Ley Reservada del Cobre (Spanish for Copper secret law) that provided yearly for part of state-owned Codelco's copper sales, without parliamentary control, for the purchase of weapons.

Twenty years later, in 1978, in order to avoid a repetition of the fait accompli, Chile placed troops on Snipe and their other islands south of the Beagle Channel before Argentina had started a planned invasion, Operation Soberanía.