LETTER TO COLONEL JOHN R. REITEMEYER FROM VERNON A. WALTERS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80R01731R002300020017-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 3, 2003
• Sequence Number: 17
• Publication Date: January 15, 1975
• Content Type: LETTER

Approved For Release 2003/10/16 : CIA-RDP80R01731 R002300020017-1
15 January 1975
STAT Colonel John R. Reitemeyer
Dear Colonel Reitemeyer:
It was a pleasure to hear from you again after so long a time.
Marshal Dutra died on June 11 just this past year. He was 89.
Hank Piper, a former employee of yours who has been in
Washington for a number of years now, says that you have retired
as President of the Hartford Courant. He recalls that he had an
opportunity to chat with you again a couple of years ago while
vacationing in the Dominican Republic. I trust retirement agrees
with you, but I am delighted to see that you retain your interest in
thos pressing problems affecting our government and nation.
The problems in Chile are grievous indeed. Both the problems
themselves and the circumstances which have precipitated them have
existed in an atmosphere of misunderstanding which, until recently,
seems each day to have been compounded. With respect to the role
of the press in dispelling some of this, I was heartened to hear not
long ago that General Pinochet had declared an end to prior censor.
ship of the press in Chile. This must have been an encouraging
development to your colleagues in the Inter-American Press
Association. By chance the other day I had lunch with a Chilean
official who informed me that the Junta has been making a concerted
effort to ensure that no one does further violence to the principle
and the exercise of fundamental human rights in Chile. The turmoil
and disorder following the Junta's assumption of power in Chile has
been overcome to the point where the current regime apparently is
confident that it can guarantee such a situation and seems disposed
to do so.
Approved For Release 2003/10/16 : CIA-RDP80R01731 R002300020017-1
 Approved For Release 2003/10/16 : CIA-RDP80R0l731 R002300020017-1
I am most grateful, Colonel Reitem.eyer, to have the benefit of
your observations and the encouragement of your kind remarks, as
well as the pleasure of the memory of that incident from a less
complex time.
Faithfully,
MI Vembri X.- V,,O-feft
Vernon A. Walters
Lieutenant General, USA
Distribution:
Orig - Addressee
V~I - DDCI
I - C/LA w/cy of basic
I -ER
E14
Approved For Release 2003/10/16 : CIA-RDP80R0l731 R002300020017-1