JOHNSON'S “INTEREST" DOES FREI NO GOOD
The Chilean Senate dealt President Eduardo Frei Montalva a stinging rebuff January 17 on a routine motion to grant him permission to leave the country for a scheduled official visit to the United States. His request was turned down. It was the first time such a thing ever occurred in the history of Chile.
The preparations for the trip were already well advanced. A round of appearances had been set for Washington, New York and Boston. Johnson had laid out the red carpet in his own inimitable way in an announcement last December 20: "I am particularly interested in learning more from President Frei about the achievements of his great experiment of revolution in freedon."
Johnson, of course, doesn't have the slightest interest in anything south of the Rio Grande so long as it does not constitute a "Communist threat." The sentence was just ground out by some anonymous speech writer. In Chile, however, the sentence was taken at face value as showing direct backing from the White House for Frei's Christian Democratic campaign propaganda. Thus, in the Senate, the only ones to vote for the trip were the members of Frei's own party and three independents. The "no" vote was an indirect way of censuring Frei for his too flagrant stand in favor of the Yankee master.
Frei had ne choice but to try to conceal his embarrassment and cancel the junket abroad.
The Chilean senators, naturally, are not revolutionists. In fact part of the vote came from right-wing bourgeois forces in opposition to even the largely demagogic agrarian reform sponsored by Frei. The left, including Socialists and Communists, cast their votes to preserve their public image of champions of the people. Whatever the reasons, it was expected that there would be widespread approval of the vote.
It was reported from Santiago that the Christian Democrats will seek to overcome the effects of the public blow to Frei's prestige by staging a series of demonstrations. If these should be countered by critics of the president's kowtowing to Washington, a period of political turbulence could open in Chile.