Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952–1954, The American Republics, Volume IV

Eisenhower Library, Eisenhower papers, Whitman file, NSC records

Memorandum of Discussion at the 199th Meeting of the National Security Council on Thursday, May 27, 1954¹

top secret
eyes only

May 27, 1954

[Here follow a list of those present (22) and discussion of matters unrelated to Guatemala.]

3. U.S. Policy in the Event of Guatemalan Aggression in Latin America (NSC 5419;² NSC 144/1³)

Mr. Cutler pointed out that the short Planning Board paper had been drawn up in the light of Articles 3 and 6 of the Rio Treaty. It has also taken into consideration the U.S. right of self-defense and the great desirability of collective action in dealing with the problem of Guatemala. He then turned to the Recommendations in the Planning Board paper, which he proceeded to read, together with the recommendation for revision submitted by the Joint Chiefs of Staff.⁴ The proposals for revision of paragraph 5–b and paragraph 7 offered by the Joint Chiefs of Staff were agreed to by the Council, as was a suggestion for the revision of paragraph 8 offered by Mr. Cutler.

Thereafter, Mr. Cutler informed the Council of the decision made by the President on the previous Saturday,⁵ on means to prevent further shipment of arms to Guatemala. After reading a brief statement of the content of the President’s decision, Mr. Cutler asked Secretary Dulles for his comments.

Secretary Dulles suggested one slight amendment in the Presidential statement, and said that he had little else to say except that the State Department has commenced its informal conversations with those countries which were likely to have vessels in the area near Guatemala. He predicted that these various countries would not accord formal recognition of our right to detain and search their vessels on the high seas, but that they would be willing to look the other way while we did this. Secretary Dulles also expressed the opinion that action taken thus far by the United States had probably scared away other vessels carrying arms to Guatemala. Accordingly, the immediate danger of shipments of arms to Guatemala had been allayed. The point that had been hard to get other people to appreciate was the relative magnitude of the first shipment of arms to Guatemala. While not in itself large, the shipment really had produced a serious shift in the balance of military power in Central America in favor of Guatemala.

Mr. Cutler then asked whether the arms which had arrived in the first shipment to Guatemala were being handed out to the strikers in Honduras. Secretary Dulles replied that part, at least, of these arms was apparently being set aside for subversive activity both in Honduras and Nicaragua.

Secretary Anderson⁶ referred briefly to the preparations by the Defense Department to evacuate American civilians from Honduras if this proved necessary.

Secretary Dulles then expressed very great concern about the Communist line being followed by Sydney Gruson in his dispatches to the New York Times. Gruson, thought Secretary Dulles, was a very dangerous character, and his reporting had done a great deal of harm. The President said that he often felt that the New York Times was the most untrustworthy newspaper in the United States, at least as far as the areas of the news with which he was personally familiar were concerned. Mr. Allen Dulles pointed out some very disturbing features of Sidney Gruson’s career to date.

The Attorney General⁷ asked if it would not be a good idea for someone to talk informally to the management of the New York Times. Admiral Strauss⁸ them suggested that he would be glad to talk to Arthur Sulzberger⁹ if the President thought it a good idea. The President said he had no objection to Admiral Strauss’ proposal, but he doubted if anything useful would come of the conversations.

Mr. Allen Dulles then pointed out that the forthcoming arms shipments to Guatemala might well come from other countries than those behind the Iron Curtain, and wondered whether the phrasing of the President’s statement should be changed to recognize this fact and to take account of the importance of the use to which the arms were put rather than the place of origin of the shipment.

Secretary Dulles commented that of course the essence of the matter was not the place of origin but the fact of a hostile government in Guatemala. If this government succeeds in procuring arms next time from elsewhere than the Soviet bloc, we should, of course, do all we can to prevent the shipment from reaching its destination. The President’s statement was amended to meet the point raised by Mr. Allen Dulles.

The Attorney General then made a brief comment as to the legality of the U.S. action proposed by the President, of stopping suspected vessels on the high seas. Such action was in general outside the limits of international law. There was, however, a well-established exception which permitted interference with vessels of another nation on the high seas if self-defense or self-preservation was clearly involved. It seemed to the Department of Justice, continued the Attorney General, that the facts of the case, as presented by Secretary Dulles in his recent press conference, fully supported an invocation of self-defense and self-preservation.

Secretary Dulles pointed out that Guatemala’s military establishment was three times as large as the military establishments of all its neighbors put together. This completely denied Guatemala’s allegation that the arms it had imported were for its own self-defense. The Attorney General agreed, but warned the Council to be prepared to see a division among the international lawyers on this question. He also expressed the opinion that no internal constitutional issue was raised by the Presidential action, and that there was no need to seek Congressional approval.

Governor Stassen¹⁰ said that the problem of Guatemala seemed to him to raise the question of revising the Monroe Doctrine to prevent shipment of arms to a government in this hemisphere which was dominated by a foreign ideology. Secretary Dulles replied that he thought something like this had been accomplished at the Caracas Conference. The present action against Guatemala was simply a detailed application of the general rule of preventing the extension of the Communist conspiracy to the Western Hemisphere. He added that the United States was preparing to take the Guatemalan problem into a meeting of the Organization of American States as a situation which called for action even beyond the terms of the Caracas anti-Communist resolution.¹¹ He said that he had had conversations with the Brazilian Ambassador, who had said that his country would not only go along with us, but would take the lead. This Secretary Dulles found very heartening, since we needed support from others than the Somozas in the Hemisphere.

The President expressed the hope that we could secure the support of Uruguay as the outstanding democracy in South America. Secretary Dulles replied that the Brazilian Ambassador had suggested that one of the best ways of getting Uruguay to go along would be to propose holding the OAS meeting in Montevideo. He predicted it would be hard to gain the support of Uruguay, but thought that this suggestion might help. Mexico also would prove difficult.

With regard to the problem of military assistance to the Latin American republics, the President said he hoped that we would not forget that we could not strengthen the military position of tiny countries like Honduras by merely dumping modern arms into them. We should supplement this action by seeing to it that the armies of these countries were taught the effective use of the armament we provided. He thought this problem ought to be surveyed as a long-range affair.

Governor Stassen inquired as to whether thought should be given to cancelling the very small amount of Technical Aid which the United States was still providing Guatemala….

The National Security Council:¹²

a. Discussed the reference report on the subject (NSC 5419) in the light of the views of the Joint Chiefs of Staff presented orally at the meeting.

b. Adopted the Recommendations contained in paragraphs 5–9 of NSC 5419, subject to the following changes:

(1) Paragraph 5–a, 3rd line: Change “paragraph 2” to read “paragraph 1”.

(2) Paragraph 5–b, 5th line: Add, after “to the extent feasible”, the words “and unilaterally only as a last resort,”.

(3) Paragraph 7, 1st line: Insert “political” between “practicable” and “steps”.

(4) Paragraph 8: Revise to read as follows: “8. Appropriate Congressional leaders should be immediately informed of the above policy.”

c. Noted that the President, in order to protect the security of the United States and specifically to defend the Panama Canal, had authorized the Navy to halt on the high seas off the Guatemalan coast vessels, including foreign-flag vessels, suspected of carrying munitions of war destined for Guatemala, in order to inspect their cargoes, and if such inspection is refused, to escort such vessels by force, if necessary, to Panama for inspection; such action to be taken, where time permits: (1) after notice to the country of registry of any such vessel in order to obtain. if possible, such country’s consent to such inspection and (2) after notice to the Organization of American States and, if possible, with the approval of such Organization.

d. Noted the President’s reference to United States policy as to training the military establishments of Latin American nations, provided in NSC 144/1, paragraph 18–b.

Note: The Recommendations referred to in b above, as approved by the President,¹³ and the actions in c and d above subsequently referred to the Operations Coordinating Board as the coordinating agency designated by the President, and circulated as NSC 5419/1.

1. This memorandum was drawn up by NSC Deputy Executive Secretary Gleason.
2. Supra.
3. NSC 144/1, “United States Objectives and Courses of Action With Respect to Latin America,” dated Mar. 18, 1953, p. 6.
4. The Joint Chiefs of Staff, in a memorandum to the Secretary of Defense dated May 26, 1954, stated that they assumed early action would be taken to convene the Organ of Consultation of the Organization of American States as one of the steps to be taken under the provisions of paragraph 7 of NSC 5419. They recommended that paragraph 5 of the draft statement be revised to indicate that “unilateral military action should be taken only as a last resort”, and suggested that, for accuracy, “direct attack” be substituted for “aggression” in the title of NSC 5419. A copy of the May 26 memorandum is in JCS files.
5. May 22. See the Secretary’s memorandum of conversation with the President, p. 1123.
6. Robert B. Anderson, Acting Secretary of Defense.
7. Herbert Brownell, Jr.
8. Lewis L. Strauss, Special Assistant to the President.
9. Publisher of The New York Times.
10. Harold E. Stassen, Director, Foreign Operations Administration.
11. Reference is to Resolution XCIII; see footnote 2, p. 1093.
12. Subparagraphs a–d constitute NSC Action No. 1135.
13. President Eisenhower approved the recommendations contained in Paragraphs 5–9 of NSC 5419, as amended and adopted by the NSC, on May 28, 1954.