Tortoises & Air Bases

As softly as the flup-flupping of galapagos (tortoises) on the black island rocks, discussions began between the U.S. and Ecuadoran Governments. Subject: permanent, jointly operated air bases in the Galapagos Islands. In return for the use of the airfields and naval installations,* Ecuador would get $15,000,000 in U.S. loans for sanitary and road improvements. In Washington, Ecuador's jaunty Ambassador Galo Plaza explained that his Government fully realized the value of the bases in the defense of the Canal. He thought that the talks might lead to a treaty. Of course, the treaty might never be written, the original "gentlemen's agreement" might be enough without a written document.

But the soft talk was heard in Quito. Ecuadoran resentment against the U.S. had simmered since the Rio Conference of 1942, when the U.S. seemed to favor big Peru in the settlement of its 112-year-old boundary dispute with little Ecuador. Last week the resentment boiled over. There were cries of "Yankee imperialism." The Assembly met in secret session, issued a blast in the press condemning the Peruvian boundary settlement. It inferentially warned its Washington representatives not to give away any more Ecuadoran territory. The nation had already lost altogether too much.

The talks stopped in midair. And at week's end the only important people concerned with the Galapagos Archipelago were the G.I.s, who had been there for more than two years. They contemplated the giant tortoises, some of whom had been there 200 years.

* In 1942 Ecuador gave the U.S. the use of bases at Salinas, on the Ecuadoran mainland, and on the volcanic Galapagos Archipelago, 864 miles southwest of the Panama Canal.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.