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Carlos Prats González (; February 24, 1915 – September 30, 1974) was a Chilean Army officer and politician. He served as a minister in Salvador Allende's government while Commander-in-chief of the Chilean Army. He resigned in August 1973 amid growing national discontent. Immediately after General Augusto Pinochet's September 11, 1973 coup, Prats went into voluntary exile in Argentina. The following year, he and his wife, Sofía Cuthbert, were assassinated in Buenos Aires by a car bomb planted by the Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional.
In 1935, he was commissioned as an artillery officer. Three years later he became a Sub-lieutenant. Soon he returned to the Military Academy, this time as a teacher. He taught there and at the War Academy until 1954. In 1944, he married Sofia Cuthbert, with whom he had three daughters.
In 1954, Prats González was promoted to Major and sent to the military mission to the United States as adjunct military attaché, where he served until 1958. That year he was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and returned to the War Academy as a teacher. In 1961, he became commander of the Artillery Regiment Nº3 “Chorrillos”, and in 1963, became commander of the Regiment Nº1 “Tacna”.
In 1964, Prats González was promoted to Colonel and sent as military attaché to Argentina. He returned to Chile in 1967 as commander of the III Army Division. In 1968, he was promoted to Brigade General and Chief of the General Staff. The following year he was promoted to Division General.
Prats' reputation was significantly damaged in the Alejandrina Cox incident of June 1973, in which he became involved in an altercation with members of the public and fired a shot at their car. He immediately tendered his resignation, but Allende refused to accept it. Days later, an attempted coup known as the Tanquetazo took place; Prats' rapid response helped to defeat the coup and somewhat restored his public standing.
Prats' retirement removed the last real obstacle to a military coup, which took place less than three weeks later, on September 11, 1973. Immediately after the coup, on September 15, 1973, Prats voluntarily went into exile with his wife in Argentina.
In Argentina, DINA civil agent Enrique Arancibia was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment in 2004 for Prats' murder. In 2000, SIDE agent Juan Martín Siga Correa was detained by Argentine officials on the orders of federal judge María Servini de Cubría. Dictan nueva orden de detención en caso Prats , El Mostrador, May 22, 2000 Martín Siga Correa was DINA's main connection with the SIDE and with Intelligence Battalion 601, and was also a member of the Tacuara Nationalist Movement.
In 2003, Argentine federal judge María Servini de Cubría asked Chile for the extradition of Mariana Callejas, who was Michael Townley's wife, and Cristoph Willikie Fleent, a retired colonel from the Chilean army; the three together were charged with Prat's murder. But Chilean Appeals court judge Nibaldo Segura refused extradition in July 2005, arguing that the three had already been prosecuted in Chile. "Chilean agent convicted over Prats' killing", Jornada (in Spanish)]
Italian terrorist Stefano Delle Chiaie was reportedly also involved in the murder of Prats. Along with fellow extremist Vincenzo Vinciguerra, Delle Chiaie testified in Rome in December 1995 before Judge Servini that Enrique Arancibia Clavel (a former Chilean secret police agent prosecuted for crimes against humanity in 2004) and Michael Townley were directly involved in this assassination.
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