710.Consultation (3)A/431: Telegram
The Ambassador in Uruguay (Dawson) to the Secretary of State
[Received 8:37 p.m.]
977. For Duggan from Spaeth. The Argentine member has requested the Secretary General69 to make available certain of the documents referred to in Embassy’s cable No. 948 of November 5. The Secretary General has advised the Argentine member that there is to be no distribution of documents until the subcommittee, to which reference is made in the above-mentioned cable, has reported.
The Brazilian and the Venezuelan members of the subcommittee have suggested provisionally a formula which would recite the nature of the documents received, stress that they were given the delegations in strict confidence by Cabinet Ministers, military and law enforcing officials of countries which have either declared war or broken relations with the Axis, and conclude that the documents can therefore be of interest and should be made available only to members of the Committee who are competent to act on behalf of countries which have declared that they are the victims of Axis military or political aggression by adopting measures pursuant to the resolutions agreed upon at Rio de Janeiro. My colleagues suggest that upon approval of this or a similar formula the Committee simply notify the Pan American Union of its decision without requesting any action. They recognize that such a notification could eventually raise the membership [Page 32] issue in the Union but are of the opinion that Argentina will not choose to do so. It is also their opinion that if the member from Chile does not agree to the formula, the Committee should act by majority of five.
Pending instructions I am postponing formal subcommittee action but as it will be difficult to delay much longer without taking a position, it is important that I receive the Department’s views at an early date.
During the past 2 weeks statements by Argentine officials and additional appointments of pro-Nazis to high Government posts have strengthened the opinion of the majority of the Committee as expressed in the above-mentioned cable. [Spaeth.]
- José L. Chouhy Terra.↩