429. Memorandum From Byron E. Blankinship, Officer in Charge of North Coast Affairs, to the Director of the Office of South American Affairs (Atwood)1
SUBJECT
- Colombian Request for Additional Military Grant Aid
I have reviewed the files with a view of discovering new or important points which might be presented to Mr. Holland in preparation for his discussion with Dr. Milton Eisenhower. I have found none with which you are not already familiar, but I summarize those which have already been discussed:
1. Current Military Grant Aid Program
The bilateral military plan with Colombia designates the following Colombian units:
- (a)
- one anti-aircraft battalion. Deliveries of equipment for this battalion are substantially completed.
- (b)
- one infantry battalion. This was the Korean battalion. Its equipment, valued at roughly half a million dollars, was returned to Colombia with the unit in November 1954, at which time this battalion was designated in the secret bilateral plan as a unit available for hemispheric defense.
- (c)
- one fighter squadron, 14 F–47’s promised, have already been delivered.
- (d)
- one squadron of light bombers. Seven B–26’s of 14 scheduled already delivered to Colombia.
- (e)
- a small naval program involving ship modernization has been carried out as promised.
2. Colombian Utilization of Grant Aid
U.S. military attaché reports indicated that until at least recently Colombia was not making effective use of the units and training, because:
- (a)
- the Colombians were not assigning adequate number of personnel to the anti-aircraft unit;
- (b)
- personnel trained in U.S. service schools were transferred away from the designated units;
- (c)
- the infantry battalion as well as the aircraft battalion was dispersed, broken up and assigned tasks which greatly decreased its effectiveness and;
- (d)
- senior commanders and staff officers have little personal interest or understanding of the anti-aircraft unit. However, more [Page 869] effective use seems to be made of training and equipment assigned to the Colombian Air Force and Navy.
3. Recent Requests
In November 1954 Colombia submitted a request for equipment referred to by Colombian officers as “a letter to Santa Claus”. This request would have involved a grant aid of $135 million, more than is scheduled for the entire Latin American military assistance program. At least one ranking Colombian officer readily admitted that the economy of Colombia could not sustain such a grant assistance program even if all of the equipment were given to Colombia.
Recently the total requests have been reduced by Ambassador Zuleta to equipment for: two battalions of infantry, one battalion of Marines and two destroyers.
Recommendation
Zuleta should be told clearly that sympathetic consideration has been given to the Colombian requests but under present military planning there is no room for additional grant aid as requested. He should also be told that evaluations of the use already made by Colombia of MDAP equipment indicate that Colombia itself could take measures to make much more effective use of its equipment already on hand.
- Source: Department of State, Central Files, 721.5–MSP/2–255. Secret.↩