A New Policy for Latin America

...You come down here expecting us to speak your language...

...Then there is the vital area of economics...

...Some of us think we should do so for purely selfish reasons ("the Latins are good customers"), others think we should do so for charitable reasons ("let's feed and clothe the poor, starving, naked Indians...

...This is not a crisis we can attribute to Communist machinations, but has many economic and political roots that have little or nothing to do with Communism...

...We still tend to think in these terms...

...Government intervention can, as it has in Mexico, be a major source of strength to private enterprise...

...To be sure, deep-seated attitudes cannot be changed overnight...

...It can open up new areas to private investment...

...This means, inevitably, government intervention...

...it can't tell the Soviet Embassy how many people to employ...

...Therefore, it is unrealistic and even foolish to apply economic principles which may be efficacious in an industrial country to an underdeveloped country...

...Just how important is it to us...

...If highly-industrialized Europe required a Marshall Plan to put it on its feet, what makes us think that under-industrialized Latin America can reach Europe's level with aid on the scale of the Marshall Plan...

...The first thing required is a realistic appraisal of Latin America...

...It found that all the critical materials we now import from Asia and Africa would be denied to us in time of war, either because of enemy blockades or because of unfriendly governments being in power...

...Although at numerous inter-American conferences since then we have solemnly insisted upon the equality of all the American states, both we and the Latins have always been aware of the basic inequality in a relationship that establishes us as the protector and our southern neighbors as the protected...

...In this case, we can separate economics from politics...

...But in communication through a third person more is lost than gained...

...An 8-point program for consolidating friendly relations with our southern neighbors A New Policy for Latin America By Daniel James Mexico City The present "agonizing reappraisal" of our Latin American policy being conducted by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee may prove the healthiest development in inter-American affairs since the Good Neighbor policy was launched more than two decades ago...

...There is little doubt in my mind that much of the confusion and misunderstanding attending Nixon's trip is attributable, at bottom, to a failure of communication due to language difficulties...

...Last year our press made it appear that because some important U.S...

...Despite the great advances that the Latin Americans have made in recent years, one still detects in the average American traveler down here a patronizing attitude toward them...

...Whose submarine was it...

...The answer is self-evident: to date, they have not been...

...True, Brazil and Argentina may have been foolish to nationalize their oil resources at this time...

...Take, also, the matter of Communist espionage activities...

...A good step would be the formulation of price-stabilization agreements...

...These should be extended to cover minerals and other products...

...3. To achieve minimum industrialization, Latin America must have a good highway network, abundant electricity, irrigation projects, etc...

...Communists had fled to Mexico this country was a hotbed of Communism...

...But the Monroe Doctrine is outmoded...

...5. We must learn to regard Latin America both as an area and, at the same time, as 20 different republics...

...The whole Western Hemisphere, in short, depends for its survival upon all of its respective parts...

...Events since Poinsett's time—particularly our war with Mexico in 1847 and our interventions in Mexico and several Caribbean countries during the first quarter of this century—have reinforced the American's image of his southern neighbors as "spoiled children...

...Americans have no idea how angry our southern neighbors are about this...

...7. If we send goodwill ambassadors to Latin America, they should at least be able to carry on an elementary conversation in Spanish...

...None, to this writer's knowledge, pointed out the only fact that mattered: Soviet activity in Mexico is not directed at Mexico but solely at the United States...

...They will smile and shake hands heartily or even give you a big warm abrazo, but privately they are most likely thinking: "What silly people these gringos are...

...And even the very best policy we can devise will suffer because it will not express the way we really feel and think...

...correspondingly, in our lack of recognition lies our weakness...

...2. Our policy toward Latin America (and other underdeveloped regions) must be flexible enough to permit us to take certain unorthodox measures...

...Do we think the Latins will forget this treatment and come rushing to our aid when we are in dire straits...

...As a matter of fact, we have made a tentative effort to do just that by joining several Latin American nations in coffee talks...

...Once we realize that we haven't been adhering to any law at all, we can dig into the price problem on a realistic basis...

...rather, the tactics stem from the fundamentally correct Russian analysis that nowadays there is no sharp division between economics and politics...

...Our experience with European dictators should have taught us that no one is more unreliable as a friend or ally, regardless of any temporary benefits we may gain from him, than a dictator...

...It is not a case of the Soviets using "better" tactics...

...Involved here is an attitude that Americans have had toward Latin America since the former Spanish colonies won their independence nearly a century and a half ago...

...Its failure in Guatemala has not deterred it from attempting to establish new, and more effective, beachheads elsewhere to the south...

...Do they think that sending us this very important man will make us forget the problems his country is causing us...

...It needs much more than a Marshall Plan...

...But our refusal has not only delayed getting oil out of the ground and hurt both countries economically...

...In such a country, more than in an industrialized one, the line between economic and political problems scarcely exists...

...Few Americans stop to think that we have to aid Latin America to survive...

...The Latin Americans are among the most cynical people on earth...

...But the committee will have to look beyond the immediate causes of the rough reception Vice President Richard M. Nixon received on his recent South American trip...

...The Latin Americans, in short, are tired of circuses...

...Formally, there is little the Mexican Government can do...

...Obviously, it did not belong to any of the Latin American nations...

...A Mexican industrialist recently said to me: "How can you expect to communicate with us if you don't speak our language...

...Latin America has been virtually under our protective wing since the Monroe Doctrine was proclaimed in 1823...

...only this kind of partnership can raise the area's general economic level...

...with our superior economic power, we have dominated the market and forced down the prices of raw materials...

...A State Department spokesman recently "explained" that we gave General Marcos Perez Jimenez a decoration, when he was Venezuela's dictator, as a reward not to him personally but to his country for its cooperation and friendship...

...But it can cooperate with the U.S...

...they want bread...

...only two or three of them have submarines and there would be no reason for those vessels to cruise in Argentine waters surreptitiously...

...Nevertheless, from the economic standpoint we should regard Latin America as an area,1 since the republics have many common economic problems which require area-wide solutions...

...After weeks of investigation, it is now thought that the submarine was Russian and that the Soviets may be building a submarine base in the Antarctic...

...To whom could we turn...

...We have refused, for example, to help the nationalized Brazilian and Argentine oil industries...

...Indeed, the Kremlin would be foolish to hurt any Mexican regime which permits it to conduct its activities against the U.S...

...Minister to Mexico, Joel R. Poinsett, writing to Henry Clay on July 8, 1827 in explanation of why he had become a controversial figure in Mexico (he had involved himself neck-deep in Mexican politics), dismissed the uproar he had caused by saying: "I cannot too often repeat that if we desire to preserve a good understanding with these countries [in Latin America], we must regard the faults committed by Mexico with utmost indulgence...

...it can in a region which has been cleared and possesses roads, water and electricity...

...We are baffled by Russia's economic penetration of Latin America and other underdeveloped areas precisely because trade —to us a purely economic matter—is employed as a political weapon...

...Nor is this as bad as it sounds...

...8. Finally, let us not overdo this business of sending goodwill ambassadors to Latin America...

...We face an unprecedented crisis in our relations with Latin America: The entire Latin American region is ranged against the United States...

...Hitherto, we have taken the stand-offish attitude that the law of supply-and-demand should determine the level of prices...

...A plant cannot be built in a trackless jungle...

...The Kremlin is becoming increasingly aware that Latin America can prove an ideal springboard for attacks upon the United States...

...The Latin countries hate to be lumped together as if they were one big homogeneous unit, which they distinctly are not...

...This alone should make clear why we must maintain the best of relations with Argentina, and with another nation bordering on the Antarctic, Chile...

...If we must send special envoys to Latin America, we should send men who are authorized to tackle problems on the spot and who can leave behind the feeling that something has been accomplished...

...Yet when foreigners visit you in the United States, you make no effort to speak theirs...

...The potential danger, from our standpoint, is that this bloc could some day become strong enough to decide the economic destiny of the hemisphere...

...The President's Materials Policy Commission, under Harry Truman, supplied the answer several years ago when it learned that the 12 strategic materials absolutely essential to the conduct of modern war are all available, in abundance, right here in the Western Hemisphere...

...If allowed to fester, however, the crisis will (and already has to some degree) become complicated by the Communist issue, and ultimately will lay Latin America wide open to a major Red offensive...

...in tracking down Embassy-directed Soviet agents working against us, and in helping patrol the border to stop or curtail the infiltration of Soviet agents into the United States...

...They are those of a spoilt and wayward child the effects of pride, ignorance and prejudice...

...We should encourage government-industry partnership in Latin America...

...Despite external appearances, today we are as dependent upon the Latin Americans for our own protection as they are upon us for theirs...

...Some publications added knowingly that the Soviet Embassy here has an outsized staff...

...4. At the moment, the best form of aid for Latin America is not necessarily a Marshall Plan—which is long-term—but measures to halt the fall in prices of Latin American raw materials...

...But we must at least recognize the fundamental obstacle to good relations created by our attitudes and look for ways to change them...

...Can public works of such magnitude be constructed by private enterprise...

...We are all agreed that we should give aid to Latin America...

...not only is- the third person usually unable to convey the feeling of the other two but his very presence hinders the establishment of real rapport between the principals...

...as a rule, such insistence will only make it do the opposite...

...The first U.S...

...This type of specious reasoning only makes matters worse, for skeptical Latins see in it a stupid attempt to excuse past mistakes for the purpose of committing them again...

...We must realize that we cannot order another country to adopt our economic philsophy...

...Most of them are to be found in Latin America—something the aforementioned Senate subcommittee also learned...

...Of course, official visitors .unable to speak Spanish are usually accompanied by good interpreters...

...Whether we like government intervention at home or not, there is no substitute for it in Latin America and we must accustom ourselves to that fact...

...It was fired upon by the Argentines and an oil slick was later seen, confirming the submarine's existence...

...6. It must be stressed that our coddling of dictators has proved to be one of the most damaging aspects of our policy in Latin America...

...The Latin American nations have, in fact, begun to form a regional economic bloc—a Mercado Comun (Common Market) —as a defense against our injurious economic policies...

...But, in practice, that "law" has all too often been ourselves...

...Insisting that our aid go only to strengthen private enterprises, and withholding it from state-owned industries, is contributing to our undoing in Latin America...

...We can beat the Communists at this game only if we come to grips with the basic issues...

...By definition, an underdeveloped country is one that is far behind an advanced one in industrial development, and presents special problems which acquire special handling...

...Recently, for example, a submarine was detected off the coast of Argentina...

...One of the special problems of an underdeveloped area is that vast public works are essential to industrial development but, because of such obstacles as clearing away jungles and cutting through formidable mountain ranges, the concerted effort of a whole nation, or group of nations, is necessary...

...Until this changes, we will not be able to treat the Latin Americans as equals...

...Admiral Alfred T. Mahan, our famous naval strategist, more than half a century ago referred to the Caribbean as the "American Mediterranean...

...The free-enterprise system cannot be exported along with our aid...

...On this issue, a forthright policy declaration from President Eisenhower or Secretary Dulles would have a very beneficial effect in Latin American just now...

...Apart from obvious differences between Portuguese-descended Brazil, French-speaking Haiti, and the Spanish-speaking majority of countries, there are marked distinctions among the latter...

...In this recognition lies their strength...

...it has also angered the Brazilians and Argentines and driven them to seek Soviet aid...

...If this is so, why do we force down the price of minerals—both strategic and nonstrategic—and add to the impoverishment and suffering of the people who hold our lives in their hands...

...One look at the map should be sufficient to show how vulnerable we are in that region, and how difficult it would be to defend it—and hence our own southern coast—without the friendship and cooperation of the Caribbean countries...

...In 1954, a subcommittee of the Senate Interior Affairs Committee made a study of the accessibility of critical raw materials...

...While space does not permit the presentation of a detailed program, several basic points which an intelligent Latin American policy must include can be indicated: 1. We must recognize that economic policy and political policy cannot be divorced...