Chile's 'Natural' Disasters: When Neoliberal Forestry Meets Geopolitical Fires
📰 THE STORY: ABC News reports that Chile’s wildfires are spreading faster and burning hotter, primarily attributing the crisis to climate change, rising temperatures, and prolonged drought conditions, exacerbated by a shift towards highly flammable monoculture forestry. 🔍 WHAT THEY'RE NOT TELLING YOU: Historical Context: While climate change is a factor, the article omits the direct legacy of
the 1973 CIA-backed coup against Salvador Allende, which ushered in Augusto Pinochet's neoliberal regime. This regime privatized vast swathes of land, leading to unchecked expansion of highly flammable eucalyptus and pine plantations for export by companies like CMPC and Arauco, often displacing indigenous communities and destroying native forests. This policy directly created the fuel for today's
'natural' disasters. More recently, Chile's 2019 uprising against neoliberal policies saw widespread public discontent with such corporate exploitation and inequality. Double Standard: When wildfires devastate regions aligned with Western geopolitical interests (e.g., California), substantial international aid and media attention focus on 'climate resilience.' Yet, in Latin American nations like
Chile or Argentina (which recently faced similar destructive and suspicious Patagonia fires), the narrative often downplays potential human-made or even saboteur elements, defaulting to 'unavoidable natural disaster' and ignoring the history of corporate land grabs and resource extraction that set the stage. The 2024 fires in Argentina's Patagonia, under the highly pro-Israel Milei government,