NEW YORK—Somewhere in the shadows of federal bureaucracy, there was an issue pertaining to the drinking habits of Augusto Pinochet.
The National Security Archive, an advocate for open government, had for years tried to gain access to intelligence files about the Chilean dictator, his human rights abuses and his ties to the United States. In 2003, the Defense Intelligence Agency declassified documents that included a biographical sketch of Pinochet assembled in 1975, two years after he seized power. Parts of the sketch had been blacked out, “redacted,” for national security. The archive had no trouble discovering that the missing information included Pinochet’s liking for scotch and pisco sours.
