23. Telephone Conversation Between the Under Secretary of State for Economic Affairs (Mann) and President Johnson1
Mann: Last night about 9 oʼclock we got a statement from both sides. The Navy is absent in all this but both of the combatant sides would permit an orderly evacuation as far as they were able to do so. As far as they were concerned. They could not speak for the other side. And early this morning they have assembled some 400 or more Americans, mostly tourists in the Hotel Ambassador, and they are ready for evacuation. We did not want to try to get them out at night because of all the Communists running around at night. We thought it was too dangerous. Early this morning we hear reports that the Navy, which has gone back with the Wessin Air Force group, is threatening to deliver an ultimatum—not to start shooting but to deliver an ultimatum—somewhere between 7 and 9, our time, this morning to bombard the city in a very intensive way. They could get maybe as many as 30 planes in the air and if the Navy turned their guns on, it could be a pretty messy thing. So I have just talked to the Secretary—what I think we should do, if you agree, is to tell our Navy to come into the port of Haina, this is about 7 miles from the center of town—this is where the Embassy wants them to come in because they are not supposed to be shooting—get in touch immediately with the Dominican Navy and since land lines are out we cannot communicate this morning with the Air Force people or the Wessin people—and find out whether they can communicate over the Naval radio (Dominican Naval Radio) with [Page 64] those bases and tell them what we are doing and that we insist on a cease fire until we can get these Americans out and if they canʼt get in touch any other way, to send them a helicopter if this is necessary, to the San Isidro Air Base. We already have the word of the Commander [Colonel Elias Wessin y Wessin] and make sure that this cease fire and this ultimatum and bombardment doesnʼt start until we are through evacuating, then use this time to try to get a ‘junta’ set up of some kind which will stabilize the situation. Does that make sense?
President: Yes. Yes. Why would they want to be bombarding the city until we got our people out, they agreed itʼs all right to take them?
Mann: Well I think they are desperate. The Navy and the Air Force and Wessinʼs force are cut off from the city and they cannot get in and they do not have the strength to get in. They cannot get across this bridge and this is about all they can do. They strafe and bomb. It looks like to me a measure of desperation, and designed I think to break down the morale of the rebels and regain control ultimately in the city. This is what the design would be. Must be a pretty bitter feeling between the two branches of the Armed Forces by this time.
President: This is awful, isnʼt it?
Mann: Yes, it is awful.
President: How much did we know about all this, Tom?
Mann: Well, we knew that it is a graft-ridden place and this guy [Donald] Reid [Cabral] has done a very courageous job in firing unnecessary people trying to balance his budget and doing all these unpopular things like taking taxes from the rich; eliminating graft in the military forces, and that sort of thing. They had duty free entry privileges, and brought in scotch and selling it twice for what they paid for it. They just tried to establish a little order out of chaos down there. It pinches everyoneʼs toes who were used to all these unusual privileges. The price of sugar dropped and we knew they were going to have a drought; we knew that things were not going well, that is why Tap Bennett was up here to tell us that we had about 2 or 3 weeks to try to do something about it.2 We have put in a good deal of money but money does not do everything we hope it will sometimes. They had 30 years of a very strong rule and they just do not know how to manage their own affairs now that they have the responsibility themselves. It is a complex thing.
President: Does it mean, do you think, that this is another Castro government?
[Page 65]Mann: Not yet. No. It is hard to tell what comes out of one of these messes and who comes out on top, but we do not think that this fellow Bosch understands the Communist danger. We do not think he is a Communist but what we are afraid of is that if he gets back in, he will have so many of them around him; and they are so much smarter than he is, that before you know it, theyʼd begin to take over.
President: What is it that they see in him, why do you have this Bosch?
Mann: Bosch is a kind of literary man. He writes books but he is the most impractical fellow in the world—sort of an idealist floating around on Cloud 9 type—he is a handsome man and a good orator and the people just do not have the maturity to distinguish between words and deeds. He makes a lot of promises to them and so forth. That is the way he got elected by being a good orator.
President: What should I say about him in this press conference?3
Mann: That the situation is fluid; that we are evacuating Americans. Thereʼs some kind of bakerʼs convention there; a lot of tourists there and we are getting them out. We are going to ask the Embassy if we should get the wives and families of our official people out and that we have been promised a cease-fire so that this can be accomplished and we are in touch with both sides hoping to do what we can to stop the bloodshed.
[Omitted here is discussion regarding Mannʼs failure to contact Luis Munoz-Marin, former Governor of Puerto Rico, due to Munoz-Marinʼs attendance at a meeting on the death of Albizu Campos, an independent leader in Puerto Rico.]
President: Now letʼs go back over what weʼre doing again.
Mann: We will tell the Navy we have this OK from both sides to get in touch immediately with the Navy at the Port of Haina and make sure everything is safe and that they are expected and unless some trouble develops, to let us know immediately, otherwise go on in as fast as they can, and get in touch with the Embassy. We will tell the Embassy the same thing and establish communication as best they can with the Air Force and the Wessin Forces across the river either by land line or by naval/military radio or if necessary by helicopter and tell them that we are starting to evacuate and to hold off on any shooting.
[Page 66]President: Is it likely that we might start moving our people out and theyʼll start shooting?
Mann: I think there is certain risk in this kind of situation that somebody will shoot. As long as you have all these Communists and everything else around, and there is a chance for misunderstanding, I think there is always a certain risk. That is why we did not want to do it in the middle of the night. Communications are very poor but certainly with these threats of bombardment.
President: Where do you get those reports threats? Who tells us that? Gossip?
Mann: No, no. These are reports that the Embassy has whether they are listening to them over the radio or something, I just donʼt know, I suspect it is just a radio threat. They said theyʼre going to announce it between 7 and 9, and give them a little time to think about it and then presumably start. That would put them up around 10 or 11. But I think the sooner we get started this morning the better.
President: How long does it take to get our people out?
Mann: Well, this we donʼt know. The Port of Haina is about 7 miles. I presume the Embassy can get enough cars to get these 400 or more people down to Haina and then presumably theyʼll have to be lifted either on helicopter or on these boats which would take several hours. But once they get to Haina, theyʼre 7 miles away from the center of town.
President: I would get them out as quick as I could.
Mann: Will do.
- Source: Johnson Library, Recordings and Transcripts, Recording of telephone conversation between President Johnson and Thomas Mann, Tape F65.11, Side A, PNO 1. No classification marking. This transcript was prepared in the Office of the Historian specifically for this volume. President Johnson placed the call to Mann, which lasted approximately 11 minutes.↩
- Ambassador Bennett left Santo Domingo on April 23 for consultations in Washington; see footnote 2, Document 20.↩
- Reference is to a news conference on April 27 at 4 p.m. in the East Room at the White House during which the President summarized the situation in the Dominican Republic. (Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Lyndon B. Johnson, 1965, Book I, pp. 448–457)↩