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

824/6354/439a: Telegram

The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Bolivia ( Boal )

Washington , December 31, 1943—4 p.m.

1497. Etchenique²³ approached the Department for an exchange of letters to take care of tin purchases beyond December 31, 1943. The Department informed him that for the present this was not desirable and that it was intended that the U. S. procurement agencies would for the present continue to purchase any tin tendered on a day to day basis at unchanged terms.²⁴

The Department has written to FEA²⁵ in this light, the concluding paragraph of which reads as follows:

“The purpose of this letter²¹ is to request (1) that no exchange of letters take place with any Bolivian entity, including the tin producers or their representatives, and (2) that deliveries of tin be accepted on unchanged terms, but only in such a manner as will enable the procurement agency to withdraw from the market without prior notice.”

Hull

23. Miguel Etchenique, Bolivian representative in the United States of the Banco Minero and the Bolivian Development Corporation.
24. Relationships between the United States and Bolivia, economic as well as political, were subject at this time to uncertainties due to the overthrow of the Peñaranda regime and the assumption of power by a revolutionary junta. For correspondence on the recognition of the revolutionary junta by the United States, see pp. 427 ff.
25. Foreign Economic Administration.
21. Not printed.