724.34119/216: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Argentina (Weddell)
136. For Gibson. Your 230, October 4, 11 p.m., and 232, October 5, 7 p.m. In view of the situation confronting the Conference, we are in agreement with you that this proposal, and the procedure suggested for putting it before the Conference and before the Governments of Bolivia and Paraguay, is reasonable and we will be prepared to support it at Asunción and La Paz.
We assume that the proposal, as outlined in your telegrams under reference, is approved by all the mediatory delegations.
With reference to the third paragraph of your 232, in which you state that as regards the territorial question the proposal is based on the concessions which each party has indicated in conversations [Page 157] it would be prepared to make in the final analysis, it would seem from paragraph 6 of your 194, September 2, 9 p.m., that the proposal goes a little beyond anything which Elío has indicated that he would be prepared to accept. We should be glad to know whether the Bolivians have indicated that they would be prepared to abandon the request for an arbitral zone east of meridian 59 degrees west of Greenwich and between the latitudes of Fort Olimpo and Bahia Negra, which they were apparently insisting upon as reported in Dawson’s 194.94