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Pinochet Death Renews Calls for CIA Files
Full disclosure, Kornbluh said, would likely show how the U.S. government helped Pinochet's regime consolidate its power with overt and covert support, despite knowing of its abuses.
Documents already released indicate that U.S. officials did not directly participate in the military coup on Sept. 11, 1973 that toppled Chile's Marxist president, Salvador Allende. But the CIA said it had advance warning of the coup and had tried to foment earlier coup attempts on direct orders from Nixon and Kissinger.
  Augusto Pinochet, second right, is seen with other members of the four-men military junta that seized power in Chile on Sept. 11, 1973 in a bloody coup against President Salvador Allende, as they salute during Independence Day celebrations in this Sept. 18, 1973 file photo. Pinochet, who ruled Chile after a military coup from 1973 to 1990, died Sunday from heart complications. He was 91. From left are: Air Force Commander Gen. Gustavo Leigth; Pinochet, Navy chief Adm. Jose Toribio Merino, and Police Director Gen. Cesar Mendoza. (AP Photo) (AP) PHOTOS |
A report released by the CIA in 2000 said the agency had been "aware of coup-plotting by the military, had ongoing intelligence-collection relationships with some plotters and -- because CIA did not discourage the takeover and had sought to instigate a coup in 1970 -- probably appeared to condone it."
A secret cable from the CIA deputy director of plans, Thomas Karamessines, conveyed Kissinger's orders to CIA Santiago station chief Henry Hecksher in 1970: "It is firm and continuing policy that Allende be overthrown by a coup," and that the "American hand" be hidden.
Nixon's CIA director, Richard Helms, in handwritten notes said the president, intent on saving Chile from communism, ordered covert operations to "make the economy scream" under Allende.
Even U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, when asked about covert U.S. activities in Chile, acknowledged in 2004 that, "It is not a part of American history that we're proud of."
The CIA kept in regular contact with Contreras _ blamed for much of the torture and death under the dictatorship _ until 1977, though it said the relationship "was not cordial and smooth."
Indeed, public outrage over Chile's human rights record prompted the U.S. Congress to ban weapons sales in 1976, not long after Kissinger's meeting with Pinochet.
In Santiago, Juan Pablo Letelier recalled the violent deaths of his father and thousands of other victims of Pinochet's dirty war.
"Pinochet died as an old man at the age of 91, surrounded by his family, his kids, attended by top medical assistance," he said. "My father's legs were severed by a bomb and he bled to death on a street on Embassy Row in Washington. Others had been tortured and thrown into the ocean ... It makes one think."
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