Office of the Historian

The Acting Secretary of State to the Argentine Chargé1

Department of State,
Washington, August 10, 1910.

My Dear Mr. Chargé d’Affaires: Referring to previous correspondence in regard to the tripartite mediation between Ecuadoi and Peru, I beg to inclose herewith, for your confidential information, a paraphrase of a telegram received on the 6th instant from Mr. Fox, our minister to Quito, reporting discouraging comments appearing in the Government newspapers in regard to the mediation. The facts reported in this telegram, together with the situation already known to the mediating powers, render it desirable, in the opinion of the department, that further joint representations be made at Quito to make clear the views of the mediating Governments as to the present attitude of the Ecuadorian Government in regard to the mediation. I am to-day sending Mr. Fox a telegram, of which I inclose a paraphrase, directing him, when his Argentine and Brazilian colleagues shall have been authorized to do likewise, to make clear to the Government of Ecuador that its failure to show a conciliatory disposition and to take the steps recommended, which provide honorable means to a friendly adjustment of its difficulties with Peru, can only be regarded by this Government as an evidence of (1) a disinclination to reach a peaceful and honorable solution of the boundary difficulty or (2) lack of confidence in the mediating powers.

I beg you to be good enough to communicate to your Government the views of the department on this matter and its suggestion that similar instructions be sent to your representative at Quito.

I have seen Mr. Freyre and asked him to explain to the Peruvian minister the situation as we find it to-day. The mere fact that the Government of Ecuador demurs to the reference to the Spanish award and raises the question of Colombian inclusion, which seems at this date both premature and impracticable, is undoubtedly well understood at Lima, and I explained to Mr. Freyre that until a formal reply comes to us through Mr. Arizaga, to whom the draft protocol was handed, we could scarcely consider any official rejoinder due Ecuador from us.

I am, etc.,

Huntington Wilson.
  1. Mutatis mutandis to the Brazilian chargé.↩