CHILE'S AMBITIOUS PLANS FOR DEFENSE REFORM

UNCLAS SANTIAGO 000124 SENSITIVE SIPDIS STATE FOR WHA/BSC AND PM--JEFF BURNETT PENTAGON FOR OSD--KRISTI HUNT E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: MARR PGOV PHUM SOCI CI SUBJECT: CHILE'S AMBITIOUS PLANS FOR DEFENSE REFORM ¶1. (SBU) Summary: Although it has received only periodic attention in the press, President Bachelet has encouraged a far-reaching series of defense reforms which, if approved, would dramatically restructure the Ministry of Defense, usher in significant changes to military procurement, and create new military justice and pension systems. Two reforms--creating five-year professional careers for enlisted soldiers, and formalizing procedures for Chilean participation in peacekeeping missions--have already been signed into law. Taken together, these proposed and recently enacted changes represent important steps to replace ad hoc and antiquated systems with modern best practices and finally purge some of the structures--such as the military justice system--which enabled Pinochet-era abuses. End Summary. Chile's Long Road to Sound Civilian-Military Relations -------------- -------------- ¶2. (SBU) From the 1930s to 1970s, the armed forces were thoroughly segregated from--and undervalued by--mainstream Chilean society, according to the director of Catholic University's defense studies program, Guillermo Patillo. Military personnel, including officers, were part of a cultural "ghetto" and were seen as largely irrelevant by many in the professional civilian world. Other civilians resented the armed forces' failure to intervene against squatters and others who threatened law and order. These decades of disrespect and frustration helped to feed the military violence expressed during the Pinochet years, Patillo told poloff, and together the disrespect and violence laid a difficult foundation for building healthy relationships between the civilian and military worlds. ¶3. (SBU) According to academic Augusto Varas, the 1990s were characterized by conflict between the civilian government and the military, with the presidency gradually gaining power. Patricio Rojas, Defense Minister from 1990-94, was fond of saying that the only power he had was the "point of a pen." ¶4. (SBU) Two events during the presidential administration of Ricardo Lagos (2000-2006) represented turning points in civilian-military relations, according to Vargas. A decade after the return to civilian rule, military leaders felt that they were increasingly under attack. Pinochet had been arrested in London and a Chilean judge was stripping his immunity from prosecution; military officials--including some still in office--were facing human rights abuse trials; and some parliamentarians were promoting political reforms intended to limit the power of the elite and the military. To signal their unity in the face of these challenges to military power, the commander in chiefs of Chile's three military service branches and the commander of the Carabineros police force held a well-publicized lunch--in public, in uniform, and with TV cameras--without Lagos. President Lagos--who did not have the legal authority to fire the commanders in chief--sharply rebuked them, firmly asserting civilian control over the military for the first time in post-authoritarian Chile, and ensuring that the dismantling of the remnants of the military state would continue. The incident is known as the "servilletazo." ¶5. (SBU) A second key moment came in 2004, when Army Commander Juan Emilio Cheyre made a dramatic break with the army's past. In his "End of a Vision" speech marking the closure of the infamous Army Intelligence Battalion, Cheyre said that the army would abandon the Pinochet optic of demonizing political opponents as enemies undeserving of rights or dignity. He also said that the army as an institution bore responsibility for the human rights violations committed and pledged that the army would become a firm defender of human rights in the future. ¶6. (SBU) By 2006, when Bachelet became President (after serving as Minister of Defense from 2002-2004),she recognized that the time was ripe for institutionalizing changes to the defense structure, and asked Defense Minister Goni to develop and undertake a series of reforms. This has led to an ambitious set of proposals to dramatically restructure the Chilean military's organizational structure, personnel system, retirement policy, financing, judicial system, and peacekeeping norms. (Septels will describe other reforms in detail and give congressional perspectives on likeliness of passage.) Two reforms--creating professional soldiers (enlisted soldiers with five-year contracts),and a new law on peacekeeping operations--have already become law. Observers agree that while the reforms will be considered by Congress on an individual basis, they are really part of a package designed to modernize the armed forces and make a complete break from the Pinochet past. What's on Tap: Recently Enacted and Proposed Changes to Chile's Defense System -------------- -------------- ¶7. (U) The following reforms have been enacted in the last year: --PROFESSIONALIZATION OF SOLDIERS: This legislation, which became law in July 2008, will, in effect, create an all-voluntary military service where volunteer conscripts serving one-year terms can apply to become professional enlisted personnel on five-year, renewable contracts. Due to demographic changes and job market challenges, the Army--which has by far the largest number of conscript positions--currently has far more applications for conscript positions than it can accept. Chile's previous system, which before 2005 included universal military service but had multiple waiver categories, including for university or professional education, generally allowed uninterested potential draftees to find a way to avoid military service. The new system should help to alleviate the considerable loss of skills due to short tours of duty for enlisted personnel, a particular weakness given Chile's modern defense equipment and the training required to operate it. (See also IIR 6817 0092 08 for more information.) --NEW LAW ON PEACEKEEPING: This new law establishes the first clear procedures for Chile's participation in peacekeeping missions, specifying that the President will authorize the sending of troops, the Senate will approve the action, the Ministry of Defense will provide the equipment and transportation necessary to deploy, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will fund the deployment. The law stipulates that Chile participate only in UN-led peacekeeping operations. It also allows, for the first time, for Congress to approve multiple-year missions, avoiding the current practice of annual congressional approval. (See also IIR 6817 0067 09 for more information.) ¶8. (U) Additional reforms are being considered, although it is not clear when these will come to a vote, particularly given that 2009 is a presidential and parliamentary election year: --RESTRUCTURING THE MINISTRY OF DEFENSE: The current Ministry of Defense grew in an ad hoc way to accommodate the 1930s joining of the Ministries of War, Navy, and Air Force; evolving defense needs; and congressional and executive dictates. Draft legislation would emphasize jointness by ending the practice of naming an undersecretary for each service branch; replace a system of military advisors and civilian contractors with a corps of direct-hire defense staff; and formally move the police forces (Carabineros and Investigative Police, or PDI) under the Ministry of Interior. The lower house of Congress has already approved the re-organization. Septel will report on prospects for Senate passage. --REFORM OF THE COPPER LAW AND CHANGING MILITARY FUNDING AND PROCUREMENTS: Chile's copper law funnels 10 percent of earnings from the state-owned copper company, Codelco, into a fund for defense equipment purchases. For several years there has been talk of breaking the link between copper sales and military financing, and instead moving towards a multi-year defense procurement budget. This discussion has been encouraged by record high copper prices over the past several years, which swelled the fund before the recent decline in copper prices. While earlier speculation held that this was too controversial to be passed this election year, the press attention recently riveted on the Mirage defense purchasing scandal has increased the likelihood that the Congress will take up the issue. (Note: USD 15 million in kickbacks--including 2.4 million given to former Air Force Commander in Chief Ramon Vega and his family--has allegedly been uncovered in the 1994 purchase of 25 Mirage aircraft from Belgium. End Note.) --OVERHAUL OF MILITARY JUSTICE SYSTEM: Chile's military justice system was formed in 1925 based on 18th century jurisprudence, according to MOD advisor Pablo Contreras. The current system allows for both specifically military and essentially civilian cases to be heard via the military justice system, a provision which was widely abused during the Pinochet era. Proceedings are secret and the defendant does not have the right to see much of the evidence against him, commonly leading to an inadequate defense. Prosecutors and judges are typically military personnel--often without any legal training--who remain within their normal chain of command while serving in the military justice system on a rotation, leading to severe limitations on their ability to investigate and fairly judge their superiors. Current proposals to reform the system would follow US and German adversarial models, and would create a distinct military service of legal professionals, better insulating them from pressure from superiors in the general military service. The criminal code would also be rationalized, removing infractions that are not specifically military in nature. New jails and prisons would meet higher standards and allow those awaiting trial to be separated from the convicted. --CHANGES TO MILITARY PENSION SYSTEM: The generous pensions offered to Chile's military are out of step with retirement planning for the rest of the workforce. Chile is renown for having embraced privatized retirement planning decades ago. Military personnel are eligible for a full pension after twenty years of work, and many go on to start second careers--including as civilians within the Ministry of Defense--while retaining their military pensions. When a member of the military dies, his wife and any single daughters under the age of 26 are eligible to receive a survivor's stipend until they marry. As a result, many widows and adult daughters of deceased military personnel enter stable, decades-long relationships and have children with their partners but decide not to legally marry so that they can continue to receive the stipend. Chileans also recognize that pension regulations need to be reformed in light of changing gender roles and the growing number of women in uniform. Comment -------------- ¶9. (SBU) These reforms to Chile's defense system are long overdue, reforming systems that can be easily abused--like the military justice system; providing a legal basis for peacekeeping and the structure and operation of the Ministry of Defense for the first time; and creating a better-trained fighting force with the introduction of professional soldiers. Reforming the copper law would sever the illogical link between copper proceeds and military spending. The current proposals would introduce a more logical and transparent multi-year procurement system and perhaps give the military more flexibility to fund non-equipment costs such as personnel, maintenance, and operations. SIMONS