Pinochet File: A Declassified Dossier on Atrocity and Accountability

The newly declassified documents that reveal the startling facts behind US collusion with the notorious Chilean dictator. The October 1998 arrest of General Augusto Pinochet in Great Britain, and the ongoing saga of efforts to prosecute him in Chile, have renewed world awareness of the horrible crimes against humanity committed during his regime. The Pinochet case has also raised many questions about the US role in bringing him to power and supporting his notorious dictatorship. For decades, the CIA, the Pentagon, and other intelligence agencies have guarded state secrets concerning this shameful era. Now, thanks to the efforts of the National Security Archive, hundreds of US government records that reveal this important and shocking story have been declassified. The Pinochet File reproduces many of the key and formerly secret records of atrocity and complicity that are at the heart of the international campaign to hold this Chilean general legally accountable for murder, torture, and terrorism. Peter Kornbluh's sharp, investigative narrative puts the documents in precise historical context, exposing the CIA's continuing efforts to cover up this history, and filling in the gaps created by documents that the agency continues to withhold. The Pinochet Filecontains the most comprehensive chronology ever published on US involvement in Chile and the pursuit of justice against General Pinochet.

Author Biography: Peter Kornbluh is the director of the National Security Archive's Chile Documentation Project and the editor of Bay of Pigs Declassified (The New Press). The National Security Archive is a nonprofit research library of declassified USGovernment documentation in Washington, DC. Located at George Washington University, the Archive obtains and disseminates formerly secret records that are indispensable to informed public debate.