Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952–1954, Western Europe and Canada, Volume VI, Part 2

711.56352/9–2652

No. 870
The Ambassador in Spain (MacVeagh) to John Y. Millar of the Office of Western European Affairs ¹

secret
official–informal

Madrid , September 26, 1952.

Dear Mr. Millar: Your letter of August 29² has just reached me. I am glad Colonel Lennhoff had a chance to talk with you, and think he correctly put his finger on the question of intent. However, our negotiations, properly speaking, have not yet begun, and consequently they could not have “progressed favorably up to June 1” and deteriorated after that. So far all that has happened has been discussion between the military and economic experts aimed to prepare the ground. These preparatory talks have been useful in developing certain views on both sides. They have clarified for the Spaniards the ideas we have in mind and in so doing have drawn from the Spanish Government a coordinated but informal top-level reaction, the so-called Arguelles memorandum.³ That memorandum contains more than what has been or could be discussed on the technical level; and together with the informal answer which is now awaited from the Department, should form a basis for our eventual talks in the Foreign Office which alone can properly be termed “negotiations”. I mention, and indeed stress, all this because I feel the military often tend to talk as if they themselves were “negotiating a base agreement”, which helps prevent people—including the press and sometimes even ourselves—from seeing the forest for the trees. The Foreign Minister summed up the real facts when he referred, as I reported in my telegram No. 82 of July 25,⁴ to the moment drawing near for discussion on the government-to-government level “since fundamental aspects beyond experts’ competence and purview are now taking shape.”

These fundamentals, namely (a) the question of what exactly is the relationship between us and Spain which would justify the latter’s concluding such bilateral executive agreements as we propose, and (b) the question of whether military end items can be included as well as training equipment and instruction in our aid to Spain, are what I have tried in my telegrams to present to the Department as together likely to constitute the core of our problem once we get to the council table. In these telegrams, I have also endeavored not only to show the capital importance which the Spanish attach to these fundamentals, but also to explain their reasons for doing so. Incidentally, you should not imagine, as Colonel Lennhoff says both you and Mr. Dunham do, that some of our recent policy telegrams dealing with the negotiations were not written by me personally but only signed with my name, owing to my absence in San Sebastian. Since my arrival here, all policy telegrams from this Mission have been written by me, though my officers may have submitted drafts in whole or in part, and are indeed encouraged to do so, and as regards such telegrams dealing with the negotiations, they have been built up with the aid of Train and Kissner and often with that of White and McCaffery as well, but in their final form have all been subjected to my ideas, cast in my language and presented as our joint views in such form as I thought best. My being in San Sebastian involved no departure from this procedure since I came back to Madrid no less than six times during my supposed stay in the north.

In expressing our views, as distinguished from simply reporting facts, we may have been right or wrong in these messages. But it occurs to me that when it comes to estimating whether the Spanish will or will not insist finally on any specific point in our future talks, we here may be in a better position to guess right than someone in Washington. Lennhoff said you maintained to him that we were wrong in interpreting the Arguelles memorandum as we did in my telegram No. 155 of August 15 [16].⁵ You feel, he said, that the memorandum means that a “little agreement” and vast military aid are matters of sine qua non in the Spanish position, whereas we feel that the introduction of these points means only that they must be considered in the negotiations and that some way of accommodation must be found in their regard. You may be right, but our impression from our personal contacts here is that there is considerably more flexibility in the back of the Spaniards’ mind on these matters than, for negotiating purposes, they are willing now to reveal, and that the very manner in which the Arguelles memorandum itself was presented is an indication that what it says should not be taken by any means as the final Spanish word. Proof, of course, will be provided in the eating, and the question might be classed as purely academic in advance of our finding out at the council table what the Spanish do really hold out for, if it were not for the advisability of our being prepared in advance to take advantage of any flexibility which may develop on their part.

This, of course, is tantamount to saying that we must have some flexibility ourselves to match what the Spaniards may show, and I must confess—to conclude this long letter—that I have less hope of our willingness to modify our position than I have of theirs to meet us on some middle ground. However, one must do one’s best, and when I see Mr. Perkins next week,⁶ I shall tell him I feel that when we get to actual negotiations we should have some latitude as regards satisfying Spanish insistence on the questions cited above which they consider basic. I shall say that this does not mean we need go anywhere near what the Spanish have so far been advancing as necessary from their point of view. Some form of statement of intent may cover the “little agreement” problem, and it may well be that a very drastic scaling down of the military end-item assistance they now talk about could also be effected, if some similar accommodation regarding principle were reached in this matter as well. In the one instance, we have Spanish national pride to consider, and in the other, Franco’s need for giving the Army, which is the main support of his regime, at least some grounds for hope, and in both it is not lack of good will but simple political necessity which dictates the Spanish Government’s position. I am perfectly aware that if we are to provide any military end items to Spain at all, we must revoke the assurances hitherto repeatedly given to the British, and perhaps also to other members of NATO. But this would seem inescapable now that we have come to know the Spanish attitude better than was possible at first, and if we want our negotiations here to succeed. On the other hand, should we concede in principle that we are treating Spain as an equal and that we are willing to aid her with end items as may be found feasible, the door would be open, as I believe, to almost any limiting arrangements we might find it necessary to make regarding what amounts of such items would be provided and in what fiscal years.⁷ The Spanish understand very well our dependence on congressional appropriations and the many priorities already attaching to the distribution of our supply potential. What sticks in their craw is any sort of blanket discrimination against them. With such removed both as regards the political and the military aspects of these negotiations, the rest should not be too difficult.

Sincerely yours,

Lincoln MacVeagh

1. Circulated to Perkins, Knight, Williamson, Bonbright, and Dunham.
2. In his letter, Millar reported a conversation which he had held with Colonel Lennhoff on Aug. 27, during the course of which the apparent differences between Washington and Madrid, as expressed in Documents 865 and 866 were discussed. A summary of that discussion was enclosed. (Spanish Desk files, lot 58 D 344, “Negotiations—U.S.–Spanish, July–Sept. 1952”)
3. Transmitted in Document 861.
4. Document 863.
5. Document 866.
6. Perkins, who departed Washington on Sept. 21 for consultations in London, traveled to Paris on Sept. 29, where he met Draper, Anderson, MacVeagh, Kissner, Garvin, and Train. The discussions, which occurred on Sept. 29, concerned the reply to the Arguelles memorandum of July 9. An account of the conversations, along with a request for final clearance from Washington of the proposed reply, are in telegram 1975 from Paris, Sept. 30. (740.5/9–3052)
7. In the margin next to this sentence, the following questions were penciled in: “Purpose? To get bases? For Def. Spain? For use Spanish forces in WE?”.