vault backup: 2026-09-21 18:07:25

10 - PEOPLE/(T-Z)/Vernon Walters.md

@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ After the war, Walters served as aide to [[W. Averell Harriman]] at Marshall Pla
 
 Walters returned to Brazil on October 10, 1962, designated as US Military Attaché at the Embassy in [[Rio de Janeiro]] under Ambassador [[Lincoln Gordon]], at Gordon's specific recommendation. His unique asset was his long-standing personal friendship with the Brazilian generals who would lead the 1964 coup, particularly [[General Humberto Castelo Branco]], who by 1964 had risen to Army Chief of Staff and would become the coup's first military president.[^5]
 
-The documentary record of Walters's pre-coup intelligence work opens in the NSA Electronic Briefing Book No. 465, "Brazil Marks 50th Anniversary of Military Coup," compiled by [[James G. Hershberg]] and [[Peter Kornbluh]] of the [[National Security Archive]]. Document 1 of that collection, a White House transcript from July 30, 1962, records the Kennedy administration's decision to appoint Walters specifically to strengthen contacts with Brazilian military leadership.[^6]
+The documentary record of Walters's pre-coup intelligence work opens in the NSA Electronic Briefing Book No. 465, "Brazil Marks 50th Anniversary of Military Coup," compiled by [[James G. Hershberg]] and [[Peter Kornbluh]] of the [[National Security Archive]]. Document 1 of that collection, a [[White House]] transcript from July 30, 1962, records the Kennedy administration's decision to appoint Walters specifically to strengthen contacts with Brazilian military leadership.[^6]
 
 On the evening of March 13, 1964, Walters was present at Castelo Branco's residence in Rio when they watched together on television [[President Goulart]]'s inflammatory speech at a military rally. It was one of the moments at which Castelo Branco made political remarks to Walters, confirming the gravity of the officers' opposition to Goulart's direction.[^7]
 
@@ -68,11 +68,17 @@ As DDCI, Walters was not limited to the Watergate crisis. In mid-February 1974,
 
 Three weeks after the Walters-Pinochet meeting, Contreras traveled to [[CIA]] headquarters at [[Langley]] for briefings on intelligence service organization. Contreras met with Walters twice in Washington, in 1974 and 1975, during the period when Walters was second-in-command at the Agency. In mid-1975, the CIA briefly placed Contreras on its payroll as a paid asset. DINA subsequently became the primary instrument of the Pinochet regime's repression, responsible for torture centers, extrajudicial executions, forced disappearances, and international terrorism including the [[Letelier assassination]] in Washington in 1976.[^18]
 
+On Saturday, July 5, 1975, Walters met Contreras secretly at a CIA office at [[Fort Myer]]. He reported that Contreras asked how Chile might obtain American arms despite the congressional ban: "Wonder if there is any way they could get it indirectly via [[Spain]], [[Brazil]], or the Republic of Korea." They lunched at Langley on August 25. Ambassador [[David Popper]] had advised that publicity "could be counterproductive" but that "it would be worthwhile if General Walters could give Contreras a little time." Walters told the FBI in 1979 that "part of his function as deputy director of the CIA was to coordinate and conduct foreign liaison," and that he had received Contreras in that capacity. Contreras said from prison in 1999 that Walters had proposed placing CIA officers inside DINA and hiring five retired senators as lobbyists for Chile at two million dollars a year.[^19]
+
+In June 1976 Walters went to [[Paraguay]] to remove the CIA station chief, who had deceived Ambassador [[George Landau]], and to ask the government of General [[Alfredo Stroessner]] not to kill a Paraguayan agent of the CIA who had been arrested and tortured. He was received by Stroessner's aide [[Conrado Pappalardo]] and left in the last week of June with the agent still in prison. In July Pappalardo asked Landau for American visas in false Paraguayan passports for two Chilean officers, saying that they were to contact Walters in Washington. Landau told Walters that the request appeared to be "the quid pro quo that Paraguay was demanding in exchange for sparing the CIA agent's life," issued the visas, and sent photographs of the passports to Walters through the State Department's "Roger Channel" on July 28. Walters was on leave in [[Florida]] before retirement, and the cable went to Director [[George H.W. Bush|George Bush]]. On August 4 Walters replied that he had made no arrangement with Pappalardo, that he and Bush "had agreed that the agency wanted nothing to do with the DINA matter," and that the request was "highly irregular" and "a strange way of doing business." Two DINA captains using the same false names reached Washington on August 22 and had the Chilean embassy telephone Walters's office at Langley. The CIA did not tell the prosecutor of the [[Orlando Letelier|Letelier]] murder, [[Eugene Propper]], of any of this when it began sending him files that fall.[^20]
+
+As ambassador at large for President [[Ronald Reagan]], Walters visited Pinochet in February 1981. "We spoke as old friends," he reported. "He offered full support and said he would do anything we wanted to help us in the Salvadoran situation." He told a congressional committee that the Letelier bombing had been "a mistake," like [[Napoleon]]'s execution of the Duke of Enghien: "You can't rub their noses in it forever."[^19]
+
 ### Later Career
 
 After retiring from the CIA and from active military service in 1976, Walters published his memoir, "Silent Missions" (Doubleday, 1978), covering his career through Watergate.
 
-Under President [[Ronald Reagan]], Walters served as Ambassador-at-Large from 1981 to 1985, during which he visited 108 countries. He served as US Ambassador to the [[United Nations]] from May 22, 1985 to March 15, 1989, becoming the first American UN delegate to address the General Assembly in Russian. He served as US Ambassador to West Germany from April 24, 1989 to October 3, 1990, and remained as Ambassador to unified Germany from October 3, 1990 to August 18, 1991, spanning the period of German reunification.
+Under President Ronald Reagan, Walters served as Ambassador-at-Large from 1981 to 1985, during which he visited 108 countries. He served as US Ambassador to the [[United Nations]] from May 22, 1985 to March 15, 1989, becoming the first American UN delegate to address the General Assembly in Russian. He served as US Ambassador to West Germany from April 24, 1989 to October 3, 1990, and remained as Ambassador to unified Germany from October 3, 1990 to August 18, 1991, spanning the period of German reunification.
 
 ### Footnotes
 
@@ -94,3 +100,5 @@ Under President [[Ronald Reagan]], Walters served as Ambassador-at-Large from 19
 [^16]: CIA FOIA, Memorandum for Deputy Director Walters from Richard Helms, June 28, 1972, Watergate Affair (CIA-RDP75B00380R000100110051-7); Judicial Watch, "CIA Inspector General's Watergate History Report" (declassified 2014), citing Walters-Gray meeting of July 12, 1972.
 [^17]: National Security Archive, CIA Cable, "Personal to Dr. Henry A. Kissinger [from CIA Deputy Director Vernon Walters on Secret Meeting with Pinochet]," Secret, February 14, 1974 (Document 5 in NSAEBB series on DINA).
 [^18]: National Security Archive, "The Pinochet Regime Declassified: DINA," June 2024; Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, "Staff Report on Covert Action in Chile, 1963-1973," December 18, 1975 (released by Church Committee); Contreras CIA payroll: CIA Inspector General report on DINA relationship, released 2023.
+[^19]: Kornbluh, Peter. *The Pinochet File: A Declassified Dossier on Atrocity and Accountability*. New Press, 2003, pp. 213-215, 409-410, and note 34 at p. 522.
+[^20]: Dinges, John, and Saul Landau. *Assassination on Embassy Row*. McGraw-Hill, 1980, pp. 200-201, 242-243, 309-311, 383-384.