The Problem of Guatemala

Because the U.S. views Communism in Guatemala as a menace to hemisphere security, it wants the 21 American republics to take joint action against this danger at the Inter-American Conference in Caracas next March. But the U.S. is running into trouble trying to get the Latin Americans to agree to anything like a strong line against Guatemala's fellow-traveling government. It is even having difficulty finding a suitable neighbor to take the lead in presenting the case under the 1947 Rio pact provision for joint measures against "an aggression which is not an armed attack."

Like many Europeans, the Latinos are not nearly so roused against the dangers of world Communism as people in the U.S.; in fact, a large body of non-Communist leftist opinion holds that the U.S. is too upset about the Reds and not bothered enough about right-wing dictatorships. Latin America's powerful nationalist sentiment, moreover, tends ,to sympathize with Guatemala's Red-led harassment of U.S. companies.

Old Ghosts. At bottom the trouble is that any U.S. proposal for strong action against Guatemalan Communism raises the old specter of U.S. intervention, which scares the Latinos more than Communism --even after a generation of U.S. good will, loans and trade agreements. Said a pro-U.S. South American President: "Nonintervention is essential to continental solidarity." The intervention of Moscow-controlled Communism apparently does not bother them yet. Even such neighbors of Guatemala as El Salvador and Honduras, while turning up evidences of Communist infiltration, are reluctant to step forward with accusations.

But the subject is definitely on the agenda for Caracas, as it was at Bogota in 1948. The way of handling it is still unsettled. There is little likelihood that Guatemala will be arraigned on charges of undermining the hemisphere's security. The U.S. will press for a full debate, in the course of which Communism's growing influence in Guatemala will presumably be aired. U.S. delegates will probably also propose specific measures for controlling Communism through stricter limits on the circulation of propaganda and issuance of visas.

Vital Interests. Through some such concerted program, the State Department still hopes to convince Guatemala's President Jacobo Arbenz of the error of his fellow-traveling ways. But if the situation in Guatemala continues to deteriorate, the ultimate possibility of unilateral U.S. action cannot be ruled out. Said U.S. Ambassador John Peurifoy in Guatemala City last week: "Public opinion in the U.S. might force us to take some measures to prevent Guatemala from falling into the lap of international Communism. We cannot permit a Soviet republic to be established between Texas and the Panama Canal." Peurifoy declined to say what possible measures he had recommended to Washington, but it is a fact that Guatemala rarely has more on hand than eight days' supply of gasoline.

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