835.00/2618: Telegram
The Ambassador in Argentina (Armour) to the Secretary of State
[Received March 11—3:40 a.m.]
698. A member of my staff has obtained from a reliable source which must be protected a signed copy of Ramírez’s letter of resignation dated March 9. Embassy does not have specimen of Ramírez’s signature but person familiar with signature believes it to be genuine. Text reads in translation as follows: [Page 263]
“To the people of the Republic:
His Excellency the Vice President of the nation in exercise of the executive power, Brigadier General D. Edelmiro J. Farrell.
On repeated occasions, now in public now in private, I have manifested that: ‘as soon as noticed that I had ceased to enjoy the confidence of the Armed Forces that brought me to occupy the post of the first magistrate, of the country, I would resign immediately from that high post and would return it to those who, without my having desired it or asked for it, had handed it over to me in a moment that was difficult for the fatherland, considering me, perhaps, the exponent of the ideals that animated the glorious revolution of June 4, 1943’. And (on those occasions) I added that, in such case, I would present myself before my people and before my comrades to render account of my errors.
Little time has been necessary for that kind of prediction to be fulfilled.
In effect, for some reason that history one day will tell, of [at] meeting held in the Ministry of War on the night of February 24–25 and attended by a large number of officers of the garrisons of the federal capital, Liniers, Palomar, (aerial base and military academy), Campo de Mayo and La Plata, the opinion of those officers, as expressed personally through their garrison chiefs, took an unfavorable attitude toward me, and those chiefs asked me to delegate my mandate to His Excellency, Vice President and Minister of War General Farrell.
What had happened? The opinion of the officers of those garrisons mentioned, already deceived once, with regard to the rupture of relations with Germany and Japan, in the sense that (they believed) the motives for that action as made public by the Government (German and Japanese espionage) were not exact, while the fear of supposed measures of pressure on the part of the Government of the United States of North America did, on the other hand, exist, was violently shaken as an expression of reaction to a supposed lowering of the national dignity. That same opinion was, a little while later, again deceived by the rumor that I had ready, ‘and according to some, signed’ three decrees that would shortly be issued. Those supposed decrees were: (1) decreeing martial law; (2) declaring war against Germany and Japan; (3) decreeing general mobilization.
Of no avail were my efforts to convince the officers corps of the falsity of such unfounded tales. Nor were my own words, expressed before the corps of chiefs and officers in two large meetings, one of which took place in the headquarters of the first division and the other in Campo de Mayo, sufficient to convince them of their error. The die was cast; intrigue availed more than did reason.
Today there only remains for me to declare solemnly before the people of my fatherland, and with God as my witness, that: I swear by my honor as a soldier that everything that has been said relative to the existence of the three decrees to which I have made reference is absolutely false and tendentious.
For the reasons here expressed by me, which make my continuance in the high office that I now occupy incompatible with my dignity and honor, I present to those to whom I gave my oath, to the people [Page 264] and to the armed forces, my resignation as President of the Argentine nation.
Buenos Aires, March 9, 1944.
Pedro P. Ramírez, Major General.”