_ ASSASSINATION ON EMBASSY ROW

By John Dinges and Saul Landau
Pantheon Books, New York City
412 Pp., $14.95

; By Lewis M. Moroze

Pk csassination on Embassy Row, by
John Dinges and Saul Landau, is a

_ Penetrating, gripping report on the

Planning and execution of the murder of
Orlando Letelier, former Chilean Am-
bassador to the U.S. and his secretary,

Onni Moffitt. This heinous crime was

' Committed by the DINA, the secret

Police of the Pinochet junta now in con-

_trol of Chile. The Pinochet junta is the

Creature of the U.S. authorities in Wash-
ington doing the bidding of the U.S. mul-
tinationals and the tiny Chilean oligar-

hy.

It is a study well worth reading and
digesting in view of its factual data, its
Insights and the profound questions it
raises about the policies of our govern-
ment.

John Dinges went to Chile during the
Allende government as a news corre-
Spondent and remained for five years.
Saul Landau was a colleague and friend
of Orlando Letelier and Ronni Moffitt at
the Institute of Policy Studies with
Which he is still affiliated in.a leading
Capacity.

We are informed that ‘in July 1976,
eight weeks before Orlando Letelier and
Ronni Moffitt were killed,” a number of
high ranking CIA and State Department

_ Officials knew that the DINA had un-

re.

€ashed an undercover operation to take
Place in the United States. The ‘‘covert
action’? being planned by the DINA,
Whose emblem is a mailed fist, was the
assassination in our capital city of Or-

; Juan
_ Of Chile’s DINA secret police at the time of the

nuel Contrera Sepulveda, director

Murder of Orlando Letelier x

lando Letelier. The assassination of
Ronni Moffitt was not in the original
plans.

The authors study and assess the as-
Sassination within the framework of of-
ficial U.S.-Chilean relations. They ob-
serve that ‘Pinochet, in getting rid of
Allende, had extracted a major thorn
from the lion’s paw, and Washington
was grateful . . . . The thrust of U.S. pol-
icy toward the military government
was that of protector to protege.” Keep-
ing this perspective in mind readers are
asked to probe most carefully the role of
the U.S. authorities in the unfolding of
the covert action planned by the DINA,
the role of the U.S. authorities in at-
tempting to derail the investigation of
the assassination, and the “legal” ar-

~rangements worked out by the U.S. au-

thorities to protect the chief Chilean
culprits to save them from facing trial
in the U.S.

In a strategic post at the time of the
assassination was George Bush, cur-
rently the candidate of the Republican
Party for the Vice-Presidency of the
USA. The ‘‘moderate” (sic!) George
Bush was then head of the CIA. In pos-
session of information implicating the
DINA in the assassination, Bush passed
it on to then: Secretary of State Henry
Kissinger, admirer of Metternich and
the Shah. Bush then brazenly not only
leaked through CIA channels an esti-
mate that the DINA was not involved,
but went further and spread the other lie
that the “‘left’”’ was responsible for what

the author’s described as ‘“‘a grotesque

act of international terrorism’? —
shades of Adolph Hitler and the
Reichstag fire. The monopoly press
only too gladly and quickly picked it up
— the Washington Star, Newsweek and

the New York Times.

Suedjeg uegsuys

Augusto Pinochet, the CIA’s protege

Orlando Letelier — his murderers are still at large.

~ The scope of this probing study
makes it most informative for all seek-
ing a reversal of current U.S. foreign
policy as pursued by the White House,
the State Department and the ‘dirty
tricks” departments — the CIA and the
FBI. The work is of particular value to

the many democratic groupings in our -

land concerned about the plight of the

people of Chile under the USA-imposed’

Pinochet junta and the implications of
U.S. policy throughout South America
and the Caribbean. To the extent that it
can be distributed, the book should find

‘a most receptive readership among the

people thoughout Latin America.

Senator George McGovern de-
scribed the work as a “remarkably re-
vealing account of the most shocking
events of our recent history.” The tragic
historical truth is that the assassination
was but one ‘‘of the most shocking
events of our recent history.”

Readers will find valid reason for
Richard Barnet’s observation that the
book ‘‘offers a unique X-ray view of the
national security state.”” One might add
that it also reveals the fraternal rela-
tionship between the CIA and the DINA.
Students of U.S. foreign policy and CIA
activities will no doubt echo Seymour
Hersh’s comment that “this book raises
inevitable and still unanswered ques-
tions about possible advance knowledge
by the U.S. government of the Letelier
assassination plans.” Protecting the
DINA agents delays eliciting the truth.
That the U:S. authorities knew that a
covert action by the DINA was to take
place in the USA is not in doubt.

Politically revealing is the arrogant
role of the DINA. Fully aware that the
CIA was tipped off about their planned
covert action to take place in the USA,
the DINA went full steam ahead, fully
confident that the CIA would permit
them to proceed with impunity.

Seven persons involved in the assas-
sination plot were indicted, including
the head of the DINA, General Juan
Manuel Contreras Sepulveda, and two
of his Chilean aides, but only four, non-
Chileans, were brought to trial. The top
DINA aides were not in the dock.

Up to the time of the assassination of
Orlando Letelier and Ronni Moffitt, the

Chile solidarity movement in the USA
and throughout the world was register-
ing measurable successes in bringing
the truth about the Pinochet coup andits
consequences to the people. The gross
violations of human rights by the junta
were exposed and widespread protests
poured out from trade unions, human
Tights groups, the peace. movement,
church leaders and other democratic
sectors. Support was mounting for the
families of the disappeared. The United
‘Nations Commission on Human Rights
was receiving growing support and in-
creased votes each year for their annual
reports exposing and condemning the
violations by the Pinochet junta.

During this period Orlando Letelier
wrote and spoke about the repressive
economic and political aspects of the
(Milton) Friedman-Chicago Boys’
Economic Model. Letelier was persis-
tent in promoting the interests of the
-widest sectors of the people of Chile and
of the Popular Unity forces.

. This then was a propitious moment
for the U.S. “‘proteges”’ — Pinochet and
the DINA — tostrike a blow against the
solidarity movement and, in turn,
against the people of Chile.

To this very moment, our govern-
ment, self-proclaimed champion of
human rights, is making no effort to
extradite the DINA assassins, still at
large in Chile.

There must be a persistent nation-
wide demand that the assassins of
Letelier and Moffitt be extradited and
tried for their crimes. Economic and
political sanctions should be imposed
upon the ‘‘pariah government”’ in Chile
until human rights are fully restored.

_ All supporters of the Chilean solidar-
ity movements; all advocates of peace

and the extension of human rights will

find great rewards in this book. Public
libraries should be requested to stock
this work. The book can be purchased
through the National Chile Center. 7
East 15th Street, Room 408, NYC 10003.
Tel No. (212) 989-0085 and at the Unity
Book Center, 235 West 23 Street, NYC,
10010.

Lewis Moroze is acting executive di-
rector of the National Chile Center.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—OCT. 3, 1980—Page 7

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