Aye! Venceremos! Scotland and Solidarity with Chile in the 1970s — And Why it Still Matters Today
By Colin Turbett, Carlton Books, £10

COLIN TURBETT is a lifelong socialist, political activist and trade unionist who can trace his own political awakening in the 1970s right back to being inspired by the actions of the Chilean solidarity movement in Scotland at that time.

In fact he was so inspired that at university in 1978 he did his dissertation on Chilean refugees in the west of Scotland for his social work degree.

So really there can be few better placed to write this excellent book. 

Fifty years ago the fascist coup in Chile resulted in the murder of the elected socialist president Salvador Allende and thousands of his supporters.

This book is a timely reminder of this infamous attack on democracy and the wide-ranging atrocities that were committed against the Chilean people.  

But as well as revisiting the darkness and the truly awful reasons why thousands were forced to flee, rebuilding their lives elsewhere, this book also shows us the light and the hope created by the stories of the grassroots international solidarity movement in Scotland that supported over 300 families and took important collective actions against the Pinochet dictatorship.

It looks at the impact they had then and the impact that similar solidarity still has today.

Every struggle for democracy and socialism matters, but it is hard to exaggerate how important Chile was from the 1970s onwards.

The spectre of democratic socialism put fear into the governments of South America.

It was understood that if the Chilean experiment had succeeded, it would have acted as a model for others to follow, presenting a massive challenge to US hegemony. 

That’s why the state apparatus of the US and other reactionary countries was put at the disposal of the coup.

Pinochet famously became known as Thatcher’s favourite dictator, which is not surprising given that he was fundamentally important to the neoliberal project which has blighted economies across the world ever since.

But what this book does best is to focus on the other side of the story and the impact that good people on the ground, organising, coming together and offering friendship and solidarity can have both then and now.

Perhaps the most famous act of solidarity with the Chilean people from the British labour movement was the action of friends and comrades in the Rolls-Royce factory in East Kilbride.

As depicted in the great film Nae Pasaran, the workers refused to mend Chilean air force jet engines. Their boycott meant the jet engines lay unrepaired for years before they disappeared in the middle of the night and were secretly sent back to Chile. 

The East Kilbride boycott lasted for four years. Unknown to the workers they had grounded half of Pinochet’s air force as well as well as providing hope and inspiration to the many trade unionists and activists who were jailed in Chile at the time.

For me, the key lesson of this book is that solidarity action is still crucial and has far more impact than we realise, because even in the darkest of times the light of common humanity shines through and overcomes evil.

As Allende himself said in his final broadcast before he was murdered: “Workers of my country, I have faith in Chile and its destiny. Others will overcome this dark and bitter moment when treason seeks to prevail. Go forward knowing that, sooner rather than later, the great avenues will open again where the people will walk to build a better society.”