715.1715/957: Telegram
The Special Representative of the President (Corrigan) to the Secretary of State
[Received November 19—1:30 a.m.]
17. For the Under Secretary. The 10 points of mediation approved by the Commission were signed and delivered to the two delegations tonight and I have every hope that they will be accepted by the two Governments. This will relieve present tension but I am not so sanguine as to the future. The only real way to avoid war is to settle the basic boundary controversy. I feel there is a real desire to settle the matter once and for all on the part of Nicaragua, and an equally real disposition to compromise in order to obtain this end. I cannot say as much for the attitude of Honduras, which takes the stand in public and in private that the Mediation Commission exists not to conciliate a dispute as to the frontier, but to force Nicaragua to accept the line of the award of the King of Spain as the definitive boundary. I seriously doubt if Honduras would be willing, for example, to cede certain territory on the left bank of the Cocos River [Page 107] and the lands between it and the Cruta to Nicaragua in return for acceptance by the latter of the principle of the validity of the King’s award, the most reasonable solution which occurs to me so far, since the villages lying in these territories have long been Nicaraguan by every standard and could not be abandoned by Nicaragua. Furthermore, I seriously doubt that Honduras will consent even to submit the validity of the award to arbitration and fear that any peaceful gesture on the part of the Honduran Government would be rejected by the people of the country, in their present temper. I, therefore, consider that it might be desirable for the Commission to recess if or after the Protocol is signed, to allow time for passions to cool and for diplomatic approaches to Carias, in the hope that modification of the present intransigeant attitude of Honduras can be obtained. I regretfully repeat my belief that the full moral pressure of the United States will be necessary to induce Honduras to make any concession whatsoever in the interest of peace. This mediation cannot be permitted to fail, or the entire structure so carefully erected at Buenos Aires falls to the ground.