Augusto Pinochet was a Chilean general and politician, dictator of that country in the period between 1973 and 1990.
He was appointed commander-in-chief of the Chilean Army on August 23, 1973, by President Salvador Allende, replacing the resigned General Carlos Prats. On September 11 of the same year, in the midst of a political, economic and social crisis, he led a coup that overthrew the democratic government of the coalition of left-wing political parties called Unidad Popular, ending the period of the Presidential Republic. From that moment, Pinochet governed the country. His mandate ended by democratic means through a plebiscite held in 1988, after which he was replaced - after presidential and parliamentary elections - by Patricio Aylwin on March 11, 1990.
The new regime implemented economic liberalization, including monetary stabilization. It also eliminated tariff protections for local industry, banned unions and privatized social security and state enterprises. These policies produced an initial economic growth, which Milton Friedman called the "miracle of Chile", but which contrasts with a dramatic increase in income inequality that led to a devastating economic crisis in 1982. During most of the decade In 1990, Chile was the best performing economy in Latin America, although the legacy of Pinochet's reforms is still in dispute.
During the dictatorship, serious and diverse violations of human rights were committed. Pinochet persecuted leftists, socialists and political critics, which led to the murder of between 1,200 and 3,200 people, the detention of some 80,000 people and the torture of tens of thousands.
