Meanwhile, Down in Chile...

LAST week's Anderson revelations were an expose fancier's delight: big business pressure on the Administration combined with foreign intrigue. The columnist published two articles and gave fellow newsmen 80 pages of confidential documents said to be from ITT files. The material portrays ITT staff members as working desperately to prevent Presidentelect Salvador Allende of Chile from taking office in 1970. If taken at face value--a considerable if--the memoranda also indicate a degree of cooperation from some U.S. officials and a sympathetic Richard Nixon.

Both the State Department and ITT denied any attempt to keep Allende out of office. Neither, however, challenged the authenticity of the documents. Certainly the company had a motive for wishing the Marxist Allende gone: it has communications and hotel interests in Chile. Anderson charged that ITT was willing to spend millions to block Allende and even considered fomenting a coup.

The hope of the anti-Allende forces was explained in a memo said to have been sent to Robert Berrellez by Harold Hendrix, former newsmen who became public relations officials for ITT. The suggestion was that "massive unemployment and unrest might produce enough violence to force the military to move."

The economic pressure that could be applied was outlined in a note from ITT Senior Vice President Edward J. Gerrity Jr. to Chairman Harold S. Geneen, although Gerrity cautioned that "I do not necessarily agree" with the tactics. They included: "1) Banks should not renew credits or should delay in doing so. 2) Companies should drag their feet in sending money, in making deliveries, in shipping spare parts, etc. 3) Savings and loan companies there are in trouble. If pressure were applied, they would have to shut their doors." The document then mentions that a "visitor," whom Anderson identifies as William V. Broe of the CIA, had said that money was no problem.

According to the papers, some preliminary steps to encourage a coup were actually taken, though it was not clear by whom. One paper has ITT Vice President William Merriam advising ITT Director John McCone, who once headed the CIA: "Today I had lunch with our contact at the McLean agency [Anderson translates this as the CIA, whose headquarters are at McLean, Va.], and I summarize for you the results of our conversation. Approaches continue to be made to select members of the Armed Forces in an attempt to have them lead some sort of uprising--no success to date."

A memo bearing Hendrix's name is more specific: "It is a fact that word was passed to Viaux [former Chilean Brigadier General Roberto Viaux, a political foe of Allende] from Washington to hold back last week. It was felt that he was not adequately prepared, his timing was off, and he should cool it for a later unspecified date."

The material depicts President Nixon as determined to try to stop Allende. A paper dated Sept. 17, 1970, carrying the names of Hendrix and Berrellez, says: "Late Tuesday night Ambassador Edward Kerry finally received a message from the State Department giving him the green light to move in the name of President Nixon. The message gave him maximum authority to do all possible--short of a Dominican Republic-type action--to keep Allende from taking power." Korry, then the U.S. ambassador in Santiago, is described in another memo as "a male Martha Mitchell" who often made undiplomatic remarks to newsmen. ITT's contacts with the White House allegedly included a telephone call from ITT's J.D. Neal to Henry Kissinger's office. In it, a Kissinger aide was told that "Mr. Geneen is willing to come to Washington to discuss ITT's interest and that we are prepared to assist financially in sums up to seven figures."

If there was an ITT-CIA plot, as Anderson claims, it failed to produce a coup. The head of Chile's army, Rene Schneider, was assassinated, and Viaux was imprisoned for taking part in the murder conspiracy. This killing could have been an attempt to incite a military uprising; there has been no evidence whatever that the U.S. was involved, or would have wanted to be, in so crude and brutal an enterprise. Once in power, Allende quickly took control of ITT's telephone company, though other ITT enterprises remained independent. Given big play in the Chilean press, the Anderson story has been a boon to Allende as he faces rising protests about economic conditions. Last week pro-government demonstrators in Santiago cited the Anderson charges in assailing "North American imperialists."

The company argued last week that it "has been, and continues to be, a good corporate citizen in Chile." The State Department refused to comment on details of the revelations but declared that "any ideas of thwarting the Chilean constitutional process following and before the election of 1970 were firmly rejected by this Administration." That hardly clears the air. A Senate investigation voted last week by William Fulbright's Foreign Relations Committee may do better.

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