Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1944, The American Republics, Volume VII

816.00/1238b: Telegram

The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Guatemala ( Long )⁴

Washington , April 3, 1944—5 p.m.

200. A serious revolutionary movement appears to have broken out in El Salvador. Although our information is only preliminary, it does not indicate that there are any Nazi influences involved or that other influences hostile to continental security are in any way concerned. Under these conditions, and in the absence of any contrary information, the Department proposes, in the event that the revolution is successful, to apply standard policy in the matter of recognition, subject, of course, to inter-American consultation and exchange of information as provided in Resolution XXII of the Montevideo Committee.⁵

The above is for your information only at the present stage. However, in the event the matter is brought up by the Government to which you are accredited, you should discreetly discourage any attempt to involve the fate of the Martínez administration with the security of the hemisphere.

The Department’s information indicates that the struggle now going on in El Salvador is purely internal. The Department is confident that in view of the nonintervention pacts to which all the American Republics are parties it will be kept so.

The Department believes that the principles set forth above are fully understood and accepted by the Government to which you are accredited and that they will be adhered to spontaneously, so that it will not be necessary for you to discuss these principles. The Department, however, gives you discretionary authority to place its views before the Government to which you are accredited in the event you have well-founded reason to believe that that Goverment is considering a contrary policy.

Hull

4. Repeated as telegrams Nos. 155 to Nicaragua and 86 to Honduras.
5. For text of Resolution XXII of the Emergency Advisory Committee for Political Defense, see telegram from the Chairman of the Committee, December 24, 1943, Foreign Relations, 1943, vol. v, p. 34; also printed in Emergency Advisory Committee for Political Defense, Second Annual Report, July 15, 1943–October 15, 1944 (Montevideo, 1944), p. 79. For correspondence regarding this Committee, see ante, pp. 1 ff.