Óscar Bonilla

Óscar Bonilla Bradanovic (* December 24, 1918 in Iquique ; † March 3, 1975 in Curicó in a helicopter crash ) was a Chilean major general and politician who, among other things, served as interior minister during the military dictatorship under General Augusto Pinochet between 1973 and 1974 and then from 1974 to Minister of Defense on his death in 1975. He was one of the main initiators of the September 11, 1973 military coup .

Life

Military career and military coup of September 11, 1973

After attending school, Bonilla trained as an officer in the infantry . There is no information as to whether Bonilla graduated from the US Army's Escuela de las Américas at Fort Benning in Columbus, Georgia , a training camp established in 1946 that was attended by more than 60,000 Latin American military personnel.

In the mid-1960s he was in command of the 5th Carampangue Infantry Regiment stationed in Iquique , before becoming a Colonel Aide-de-camp of President Eduardo Frei Montalva in 1966 . He then became a military attaché at the embassy in Spain , while Colonel Sergio Arellano Stark succeeded President Frei Montalva as aide-de-camp. A few years later, Bonilla and Arellano belonged to the selected group of officers who criticized the government of President Salvador Allende at an early stage because of their intimate knowledge of the presidential powers.

Later, as major general, Bonilla was director of the logistics department of the army. At a meeting with the Commander-in-Chief of the Army, General Augusto Pinochet, on August 23, 1973, Pinochet asked all Army generals to submit their resignation. Bonilla and Arellano, who both still had good relations with former President Frei Montalva and the reactionary forces in his Partido Demócrata Cristiano de Chile (PDC), refused.

On the day before the coup d'état, Pinochet met again on September 10, 1973, and Generals Bonilla, César Benavides , Arellano and Javier Palacios Ruhmann in the Ministry of Defense, at which Bonilla was chosen as the possible successor to Pinochet as Commander-in-Chief of the Army. In his memoir, Pinochet wrote that in the event of his death in the coup, the senior general, Bonilla, would be his successor. In fact, Bonilla, a confidante of Pinochet, was seventh in the hierarchy of command. On the day of the coup, Bonilla took command of the intelligence regiment in Peñalolén and thus maintained the links between the commander-in-chief and the associations used in the coup.

Minister of the Interior and Minister of Defense

One day after the military coup, Bonilla became Minister of the Interior (Ministro del Interior) on September 12, 1973, succeeding Carlos Briones Olivos . He held this ministerial office until July 11, 1974 and was then replaced by César Benavides Escobar .

He himself became Minister of Defense (Ministro de Defensa Nacional) of the military junta on July 11, 1974 as successor to Patricio Carvajal Prado and held this ministerial office until his death on March 3, 1975. Her successor was Hermán Brady Roche .

The journalist Pablo Azocar wrote of Bonilla's role during the military dictatorship:

“Bonilla was initially seen as the regime's friendly face. The New York Times called him the 'leader of the liberals in the military junta' who toured cities in the country after the coup and promised mothers and wives to answer questions about their missing children and husbands. In June 1974 he left the Ministry of the Interior and took over the post of Minister of Defense in the military government, which was of little importance, however, since the power rested exclusively with the Commander-in-Chief. The Comisión de Verdad y Reconciliación nacional , chaired by Raúl Rettig , charged that just four days after taking office as Minister of the Interior on September 16, 1973, 53 people were executed in cold blood without being charged. At the same time, Bonilla had met with foreign correspondents. However, his intervention at least led to changes: For example, the director of the National Secret Service DINA ( Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional ), Colonel Manuel Contreras, who was responsible for the Tejas Verdes prison camp , was criticized by him. "

'Bonilla, en el primer tiempo, se convirtió en el rostro amable del régimen. The New York Times lo definió como “el líder de los liberales en la Junta Militar”, que evidenció su carisma después del golpe, visitando poblaciones y prometiendo entregar información a madres y esposas que tenían un familiar detenido. In junio de 1974, dejaba el Ministerio del Interior para ocupar el de Defensa, que en un gobierno militar tiene escasa importancia, pues todo el poder se ejerce desde la Comandancia en Jefe… La Comisión Rettig es hoy un dedo acusador. Ese mismo día 16 de septiembre, en que Bonilla se reunió con los corresponsales extranjeros, 53 personas füron ejecutadas fríamente, sin ser llevadas ante ningún tribunal… Sin embargo, había creado anticuerpos. Manuel Contreras, por entonces coronel a cargo del campo de prisioneros de Tejas Verdes, mereció su reprobación. '

In fact, Bonilla had visited Tejas Verdes at the end of 1973 and saw the underground facilities that were under a casino. He also saw the people being tortured and spoke to Contreras about it, but for decades he denied that there was any torture.

Criticism of the DINA secret service and unexplained accidental death

At a meeting between Bonilla and the former head of the Army Intelligence Service SIME (Servicio de Inteligencia Militar del Ejército) , General Augusto Lutz Urzua , both declared their dissenting views on the original declaration of the armed forces (Pronunciamiento de las Fuerzas Armadas) and expressed them on June 24, 1974 also their criticism of the DINA secret service.

Five months later on November 28, 1974, General Lutz, meanwhile commander of the 5th Army Division stationed in Punta Arenas , died under unexplained circumstances. Another four months later, Bonilla was also killed under unexplained circumstances, after which his helicopter crashed shortly after taking off from Santiago de Chile near Curicó. The two technicians who were sent to Chile by the French manufacturing company to investigate the cause of the accident were killed under similar circumstances and died in the burned-out helicopter before their investigations were completed.

On the other hand, his name appeared again and again in connection with the so-called "death caravan" (Caravana de la Muerte) . In October 1973 he visited, among other places, the Pisagua prison camp to ratify the death sentences by which a court martial had sentenced several prisoners to death by shooting.

Bonilla was married and had three children.

Web links

• Entry (No. 6) in 11 DE SEPTIEMBRE DE 1973: Golpe Militar en Chile
• El Clan Bonilla

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Pablo Azocar: Pinochet. Epitafio para un tirano , pp. 38, 196, Ed. Cuarto Propio, 1999
2. ↑ Causas que lleva el abogado Francisco Bravo en representación de ex detenidos en Tejas Verdes , in: Diario Primera Línea of February 1, 2001
3. ^ General Bonilla muere en accidente aéreo