818.20/25: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Minister in Costa Rica ( Hornibrook )
63. Your 87, July 11, 10 a.m. War Department is instructing the Commanding General in Panama to send a Spanish-speaking officer immediately to San José to confer with the Government authorities there and to consult in conjunction with the Military Attaché, Colonel Pate,22 with regard to the needs of the Government of Costa Rica for a military mission to prepare and put in operation a plan for military reorganization.
You may inform the Costa Rican authorities that this Government is prepared to give every favorable consideration to a formal written request of that Government for a United States military mission. This request should be submitted either directly to you by the Foreign Minister or to the Department of State through the Costa Rican Minister in Washington.
Upon the receipt of the formal request and of the suggestions of the officer detailed from Panama to conduct the survey of Costa Rican needs for a military mission, a contract can be immediately drawn up for an American military mission to go to Costa Rica to undertake such work as may be desired by the Costa Rican Government.
If any doubt should be expressed to you as to Costa Rican ability to pay sufficient additional compensation to the personnel who are to form this mission, you may assure the Costa Rican authorities that this Government, under the general plan for cooperation in matters of [Page 90] hemisphere defense, is confident that arrangements can be made to fix such additional compensation at a scale well within the financial capacity of the Costa Rican Government.
- Col. Joseph Benjamin Pate, Military Attaché and Military Attaché for Air.↩