Slide-Rule Failure in Brazil

...Brazil, like Ghana or Burma, wants a policy of its own...

...No assurance, however, is provided that after Brazil has been lulled, the cycle will not begin again...

...Everything here works by tangents and approximations...

...Whether this resolves the problem is a matter of conjecture...

...It has, for instance, cost Francisco San Tiago Dantas, the present Minister of Finance, no inner debate to alter his political position from that of the "brain" of the Integralist dictatorship of Getulio Vargas to that of the theoretician of a sovereign Brazil: The two are not really so very different...

...A proper panorama of the Brazilian situation cannot leave out dissension within the armed forces over promotions and pay...

...the Washington Post has come out for Brazil...

...The Brazilian Government constantly promises reforms —they now go by the name of "basic" reforms, in keeping with the new jargon—but the idea of reform remains more important than the practice...

...Federal outlay in some fields, particularly education, is disastrously low...

...Where is a young man to go...

...Nor is it surprising to learn that the armed forces of Brazil have been undergoing a process of "renovation" along Goulart-Labor party-Nationalist lines...

...the great bulk of the deficit is due to an inflated bureaucracy...

...Similarly, whenever Jango Goulart has met too much resistance to his tactics, when he has understood that he has gone too far, he has simply backtracked temporarily and reassured the country, which really profoundly dislikes radicalism of any kind...

...This is but a small part of the trouble, however...

...The one way to make sure they will not work is to put them in abstract, generalized terms and to prefer the vast, global plan to any kind of modest beginning...

...They call forth predictable reactions from some sections of the voting public, which is what they are for...

...The Communists in Brazil are few and infinitely less dangerous in the long run than the kind of wordy opportunists who have, in fact, taken up strong positions in the present Administration...

...In many parts of Brazil, small, almost insignificant projects have gained public support and materially benefited the "people...

...the Navy's smuggling past Federal Customs planes with which to fit out its phantom aircraft carrier...

...But who is going to cover the great Brazilian blind spot, the incompetent get-ahead intellectual masquerading as a patriot...

...may think of these), the two countries will generally be in agreement...

...On this score, it is hard to see how the United States, which from the beginning has conceived of the Alliance for Progress in the vastest possible terms, and as a great "slogan" to prove its interest in Latin America, can criticize Brazil when it, too, thinks in terms of "bigness" and reforms that remain words...

...Finally, U.S...

...If Brazilian loyalty to the free world rests on taking up a "firm" position on the Cuban question, the United States is only providing ammunition for the Nationalists, who see the U.S...

...Until very recently, the Brazilian Government solved its economic problems by printing new money...

...the Nationalist bloc in Congress was hunting for Ambassador Lincoln Gordon's head, or at least his credentials...

...Recently I was privileged to observe that it took 21 employes two-and-ahalf hours to clear a package through Customs...

...indeed, often the policy's only justification is its "independence...

...On the other hand, no country today can demand of another unswerving support of its own foreign policy...

...There is to be an anti-inflationary "plan" and a "three-year plan...

...and the Salguiero sambistas held a silent parade of protest—all is now sweetness and light...

...Subcommittees of the United States House of Representatives, with their slide rules and multiplication tables (X number of Communists equals subversion), are far out of the picture...

...and each is a proof that the United States need not preach "revolution...

...In North American insistence on the "menace" of Cuba, they see only an irrational obsession with Communism...

...These men are "radicals," "nationalists" or what-have-you simply because they believe this will give them position, power, prestige and money...

...Likewise, no one denies that there are several Communists or "useful fools" in Goulart's immediate entourage...

...Now the tendency is to "plans...

...A continuing inflation, a sag in productivity and an enormous accumulated debt indicate that twice as much money is needed as is in the bank...

...and Jango Goulart is trying to muzzle his brother-in-law Leonel Brizola...

...If the subcommittee had had a potted biography of each so-called "Communist," it would probably have approved of the type: corporation lawyers, journalists, professors, industrialists and, in the Northeast, overseers for the great jazendeiros...

...In defending its interests, the first thing the United States ought to know is who its real enemies are...

...His Press Secretary, Raul Ryff who was probably responsible for the fictitious "breaking-off" of the talks in Washington, is an avowed and active Communist...

...To the public this means restricted credit, prices out of reach and development at a standstill: or, to make it clearer, no new car or TV, less food, and dipping into savings...

...In the cold war, this agreement is a matter of where the United States lays its emphases, and how much it insists on areas of disagreement...

...Professional Communists can be left to the Brazilians...

...insistence on internal "reform" verges on the impossible...

...he has always needed to find support...

...This labor netted 65 cents for the Federal Government, in itself an unusual amount, since the more general practice is to pay one of the employes and pay the Government nothing...

...Nor is it easy to be told to put one's house in order when one of the advisers of the Alliance is Juscelino Kubitschek, who by ambition and greed, started the whole inflationary spiral in Brazil...

...Nevertheless, it is time the United States recognized that Brazilian society is based on democratic principles...

...Starting from this axiom, it should not be hard to see how Brazil can be linked to its sister-democracy, the United States...

...It cannot be done by ramming a Cuban position down its throat or by conjuring up menaces that do not exist and bypassing the very real dangers that abound...

...Latin American intellectuals are more prone than most to take the path of least resistance...

...Revolution" is not a very safe word if you cannot provide the goods, and modesty in demands and plans—things that can be achieved —is always preferable to ambitious dreams that fail...

...Each of these is a resounding blow against the mainstream of empty talk that flows about the Brazilian "Left...

...and a crime wave in Rio which revealed that there are twice as many convicted criminals walking the streets as there are in the prisons...

...House subcommittee, where testimony had been taken to the effect that "Communists" had "infiltrated" Brazilian society and even branches of its Government...

...Instead of trying to "solve" the problem of the Northeast, which may well be insoluble, why not make tangible progress—which is quite possible—on other problems, equally or more desperate...

...But, at the same time, it bothers him little to follow a nationalist line when it suits him and yet continue his legal practice for the North American corporations his colleagues denounce...

...Change and reform are by their nature slow processes...

...After all, the President's power has been challenged ever since he took office...

...The facility with which the young rise in Latin America is a symbol of intellectual corruption...

...WASHINGTON'S FALSE EQUATION Slide-Rule Failure in Brazil By Keith Botsford Rio de Janeiro After an eventful week in Brazilian-American relations —during which the President was believed to have ordered the recall of his Finance Minister and the suspension of negotiations with the United States...

...Meanwhile, the Center is firmly occupied by ripe old senatorial types with long locks and fine speeches—the traditional parties and the traditional elites...

...Failing the example of small successes that the "people" can see and benefit from, and put pressure on the Government to emulate, the result is likely to be big failures...

...Now it is not exactly news that Brazilian Communists, thanks to the apathy and division of their opponents, are able to control the student movement or many of the unions with a tiny minority of activists...

...A thread runs through these apparently disparate reflections: the shapelessness of Brazilian society...

...If a few speeches, a badly written pamphlet and a couple of heroic attitudes will obtain a department or a ministry or a reputation at the least, why waste time on honest work...

...It is simply impossible to judge this country according to European or North American standards...

...This typical profile of a Brazilian crisis—gloom and optimism, confusion, doubt and euphoria—began in a U.S...

...As the United States has never stated what alternatives it backs, what people, what platforms, or what it will do about Cuban land reform, the expropriated companies or the emigration, Brazilians, like Mexicans and many other Latin Americans, presume the worst...

...Keith Botsford is The New Leader's correspondent in Latin A merica...

...challenge to Cuba not in terms of freedom and justice, but as a desire on the part of Washington to reaffirm its "control" over the island...

...Words are the escape valve of progress...

...The State Department, most sensibly, has assuaged Brazilian pride...

...Government expenses are to be cut nearly in half...

...And the worst has a tangible form—the status quo ante represented by the redoubts of Miami...

...When North American demands do not violate or threaten Brazil's economy, its social structure or its long-standing political commitments (whatever the U.S...

...Reforms in Brazil are power-plays, like everything else...