Francesco/who-killed-jfk huggingface dataset:
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in mind that the things that are mostly meaningful to these groups of people is whether they are working, the price structure, and just the general bare economic needs that are met by any government. I want to talk now for a moment about the Alianza para Progresso and some of my impressions about how it's doing, not only in El Salvador, but in Guatemala and some of the other countries that i observed. One of the most immediate isopressions that I get is during the last few months is that the Alianza para Progresse has been terribly over publicized. I think we made a serious mistake in arousing expectations in Latin America that may not be met. As a Batter of fact. I know from talking with many of the people there that the expectations they have simply are not within the reckoning of what the United States has planned. I even think it's unfortunate if we have a slogen, that the Alianza para Progresso as a slogan is open to serious attacks both humorously and satirically. As a matter of fact, already many people even our friends are beginning to use the slogan by way of criticism. I have in mind recently, that the foreign minister of Honduras was in Mexico and in a public statement said, "we have a lot of alliance but no progress." And of course in the schools in El Salvador, there are all kinds of turnings about twisting the words around by way of criticism.What I mean by over publicizing and sloganizing is the fact that almost all over Latin America, the newspapers are reporting an outpouring of millions and millions of dollars, and as you might expect they convert the figures into pesos, or other local currency whatever you happen to be, so that there is an announcement saying that the Alianza para Progresso has allocated 10 million dollars and then they convert that into 120 million pesos; it sounds like an awful lot of money. Immediately people have grandioso ideas about what is going to be done with all this money when in effect it is only a request for that kind of money that has been done. We have, basically speaking, still some problems among Congress as to how much soney is going to be allocated. Let me give you a specific case about what I feel is an over publicizing of the Alliance's program. In El Salvador there was an announce- went in the papers that three million dollars had been ailo- cated by the United States Covernment for the building of schools. Now, 3 million dollars converted into local currency is something like seven and half million colones. That's a big sum of money down there and, of course, it got tremendous play in all the newspapers. Well it turned out, what the Alliance had in sind, along with the Junta, was to build ore hundred small schools. This would be 100 schools worth around $30.000 a piece. Well, one of the model schools, right now, is in the process of constructions in one of the neigh- borhoods in El Salvador. While I was there, there was
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-5-considerable snide criticism by the press; by a lot of the population that this was a poor example of Alliance for Progress spending. It was a small school; it was within the desired $30,000 budget, but I am thinking that eest of the people in El Salvador having talked about 7,500,000 colones, were expecting palaces to be built. Suddenly you have a very small school, and it was being criticized by the press; by the people at large. The next day, quite fortunately, the Minister of Education very ably took this issue and quieted it by saying: "Ne said we are going to build schools, not palaces." But I think that even this criticise could have been avoided had we announced rather that the expenditure of 3 million dollars or 7,500,000 colones, had we just announced that the Alliance for Progress, in cooperation with the El Salvador government, was going to build 100 small schools and say so without any more dressing it up, not even mentice the acount of money that was going to be spent in total because then no one could expect more than a small school. Also I think it would have been better to have the first schools outside El Salvador, possibly in a little town like Santa Techia or one of the other neighboring towns; and then build the school right next to the old school so that there would be a marked contrast in every way. You could see it immediately. Certainly there is always land available near all the old schools, and Just destroy the old school when you've built the new one; and then really to do a public relations job, get statements from the teachers, from the students, and, perhaps, have the oldest school teacher in the neighborhood lay the cornerstone to the school. Really do a public relations job of it en a very personal basis rather than trying to stagger people with huge sums of money. This is what I mean by talking in huge figures when you can do a better job and arouse less expectation.. When you have few expectations, almost anything is better; so I think if we talk little and act big, we're going to be much better off in the long run.I think also a very highly over publicized group is the Peace Corps. Here again, I think we're setting curselves up for some possible difficulty. All of this publicizing is very good for consumption here in the United States; but in the world we're living in now, the same kind of propaganda gets outside the United States, Already there are all kinds of jokes about the Pesce Corps. Its done a terrific job of publicizing here in this country. They get great coverage in
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SEDACI-6-all the big picture magazines. In time there's going to be a musical comedy about the Peace Corps. All this is great stuff as far as the United States is concerned, but I'm afraid it is going to create serious problems abroad. Actually the actual observable benefit of the Peace Corps in the various areas will be very minimal when you consider, for example, they have about 29 people that will be in the Peace Corp in San Salvador. They're not going to be able to make much of a dent in separate communities, because they are separated. As I understand it, from talking to the manager of the Peace Corps for the Contral American area; most of these kids will be alone in the villages they are going to, and whatever they do is not going to be very observable as far as the general population is concerned. Unfortunately, one of the things that we haven't yet learned in our thinking about these under-developed countries is the fact that we do such naive things as this: there is an elderly lady about 63 years of age that has been assigned to one of the small villages in southern El Salvador and her expertise is home economics. If you have ever been to one of these small villages and if you have seen that they subsist, and I say subsist, merely on a small supply of beans and maybe one or two tortillas; and the difference between the supply of one or two tortillas is a very meaningful one. When you start talking about balancing the diet and varying the diet and having a home economics expert to teach them this, this gets pretty ironic. This is precisely the thing that could easily be open to criticism and easily open to satire. I can imagine if I were someone in a position of Dr. Jose Rodriguez RUIZ, who was a very left leaning Dean of the School of Economics, in El Salvador--if I really wanted to cede on one issue and ridicule it, I would talk about this person who was an expert on home economics; balanced dieting; and how many vegetables you should have; what variety of vegetables, how much cottage cheese you should have; and the whole thing in the balanced diet. I could murder this whole thing in very short time and make it very ridiculous.I think these are things that we've got to think about. We've got to think about all the possible weaknesses, how this thing can be turned around. I know that in the United States, I know that in the hometown of this woman (she's from Nebraska) it sounds absolutely marvelous and this home economics expert is going down to a little Latin American country and tell them all about home economics, but from the point of view of the Latin American it's sheer irony and it's susceptible to attack.
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-7-with respect to your question about the influenceof the Church with the campesinos in other parts of thecommunity; I think that it's probably true all overLatin America that the Church has great influence on thethinking of the population. It's interesting to notethat in San Salvador and Mexico the real church goersare the women and not the wen, but the ren are very certainthat their wives go to church so that they're theirsurrogates and that they take their children along withthem. Although they are not great church goers, I thinkthey are Catholics and are greatly influenced by the priests.You asked whether the people in Ei Salvador areoware that there have been food shortages in Cuba and thatthe Castro program is undergoing serious difficulties andthe answer to that is "yes". As a matter of fact I was.interested in this when I talked to various people, includingcab drivers and boys that shine your shoes, people workingin the markets, and some of the campesinos. There is anawareness, certainly in the city, that Castro is having hisdifficulties. One of the things that is interesting and,of course, I think this may be referable to their Churchinfluence, is that the word Communism per se still has aserious effect on people. I think it's one of the thingsthey talk about--social reform, etc., etc., but, the tagCommunisa is still a very harsh tag in the Latin Americanmind. I think this is one of the serious errors Castremade from his point of view was to declare himself aCommunist and a Marxist-Lenninist because many people thatmight have gone along with him at that moment got frightenedoff. There is an awareness that he is having troubles andthat the Revolution hasn't gone along on the way it has.Also there was a lot of talk among a certain group ofpeople that I talked with-these were some workers from atextile mill, that there had been an awful lot of killingthat was done by Castro. Apparently, there had beenpictures of a lot of executions in some of the Latin American.newspapers; and this has had an effect on them.With respect to the government prosecuting anyone forviolation of the minimum wage law: As far as I understand,it's still in its infancy. I think the belief of thegovernment is that if they start to impose any violationsthis might have a serious effect in getting the programacross. But in this respect, I'd like to mention theseventh day wage that was passed about a year ago when I
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- 5 -was in Salvador apparently is working fairly well. You'll recall that this was accepting with the Bible that if anyone worked for six days (this was referable to the campesinos) he was entitled to the seventh day pay. I was worried at the time and mentioned my worries to Choretic (Phonetic) and also the Minister of Economics who was at breakfast with us at that time, that one of the possible dangers of any reform is that it is not carried through intelligently and forcibly. It is better not to have a reform, not to announce a now idea, not to arouse expectations, if there is going to be violation of those expectations. At that time it was contemplated that the army would administer the program of the seventh day pay. Apparently they have changed their mind on that and have a civilian group that is administering the program; there has been nc real scandal with respect to violations of this. I was a little fearful that a local army guy would get paid off by some of the big plantation owners and thus be permitted to do all kinds of violations. Apparently this has not happened, and they've been pretty effective in the administration.My big objection at that time was that again the minimum salary thing was not properly publicized. They could have had all kinds of radie and television programs, interviews with the campesinos, and asked them what they felt about this and actually doing that kind of public relations job which they did not do. I think this is true with all these reforms. I think that they have got to be brought to the people where you get reaction from the people as to the extent of the change, any reform has on their personal existence. This again is a matter of attitude, a matter of technique in public relations.Well, it is certainly true that there has been a considerable amount of publicity about the Alianza para Progresso. I was not aware that it was this specific group that was pushing the program of publication. However, harking back to a previous statement, I think that there is a serious possibility that over publicizing of the Alianza will cause more trouble than we can at present anticipate. As a matter of fact some of the problems are already beginning to arise. I had a long talk with Ambassador Willians on this, and I think we both agreed that we ought to soft pedal much of the talk about the Alianza; and certainly to stay away from these enormous figures of millions of dollars. As far as the people in Latin AmericaT
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- 9 -are concerned they really think the world is going to change overnight and expect it to change overnight. When the changes aren't forthcoming, they are going to be very embittered and we may possibly create enemies we need not have had.I have in mind talking with one man; he was a newspaper vendor and I happened to see a headline about the Alianza para Progresso, and this of course gave me an opening to talk to him about it. I said, "What is this going to mean to you?" He said, "I understand they are going to give me a new house." Someone standing close to his said, "What do you mean--they're going to give you a house," and they actually had an argument about the thing. The man selling the newspapers insisting that's what they were going to do--build him a new house, etc. The other man saying that's all propaganda, it's all demagogy; they say this all the time and nothing is going to occur. The chances are very strong that this man will not get into a house. The chances are almost equally strong that he won't even get an apartment because you cannot possibly meet the housing shortage in such a place in San Salvador, where I doubt more than 10% of the people have adequate hygienic dwellings. So here again, well at least, this newspaper vendor has gotten an enormously over bloated notion about what we're going to do. It may be that in his particular case, he is more aware of the Allanza and more aware of the million dollars because he is selling news papers and magazines and he is reading about it all the time. Here again I think is one of the dangers with respect to the publicity about the Alianza.I think I mentioned in my report about a year ago it might be a good idea to get some experts in public relations, and that they might be recruited from such places as Mexico and Puerto Rico where you have people who have worked with either government agencies, with some of our embassies, or with some of the public relations firms such as General Rubicam & Noble Advertising and other very widely-known public relations groups in Latin America. I think it might be a good idea for the government to have someone counseling him and particularly on any wide shifts of policy on how to present it to the public. I think it would be an enormously effective way in presenting the programs of the government, and it would be a good investment they could make at this point. And I don't just mean getting the
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# SECRET- 10 -ordinary Madison Avenue flock. : I think it ought to be a person who has had some experience dealing with the Latin American temperament because any program has to arise out of the psyche of the peopio that are being dealt with.Incidentally, I did see some of the pictures and some of the coverage that was given Rivera during his election campaign and whoever handled that, I think, was very effective; and I've suggested to the Arbassador that he might suggest that the same people or person be retained to accompany Rivera into his position as prosident.I think one of the key persons with respect to the left in El Salvador is the Dean of the School of Economics whose name is Jose Rodriguez Puiz. He is also the son of the president of the University. Now first a word about the young son--he gave a lecture on Marxism one of the nights I was there, and I went to the lecture. The hall was filled to capacity; there were people standing in the doorways, and I would estimate there were 400 or 500 people thore. It was a rather interesting experience because from what I heard I had been led to believe that it would be kind of a rabble rouser and that he would try to instigate the people into action. Actually what I saw was--personally It was very moving, really: He has kind of the manner of a priest. His voice tends to tremble at first, but as he got more involved, he lost the tremor in his voice and sounded more like a very intense professor. The interesting thing was when he spoke about the United States, it was more in symbolic toras; there was nothing of real harsh personal rancor either in his voico, his manner, or in what he was actually saying; but it was almost as if he were referring to an obstraction of the United States. lie didn't take off on the Ambassador personally. He just talked about American ambassadors and he was bitter, less inclined to be sarcastic then merely hitter. Be is a very effective human being. I note as I sat there, he moved the audience that he had, emotionally. I could see one of them kind of swallowing and the tears running down eyes of the girl to the left of de. There was really no attempt to rabble rouse as such, there was no attempt to get the people out in the streets as it were. Toward the end he made a very Interesting statement--he said: "We know that there are changes necessary, we know that we have got to free ourselves of the imperialist yoke of the United States, and we know that these changes have got to core through us; no one is ing to help us but ourselves," but he says in In making these
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- 11 -changes come about, let us be careful that we do not ruin and that we do not set back our program by taking precipitous action, without plan. Suddenly, it come almost as a jarring note, he said--well perhaps we're not ready to act yet, but whatever we do, we've got to do it reasonably so that we don't lose the revolution as such. I don't know whether he had eference to the fact that maybe in Cuba the revolution did not work because certainly he was very pro Castro. I think that there was a kind of note of wariness in his talk, and it is interesting.I suggested to the ambassador that it might be a good idea for him to set up a meeting with Guillermo Moscoso with the older Jose Napoleon Rodriguez Ruiz who was the (rector) of the University, and possibly ask this younger follow, the Dean of the School of Economics to come along and try in effect to have Moscoso say, "Look, I know you probably disagree with a lot that we're doing and you are very skeptical about the Alianza para Progresso; you're very skoptical about the United States per sc. Maybe in many senses you're right, warhe in the past you had renson to feol that there has been imperialism, but we want to indicate to you that we have a change of attitude and just give us a chance and I need your counsel and you're un economist and I want to know. I realize that we may disagree, but I wanted to meet you anyway." I think that there is a pessibility that a person in his frame of mind and I say this is only a ressibility and it may be very minimal as a possibility; but there is a chance that we may be able to recreato some kind of the with him so that he is not aร bitter and as antagonistic. I do not think, at least from hearing that lecture, that evening that he is entirely boyond the pale; and bear in mind that there were no Americans, there was no one in the audience (that I could detect at least) who were not from El Salvador itself. I realize that there may be various opinions with respect to this, but I did suggest it to the ambassador. He thought it might be a good idea and he may very well do that.Apparently the father, Jose Rodriguez Ruiz, Sr. (Napoleon), is a person who is approachable. Ho is not as far to the left as his son. He is a liberal, but he is not considered a Communist. There is, I understand, some- thing in the Embassy about him, but apparently it has been checked out and it is felt that he is not a Communist. In any event, there has been an invitation extended to him to come to the United States. I think, as a matter of fact, that with many of these poople that if they were to come to
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-12 -the United States and given some kind of chance to observe the United States first hand, they would be less bitter about us. I think that they have adopted some very dogmatic notions about us; they believe some of what they see in the movies; kinds of snatches of newsreels about the situation in the South. Actually, they have a very distorted notion, and some of it is a very sincere distorted notion. They really believe some of the things they've heard. I think if they would see us first hand they might feel differently. Just as I think sometimes when a lot of these fellows go to Russia or Cuba; they come back disenchanted that it isn't what they have been told it is. I know that I've talked to some people in Mexico who have seen Cuba first hand during the last year and have had noticeable changes of mind as to what it is. It's one thing to hear all the good things that the leftists say about a thing, but it's another thing when you actually go there and observe some of the tyrannical atmosphere. I think the same thing is true on the reverse that you can disenchant people by sending them to Russia or to Cuba or behind the Iron Curtain. Just as sometimes you can rub away some of the malimpressions, erroneous impressions by sending people to the United States and having them live on a campus for example, such as Cambridge, Michigan, or any such place where they can see first hand that we're not the oppressors that they have been led to believe for a long time. Much of this is really lack of exposure.During the time that I was in El Salvador about 10 days ago, there arose a serious problem of the departation of Salvadoranians from Honduras; and it was all over the news- papers, and very strong statements were issued both in the editorials and by people over the radio about chasing out some of the Salvadoranians that had been working in Honduras for a long time. Apparently there has been a rapproachment; there were meetings between the foreign ministers and I think the problem may be resolved.It's interesting to note that El Salvador is the most heavily populated country of Central America. I think they have a population of about 120 per square mile, whereas Honduras and Nicaragua have something like 15 of 17 per square mile. Therefore, you have a very definite problem of space and overpopulation in San Salvador. The other thing is traditionally the people of San Salvador are supposed to be the hardest workers in Central America. I remember that Antonio Rivera, a very well-known attorney in San Salvador, said that the Salvadorans were referred to as the