103.9169/3434d
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Chile ( Bowers )
The Secretary of State refers to the Embassy’s despatch no. 9079 of March 9, 1944 concerning the simplification of the Decentralization Plan and the questions raised by the Chilean National Foreign Trade Council in connection therewith.
The proposal advanced by the National Foreign Trade Council that “authorities in Washington will continue to give their support to the ‘Advance Import Permits’ issued by the Council, processing only those export license applications which have fulfilled this prior requirement” indicates a misconception on the part of the Chilean authorities concerning the objectives of the modification of decentralization. The modification was designed not to bring about a substitution of other documents for the controls which have been eliminated but effectively to eliminate them.
The Department is aware that the Chilean exchange and import control system is of long standing, and that the Chilean authorities may, for reasons which they consider valid, deem it necessary to maintain the system in force, despite the steps which are being taken by this Government to simplify necessary controls and to eliminate controls which have become unnecessary. The administration of the Chilean exchange and import control system is, however, a responsibility solely of the Chilean Government, and this Government could not appropriately assist in its enforcement, as suggested, by requiring that applicants for export licenses for shipments to Chile accompany their applications by evidence of issuance of an Advance Import [Page 742] Permit to the importer by the Chilean National Foreign Trade Council.
The Embassy’s attention is called to the last paragraph of the Department’s circular airgram of February 12, 3 p.m., in which missions were urged to stress, in their conversations with officials of foreign governments, the desirability of removing all unnecessary wartime import controls and of simplifying such controls as may be considered indispensable. Actions designed to perpetuate such controls longer than is necessary, or to replace them by equally onerous “normal” trade restrictions, are counter to the views of this Government that a general relaxation of trade barriers is essential to the expansion of international trade in the post-war period.
The Embassy is requested to inform the Chilean National Foreign Trade Council of this Government’s attitude as outlined above, and to keep the Department informed of further developments.