816.01/356: Telegram
The Minister in Nicaragua (Lane) to the Acting Secretary of State
[Received 10:37 p.m.]
9. Department’s 4, January 12, 5 p.m., does not appear to have been filed until 11:09 last night and was consequently not received here until this morning.
The President whom I left just before noon told me that the procedure contemplated is as follows:
- 1.
- Senator Sacasa was to leave for San Salvador about noon (have ascertained from Pan American Airways that he actually did leave). Senator is to thank General Martínez for kindness to Mrs. Sacasa on her recent trip and to say that he is also proceeding to Guatemala and Honduras to confer with respective Presidents with a view to obtaining closer cooperation among Central American states having in mind revision of general treaty of 1923 and that he will confer further General Martínez on his return trip. (Protocol to be signed is not to be shown to anybody in El Salvador until it has been signed by Presidents of Guatemala and Honduras).
- 3.
- [sic] Senator is to proceed from San Salvador to Guatemala tomorrow morning by plane and submit unsigned copy of protocol to President Ubico (translation of text as signed by President Sacasa yesterday has been transmitted in my 8, January 13, 1 p.m.). If Ubico approves the text, signed original is then to be offered him for his signature (since seeing the President he has sent me word that President Ubico has telegraphed he will be glad to receive the Senator tomorrow morning).
- 4.
- If signed in Guatemala similar procedure is then to be followed in Tegucigalpa, San Salvador and San José in that order.
As the procedure outlined does not envisage the discussion of the question at issue with President Martínez until Senator Sacasa has interviewed Presidents Ubico and Carías it would seem that the suggestion made in the Department’s telegram under acknowledgment is to be followed. President Sacasa told me, however, that he is fully alive to the danger of the agreement being frustrated because of friction between President Ubico and General Martínez and that he accordingly had instructed his cousin to deal with each in the most tactful manner so as to avoid injuring their susceptibilities.
The President suggested that it would be helpful if our representatives in Guatemala exert informal good offices with the respective Governments explaining our position in order to facilitate the mission of Senator Sacasa. I told him I would transmit his suggestion to the Department.
In regard to my inquiry as to whether it would be legally possible for the five “Presidents of the Republics of Central America” to sign, as such, an agreement prior to the recognition of General Martínez by Nicaragua, Guatemala and Honduras, the President said that the protocol is intended to be a private arrangement between the five.