Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, 1914, Supplement, The World War
File No. 763.72112/477
The Peruvian Minister (Pezet) to the Secretary of State
Washington, December 12, 1914.
[Received December 14.]
The Minister of Peru presents his compliments to the Honorable Secretary of State and has the honor to enclose copy of a memorandum prepared by his Government in reference to the best means of protecting the foreign commerce of the neutral countries of America from the damages caused by the European war now existing.
[Page 445][Enclosure—Translation]
The Peruvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs to the Peruvian Minister in the United States (Pezet)
Memorandum
The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Peru has taken into special consideration the important memorandum contained in telegram No. 49 which the Minister of Foreign Relations of Chile made known to him to-day, through the Consul General of Chile at Callao relative to measures for lessening the disturbances caused to the countries of the American continent by the activity of the belligerents in the present European conflagration.
The Government of Peru is glad to see the special attention of the Government of Chile enlisted in a matter of such import and trusts that it may be possible to arrive at an agreement that would reduce to a minimum the injuries sustained by the foreign trade and general financial condition of the nations of America since the outbreak of war in Europe.
Foreseeing those grave consequences, the Peruvian Government from the start concerned itself with promoting joint and harmonious action on the part of all those nations, to the end of safeguarding their rights and interests which could not escape being affected by the war. That is what inspired its first general propositions of last August to the American, Argentine, Brazilian, and Chilean chancelleries on the subject of neutrality rules applicable to belligerent ships; it was to the same purpose that action was initiated ten days ago toward prompting an American continental agreement with the object of imposing on belligerents for the first time respect for the inviolability of the American highways of commerce, as a new principle of international law arising out of the needs of a situation created by the devastating clash of such formidable elements of force and destruction.
The fundamental object of the agreement which the Peruvian Government is seeking once clearly determined, there can enter into consideration no possibility that such an agreement may prove injurious to this or that belligerent and meet with its more or less open opposition. Since all that we seek is to prevent violent aggressions from being carried beyond their proper theatre to the enormous distance at which America lies, and since in support thereof a pacific right of self-preservation is invoked, which is obviously more worthy of respect than the right of destruction and annihilation which each belligerent claims against his enemy, there is no occasion to ask which of the combatants will accept it. Let us proclaim, maintain, and enforce the right of the neutral nations, consolidated in the form of a continental agreement, to keep hostilities away from geographical areas not involved in the natural influences and effects of the war, where prevails a normal, valuable, and peaceful trade, which is experiencing disastrous effects to the extent of crisis and ruin, daily aggravated by the continuance of such a state of things. The territorial waters fiction and, to a certain degree, the very right of asylum for ships of the belligerent countries in neutral harbors, have as their true foundation the safeguarding of moral and physical interests whose defense could not be subordinated to the right of aggression, if it may be so called, of one belligerent against the other. Respect of territorial waters and of vessels accorded asylum was enforced without ascertaining who might complain against those principles being put in practice; it was enough to know that they were the result of justified necessity, and the principles have grown to the estate of a right and of a right that is compulsory.
The new doctrine advanced by the Peruvian Government is but the broadening of that principle at the behest of modern necessities; since the progress in naval construction, the development of international commerce, and the multiplication of colonies beyond the seas have made it possible to carry war without great effort into regions which formerly found in their remoteness assurance against the action of war.
To-day the three-mile maritime zone has proved extremely scanty and inadequate to shield neutral states from the immense injuries wrought by sea forays and naval battles on their coasts; therefore the protected zone of neutral territory and commerce must be enlarged. New rights are born of the changes worked by time. In the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 not a single naval battle was fought; less than a half century thereafter, naval engagements [Page 446] have taken place on the American coasts of greater importance and of earlier date than on the coasts of the belligerents themselves.
But even if it were necessary, in this movement for the protection of neutral interests, to take into account and consideration the convenience of the belligerents, there does not seem to be any likelihood of well-grounded opposition from the British Government. The inviolability of the highways of American commerce within a certain area around the continent would, to a certain extent, free the traffic between Europe and America. In the present phase of the European war this freedom would be particularly to the advantage of Great Britain and France, since it is well known that, all access to the German coast being prevented, that Empire cannot carry on an export or import trade. The German vessels sheltered in a good many American ports, while they would be freed from the menace of British cruisers on these coasts, would be unable to return to their own country, with or without cargo, as they could never cross the seas that wash the German ports. The measure suggested by the Peruvian Government is not open to criticism on the ground of its slight bearing on commercial intercourse between Europe and America, because the widening of the neutral zone would reduce the war risk in even greater proportion; since, that risk being confined to European seas, the maritime preponderance of one of the belligerents would mean commercial freedom to its merchant vessels. Finally, the further extension of the neutral zone does not make supervision much more difficult, because, besides the possibility of confining such supervision to the commercial lanes, which for greater safety might be marked out with considerable precision, there is no doubt that the belligerents, aware that the agreement embraced all the countries of America, would find it so strong that they would not seek deliberately to violate it.
The suggested measure of restriction upon the coaling of belligerent vessels in neutral ports would not achieve the desired result. A belligerent vessel, obliged to make a coasting voyage and to enter a port of each country along the way to replenish its coal supply, would be offered greater opportunities of meeting with merchant vessels of the other belligerent country, and so would do greater harm to commerce. Furthermore, there would be set up a rule of compulsory pro rata in the supplying of coal which might prove detrimental to the country required to furnish it; for instance, it would be inconvenient to Peru to have to deliver coal at Callao (where the stock of that fuel has been reduced owing to the difficulty of transportation caused by the war) to a belligerent vessel which in Chile was allowed to take just enough to bring it to the Peruvian coast; and the difficulty would perhaps be worse in Guayaquil, if the vessel had to proceed northward. On the other hand, while the restriction might have some effect in lessening the warlike activities of ships cruising without their own colliers, from the point of view of really eliminating danger to commerce on the American coasts, which is the end to be sought, it would be unproductive of results. It would be ineffective in the case of squadrons which, like those already reported to be sailing for South America, are accompanied by vessels that supply them with fuel. Equally nugatory would be the prohibition upon coaling merchant vessels guilty of violations of neutrality, because they could not be prevented from taking coal from other vessels of the same or some other nationality.
The Government of Peru has, for the first time, obtained knowledge of the action taken by the Brazilian Chancellery for the delimitation of a neutral zone in the Atlantic Ocean. In principle, that initiative, of which no notification was received here, coincides fundamentally with that taken by the Peruvian Government and deserves the most earnest support. It needs only to be generalized, so as to comprise also the American coasts of the Pacific, and to be broadened as to the bases for defining the zone, which must not be left to the convenience of any of the belligerents, but must be established in the light of the necessity of enlarging the rights of the neutrals.
Peru, for her own part, without obstinately insisting upon any particular formula, places in the service of the cause she has espoused all her quota of good will to facilitate an agreement of all the nations of America in a matter that is of vital importance to them and that can only be happily settled in a broad spirit of continental solidarity.
Lima , November 17, 1914.