724.3415/4166
The Salvadoran Minister for Foreign Affairs (Araujo) to the Secretary of State
L. D. No. 1471
Mr. Minister: My Government has followed with lively interest the noble efforts made by the other governments of America to bring about a termination of the state of war existing between Bolivia and Paraguay. It has also lent its friendly cooperation to that end, in fulfillment of the duty of every sister people to watch over the peace and tranquility of the Continent.
Unfortunately, all these efforts have not resulted in the desired success. The specter of war continues to foment hatreds in that region; decimating generations, uselessly sacrificing hundreds of lives. Such are the cable reports that we receive daily as to the tragic development of the fratricidal struggle.
The recent appeal made by a noted Uruguayan daily, calling upon all the mothers of America to help in putting a stop to the war in question should also move the men of those countries to find the desired formula of peace and which would restore to those two sister peoples the harmony that they need.
It is with this feeling that the Government of El Salvador ventures respectfully to appeal to the conscience of America to make one more effort to bring about an agreement between Bolivia and Paraguay; and it feels sure that Your Excellency’s Government, which on all occasions has given proof of its love of peace on the continent, will see fit to give its consideration and its valuable support to the idea, which I have the honor to set forth hereinafter, the purpose of which is to put an end to the bloody tragedy.
An honorable antecedent of this attitude is the continental declaration of August 3, 1932, which filled our America with hope and brought into prominence the example of the union of all the American peoples in the face of the catastrophe of the two sister peoples engaged in the struggle. Subsequently, in confirmation of this fraternal principle, were the efforts made by the VII Panamerican Conference, which, on December 24, 1933, “reaffirms its unalterable faith in pacific measures for the settlement of international conflicts” and “reiterates the disposition of the countries represented thereat to support, in accordance with the special circumstances and policy of each Government, the formula of settlement which may be arrived at for the solution of the Chaco conflict [“].33
[Page 199]The idea in question is that we authorize our diplomatic representatives residing in Washington, to propose as soon as possible, in agreement with the Pan American Union and in the name of all America, to the Governments of Paraguay and Bolivia, on the bases that they may consider advisable, the acceptance of an armistice to last for a year at least or the time that they may consider sufficient for those countries to study a just and friendly solution of their differences, thus following the edifying example of patriotism that has been bequeathed to the history of America by four sister Republics, Guatemala and Honduras, Colombia and Peru, in recently settling their boundary disputes34 on the basis of friendship and concord, whereby they avoided a useless shedding of blood, which would have been a painful memory for posterity.
Thanking the enlightened Government of the United States of America in advance in the name of the Government of El Salvador for the kind attention that it may give to this suggestion, I take pleasure in offering to Your Excellency, etc., etc.
- Report of the Delegates of the United States of America to the Seventh International Conference of American States, p. 262.↩
- See Foreign Relations, 1930, vol. i, pp. 344 ff.; ibid., 1932, vol. v, pp. 270 ff., pp. 350 ff., and ibid., 1933, vol. iv, pp. 561 ff.↩