Editorial Note
In a letter to Secretary of Defense Wilson dated April 9, 1953, Secretary of State Dulles recommended that Nicaragua, as well as El Salvador and Honduras, be declared eligible for military grant aid assistance under the Mutual Security Act of 1951 (716.5 MSP/4–953). On December 9, 1953 in a memorandum to Foreign Operations Administration Director Stassen, President Eisenhower authorized the initiation of bilateral military negotiations with all three nations (717.5 MSP/12–1453). Negotiations between the United States and Nicaragua began in February 1954, and a bilateral military assistance agreement was signed on April 23, 1954 (despatch 426 from Managua, dated April 23, 1954, 717.5 MSP/4–2354). For further documentation on the military assistance issue in this and other Latin American cases, see pages 116 ff.