George HW Bush thought the world belonged to his family. By Ariel Dorfman
Bush had operated as head of the CIA from
30 January 1976 until 20 January 1977. He was undoubtedly privy to
exhaustive information about the devastation being inflicted by the
US supported Pinochet regime in Chile, at a time when opponents were being
disappeared, concentration camps were still open and torture was rampant.
During his tenure, the American government facilitated the infamous Operation
Condor, run by the intelligence services of six Latin American
dictatorships to coordinate their repression of dissidents.
Perhaps most
inexcusable was that Bush remained unrepentant of his country’s involvement in
so much suffering. Had he not stated – when an American missile had blown up an
Iranian aircraft with 290 innocent civilians aboard in 1988 – that he would
“never apologize for the United States of America. Ever. I don’t care what the
facts are.”
As the world says
goodbye to George HW Bush, I am tempted to add my own personal memories to
the mix, and illuminate perhaps his legacy by recounting the two intense nights
that my wife and I spent in close proximity to the former president at the end
of October 2001. It was at the Park
Hyatt hotel in Sydney, where I had been invited to deliver the Centennial
Lecture celebrating the Federation of Australia. The day after our arrival, the
hotel manager – a corpulent, affable man of Spanish extraction – asked us if we
wouldn’t mind exchanging our suite, only for the next two days, he said, for
another one, just as nice, he promised, elsewhere on the premises.
Having already
unpacked, and enjoying the most spectacular view of the bay and the Opera
House, it wasn’t hard to respond that we had no intention of moving. Was there
any reason for such an unexpected request? The manager could not
elaborate further, “due to reasons of security”. Though he would honor our
wishes, he regretted that our dinner reservation for that evening had been
cancelled, as the dining room would be closed for a restricted event.
It was only that
evening, when our centennial hosts had rescued us for a meal at another
location, that their head of protocol mentioned, in passing, that we were
sharing the Hyatt with none other than Bush the elder, who was in Sydney, with
a large entourage, to attend a meeting of the Carlyle Group, the gigantic global
asset management firm that he had been advising for the last three years
(months later we realized that this was the summit where the Bin Laden family
was “disinvested” from the firm)… read more:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/dec/02/george-hw-bush-familyVictor Jara murder: ex-military officers sentenced in Chile for 1973 death
