki/markdown/Resistance_to_Pinochet.md

**Resistance to Pinochet** refers to various methods taken out by
leftist guerillas in [Chile](Chile "wikilink") under the[Pinochet
Dictatorship](Pinochet_Dictatorship "wikilink").

## Groups

  - [Revolutionary Left
    Movement](Revolutionary_Left_Movement_\(Chile\) "wikilink") (MIR) -
    Marxist-Leninist guerilla group that evolved out of student activism
    and trade unions in 1967.
  - [Lautaro Youth
    Movement](Lautaro_Youth_Movement_\(Chile\) "wikilink") (MJL) -
    Marxist-Leninist-Maoist guerilla group that was formed by former
    members of the MAPU political party, a small democratic socialist
    political party inspired by Liberation Theology in 1982.
  - [Manuel Rodriguez Patriotic
    Front](Manuel_Rodriguez_Patriotic_Front_\(Chile\) "wikilink") (FPMR)
    - Marxist-Leninist guerilla group that formed as the paramilitary
    wing of the Communist Party of Chile in 1983.

## Notable Actions

On 23 October 1973, 23-year-old Army Corporal Benjamín Alfredo Jaramillo
Ruz, who was serving with the *Cazadores*, became the first fatal
casualty of the counterinsurgency operations in the mountainous area of
Alquihue in Valdivia after being shot by a sniper.<sup>\[38\]</sup> The
Chilean Army suffered 12 killed in various clashes with MIR guerrillas
and GAP fighters in October 1973.<sup>\[39\]</sup> On 18 November 1974,
guerrillas open fire on an army vehicle, killing Corporal Francisco
Cifuentes Espinoza.<sup>\[40\]</sup> On 17 November, MIR guerrillas
shoot and kill army sergeant Waldo Morales Neal and private Clemente
Santibáñez Vargas. On 7 November 1973, guerrillas open fire on an army
truck in the suburb of La Florida in Santiago, killing private Agustín
Correa Contreras. On 13 November, MIR guerrillas killed army corporal
Juan Castro Vega. On 27 November, MIR guerrillas kill army corporal
Ramón Madariaga Valdebenito. On 3 December 1973, MIR guerrillas kill
two army corporals, Rodolfo Peña Tapia and Luis Collao Salas and a
private, Julio Barahona Aranda. On 13 December 1973, guerrillas open
fire and kill two army sergeants, Sergio Cañón Lermanda and Pedro Osorio
Guerrero. On 15 December 1973, guerrillas shoot and kill army corporal
Roberto Barra Martínez in the suburb of La Reina in Santiago. On 26
December 1973, guerrillas open fire on an army jeep, killing private
José Luis Huerta Abarca. By the end of the year, the Chilean police
would claim to have uncovered a huge arms cache, that included 5,000
HK-33 sub-machineguns and corresponding ammunition numbering in the
millions and large quantities of 20-mm anti-tank gun
shells.<sup>\[41\]</sup>

On February 19, 1975, four captured MIR commanders went on national
television to urge their guerrillas to lay down their arms. According to
them, the MIR leadership was in ruins: of the 52 commanders of the MIR,
nine had been killed, 24 were prisoners, ten were in exile, one had been
expelled from the group, and eight were still at large.<sup>\[42\]</sup>
On 18 November 1975, MIR guerrillas killed a 19-year-old army conscript
(Private Hernán Patricio Salinas Calderón).<sup>\[43\]</sup> On 24
February 1976, MIR guerrillas in a gunbattle with Chilean secret police,
shot and killed a 41-year-old carabinero sergeant (Tulio Pereira
Pereira).<sup>\[44\]</sup> The Chilean secret police on this occasion
were met with a hail of automatic weapons fire, killing a carabinero and
a girl.<sup>\[45\]</sup> On 28 April 1976, MIR guerrillas shot and
killed a 29-year-old carabineros corporal (Bernardo Arturo Alcayaga
Cerda) while he was walking home in the Santiago suburb of
Pudahuel.<sup>\[44\]</sup> On 16 October 1977, MIR guerrillas exploded
10 bombs in Santiago. In 1978 the MIR sought to reestablish a guerrilla
front in southern Chile and launched Operation *Return* which involved
clandestine entry, recruitment, bombings and bank robberies in Santiago
that briefly shook the military regime.<sup>\[46\]</sup> In February
1979 MIR guerrillas bombed the US-Chile Cultural Institute in Santiago,
causing considerable damage. In 1979, about 40 bombings were blamed on
MIR guerrillas. Several police, military and civilians caught in the
crossfire and bomb blasts were killed in the renewed MIR attacks in the
Chilean capital and at least 70 soldiers and policemen were wounded
battling the marxist guerrillas.<sup>\[47\]</sup>

In order to reinforce urban guerrilla warfare waged in the main cities,
the MIR commanders in 1978 had set in motion Operación Retorno
(Operation *Return*), ordering exiled militants back into Chile.

In 1980, a platoon of thirty well-equipped MIR combatants of the *Toqui
Lautaro* Battalion infiltrated into the mountains of Neltume in southern
Chile and reestablished a guerrilla front. The MIR spearhead was
commanded by 30-year-old Miguel Cabrera Fernández (nome de guerre
*Paine*), who along with 120-150 Chileans had completed their training
for this operation in Czechoslovakia, Cuba and North
Korea.<sup>\[48\]</sup>

The Chilean Army moved against the guerrillas in Neltume in June 1981,
in a massive operation spearheaded by the Chilean Para-Commandos (elite
Black Berets) all under the command of Colonel Orlando Basauri, with
support from 10 Puma and Lama helicopters. Flora Jaramillo had fed and
attended three MIR guerrillas that had sought refuge in her house, and
not wanting to be later accused of collaborating with the enemy had sent
her 15-year-old son Juan Carlos Henríquez Jaramillo to warn the local
police station. Carabineros soon surrounded her house and opened fire,
killing all the guerrillas and destroying the house, but not before
warning Mrs Jaramillo to get out. The Special Forces involved discovered
the first guerrilla arms cache on 25 June killing Raúl Rodrigo Obregón
Torres (nome de guerre *Pablo*) in the process, and four more store
dumps were uncovered by the end of the first week in July. Another
gun-battle took place on 28 June, but it took some time before Basauri's
men could corner the guerrilla force.<sup>\[49\]</sup> Nevertheless,
seven MIR guerrillas were reported killed in an ambush in the third week
of September, just after the 8th-anniversary of the 1973 military coup,
but the survivors were able to escape and blend in with the local
population. On 19 September 1981, Army Private Victor Manuel Nahuelpan
Silva is killed during operations in Neltume. On 16 October 1981, Juan
Angel Ojeda Aguayo (nom de guerre *Pequeco*) who had escaped the
mountain fighting was caught and executed while resting at his parents’
home. Miguel Cabrera Fernández was himself killed on 15 October 1981, in
a clash with policemen at Choshuenco.

The Pinochet regime launched another counterinsurgency operation in
August 1984 to wipe out the remaining guerrillas, concentrating in the
areas around Concepción, Valdivia and Los Angeles, killing seven more
MIR fighters and forcing the remainder to go into permanent hiding.

Some forty MIR fighters lost their lives between 1978 (when Operation
*Return* was set in motion) and 1984 when the MIR insurgency was finally
defeated in southern Chile. Another 41 supporting Mapuche Indians that
had earlier on taken part in the land and business takeovers under
Salvador Allende were killed with 80 only spared after having been
rounded up in and around Neltume and held for long periods in secret
detention camps.<sup>\[50\]</sup> Guillermina Reinante, had three
brothers rounded up and forcibly disappeared up by soldiers from the 8th
*Tucapel* Infantry Regiment in late 1973. When she enquired about their
whereabouts a female military official informed her that they had been
executed. In the 2012 Chilean TV documentary *Neltume 81* Reinante
claimed that the military had executed her brothers in revenge for
taking part in the land expropriations.

On 15 July 1980, three guerrillas in blue overalls and yellow hardhats
ambushed the car of Lieutenant-Colonel Roger Vergara Campos, director of
the Chilean Army Intelligence School, and killed him and wounded his
driver in a barrage of bullets from AK-47 assault
rifles.<sup>\[51\]</sup> On 30 December 1980, MIR guerrillas kill two
carabineer corporals, 31-year-old Washington Godoy Palma and 27-year-old
Daniel Alberto Leiva González.<sup>\[52\]</sup>

In a message sent to Santiago press agencies in February 1981 the MIR
claimed to have carried out more than 100 attacks during 1980, among
them the bombing of electricity pylons in Santiago and Valparaiso on
November 11 which caused widespread blackouts, and bomb attacks on three
banks in Santiago on December 30 in which one carabinero was killed and
three people wounded.<sup>\[53\]</sup> On 19 September 1981, Army
Private Victor Manuel Nahuelpan Silva is killed during
counter-insurgency operations in the Neltume area.<sup>\[54\]</sup> In
November 1981, MIR guerrillas killed three member of Police
Investigations as they stood in front of the home of the chief minister
of the presidential staff. In sweeps carried out from June to November
1981, security forces destroyed two MIR bases in the mountains of
Neltume, seizing large caches of munitions and killing a number
guerrillas.<sup>\[55\]</sup> MIR guerrillas retaliated and carried out
twenty-six bomb attacks during March and April 1983.<sup>\[27\]</sup>

Leftist guerrillas, waiting in a yellow pick-up truck, ambushed on 30
August 1983 the governor of Santiago, retired Major-General Carol Urzua
Ibáñez as he left his home, killing him and two of his bodyguards (army
corporals Carlos Riveros Bequiarelli and José Domingo Aguayo Franco) in
a hail of submachine-gun fire.<sup>\[56\]</sup> In October and November
1983, MIR guerrillas bombed four US-associated targets. Guerrillas
killed two policemen (carabinieri Francisco Javier Pérez Brito and
sergeant Manuel Jesús Valenzuela Loyola) on 28 December
1983.<sup>\[57\]</sup>

On 31 March 1984, a police bus in downtown Santiago was destroyed with a
bomb, killing a carabinero and injuring at least 11.<sup>\[58\]</sup> On
29 April 1984, MIR guerrillas exploded 11 bombs, derailing a subway
train in Santiago and injuring 22 passengers, including seven
children.<sup>\[59\]</sup> On 5 September 1984, guerrillas shot and
killed 27-year-old army lieutenant Julio Briones Rayo in Copiapó in
northern Chile.<sup>\[60\]</sup> On 2 November 1984, a bus carrying
carabineros was attacked with a grenade during Chile's national cycling
championship; four carabineros were killed.<sup>\[61\]</sup> On 4
November 1984, five guerrillas riding in a van hurled bombs and fired
automatic weapons at a suburban Santiago police station, killing two
carabineros and wounded three more.<sup>\[62\]</sup> On 7 December 1984,
urban guerrillas killed a policeman and bombed a subway station,
wounding 6 people.<sup>\[63\]</sup> On 25 March 1985, MIR guerrillas
planted a bomb in Hotel Araucano in Concepcion that killed marine
sergeant René Osvaldo Lara Arriagada and army sergeant Alejandro del
Carmen Avendaño Sánchez, who were attempting to defuse the bomb. On 6
December 1985, a carabinero (Patricio Rodriguez Núñez) was shot to death
by four guerrillas who opened fire on him with submachine-guns as he
walked home.<sup>\[64\]</sup> That same month, 15 city buses were
destroyed with gasoline bombs and urban guerrillas hurled a bomb under
an incoming train in Santiago, before making good their escape after a
shootout with policemen.<sup>\[65\]</sup> The total number of documented
terrorist actions during 1984 and 1985 was 866.<sup>\[66\]</sup>

On 5 February 1986, a car bomb destroyed a bus filled with riot police,
mutilating 16 policemen. One carabinero (41-year-old Sergeant Luis Rival
Valdés) later died of his wounds.<sup>\[67\]</sup> The MIR claimed
responsibility for the bombing.<sup>\[68\]</sup> On 17 February 1986,
two trains crashed in an area of Limache that had been reduced to one
track after MIR guerrillas had destroyed a nearby
bridge,<sup>\[69\]</sup> killing 100 and wounding 500
civilians.<sup>\[70\]</sup> On 26 February 1986, unidentified guerrillas
or their sympathizers shoot and kill carabineer Lieutenant Alfonso
Mauricio Rivera López.<sup>\[71\]</sup> In May 1986 MIR guerrillas threw
sulphuric acid into a bus, seriously injuring six people, including two
children.<sup>\[72\]</sup> On 25 July 1986, a bomb planted in a trash
can exploded at a crowded bus stop a few yards from the presidential
palace, wounding 36 people.<sup>\[73\]\[74\]</sup> On 6 August 1986,
security forces discovered 80 tons of weapons at the tiny fishing harbor
of Carrizal Bajo, smuggled into the country by the Manuel Rodríguez
Patriotic Front (FPMR). The shipment of Carrizal Bajo included C-4
plastic explosives, 123 RPG-7 and 180 M72 LAW rocket launchers as well
as 3,383 M-16 rifles.<sup>\[75\]</sup> On 7 September 1986, about 30
FPMR guerrillas attempted to kill Pinochet. Pinochet narrowly escaped
the assassination attempt on his motorcade, but five army corporals were
killed and eleven soldiers and carabineros were wounded in the
ambush.<sup>\[76\]</sup> This failed operation led to an internal crisis
of the group, many of its leading members being arrested by the security
forces. On 28 October 1986, MIR guerrillas operating in Limache shot and
wounded five policemen. One carabinero NCO (36-year-old Luis Serey
Abarca) later died of his wounds.<sup>\[77\]</sup> On 5 November 1986,
guerrillas threw an incendiary bomb into a bus in Viña del Mar,
seriously injuring three women (Rosa Rivera Fierro, Sonia Ramírez
Salinas and Marta Sepúlveda Contreras). 37-year-old Rosa Rivera Fierro,
later died of her wounds.<sup>\[78\]</sup> On 28 November 1986, MIR
guerrillas after having been stopped by a police vehicles, shot and
killed 31-year-old carabinero Lieutenant Jaime Luis Sáenz
Neira.<sup>\[79\]</sup>

On 11 September 1987, a police vehicle was completely destroyed in a
bomb attack in Santiago, killing two carabineros. On 20 January 1988, a
bomb planted by MIR guerrillas in the Capredena Medical Center in
Valparaiso killed a 64-year-old female pensioner (Berta Rosa Pardo
Muñoz) and wounded 15 other women.<sup>\[80\]</sup> On January 26, MIR
guerrillas planted a bomb in a house in La Cisterna that killed
42-year-old Major Julio Eladio Benimeli Ruz, commander of the
carabineros special operations group. In June 1988, MIR guerrillas
conducted a series of bombings in Santiago, at various banks. FPMR
guerrillas that month killed 43-year-old Lieutenant-Colonel Miguel
Eduardo Rojas Lobos of the Chilean Army, after he had parked his car in
the Santiago suburb of San Joaquín.<sup>\[81\]</sup> On 19 July 1988,
leftists plant a bomb near a Church in Valparaíso, wounding three local
churchgoers (Juan Salazar Olivares, Nelson Pérez and Luis
Herrera)<sup>\[82\]</sup> In October 1988, several platoons of the
*Frente Patriótico Manuel Rodríguez* take over four important towns
throughout the country, Aguas Grandes, La Mora, Los Queñes and
Pichipellahuén.<sup>\[83\]</sup> Considerable fighting takes place,
before the Chilean military and police are able to recover the
towns.<sup>\[84\]</sup> Corporal Juvenal Sepúlveda Vargas is killed
defending the Police Station in Los Queñes.<sup>\[85\]</sup> On 10 July
1989, 26-year-old carabineros corporal Patricio Rubén Canihuante
Astudillo was shot in the head at point-blank range as he guarded a
building in Viña del Mar. In December 1989, Canadian police reported
that 30 Brazilian business executives had been targeted for abduction by
MIR guerrillas that included two Canadians, Christine Lamont and David
Spencer who had joined the movement after meeting two exiled Chileans,
Sergeo Olivares and Martin Urtubia, who came to Canada in
1978.<sup>\[86\]</sup>

## References

\[<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armed_resistance_in_Chile_(1973–1990>)
Armed Resistance in Chile (1973-1990)\] at
[Wikipedia](Wikipedia "wikilink")