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

810.20 Defense/12–2044

The Ambassador in the Dominican Republic ( Briggs ) to the Secretary of State

[Extract]

No. 589

Ciudad Trujillo , December 20, 1944.
[Received December 27.]

Sir: …

1. Staff conversations, wherever held, may increase (rather than decrease) the estimate by a given country of its alleged military requirements. Without endeavoring to argue against the validity of the general objectives recently outlined by the War Department (standardization of equipment, development of good will as between general staffs, information relative to the plans and sympathies of a given country, et cetera), it seems not improbable that the willingness of a given country to enter into an agreement for exclusive supply by the United States may be determined by such commitments as our Government is in a position to make relative to the foreign government’s interpretation of the words “adequate requirements”. That is, I foresee that at some stage in the discussion, the question will arise of our willingness to furnish—not what our military experts may estimate to be the minimum needs of a given country—but what the other American Republic concerned may estimate. Unless we are then prepared to make a commitment satisfactory to the foreign government, I should doubt the latter’s acceptance (except perhaps on a short-time basis) of an exclusive supply agreement with the United States.

2. I assume that it is taken for granted that within a short time after the termination of actual hostilities there will be a substantial amount of military equipment, munitions, matériel, et cetera, in surplus supply, not only of United States manufacture but also manufactured by other of the United Nations, especially Great Britain, Russia, and France, and perhaps also some of the neutrals. It would seem therefore that as a prerequisite to staff conversations looking toward exclusive supply by the United States, it would be necessary to reach an understanding on the policy level with the governments of the other principal arms manufacturing countries to abstain from offering arms in this hemisphere. In the absence of such a commitment, and having in mind the wartime expansion of the military establishments of many of the American Republics, I do not see how there can fail to develop a traffic in arms far beyond anything previously known, and also beyond what in terms of United States policy we might be prepared to endorse.

To summarize the two foregoing points, it would be my expectation that the holding of staff conversations may disclose a much larger “estimate of requirements” on the part of the American Republics than has hitherto been discernible, and that unless we are prepared to accept their criteria and to obligate our government to meet their requirements, there may be scant prospect of negotiating the exclusive supply agreements sought. If that is the case, it would seem prudent to explore in advance of staff conversations the possibility of persuading our principal allies not to enter the New World arms market—either now (when probably few are in a position to do so), or later (in order to satisfy appetites whetted by the conversations themselves).

3. Turning to military missions, I question the accuracy of the War Department’s statement that the presence of a United States mission is “an essential part of the machinery required to re-orient the military thought of Latin America from European influence to the democratic lines of our military doctrine.” Democratic principles must germinate in the people themselves, and be responsive to their own needs both spiritually and materially. They cannot be imposed from above or without, and hence the connection between a United States military mission and the development of democratic principles in a given foreign country, would appear to be somewhat remote.

4. Furthermore it will frankly be recognized that the governments of a number of the other American Republics are at present military dictatorships, whose leaders have shown little interest in the development of individual liberty and democracy; on the contrary they regard their military establishments as the instruments by which they maintain themselves in power—not infrequently without the consent of the governed. The effect therefore of increasing the efficiency of a dictator’s army might primarily be to give greater security to the dictator in question, permitting him to add to the chains whereby the citizens of that country are already shackled. This does not appear to me to be an objective to which our Government would wish to lend itself, and moreover I question whether it would represent “encouragement of all those conditions … favorable to the development by men and women everywhere of the institutions of a free and democratic way of life …”, as set forth by the Secretary in his recent testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee as constituting one of the major objectives of our foreign policy.⁵⁸

5. Our future relations with the other American Republics are going to be based, it seems to me, upon their interpretation both of our inter-American policy and our general world policy; on their belief in the Tightness of the objectives of the United States, which may in turn depend largely upon the sum total of our relationship in the field of economic matters, individual commercial dealings, cultural activities, et cetera, as well as on their estimate of the utilization of our vast power potential. Above all, good relations are going to be based on respect, and in the measure in which we apply to the future the principles agreed upon during the past dozen years of our association, so will our New World relationship wither—or prosper.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Respectfully yours,

Ellis O. Briggs

58. See the Department’s press release, December 21, Department of State Bulletin, December 24, 1944, p. 834.