Foreign Relations of the United States, 1958–1960, Volume V, Microfiche Supplement, American Republics

ES–1. Despatch from the Ambassador in El Salvador (Kalijarvi) to the Department of State¹

No. 481

San Salvador, March 6, 1958

SUBJECT

• Possible Deterioration in Relations with the Salvadoran Government

While our relations with the Lemus Government have been cordial and friendly, a number of recent developments taken in toto threaten to produce a cooling off by the Salvadoran President and his Government towards the United States.

The Lemus Government has given plenty of concrete evidence of its friendliness. A few typical instances might include the following:

(1) The release of the U.S. flag fishing vessel Kokomo immediately after its seizure without formal protest on our part, in a most cordial atmosphere;²

(2) President Lemus’ freely given all-out support and publicity for President Eisenhower’s letter to Bulganin,³ including his own long and favorable written commentary;⁴

The general support of the Government of El Salvador for the U.S. position in the U.N. and the particular support for the election of William Sanders as Assistant Secretary General of the OAS;

(4) The conciliatory efforts of the Foreign Office to accommodate the Salvadoran constitutional 200-mile territorial water limit to the United States position regarding conservation of resources and freedom of the sea. As part of that effort, the Salvadoran delegate to the Geneva Conference spoke in favor of the United States position barring the admission of Communist China to the Conference.⁵

(5) The signing recently of a new Air Mission Agreement,⁶ in spite of the higher costs imposed on the Salvadoran Government for the maintenance of the Mission here.

All of these illustrations testify that relations could not have been more cordial and friendly in spite of the stand the Embassy has had to take opposing the position of El Salvador on certain issues.

While the Lemus Government has cooperated with us cheerfully on important issues, our concessions to them have been few and relatively minor in importance. There were accommodations made to El Salvador during the Osorio administration;⁷ but since the inauguration of President Lemus, the one major favorable concession on our part has been the agreement to sell 28 U.S. used airplanes to El Salvador.

It is against this background that we measure the present problem. Each item that follows can be defended cogently and persuasively as the proper course for the United States to follow. Each can be justified in terms of our policies and objectives. Each alone can be managed within its own context. However, when all are taken together the composite is not manageable. In combination they raise the broad question of whether we have given enough attention to the overall aspects. They also raise the further question, Does the Department consider that any changes are in order?

(1) The delay in inviting Lemus to Washington. The Lemus visit has been under consideration for more than a year. He first publicly expressed a desire to visit the United States while President-elect. Neither Lemus nor any of the other high officials of his Government have made any secret of the importance they attach to this visit. It has been the subject of radio and press commentary. In a recent conversation with the U.S. Military Attaché in El Salvador, an official of the Salvadoran General Staff said President Lemus had expressed his disappointment to the staff officer over the failure of the United States Government to invite President Lemus to Washington for a state visit.⁸

(2) The visit of Ydígoras Fuentes and the proposed visit of Echandi to Washington. While President Lemus has made no public comment on this score, he cannot have failed to be nettled at the extension of the official invitation to Ydígoras Fuentes to visit the United States, especially since the invitation was announced while Ydígoras was visiting El Salvador. It was a front-page story in all the newspapers and the subject of radio announcement. It is small comfort to President Lemus that these visits have occasionally been referred to as informal or that the visits have been made in an individual capacity since the men in question have gone as president-elect and not as chief of state. It is impossible to explain convincingly the difference between a formal and an informal visit when the news reels in El Salvador show Ydígoras Fuentes and his wife debarking from President Eisenhower’s plane, being met at the Washington airport by Secretary of State and Mrs. Dulles, and thereafter being escorted to Blair House. Furthermore, the newspapers have played up Ydígoras’ conversations with President Eisenhower and meetings with other high officials of the United States Government. They draw no distinction between the Ydígoras visit and that of other high dignitaries to Washington. Informal comments by private individuals, some with official connections, substantiate the above evaluation. “The forthcoming visit to Washington by President-elect Echandi is certain to increase the feeling of President Lemus and other Salvadorans that he is given unequal treatment or inadequate consideration by the United States.”

(3) The state visit of President Ibanez of Chile. In this context the long-standing intention to invite President Ibanez to the United States loses its proper perspective. While the press-announced invitation extended to Ibanez may not have been as irritating as the visits of Ydígoras Fuentes and Echandi, nevertheless, coming on the heels of the other invitations, it has served further to disillusion President Lemus with the United States.

(4) Drafting of Salvadoran Citizens. Disappointments such as those recounted stir up other problems. We were unable to assure the Government that Salvadoran citizens resident in the United States would not be drafted except during time of war as provided for in the 1926 FCN Treaty.⁹ The Department agreed that such acts were in violation of the Treaty and sought to correct the situation by eliminating Article 6 from the Treaty. The Government of El Salvador would have been willing to accept the revision of the Treaty had it been possible to assure them that no Salvadoran would be drafted until one year after the date of notice. We were unable to do so, and as a consequence the Salvadoran Government felt obliged to interpret the notice, correctly so according to the Legal Division of the Department, as a termination of the entire Treaty.¹⁰

(5) Three-cent tax on soluble coffee. The 1936 Trade Agreement between the United States and EI Salvador,¹¹ provides for the free entry into the United States of coffee. United States tariff schedules, however, provide for a $.03 per pound tax for coffee substitutes, essences and adulterants. El Salvador interprets the word “coffee” in the 1936 Treaty in its generic sense to include all kinds of coffee. United States customs officials, however, ruled Salvadoran soluble coffee dutiable under the Tariff Act.

(6) The $250,000 check to Cruz Salazar. In the conversation with the United States Military Attaché referred to above, the official of the Salvadoran General Staff said that President Lemus had received a photostatic copy of a check for $250,000 made out to Colonel Cruz Salazar and signed by the chief of the Point IV Mission in Guatemala. He said that President Lemus’ interpretation of the check was that it had been given to Cruz Salazar by the United States Government as part of a deal to insure the election by the Guatemalan Congress of Ydígoras Fuentes. He said that this check provoked President Lemus’ further disillusionment with the behavior of the United States Government. While this can undoubtedly be explained, the possibility remains that Lemus may also consider this in terms of the large amount of assistance being provided to Guatemala by the United States as compared with the absence of grant aid to El Salvador. Many Salvadorans have made no secret of what they claim to be the premium the United States Government places on aid to unstable governments while ignoring the no-less-needy but more stable and democratic Latin governments.

(7) Lemus’ request for an MDAP Treaty. Although the Lemus Government is aware that former President Osorio turned down the United States offer of an MDAP agreement, it does not feel bound by the earlier decision of the Osorio administration. President Lemus has expressed interest in an MDAP agreement. This was discouraged by the Embassy, which informed Lemus that no funds were available for such a pact. As long as the neighboring countries, Honduras, Guatemala, and Nicaragua, have MDAP agreements with the United States and El Salvador does not, some residue of resentment on this score will continue to exist here.

(8) United States Officers for the Escuela de Guerra. Some months ago officials of the Salvadoran Army put out feelers as to whether the United States could provide two officers to teach in the Escuela de Guerra as partial replacements for the departed Chilean Army Mission. The Chief of the United States Army Mission discouraged this request on the grounds that Salvadoran officers can be trained better in army schools located in Panama or in the United States. The United States Military Attaché informs us that two Chilean officers are en route to El Salvador, possibly to fill the positions mentioned.

(9) Mrs. Lemus’ Welfare Program. Mrs. Lemus has been critical regarding failure of the United States to assist her in her welfare program, alleging that the Embassy promised to provide such help. The Embassy made no such promise but said it would see what could be done regarding any request she made. No such request has been forthcoming. Nevertheless, Mrs. Lemus again criticized the Embassy, along with other international agencies of the United Nations, for failing to help her with the program.

(10) Development Loan Fund Application. We have had to be lukewarm in dealing with El Salvador on the $8,000,000.00 loan sought for improvement of the conditions of the campesino, primarily because many projects contemplated do not seem to fall within the criteria of the fund. This may account for the delay on the part of the Salvadoran Government in submitting a formalized application for the loan.

This list of issues is not exhaustive. As already stated, the items taken together add up to a possible cooling off by the Lemus Government. Not only has this been reported by a member of the President’s Staff, but our own sources bear it out, and members of the Mission have sensed some change in attitude. The change in attitude is the result of what might be termed negative actions on the part of our Government rather than any sudden reversal based on any single item. As already noted, each United States action can be justified on political, legal, or other grounds, especially when taken in its individual context. Nevertheless, the net effect is adverse from our standpoint. Interpreted from the Salvadoran point of view, we are either lacking in understanding or out of sympathy with Salvadoran aspirations. It should be emphasized that the Mission here has at no time been in conflict with the Salvadoran Government on matters at issue. On the contrary, in spite of the unfavorable positions we have had to take, relations up to the present moment could not have been more cordial and friendly.

This despatch is not a criticism of any action undertaken in the past, but is prepared to lay before the Department the need for affirmative action. It is the opinion of this Mission that the opportunity still exists for overcoming whatever bad impression President Lemus may have acquired regarding our attitude towards his Government. This can most impressively be done by issuing an invitation to President Lemus for a visit to the United States and by making some kind of loan available for his campesino program. Furthermore, sometime subsequent to the Lemus visit, an invitation should be extended to the Minister of Defense, Adan Parada, and one or two high-ranking military officials to visit the United States.

Thorsten V. Kalijarvi

1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 611.16/3–658. Confidential. Drafted by Kalijarvi and Vallon.
2. On December 18, 1957, a Salvadoran patrol boat seized the U.S. flag fishing vessel Kokomo about eight miles off the coast of El Salvador for allegedly fishing in Salvadoran waters. Lemus ordered the vessel released after representations by the American Embassy and evidently by President Somoza of Nicaragua whose family had a business interest in the Kokomo. Documents pertaining to this subject are in Department of State decimal file 611.166 Kokomo.
3. Reference is to Eisenhower’s letter of January 12, 1958, to Nikolay Aleksandrovich Bulganin, Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics; for text, see Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1958, p. 75.
4. Reference is to a letter from Lemus to Eisenhower, January 30, 1958; a copy is in Presidential Correspondence, Lot 64 D 174. On January 22, Kalijarvi had delivered to Lemus a copy of Eisenhower’s letter to Bulganin.
5. Reference is to the United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea, held at Geneva, February 24–April 27, 1958; for documentation, see Foreign Relations, 1958–1960, vol. II, United Nations and General International Matters, Chapter 8.
6. For the text of the Air Force Mission Agreement, signed at San Salvador, November 21, 1957, see United States Treaties and other International Agreements (UST), vol. 8 (pt. 2), p. 2356.
7. Lt. Col. Oscar Osorio, President of El Salvador, September 14, 1950-September 14, 1956.
8. No record of this conversation with Lt. Col. Robert S. Ferguson, USA, was found in Department of State files.
9. Reference is to the Treaty of Friendship, Commerce, and Consular Rights, signed at San Salvador, February 22, 1926; for text, see Charles S. Bevans, ed., Treaties and Other International Agreements of the United States of America, 1776–1949, vol. 7, p. 521.
10. The Treaty terminated February 7, 1958; pertinent documents are in decimal file 611.1696.
11. Reference is to the Reciprocal Trade Agreement, signed at San Salvador, February 19, 1937; for text, see 50 State (pt. 2) 1564.