Prospects of Mankind with Eleanor Roosevelt; 305; Latin America Looks at Cuba

From the United Nations in New York, National Educational Television presents the WGBH TV production Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt, Prospects of Mankind, produced in cooperation with Brandeis University. Latin America is split today between two counter forces, changed through constructive progress, and the demand for change through violence. The foreign ministers of the Latin American countries are meeting under the auspices of the organization of American states to consider whether violent change is being hastened by communist block intervention in the western hemisphere through Cuba. The U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Adley Stevenson, is here to discuss with Mrs. Roosevelt some of the implications of this meeting. You're very kind to be joining us on this program, Mr. Ambassador. We are going to be discussing the meeting of the organization of American states. We are considering the question of subversion in the hemisphere coming from Cuba, and what you hope to achieve.

You've had the experience of dealing with all these ambassadors who are going to be in this meeting. We would like to know what you feel can be achieved by this meeting. Well, perhaps I could start by telling you a little bit about the background of this meeting, Mrs. Roosevelt, for what it's worth. There's been an increasing anxiety in Latin America in recent years about the effect of subversion from Cuba, Fidelismo, as it's called. As a consequence of this, the president of Columbia, Dr. Alberto Yaris Camargo, made a proposal some time ago last spring that it would be a good idea to convene the OAS, the organization of American states, under the Rio Pact to consider the threat to the peace and security of the hemisphere created by this new form of intervention in our continental affairs by subversion from the communist block in Cuba, notably in the re-export of this communism throughout the hemisphere.

As a consequence of this, various questions of a reason is to how to proceed, whether it's under the charter of the organization of American states or whether it's under the Rio Pact, which is the defense treaty of the American system. And at last, the American states have met on the 4th of December, and have agreed to have a meeting of foreign ministers under the Rio Pact. And at that meeting, they will decide what should be done to redefine, to read aggression, to include if need be this kind of subversion that has taken place in Cuba. And then perhaps to take steps to try to get Cuba to come back into the family of American states, to rejoin the Western hemisphere and to sever its connections with the East. I think this is generally what's contemplated.

Well, to some of us who are totally uninformed, of course, Mr. Castro's declaration that he had been a Marxist, Leninist, all along gave us a feeling that this might have been planned by the Soviets and that his whole, that everything that he's done might have been planned with the Soviets, if not by them, because of that statement of his. So that I wonder if there is danger in bringing this matter to the vote in the OSS, OAS, it may be a very close vote. And will this show a disunity in the hemisphere, and thus strengthen Castro? Well, this is a consideration to be sure. Actually, the fact that Castro has revealed that he has been a Marxist all along is confirmatory of what many people have suspected.

And this has been a communist-inspired kind of maneuver, takeover, always usually cloak their adventures under the symbol of democracy, and then when they've achieved their ends, they find it's not democracy, but something else. This new form of tyranny that's emerged in Cuba is a good example of it. So as to whether or not the meeting will be useful, I would just like to point out to you and to our audience, because the contestants, the participants in the panel, I'm sure, will discuss it. It is much less a problem for the United States than it is for the other American republics. Communism is much less of a threat to us than it is to them, and there are the ones who are primarily concerned with steps to isolate Cuba or to reintegrate Cuba in the Western family of nations. Now, to be sure, there will be some states which will disagree with the conclusions of this meeting, and perhaps more on juridical grounds, on the ground that we're proceeding under the wrong act, under the re-opact rather than under the charter of the OAS, for example.

And the concern there will be due to the fact that if you proceed under one, you have certain powers of imposing sanctions which you don't have under the other, and there will be arguments of that kind, and they could reveal a conflict, a division of opinion within the hemisphere. But basically, there isn't any division of opinion, the leaders of the hemisphere at least realize what the threat of Cuba is in the export of communism from Cuba. The people don't always. Do you think there is a feeling that this is interference at all in the internal affairs of Cuba or among the states, do you think that matters to the mature? Well, I haven't detected that that's a major concern because the treaties are very clear that we should meet and consult in the event of any threat to the peace and security of the hemisphere from an extra-continental power, or from an aggression which is not military in the normal sense of the word and the interference from outside.

This is taking place. A member of the family of American states has withdrawn an effect from the American states enjoying the eastern block, so that I don't believe that that's so likely. I think what it could emerge here is some conflict of opinion that would appear to disclose a difference of opinion that might be more apparent than real. Oh, but there is no real basic feeling among the leaders of desire to have the delismo spread. No, on the contrary, the leaders are very aware that people in Latin America that might have lost.

In many cases, confuse Fidelismo with a social revolution for their benefit because that's the way it started. Well, that's of course what he tried. Well, that's of course what he tried at first to make clear. That's why I thought his statement. If it reaches the people that he had been in Marxist Leninist all along, might have the effect of clarification for the people, but perhaps it doesn't reach the people. No, I think it does. I think this has been very helpful because this has been confirmatory of what many of their leaders have been telling them for a long while, but it still takes time to persuade people that a social revolution for the benefit of the ordinary people is in fact the imposition of a new form of tyranny. And one must remember that in Latin America there are a great many illiterate people. On top of that, there have been subject to a great deal of propaganda. And there has also been a great deal of anti-Americanism. All of these things combined, poverty, ignorance, anti-Americanism, propaganda have created a sympathetic reception for Fidelismo,

which far exceeds, which is much more apparent among the people than it is among the leaders. The leaders I think are quite realistic. From my own very slight experience, I would think it natural that they wanted social reforms in South America. I would not think that at all. But I would think that it would be difficult to persuade that actually someone who said they were with the Communist bloc would give them the social reforms they wanted. Do you think that is easier than we think? I think once they can be persuaded that this is an illusion, and that this is the imposition of a new tyranny. They will be much less receptive than they have been in the past. But many of the leaders of Latin America are hesitant because they have these large elements in their country.

That are unhappy. That are unhappy and extremely leftist and where Fidel Castro has been a hero. But thank you very much. I think you have given us a wonderful start for this program and for the future discussion. I would like to enjoy it very much, Mr. Roosevelt. Now, to continue the discussion with Mrs. Roosevelt, here are three men with an expert knowledge of Latin America. Roberto Campos, Brazilian Ambassador to the United States, is Latin America's foremost economist. He has acted as economic adviser to the Brazilian government at many international conferences. And in 1958 was President of Brazil's National Bank for Economic Development. A career diplomat, Dr. Campos had previously spent six years in the United States before returning as Ambassador last July. Theodore Draper has spent the last 25 years as a journalist, historian, and editor, specializing in international affairs, American foreign policy, and the American Communist movement.

In addition to other publications, he is the author of two important pamphlets on Cuba. Tad Schulz, as correspondent for the New York Times and Buenos Aires for five years, reported on most Latin American countries. Polish by birth, educated in Brazil, he worked there as a newspaper man until coming to the United States in 1947. He now covers Latin American affairs for the Times from Washington. On this program he will assist Mrs. Roosevelt in directing the discussion. Ambassador Stevenson and I have been talking about Cuba. Before we go any further, perhaps we should talk a bit about the kind regime Cuba is now. And how this came about. Mr. Draper, would you like to begin this discussion? In a word, Cuba has become an orthodox communist state. Its ideology is orthodox communism, Marxism, Leninism.

It is now ruled by a single communist party. And in every other way, Cuba is as communist as any state in the Soviet block in Eastern Europe. There are differences, but the differences might best be expressed in the way that Castro himself expressed them in a recent speech. He made a speech, a very interesting one, published in the Cuban press in December 22nd, in which he made the following point. In Russia, the state farms are called soft coals. In Cuba, the state farms are called people's farms, Grantcha del Pueblo. And he said, if we had called our state farms soft hoses, why the Cuban people wouldn't have accepted it.

There would have been trouble and rebellion. So we didn't call them with a Russian name. We decided to use a good Cuban name. And therefore, our Grantcha del Pueblo are exactly like Soviet soft hoses, but we call them differently. And this was not the only example of word substitution that he gave. This is about what Cuban originality amounts to at the present time. Well, that's very interesting. And how do you think this came about? In a most peculiar and complicated way, that is still the subject of much controversy.

Broadly speaking, I suppose one can distinguish three stages. Before January 1959, when the Batista regime fell and Batista fled, the promise of the Cuban revolution might broadly be described as that of a radical democratic revolution. This was stage one before January 1959 in the struggle for power. After January 1959 came a revision of the original promise. It might in brief be described as a social revolution that was no longer democratic, but was not communist.

That was supposedly original and indigenous, an original indigenous Cuban non-communist, undemocratic social revolution. Now we are in stage three, namely a revolution of communist totalitarianism, no different in its principle and not very different even in its details increasingly similar to the Soviet model. Well, that's a very interesting account. Now I wonder, Mr. Ambassador, if this really is the way you look at it in the rest of South America and see it, or if you see certain differences from Mr. Draper's point of view.

Well, before I start talking on this subject, perhaps I ought to clarify that I shall be speaking as an economist as an analyst of Latin American scene, and not as an ambassador or government representative. And after those words of caution for two reasons, first because all of the governments are now examining their position in preparation for the point of the last conference. So it's premature for any government official of any of the Latin American countries as it were, really to put forth a government position. Secondly, because when one talks this diplomat, one is bound to confine himself to cautious generalities in two-on-or-tally-ran-sold saying that the diplomat, for the diplomat, the words are intended to conceal the thought and not reveal it. I shall be talking therefore in my personal capacity.

Well, the greatest authority on Castro and his intentions is Castro himself, and his speech of December did indicate that he intended to conduct the revolution on Marx and Leninist lines, and that he had that conviction before. We all hoped in Latin America that it would really be an indigenous revolution. We were prepared to accept the fact that, due to special circumstances, the breaking of the social mold in Cuba probably could not be done efficiently through simple reform that more than that was needed, probably a revolution was needed because of a crystallized social mold. The situation there was too late for reform. In other countries, it's not too late for the process of reform, which, of course, we hold to be much more preferable than the surgery of revolution, dramatic and often uncontrollable. This confession, therefore, of Castro came as a disappointment to many of the center, middle of the world groups, Latin America,

who had great sympathy for an indigenous revolution, but who do not look with the same favor to an important resolution. Now, what effect would that be in this change of outlook in Cuba on the final position of the Inter-American system is a bit early to the term. First, because I don't think the revolutionary pattern of Cuba has come to a crystallization yet, intentions of Castro, according to what he himself says, are with much crystallized, but one does not know whether the underlying forces as it were, may not usher a process of change that might lead to eventual democratization. We still hope that that may be the case, although this hope has been seriously weakened by the last statement.

But what many people Latin American feel is that the statement of Castro, even though it brings new light to the picture, does not really erase this fact that the communist threat has not begun with Castro, and does not end with Castro. There is a communist movement in the world, and the best way, to our mind of dealing with the problem, is perhaps not concentrate so much on the Castro problem, as to talk more about economic development and social progress, to give emphasis to the alliance for progress, to positive measures, rather than to an obsessive preoccupation with an isolated case of communism, and the threat of communism did not begin with Castro, and certainly we not end with him. Well, of course, sir, I think the feeling has been, however, that possibly this has brought the whole situation of communism or attraction, let us say, in the whole hemisphere, clearly before us, because here is one small place where it has gained a tremendous foothold, and I think that's why we are particularly interested in Cuba.

It's very close to the United States, and here is a place from which a great deal of various kinds of influence can flow to the whole world. And the whole of Latin America, is that so? Well, I think it's quite clear that the Castro experience has given new dramaticity, as it were, and the feeling of nearness to communist infiltration. But if you look at the American reaction, as compared to the reaction of some Latin American countries, what you will find is that the United States sees Cuba as an external phenomenon, not particularly dangerous to the United States itself, because it has a fairly stable social and economic structure, and certainly, militarily, the United States is very strong, but more of a danger to the Latin American countries.

And therefore, at times, some disappointment is expressed that the Latin American countries did not jump as it were to pose for dealing with the problem in a rather vigorous way. Every point of Latin America, many of the countries feel that communism in Cuba is an external danger, but there is a permanent continuous danger of social unrest and fermentation, brought by the cultural broth, represented by poverty, by income inequalities, by the existence of regional depressed areas, so that many of them feel that the important thing is really the most important thing is really to eliminate conditions that would facilitate, that would increase really the vulnerability to communism, rather than single out a case of external communism, no matter how dramatic it is, no matter how near it is to us, single out this case.

Instead of recognizing that for many of those countries, the big real difficult problem is an internal one. And there's an economic one then. I mean, actually, what you are saying is that the conditions of the economies of these countries, which have brought about inequalities that are very evident, has to be corrected. So this is a great interest, I think, to us in the United States because, in many ways, the economy of the United States and the economy of South American countries is closely bound together. We have had relationships for a very long time. Isn't it a little peculiar that with this relationship, there has gone no sense from the United States apparently that you did not export or undertake a purely economic relationship of the country,

that you also had to undertake a demonstration of how economics and an understanding of what democracy offered more or less went together. Well, I was not really referring merely to the problem of economic conditions, but also to questions of social structure, which invariably affect political attitudes. The relationship of Latin America of the United States has traversed several cycles, as you know. Even in the relatively short period of time, from the 30s to the 60s, there has been several changes in policy.

The good-nabel policy, for instance, was not really based very much on material aid, if anything. It was a really political concept, and the relationship between Latin America and the United States was rather good at that time. Roosevelt, when he was credited with having reversed certain policies, which were political policies. As such as the policy of intervention, for instance, he was really the announcer of the principle of non-intervention, a principle which presented a long, hard-won conquest of the Latin American states, which they are not willing to abandon. That renders us particularly sensitive on this question of intervention, even though the definition of intervention, of course, is not an easy one.

We reversed certain policies, which were not liked in Latin America, and he gave a new political concept, which is the treatment of Latin Americans as equal, and there's really a political priority area from the viewpoint of the United States. After the war, the policy has varied in other directions, and Latin America was relegated, as it were, to a residual treatment. And again, the unfavorable aspect was not merely the unsatisfactory character of the economic aid that's compared to Marshall Plan, given to Europe, and so on. But again, a feeling of psychological and political dissatisfaction, because there was a residual treatment on all fields, not only economic but political. Later on, the emphasis was given to Asia, from Europe, the emphasis shift a little bit to Asia, and to a small extent to Africa.

And again, the residual policy of residual treatment, as it were, continued in some automated form. Now we have again a new revolution in the US policy, which is bound to produce good results, the alliance for progress. The psychological climate has improved the red, whether there will be later on dissatisfaction and disappointment, I don't know, I hope not. But certainly, it's an idea which again is not based million economic help, but also on the demonstration of the revolutionary character of the American experience. And the idea of promoting social reform of demonstrating the United States is not interested in mere permanence of the status quo, but wants to promote change, preferably orderly change. This has improved the conservatively US imaging in Latin America. The coral, if you may call that a coral, between the US position and position of the southern countries, is to enlarge sentimentological one.

They say that what's really important is to give a demonstration that you can achieve a rapid rate of economic development and promote orderly social change through democratic planning, as against the ideological totalitarian planning. This is, to me, the crux of the question, regardless of what is done with Cuba, even if the Cuban problem disappears, this other poem will still remain. How to promote orderly change, how to accelerate economic development for masses which feel disgranted. So we do feel that the Cuban problem has to be seen in its proper focus, the solution of the Cuban case, does not solve the problem of communist non-infiltration. And there's not really tackled this very basic and fundamental point which is that the system, the American system, can only survive democratically.

If we demonstrate that there is the alternative of democratic planning, as compared to socialist planning, with its apparent display of efficiency, but with its tremendous cost in human dignity, freedom, and even great sacrifice to the consumer because socialism has this particular quality of promising the betterment of the consumers lot, but postponing it in time. Mr. Schultz, you've had experience both in Brazil and Latin America generally, and here would you agree with this feeling that the problem will exist no matter what happens in Cuba? Yes, of course, because in the Cuban revolution, in a way, Openserve Pandora's box of anxieties and ambitions and desires and cravings, and I think Ambassador Camp was quite right in saying that even if Cuba were to vanish, we would still have the problem. It's been three years now since the Cuban revolution, and I think that perhaps we are approaching a new point of crossroads in the whole set of relationships in the hemisphere.

On the one hand, of course, the Cuban revolution has inflamed the imaginations of people who had the period to which Mr. Draper referred of a social revolution, which captured imaginations of people, which created its own mystique, this great sense of excitement of promise. Now we have entered the Cuba in the third stage and the last stage of the communist totalitarian system. The question would arise, presumably, would be this, if the admission by Castro, that his remarks as Leninist or communist, if it has indeed disappointed great many people in Latin America, if it has erased, to a lesser or greater extent, the sympathy, the deep feeling which existed for the Cuban revolution in Latin America, the question arises, is there anything that we, the Western United States, can't provide to fill this new gap? In other words, can we, through the Alliance for Progress, through the whole fabric of our new policies, to what we now call the American Revolutionary Approach to it, if we can satisfy this ideological and human hunger, which the Cuban Revolution first walk and then disappointed, or we think this appointed.

If not, of course, if we cannot do it, if we cannot fill this gap, there's going to be tremendous vacuum, I think we are unpredictable. So perhaps this is a point of crossroads again. I think the question that arises as this, can the Western approach, the United States approach, through the Alliance for Progress, offer or provide for the Latin American masses, the kind of mystique, the kind of religion, excitement, even pageantry that the Cuban Revolution provided, and at least in its first stage, I think that the Master Campus is quite right and pointed out as it did, that the great need right now is to develop the economic structures, find an answer to the great social problems, the basic problem of how to cope with the population that's growing. I think at the rate of almost 2 million in New York, in Brazil, every year, I think there's a set of statistics that points out that every year the Latin American need for housing increases by 1 million dwellings.

I think this is all terribly important, of course, we have to go ahead with those programs. But I think I'd like to come back to the initial point that unless, in our planning for Latin America, we can provide with the money, with the technical advancement, and know how this feeling of excitement, make people feel they're participating in building their countries. In the way that Castro, I think, was successful in doing in Cuba in the early days of the Revolution, the nothing that perhaps the whole lines of progress stands in danger of, I won't say going down the drain, but perhaps becoming a static thing, only based on infrastructure economic programs, which I think is not even remotely enough. I think we're past the stage where money alone can be the answer to those things.

What is your feeling? With much of what the ambassador said, and what Mr. Schultz has just said, I'm thoroughly in agreement. With some part of it, I perhaps would like to put it differently, slightly differently. I wonder whether it's possible to put the Cuban problem in one box, and the problem of orderly democratic change in another box, as if they were separate problems and did not, each on the other, have tremendous repercussions. It's my impression that these two problems are intimately connected, and that it's not quite possible to separate them so neatly, for example. We look forward to the phrase that the ambassador used orderly democratic change. The role that the Castro regime plays is to make such change as difficult as possible, if not impossible.

In most, if not all, of Latin America, I dare say, there are two enemies, two prime enemies of orderly democratic change. On the one hand, the privileged classes, who don't want any change because it will reduce their privileges and their power. They want what they have, and they want to keep what they have. On the other hand, the pro-Castro forces, which are against orderly democratic change because such change would make their role impossible or unnecessary. In a country like Venezuela, where there is, admittedly, I think, it's acknowledged by all, a leadership which is dedicated to orderly democratic change.

The enemies does that leadership face. On the one hand, one of the right, one dedicated solely to the status quo, and the other hand, the Castro forces, making life miserable for the democratic government and leadership of Venezuela. You can't ignore Castro and his followers in Latin America if you are seeking democratic change. The point is probably that there is a communist movement in Latin America, which finds it expedient and inspirational as it were to look to a leader who is nearby. But if the situation were different, if there is immediate revolutionary leader with some inspirational value, it was not nearly at hand, they would adopt some other simple problem that you point out. Without this exist, communism is a disintegrating force opposing orderly reform and promoting continuously revolutionary change. But my point still subsists even though the dramatic neighborhood of Castro underlines the problem of communist infiltration is basically a different problem.

The threat does not begin with Castro, does not end with him. The basic threat is the presence of communism, and therefore it can only be dealt with by a combination of measures of which one of the most important is really demonstration of the possibility of an alternative to ideological totalitarian planning. This puts a great deal of responsibility, I think, on the United States because we have succeeded in making changes in our country and making them peacefully without revolution. And now the question is whether we can find a way of understanding the needs and helping without offending, I think, our neighbours.

And that I think is largely a question of how we approach the whole intellectual discussion with our neighbours, of how they meet their difficulties, it's not purely the economic side, it's also an intellectual exchange of ideas, isn't it? And the understanding that comes with that change, exchange, and I think possibly being a woman, I must mention this, that perhaps the women in South America who have been very conscious of the needs of poverty, I mean the surrounding poverty, and what should could be done to help, will be rather an important factor if they can come in on the intellectual exchange between countries in South America and in our own.

Well, may I expand a little beyond what you said Mr. Roosevelt, I think you're quite right, but I'd like to come back to the point that maybe there are two levels or more, of course, intellectual ones that you mentioned, I think there's also the emotional level, I think it's a question perhaps, if I may put this way of touching the cells of people, of getting them interested in our system, I think that the commoners must such, more specifically the Castro regime, has been making quite an effort to convince Latin America that the Western approach through the Alliance of Progress, through the preaching of democracy cannot succeed, that their system is better, both in terms of economic structure, of economic planning, that we can fulfill the promise much better than ours, and I think this relates to Mr. Drebsel's observation that you cannot associate Latin America from Castro, that you cannot put in separate compartments, I think that Castro has, because he's committed to it to defend his own system, he has and is engaging in every conceivable effort to demonstrate that our, what we propose, that our solution cannot work,

I think this is where subversion will come in, this where propaganda will come in, this is where the use of the commoners parties will come in, but furthermore, I'm not sure I agree with Ambassador Campos and saying that it's only the commoners parties that will perform this work, I think that you have large, large or smaller groups of people who are called themselves Marxists in this very special way, in which leftist tendencies are subdivided not in America, left wing socialist, I think the people that in Brazil are called with a very good name of the useful innocence, people who go along with things, I think they will, they have and they will cooperate directly or indirectly with the Castro or the commoners on slot on that which we try to preach. So I think that so long as Castro and the communist system remain in Cuba, our effort in Latin America to develop it in a democratic system, I think will be under continuous attack, through propaganda, through the radio stations that Cuba has, the short way transmitters, through the student delegations that come and go between Latin American countries and Cuba, I think that's a very important point.

The fact that the Castro has established a system of scholarships for Latin American students is perhaps one of the most important current aspects of the Latin American problem, in the sense that the Cuban Revolution is busily establishing cadres in Latin America, a small new ply of highly indoctrinated students who come to Cuba spend anywhere between six weeks, in six months, on such, apparently harm with things as a grey and reform, perhaps training a little bit in guerrilla warfare, then they get a very heavy Marxist-Leninist indoctrination, and they return to their universities, to their countries, to preach and practice the credo, and I think we all are familiar with the tremendous effects that are dedicated and well-trained minority can accomplish. So I will go along with Mr. Draper in saying that you cannot, in any way, forget the Castro phenomenon, even in trying to concentrate on the orderly democratic development.

Let me ask you, Mr. Ambassador, in South America, I think in many countries, the students have always had a keen political interest and a good deal of political action has come from student groups. Are you noticing much of the Castro influence through the students today? Yes, I would say it's rather strong. Of course, the youth has a propensity for drastic change and revolutionary experiments. I think the French philosopher Conte would say that the universal law of human development is to be revolutionary in the early age, conservative, middle age, and reactionary in the old age. You have been consistent in disproving this law because you have maintained throughout the years every remarkable flare for change and work actively to promote constructive social change regardless of age, but this seems to be human law.

Unfortunately, one point in which the Schultz touched is important and his observations are correct. Namely, that part of the student movement, student groups, are obsessed with the idea that to accelerate economic development, you must have an ideology and you must have revolution. Revolution to break the social mold because they believe that otherwise change would be too slow. It's the normal impatience of the youth. And ideology to create fragimentation of the producer and patience of the consumer. Well, this idea to my mind has to be disproved, to my mind it is incorrect. Actually, the greatest and most successful expedience of developing the Western world were not particularly afflicted by ideologies, the West development, the Canadian development of Australian development, Western European development.

Admittedly, there were mistakes and this is the distinction I would like to make that to be useful and important perhaps to create a mistake of economic development of social change and of collective interest of the system. But not necessarily an ideology because the ideology carries with it a connotation of regimentation and intolerance which is only superficially effective. In fact, one very debatable subject is to determine to what extent ideology and regimentation was really de facto in Soviet development. Soviet economy was already advancing at a fairly fast pace despite political disintegration even before the preceding years of communist regime. And being a country with such vast resources, it's not at all proven that it wouldn't have developed very fast under some other regime.

At least, I would like to take it for granted. And I'm enthusiastic about the possibilities of democratic development and the basis of actual experience. You must have mistakes, of course. The United States had the mistake of the march to the West and opening up with the frontier. There were several successive mistakes which never, however, amounted to an ideology. In Brazil, for instance, we are now creating some mistakes. For instance, the mistake of rehabilitation of the Northeast, the idea that we should help this depressed area and bring it up quickly to the standards of the South as some sort of national social duty. And then Kuvishak, before the Alliance for Progress, threw the idea of Operation Panamérica and tried internally to create the mistake of the so-called Program of Goals, Program of the Metas, which there is a mistake of five-year plans, such as that of the Indian experiment, which is democratic. It's important to dispel this idea that you need a totalitarian ideology to have an amount of discipline sufficient for quick economic development.

The students, which you mentioned, are particularly affected by this skepticism concerning the speed of democratic change. The expectation of a mistake in the Alliance of Progress is not to create a mistake, it's a counter-ideology as it may. The ideas are basically sound, which three ideas are economic development, acceleration of economic development, promotion of social change, and recognition of a collective responsibility of the entire system, including particular United States, which is the wealthiest, and the most advanced member of the system. Let's then try to promote this mistake and render it effective. And let's clearly indicate that we need discipline for development, not ideological discipline, with its twin component of intolerance and regimentation.

Well, the relationship between economics and ideology in which you just touched on is one of those infinitely complicated subjects that Cuba throws some light on. Let me come back to Cuba. Artista came into power for the second time in 1952 by a coup. He lasted until the end of 1958. His regime became increasingly brutal and decayed. Politically, it was a monstrosity, but in this very period, the economic growth of Cuba developed faster than in any previous period. It was a period of great economic growth. Now, this is what the facts and the figures show, not what the propaganda likes to pretend.

Here you have one of those tremendously complicated affairs, which we must face, without, of course, in any sense, making this a justification of the butties to dictatorship, but facts, some people like to say our facts. Well, I think all this points to a very interesting sample of what will be occurring. And I'm referring to the kiss of Dominican Republic, which is almost a neighbor of Cuba's in the Caribbean. Just the other day, the organizational American states lifted the inter-American sanction against the Dominican Republic, which related to all kinds of mischief perpetrated by Trujillo, who was the dictator. The democratic system was set up on the first of this year in the Dominican Republic, two things happened first. The OAS lifted the sanctions, and two, at this point, the United States and the OAS are rushing madly into the Dominican Republic with economic aid, with technical assistance, and all sorts of things.

I think the object there is to demonstrate that the Dominican Republic should become or can become a showcase of precisely what we are discussing, in other words, that advanced economic and social planning, good development can prosper in a democratic system. The Dominican Republic is a small island. It's perhaps a microcosm of the problems in Latin America, but the way in which the political and economic situation, tied as they are, does develop in the Dominican Republic this year and next, perhaps this can offer some terribly valuable lessons on the larger problem of can Latin America develop economic and socially in the democratic system. I imagine is the sort of key question of our time. This is the main point of dispute between our two systems in East and West.

So I think we should watch the Dominican Republic with fascination and interest, because I think the way that goes, may have very important implications on everything else we do. Do you think it will have an implication on the whole of the South American thinking then, and do you feel that way I am best to count those? Yes, it might have an important bearing precisely on this point of destroying the conviction that in some quarters, which this middle ground of an intelligence and bourgeoisie, which in Brazil we call the useful innocent, who actually support revolutionary ideas, not because of any overt or concealed sympathy for commoners, but because of a, let's say, technical conviction that unless you resort to ideology and revolutionary, you can't achieve social change in economic progress with sufficient speed. Now, after the red democratization, we managed to, the system, as a whole, manages to make the Dominican Republic attain a faster rate of growth.

And as Mr. Draper pointed out, the problem is not only economic development, economic development alone is no protection, or is little protection against commoners. It's economic development process, social change. If those two things are achieved, then I think it would be a very positive contribution to the operation and success of the alliance for progress and the teases of orderly democratic change. Well, all this, of course, relates to basic trends of the future, perhaps of the present. There's one question I would like to have Mr. Draper go into, which is this, to what extent this, which has happened in Cuba, has been inevitable. Because I think the answer, on the answer to this question, there may hinge, the great many answers for the future. I wonder, Mr. Draper, would like to make a comment on this. When the Cuban Revolution began, what the United States reaction to it, if our policies had been different, and one way or another, would they have affected the deterioration and the gathering of momentum of the totalitarian state?

In other words, should we have a tremendous sense of guilt or sense of historical detachment? To my mind, the answer to that question depends upon where you start. If you start with the past 60 years of Cuban history, in which we have been intimately involved, I think our responsibilities have been very great. And I, for one, am not an admirer of our policies in Cuba over the past 60 years. If you start with, let us say 1953, with the beginning of the July 26th movement, and the attack on the monarch of barracks, here again, I think our responsibilities were very great.

I'm sorry, but our time is running out. And you have given us something to really think about, I think, because all of this discussion, I get a feeling that we could do a number of things that we have not done, but we must have imagination enough to see that is not all an economic problem, that it is a problem of the spirit and the intellect and of an identification with the interests of other people. Now I have to say thank you to all of you, and to our audience, or of war next month, joining me in the discussion on Soviet foreign policy, will be Ronald Nibor, Lord Michael Lindsay, Seymour Frieden, and Professor Marshall Schurman, or of war. Roberto Campos is the Brazilian ambassador to the United States. Theodore Draper is a specialist in international communism.

Tad Schultz is the New York Times correspondent for Latin America. Adley Stevenson, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, appeared in a special introduction to this program. Next month, Mrs. Roosevelt and her guests will discuss current Soviet foreign policy. This program was recorded through the facilities of United Nations Television and WNEW TV, Metropolitan Broadcasting, New York. This is NET, National Educational Television.