File No. 944/139.

Memorandum of a conversation held by the Assistant Secretary of State with the Minister of Chile.

Mr. Cruz, Minister of Chile, called at eleven o’clock by appointment. He said that our Chargé d’Affaires at Santiago had written to the Foreign Office saying that besides taking custody of the archives of the Peruvian Legation, which has been withdrawn, this Government has been requested by Peru to leave him to look after the interests of Peruvians in Chile, and he was directed to inquire whether this was agreeable to Chile. He handed me a paraphrase of his instruction, which I read and found similar to Chargé Pierrepont’s telegram.

After reading it very slowly and reflecting a while, I said that this surprised me very much; that it looked as if the Minister for Foreign Affairs did not fully understand what we had acquiesced in Peru’s request to do; that it was nothing like mediation, a pressing of claims or an advocacy of anything; that it was simply the habitual arrangement so common to diplomacy, i. e. allowing one’s representative to be an impartial channel of communication. I said never, in all my reading, had I heard of a case of any government refusing to lend such offices or of any case where the government at the capital from which a legation had been withdrawn had refused to acquiesce in such an arrangement.

I said the request of Chile was a very difficult one and I could not answer offhand but must lay the matter before the Secretary in order that he might give it full consideration, after which I would let the Minister know (to-morrow or so) whether the Secretary could receive him and discuss it.

I said that, speaking personally, it seemed to me that Chile’s refusal to allow Peru this very conventional and usual privilege, sanctioned by the whole history of diplomacy, would appear an [Page 1190] exceedingly hostile act, and that, for our part, to refuse Peru would place us, not in a position of impartiality, but, in view of the unusualness of such a refusal, in a position of distinct hostility to Peru.

The Minister’s tone was one of intense animosity toward Peru, which he sought to blame for unjustifiably withdrawing the Legation. He said that although the Chilean Government might understand, the Chilean people would certainly misinterpret our granting Peru’s request into an effort at mediation. He said that the Chilean people all remembered Mr. Blaine’s effort at mediation during the war which gave rise to this Tacna-Arica dispute; that they all remembered the names of Trescot and Hurlbut, and that they would think that the United States was again intervening. He said this in a very considerate and pleasant way and said that his whole work in Washington had been in the effort to create the most friendly relations between Chile and the United States, and he hoped that anything that might be misunderstood by the Chilean people could be avoided.

I said I well remembered the history of our attempted mediation during the war and that I thought it the most unsatisfactory page of our diplomacy because it had been ineffective. I added dryly, that if we had not intervened at that time history showed clearly that France or Great Britain would have done so, and effectively.

I expressed astonishment that the Chilean public should be ready to misunderstand so customary a diplomatic situation as one legation naming good offices impartially on behalf of a country and its citizens when not represented by their own legation, and I brought out the point that we were requested to take action entirely at variance with all diplomatic precedent simply because the Chilean public did not understand that the action was nothing like mediation. I added that, speaking personally, I feared that if his Government felt so strongly they would have to put us in a position to say that we had been entirely willing but that the Chilean Government had categorically refused to agree. He deprecated such an idea and intimated that their whole desire was that we should say to Peru that we had reason to believe that our lending the Legation in the manner desired would be misunderstood and would not be entirely agreeable to Chile.