BY MARK STEVENSON
  Associated Press

  CARACAS - Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, who likes to compare himself to historical figures like Simón Bolívar, has added another tragic figure to his pantheon of heroes: Chile's Salvador Allende.

  In recent weeks, Chávez has faced two alleged assassination plots, coup plots, a general strike, a small military protest and a threatened indefinite strike. Government television has begun airing The Last Days of Salvador Allende, a documentary on Allende's overthrow and death in a 1973 coup, and Chávez's fascination with the Marxist Chilean has lent an apocalyptic cast to Venezuela's turbulent politics.

  Images of Allende, who in 1970 became the first socialist elected president in the Western Hemisphere, under fire from his own military are followed by warnings that Venezuelans could face the same torture and disappearances Chileans suffered under Gen. Augusto Pinochet's 15-year dictatorship.

  Venpres, the state news agency, published a feature on Allende in September under a headline frequently heard from Chávez's lips: I will pay for the people's loyalty with my life.

  Like Allende, Chávez these days is hounded by cacerolazos -- the noisy, pot-beating demonstrations that Chileans invented to protest Allende's socialist rule.
  Venezuela's opposition uses the pot protests each time the government interrupts private broadcasts for announcements or Chávez speeches.

  ''The president has a habit of trying to take on the stature of other personalities from history, many of whom had quite different historical roles,'' said Roberto
  Lespinasse, president of the Venezuelan Psychiatric Association.

  Bolívar, the 19th-century independence hero, sought to unite Latin America; Chávez has managed to divide even this small part of Bolívar's former empire. Allende was an avowed socialist, but a moderate one. Chávez has not instituted socialist measures, but his harsh rhetoric dispels any image of moderation.

  ''It appears that with the attempts to draw parallels with Salvador Allende, Chávez is trying to portray himself as a victim, a martyr,'' Lespinasse said.

  Chávez has long mentioned Allende in his speeches. Allende attempted land reform; Chávez is doing the same. Both befriended Fidel Castro. Both faced fierce
  opposition by business interests.

  The government TV ads rolled after a group of Venezuelan military officers declared themselves in rebellion on Oct. 22. They are pushing for early elections, citing
  Chávez's politicization of the military and an economy in crisis.

  Opposition television responded by broadcasting a documentary on the downfall of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, who was overthrown by a popular uprising in September 2000 and is being tried on war-crimes charges.