Hostile Intent: U.S. Covert Operations in Chile, 1964-1974

In the choice of title for this book, Gustafson (Centre for Intelligence and Security Studies, Brunel U., UK) rather cleverly manages to sum up the entire thesis for his review of US covert activity in Chile in the decade leading up to the violent military overthrow of socialist President Salvador Allende on September 11, 1973. He doesn't deny the hostility of the US government towards the Allende government but nevertheless argues that US covert activities that may have been intended in the long run to undermine the regime did not play the central role in the Chilean upheavals of the period or in the coup of General Augusto Pinochet. Lest this be seen as a thorough vindication of the CIA's actions at the time, Gustafson does find many missteps on the part of the Agency, much of which he blames on the failure to subject the CIA to congressional oversight, thus allowing an overweening executive to make missteps not in the interests of the United States. Distributed in the US by Books International. Annotation c2008 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)