724.3415/3484: Telegram
The Ambassador in Argentina (Weddell) to the Acting Secretary of State
[Received 8:50 p.m.]
11. Referring to my No. 10, January 8, 6 p.m. As stated therein I have not attempted to make any contact with the League of Nations Commission. However, I learned this morning from an absolutely trustworthy authority that the Argentine Government proposes perhaps this afternoon to inform the Governments of Paraguay and Bolivia that unless they agree to accept the peace formula proposed to them by the League of Nations Commission, a copy of which was forwarded to the Department by air mail on January 5,12 the Argentine Government will wash its hands of the matter. There would seem to be no question of sanctions in the event of refusal by either party. My informant stated further that at least one member of the Commission was not hopeful of satisfactory results and felt that the Commission’s departure from Buenos Aires is only a matter of 4 or 5 days.
I have this afternoon received a visit from the Bolivian Ministers in Uruguay and Brazil, Escalier and Alvesteguí, who informed me that they had seen the Argentine Minister for Foreign Affairs this morning who had told them of the message from “President Roosevelt” urging Argentine efforts for peace. That they were deeply gratified by this expression of interest. I told them the message to which the Minister for Foreign Affairs referred had come from the Department of State and had been transmitted by me to the President of the Republic himself.13
They stated that they feared that in the hands of the Argentine Minister for Foreign Affairs the matter would become involved in a maze of political and economic matters and that what they now hoped my Government might be willing to do would be to urge on the Argentine Government that the cardinal point in the discussions should be the matter of arbitration. I asked if Bolivia had not insisted that arbitration include territory embraced in the Hayes Award.14 They replied that Bolivia wished to arbitrate everything.
They stated further that the formula of the League of Nations Commission was satisfactory to them since it provided for arbitration as the primary question and that to sum up they wanted arbitration [Page 41] and the application of the principles of the Washington agreement of August 3, 1932.15
Repeated to the Secretary at Lima and to Asunción.
- Ante, p. 36.↩
- See telegram No. 5, January 5, 6 p.m., to the Ambassador in Argentina, p. 38.↩
- Foreign Relations, 1878, p. 711.↩
- Foreign Relations, 1932, vol. v, p. 159.↩