CAPSULE COMMENTARY: “Our Governments Black Box”

“In last Sunday’s edition of the Washington Post, Peter Kornbluh, senior analyst at the National Security Archive, details the U.S. government’s refusal to disclose its full role in the violent overthrow of Chilean president Salvador Allende and the murder of American journalist Charles Horman. The CIA in particular refuses to open its files on the subject, despite a presidential directive to do so. (Doesn’t that make the CIA ultimately in charge?) Kornbluh pointedly observes: “But while Chileans are learning about their dark history from the U.S. documents, American citizens are learning almost nothing about their own government’s actions.”