SUBJECT

Report on Situation in Cuba

Mr. Matthews informed me over the telephone that the Times was planning to publish an editorial in tomorrow's issue relating to the suspension of arms sales to the Batista regime. He wanted to clarify the differences between grant aid equipment and that sold on a reimbursable basis as well as the agreements under which our arms program operated. I took the occasion after making these explanations to point out to Mr. Matthews that the Times' use of the word embargo was not strictly accurate and I referred him to the text of the Department's statement.[2] He had some misapprehensions concerning the amount of military equipment that had been sent to the Batista regime in recent months and I told him that the quantity had been relatively small. I corrected his impression that we had sent a shipment of tanks to Cuba in October.

He referred to his recent trip to Cuba and said he had lunched with Ambassador and Mrs. Smith; had had a two-hour talk with the Ambassador [3] in addition and also had spoken to John Topping. He said that Ambassador Smith was in a most difficult job and was under great pressure at this time. He spoke of the criticism being leveled at the United States Government for its policy of arms sales to Batista and our policy of supporting elections in June. This presented me with the opportunity of reviewing our policy on elections and our feeling that were it possible for the Cubans to have balloting acceptable to the majority of the people a show down such as one apparently in the offing would be avoided. As he had stated often in the past, Mr. Matthews said it would be impossible for Batista to allow the kind of elections that would be acceptable to the Cuban people. He said the Cubans were critical of the United States policy but he did not detect any strong feeling against Americans personally. Mr. Matthews said it was a "shame" that our policy should result in being branded pro-Batista. I again reiterated that our policy, if presented accurately to the Cuban people, could not be construed as favoring the Batista regime.

Mr. Matthews declared that Castro undoubtedly had gone out on a limb in his recent statements threatening the overthrow of Batista if the latter did not resign. However, Mr. Matthews said he was convinced after seeing the principal leaders of the opposition revolutionary movements that the coming attempt against the Batista Government was better organized than ever before. He said the attempt to overthrow the regime has been delayed while awaiting shipments of arms for the revolutionary forces in Habana. The capture of the arms shipment at Brownsville dealt a serious blow to the rebel movement and a discussion of this seizure brought up the subject of our policies of knocking off shipments of armament leaving the United States. While admitting readily that we were legally correct in stopping contraband shipments, he said in this case it was too bad we could not occasionally turn our backs. Mr. Matthews did say, however, that a recent shipment of arms was successfully sent from Mexico and he presumes they have already been landed somewhere in Cuba.

The revolutionary leaders are fully aware of the necessity of succeeding in Habana and Mr. Matthews said careful plans have been made to take the city. A militia has been set up to control the city once the Batista forces are defeated there, and they would presumably maintain order until a government could be set up. I asked him about the possibility of military intervention in the overthrow attempt and he said that he had heard that this might be possible. However, the military junta or any type of military government set up would be controlled by Castro, as he understood it, but would include military leaders like Colonel Barquin, now in prison on the Isle of Pines.

Mr. Matthews said it was heart-rending to have to contemplate the killing that would occur once the revolution got under way. He said that the revolutionary movements fully realized this but the fact would not be altered that most of the revolutionaries who might be killed would be youths in their teens. These young boys are willing to be killed if that is necessary to overthrow Batista.

The leaders who are to handle the fighting in Habana are fearful particularly of Batista's tanks and his radio patrol cars. They were hopeful of getting bazookas and heavy machine guns for use against the tanks but if the arms do not arrive they will use classic implements such as Molotov cocktails, dynamite charges, and other makeshift implements.

Mr. Matthews did not hazard a guess as to when the overthrow attempt would get under way in earnest.

While Mr. Matthews did not go into any details on the slanting of his editorial, I gathered from the general tone of the conversation that the Department would be commended for having taken action that the newspaper considered was long overdue.

NOTES:

1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 737.00/4-358. Confidential. Drafted by Stewart.

2. Stewart was apparently referring to the story published in the New York Times on March 28 (see document 4) and to the text of the Department of State's statement after it was prepared by never formally released. (see footnote 4, Document 38)