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

711.56352/4–853

No. 889
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Ambassador-Designate in Spain (Dunn)¹

secret

Madrid, April 8, 1953.

Participants:

• Spanish Foreign Minister
• American Ambassador-designate

On the occasion of my first call on the Foreign Minister, he received me very cordially. The first thing he did was to show me two documents from my dossier in the Spanish Government. One was a letter written by Ambassador Willard on March 28, 1920 informing the then Foreign Minister, the Marqués de Lema, of my arrival in Madrid and my taking up the duties of Third Secretary of the American Embassy here. The other paper was a notation of the issuance of my identity card as a member of the Diplomatic Corps.

We then spoke of the Minister’s recent trip to the Far East and in this connection he said that the Philippines, although once a cause of contention, many years ago, between the United States and Spain, could now be considered a bridge in the relations between our two countries. He said he found the Filipinos most friendly in their attitude toward the United States and most appreciative of what our country had done for them. On the other hand they still had the feeling of friendship for Spain as the country of the origin of their culture and civilization.

Sr. Martín Artajo then referred to the negotiations now pending with regard to the base rights in Spain. He remarked that although the foreign press seemed to give the impression that an agreement was about to be reached very soon on the subject, such was not the case: there were some fundamental difficulties to be overcome. He said that one of the greatest difficulties in the situation was the economic situation which was far behind that of those European countries who had received Marshall Plan aid, MSA aid and assistance in rearmament. Spain had not received any aid from any source whatsoever; had suffered great destruction during the Civil War, which had required a vast reconstruction program. This had been an enormous drain on the economic resources of the country and Spain had therefore not been in any position to rebuild its armament; she had the men and the armed forces, men of ability and great fighting spirit and within the last five years had received excellent training. The equipment of the armed forces, however, was not adequate and such as they had was either of inferior quality or had seen much use.

The Minister said that there was a general feeling in Spain therefore that if the nation were to take the step of granting rights to us for the construction and use of air bases on its territory they would be taking a deliberate step which would involve international risks; that the country should be in a position through a strengthened economy and an improvement in the equipment of the armed forces to play its proper role in the event of aggression. He said that from his own point of view he saw no great difficulty in arriving at an agreement with regard to the bases but the real difficulty was to achieve a balance between the granting of the bases and some provision for improvement in the economic difficulties and military equipment.

The Minister then said that the revised text which had been delivered to him by Mr. Jones, Chargé d’Affaires, ad interim, on March 17,² was now in the hands of the interested authorities of the Spanish Government and was receiving close study. He referred at this point also to the personal letter³ Mr. Jones had written him at that time which pointed out that, if the agreement for the bases were not arrived at very shortly, the delay might result in a reduction of the amount of money allocated by Congress for Spain. He seemed to feel that there had been an intimation that the delay in arriving at the agreement was the fault of the Spanish Government, whereupon he pointed out the long periods of delay in waiting for American replies in the exchanges of views, the matter of the change of the Government in the United States which had caused a delay on the part of the outgoing administration, and the time necessary for a review of and consideration by the new administration of the negotiations.

I explained to the Minister that there had been no intention on our part to place any blame for delays; that we understood thoroughly the difficulties caused by the change over of administration in the United States; but that the purpose of the reference in Mr. Jones’ letter to the need for speedy conclusion of the negotiations was based upon the requirements of our legislative process in the United States.

I took the occasion at this point to assure the Minister I had seen all of the responsible officials of our Government, including the President, who are concerned with this question and that I could assure him that all of our Government were well disposed toward Spain and were most anxious to have the negotiations consummated and the agreements arrived at. I went on to explain in this connection that, when the representatives of the Executive Department appear before the Committees of the Congress for more appropriations for Spain for the fiscal year 1954, and if the 125 million dollars already appropriated had not been spent or obligated or if there were not even a concrete project as a result of the signing of the agreements or some such indication that the 125 million dollars would be spent for the purposes intended, the Congressional Committees would immediately say that it was not necessary to appropriate any new money for 1954 and that a reappropriation of the 125 million would be sufficient for the next fiscal year. I explained that we were most anxious to be in a position to request more appropriations in order to carry out the objectives of the agreement and that what our people wanted was to have the background of a specific agreement or agreements on which they could base their requests for additional funds for 1954.

The Minister acknowledged that this was a procedure which took place in almost every government including their own, as the Minister of Finance always insisted that the unspent balance be allocated and then be deducted from the new allocation. I also took occasion at this point to explain to the Minister the new administration’s objective of trying to balance the budget and at the same time continue to meet the obligations we had already undertaken in the field of foreign aid with respect to Korea, NATO, Indo-China, and Formosa; in the development of new weapons and in the maintenance of our own defense establishment.

I also said that the Spanish situation had been thoroughly and completely reviewed by the responsible authorities of our Government; that from my personal conversation with all the high officials concerned, I could assure him that they all had the best will toward Spain and wanted to do everything that could possibly be done to be helpful in this situation. There was, however, the definite limit as to the amount of aid funds appropriated for Spain and that we all hoped that it would be possible to work out an agreement on the bases within the framework of the funds now made available by Congress with the expectation of obtaining more if the agreements were concluded shortly.

I further told the Minister that after a thorough review of the Spanish situation, my Government had not wished to wait until my arrival for Spain to be informed of the United States position. Therefore instructions had been sent to Mr. Jones, Chargé d’Affaires, ad interim, to communicate to the Spanish Government the assurance that new study and consideration had been given by the new administration to the end objectives of the negotiations.

Sr. Martín Artajo said that within this present month of April they would be able to give us a revised text of the agreement in response to Mr. Jones’ note of March 16 with such modifications as the Spanish authorities felt should be included.

He then said that arrangements had been made for me to be received by the Chief of State, Generalissimo Francisco Franco, next Thursday, April 9 at 12:00 noon⁴ and that the General would be very interested to see me. This ended the conversation which lasted about forty minutes.

1. Ambassador Dunn, who presented his credentials on Apr. 9, transmitted this memorandum of conversation as enclosure 1 to despatch 797 from Madrid, Apr. 8.
2. Transmitted to the Department of State as enclosure 2 to despatch 737, Mar. 18. (711.56352/3–1853)
3. Document 885.
4. For a record of this meeting, see telegram 790, infra.