THE C.I.A.' S LINK TO CHILE' S PLOT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000403680017-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 22, 2010
• Sequence Number: 17
• Publication Date: June 12, 1982
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/22 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000403680017-4
ART 13 >JE APPEARED
ON
THE NATION
12 June 1982
1,_-:3 FOLLOW-UP ON THE LETELIER CASE
`[he C.. ?'s Link
To Uhile's
Plot
Imost six years after the assassination of Chilean
exile leader Orlando Letelier in Washington,
Contreras's
tance to hith
head of the P
Cr anes was t
the two DIN
agents were tr
Intelligence
small arms." (Interestingly, Contreras's deal with Wilson
and Terpil was for 1,059 Colt Cobra revolvers, a small
hand,: widely used by plaincl(nrhec police.) Guanes also
said tr.e two agents "had the cooperati?nn of the C.I.A./
U.S.A.," which "suggested that they travel with documents
with another nationality since, as Chileans, it would be dif-
ficult to take such material out of the U.S.A." (Cong=ress
had prohibited arms sales to Chile earlier in 1976 because of
human rights violations.)
Guanes portrayed Walters, whoni he had met in
Paraguay, as helping arrange the DINA agents' trip. He
said he met U.S. Ambassador George Landau on August 6,
1976, at a Chinese Embassy r ception: "[He) took us aside
and said, `1 received a call from General Walters stating that
problems had arisen with the passports given to the Chileans
and that the State Department had cancelled the visas. It is
possible for the same two to enter [the United States] direct-
ly using Chilean passports, for which they would make
direct contact.' This information should be sent to my
friend Colonel Contreras...."
Because this account differs from Walters's denial and
Landau's testimony about the reception, F.B.I. agents at
first discounted it. They also assumed that because Guanes
was a friend of Contreras he might have concocted the
C.I.A. story to embarrass the United States. But in light of
Walters's admission of a second meeting with Contreras,
Guanes's testimony takes on new weight.
The Chilean government of Gen. Augusta Pinochet has
stonewalled on the Letelier case, denying the U.S. request
for Contreras's extradition, terminating the military and
judicial investigations it had begun, and expellin, from the
country the attorney for the Letelier family, former Justice
Minister Jaime Castillo.
Our new information indicates that the C.I.A., which had
pledged to cooperate with F.B.I. investigators, has joined in
that stonewalling. The C.I.A. and General Walters had full
information abo'.it the incidents in Par:.g;ray, including
photographs of th:: two DINA agents, within days of their
occurrence. The information was never turned over to the
F.B.I. Its importance is indicated by the fact that when the
photographs and cable traffic about the incidents were
unearthed by Federal investigators more than a year later,
they led to the arrest of DINA agent Michael 1 ownl.:y, who
confessed to having been involved in the plot, and to the in-
dictinerits of Contreras and two other DINA officials.
D.C., information continues to surface in-
11
_..k_\dicating that the Central Intelligence Agency
concealed facts about its relations with DINA, the Chilean
secret police, that might have helped solve the murder
quickly.
In our earlier report [see "The Chilean Connection,"
The Nation, November 28, 1981], we showed that D1NA's
head, then-Col. Manuel Contreras, visited Washington
secretly only days after he gave his agents orders to begin the
assassination operation. Contreras made the trip to pur-
chase weapons illegally from a company run by former-
C.I.A. officers Edwin Wilson ai.,.I Frank Terpil.
New information from a year-old Congressional hear-
ing-unnoti, I at, the time-reveals that Contreras had
another meeti rg, this one with the second-ranking officer of
the C.I.A., Deputy Direct: Vernon Walters. Walters told a
March 10, 1981, hearing of the House Foreign Affairs Sub-
committee on Inter-American Affairs that he had two
meetings with Contreras in Washington: one, previously
publicized, in August 1975, the second "a year" later. An
aide to Walters says that "every meeting" with Contreras
involved "agency-t. agency business" and none took place
after Walters's retirement fra n the C.I.A. on July 2, 1976.
We don't know the nature of the business, nor is there
any evidence that Contreras told Walters of the Letelier
assassination plot. But it is nctey.orthy that, according to
F.B.I. investigators, Walters never told then about the sec-
ond meeting with Contreras, even though its proximity to
the assassination on September 21, 1976, made it particular-
ly relevant to the investigation.
V,'alters's name has arisen several times in connection
with Contreras and the DINA agents plotting the murder,
according to th,_ evidence compiled by the F.B.I. That
evidence shows that Walters traveled to Asuncion,
Paraguay, in June 1976 on agency business. A month later,
two D1NA agents assigned to kill Letclier arrived in
Paraguay to obtain false passports, using Walters's name
and alleging that Walters and the C.I.A. knew about the
DINA mission to Washington. AVM lters has denied he had
anything to do with the DINA agents or the false passports.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/22 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000403680017-4 7
?JOHN DINGES AND SAUL LANDAU