Sub-Perpetrators in the Chilean Security State

Abstract:What are the experiences in the security state of foot soldiers who do not make key decisions but who implement them—by spying, seducing, detaining, disappearing, torturing, or killing? Are they better understood as victims or perpetrators of human rights violations? Based on research collected in US and Chilean archives on the assassination of Chilean exile Orlando Letelier, killed in Washington in 1976 by the iron-fisted August Pinochet dictatorship, my article addresses this main question by asking about the process of joining, working in, and leaving the security state. It focuses on three specific recruits—Michael Townley, an American-Chilean who built the car bomb that killed Letelier; Armando Fernández, a military man who helped spy on Letelier; and Mónica Lagos, a sex worker who attempted to seduce Letelier. All three worked for DINA, the Chilean secret police, for the Letelier assassination and other assignments. The public nature of the Letelier case—prosecuted to the fullest in both the United States and Chile—produced uniquely deep knowledge of the foot soldiers involved. All joined DINA desperate either for financial rescue or a sense of belonging; once inside DINA, all three found that those desires, patriotic or personal, clashed with the very secrecy of the secret police. They resented what was asked of them as they were kept in the dark. They lost their sense of belonging as their personal desires diverged from those of their employer. Once retired from DINA, all three, regardless of their personal circumstances, felt a deep sense of regret and shame. The article contributes to the historiography of the Chilean security state and to the theory on security states by understanding foot soldiers as "sub-perpetrators," responsible for their actions but operating in a repressive system stifling their options.