Brazil Conspired with U.S. to Overthrow Allende (Updated) Brazilian General Accused U.S. of Asking Brazil to "do its dirty work"

Washington, DC. - In December 1971, President Richard Nixon and Brazilian President Emilio Garrastazu Medici discussed Brazil's role in efforts to overthrow the elected government of Salvador Allende in Chile, formerly Top Secret records posted by the National Security Archive today reveal. According to a declassified memorandum of conversation, Nixon asked Medici whether the Chilean military was capable of overthrowing Allende. "He felt that they were," Medici replied, "and made clear that Brazil was working toward this end."

The document was the subject of a story in today's New York Times ["Memos Show Nixon's Bid to Enlist Brazil in a Coup" - http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/17/world/americas/17chile.html?_r=1&ref=world ]

According to the Top Secret "memcon" of the December 9, 1971, Oval Office meeting, Nixon offered his approval and support for Brazil's intervention in Chile. "The President said that it was very important that Brazil and the United States work closely in this field. We could not take direction but if the Brazilians felt that there was something we could do to be helpful in this area, he would like President Medici to let him know. If money were required or other discreet aid, we might be able to make it available," Nixon stated. "This should be held in the greatest confidence."

The U.S. and Brazil, Nixon told Medici, "must try and prevent new Allendes and Castros and try where possible to reverse these trends."

During the same meeting, President Medici asked Nixon if "we" should be supporting Cuban exiles who "had forces and could overthrow Castro's regime." Nixon responded that "we should, as long as we did not push them into doing something that we could not support, and as long as our hand did not appear."

The documents were declassified in July as part of the State Department's Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS) series.

The memcon records Nixon telling Medici that he "hoped we could cooperate closely, as there were many things that Brazil as a South American country could do that the U.S. could not." Indeed, the documentation reveals that Nixon believed that a special relationship with Brazil was so important that he proposed a secret back-channel between the two presidents "as a means of communicating directly outside of normal diplomatic channels." Médici named his private advisor and foreign minister Gibson Barbosa as his back-channel representative, but told Nixon that for "extremely private and delicate matters" Brazil would use Col. Manso Netto. Nixon named Kissinger as his representative for the special back channel.

Communications between Nixon and Medici using the special back-channel remain secret.

Peter Kornbluh, who directs the National Security Archive's Chile and Brazil projects, noted that "a hidden chapter of collaborative intervention to overthrow the government of Chile" was now emerging from the declassified documentation. "Brazil's archives are the missing link," he said, calling on President Ignacio Lula da Silva to open Brazil's military records on the past. "The full history of intervention in South America in the 1970s cannot be told without access to Brazilian documents."

http://www.nsarchive.org