The CIA reported to the Nixon administration that reports of repression by Gen Pinochet's regime in Chile were exaggerated and due to Communist propaganda. The report was made in March 1974 six months after the military coup against President Salvador Allende which resulted in about 5,000 deaths and the execution or "disappearance" of a further 3,000 persons.
The report is contained in 6,000 previously classified documents from the State Department, the CIA, the Pentagon and other agencies covering the five-year period after the 1973 coup, which have now been released in edited form. The Clinton administration agreed to release selected confidential documents following the arrest of Gen Pinochet in London last October in response to a Spanish request for his extradition.
A CIA report to Washington 10 days after the coup on September 11th, 1973 by the military junta said that its intention was "to stamp out all vestiges of communism in Chile for good. Severe repression is planned."
In October 1973 the CIA said: "The regime shows no sign of relenting in its determination to deal swiftly and decisively with dissidents . . . and the bloodshed goes on." The report added that "the line between people killed during attacks on security forces and those captured and executed immediately has become increasingly blurred."
But several months later on March 1974, the CIA defended the Pinochet regime and said that the accusations of repression are "traceable to a worldwide Communist-orchestrated campaign to discredit the junta." Around the same time, the US ambassador in Chile, Mr David Popper, wrote to the State Department that in conversations with the new regime, "I have invariably taken the line that the US government is in sympathy with, and supports, the government of Chile, but that our ability to be helpful . . . is hampered by US Congressional and media concerns . . . with respect to alleged violations of human rights here."
When President Carter was elected in 1977 his administration turned against support for the Pinochet regime but the US embassy in Chile expressed irritation over being asked to write "still another human rights report" on Chile.
The embassy military group complained that "we the US do not appear to be visionary enough to see the total picture; we focus only upon the relatively few violation cases which occur and continue to hound the government about past events while shrugging off demonstrated improvements."