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The CIA’s Continued Secrecy on Chile and JFK

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On August 31, the Nation magazine published an article entitled “Chile: The Secrets the US Government Continues to Hide,” which details the CIA’s continued steadfast insistence on keeping its records secret that relate to the agency’s 1970-1973 efforts to bring regime change to Chile.  The CIA’s continued secrecy, of course, brings to mind the agency’s equally steadfast insistence on keeping its JFK-assassination related records secret into perpetuity.  The CIA, needless to say, cites the two magic words — “national security” — to justify its continued secrecy in both events.  I suggest that two other words are the real reason for the CIA’s continued secrecy in both events: “criminal cover-up.” After all, the JFK assassination took place 60 years ago and the Chilean coup took place 50 years ago. The notion that the release of CIA assassination-related and coup-related records would threaten “national security,” no matter what definition is used for that ridiculous, meaningless ...

Before Agreeing to Gun Control, Remember Chile

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Calls for gun control after a mass shooting in America has, of course, become standard fare. But before Americans permit themselves to be stampeded into surrendering their right to own guns, it would be wise to keep Chile in mind. In 1973, the Chilean national-security establishment, after winning a quick military battle against the president of the country, took power. The new ruler, a military general named Augusto Pinochet, established one of the most brutal dictatorships in modern history. Tens of thousands of people were rounded up without arrest warrants, indictments, or other aspects of due process of law. Most of them were brutally tortured. What Pinochet’s people did to female prisoners, sexually, is so gruesome that it defies credulity. Some three thousand people were executed or disappeared. What had these people done? Their only “crime” was being socialists or communists or supporters of the democratically elected president who had been ousted in the coup, Salvador Allende. That’s the reason they were ...

The CIA and the Assassination of Orlando Letelier

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On September 21, 1976, a car bomb exploded on the streets of Washington, D.C., killing former Chilean official Orlando Letelier and his young assistant Ronni Moffitt. Since it was clearly a case of premeditated, cold-blooded murder of two innocent people, the killers were subject to being sentenced to death or life in prison. Yet, consider what actually happened to some of the people implicated in the murders: Michael Townley, who put together the murder team and actually participated in the car bombing itself. Federal officials agreed to a plea bargain that enabled him to get out of prison after only five years. After that, federal officials admitted Townley into their Federal Witness Protection Program, where he has been under federal protection ever since. The following is what happened to the men who Townley recruited to be on his murder team: Guillermo Novo Sampol and Alvin Ross Diaz. A jury convicted them of murder and they were sentenced to life in prison, a reasonable ...

Why Did the U.S. Government Prosecute Letelier’s and Moffitt’s Assassins?

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REMINDER: FFF's blockbuster conference, "The National Security State and JFK," is this Saturday, June 3, at the Washington Dulles Airport Marriott Hotel. Speakers: Oliver Stone, Ron Paul, Stephen Kinzer, Jeffrey Sachs, Michael Glennon, Doug Horne, Peter Janney,  Michael Swanson, Jefferson Morley, Jim DiEugenio, and Jacob Hornberger. One of the most interesting aspects of the Cold War was the Justice ...