611.3231/1176: Telegram
The Chargé in Brazil ( Scotten ) to the Secretary of State
[Received 1:35 p.m.]
67. For the Under Secretary. In a conversation with the Minister for Foreign Affairs29 last night the latter informed me of the receipt by the President of a letter from Aranha reporting a conversation with Mr. Welles and stating that the latter had taken a firm stand and had called Aranha’s attention to the preferential treatment given by Argentina to the British, although Great Britain did not accord to Argentina the same favorable treatment which the United States extended to Brazil and that Mr. Welles felt that on account of the political relations between the United States and Brazil the latter should be willing to extend better treatment to the United States than is accorded at present. The letter mentioned above is probably the one referred to in the Department’s 36.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs added that he considered Mr. Welles to be “absolutely right” in his stand and that just before the Minister of Finance departed he, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, had again endeavored to impress upon him that because of the political relations between the two countries he should be willing to waive the immediate material benefits which Brazil derived from the present arrangement with Germany. He added that Souza Costa had replied that the political side of the question did not interest him and that he was only interested in the material side. He then added that he was convinced that the attitude of the Minister of Finance in the forthcoming negotiations in Washington would depend largely upon the degree of firmness with which he was treated by the State Department. He said that he was convinced Souza Costa would endeavor in every way to secure our consent to a renewal of the agreement with Germany with possibly some slight concessions to us. He felt that if our stand was firm, however, Brazil would do away with this agreement.
- Mario de Pimentel Brandão, Acting Minister for Foreign Affairs.↩