Office of the Historian

476. Memorandum From the Counselor and Chairman of the Policy Planning Council (Rostow) to President Johnson1

Washington, February 10, 1966.

You have the cabled reports of my mission to Peru plus the Washington instructions I followed.2

The facts are:

1.
Belaunde fully met the condition we laid down; namely, that he give to you personally his assurance that the status of IPC would not be impaired in the lifetime of his administration.
2.
He subsequently confirmed his verbal message to me in a conversation with Ambassador Jones. He knows I reported in writing; he knows you have that report; and he has confirmed its accuracy.3
3.
What he permitted me to communicate to you, he has often said to some of our officials. But this time he knew he was making a most solemn and personal political deal. It could be explosive for him if it is known. He has put his political life in your hands. That is why I asked my cables to be handled with such special care.
4.
Before I left, Linc Gordon cleared the deal with Senator Hickenlooper. As you know, I was recruited for this job by all three of my Latino pals: Tom Mann, Jack Vaughn, and Gordon.
5.
As the attached cable4 indicates, there is some irony in all this: Belaunde is the most pro-U.S. business President in Latin America. IPC is simply an inherited political problem peculiarly difficult for his rickety coalition. His campaign speeches and subsequent dilatory tactics have not helped. But basically he wants a settlement if he can swing it: he doesn’t want to nationalize: if he breaks his word to you, the Hickenlooper Amendment is there, and he knows it.
6.
I recommend that we proceed promptly with the $15–20 million A.I.D. package as promised.
7.
Sometime at your leisure and convenience, I’d like to tell you what the east slopes of the Andes look like. The last real frontier. Real nice place to bring up kids.

Walt
  1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Peru, Vol. II, 1/66–10/67. Secret; Eyes Only. The President also received an advance report on the Rostow mission from Bromley Smith on February 9. (Ibid., Memos to the President, McGeorge Bundy, Vol. 20)↩
  2. Rostow’s instructions were attached as Tab B to Document 475. Bowdler forwarded the “cabled reports” to the President under the cover of a February 10 memorandum. (Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Peru, Vol. II, 1/66–10/67) These were telegrams 1107 and 1114 from Lima, both February 5. (Also in National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1964–66, PET 6 PERU and POL 29 PERU, respectively) Rostow delivered the letter in a meeting with Belaúnde on February 4. A detailed account of the meeting is in airgram A–450 from Lima, February 9. (Ibid., POL PERU–US)↩
  3. In telegram 1124 from Lima, February 8. (Ibid., POL PERU–US)↩
  4. Telegram 1138 from Lima, February 10; attached but not printed.↩