From Development to Dictatorship: Bolivia and the Alliance for Progress in the Kennedy Era

Notes

Preface 1. Hunter S. Thompson, “Baffling Bolivia: A Never-Never Land High above the Sea,” National Observer, 15 April 1963. Thompson wrote of his bourbon-fueled nights in the home of US labor information officer Tom Martin in “Mr. Martin in Bolivia: What the Miners Lost in Taking an Irishman,” National Observer, 16 December 1963. Confirmed in interviews with Martin’s wife, Mariela, and his son Rory. 2. Stephansky to Secretary Rusk, 29 August 1962, “Bolivia, General, 8/62–12/62,” box 10, National Security Files—Countries (hereafter NSF-CO), John F. Kennedy Presidential Library (hereafter JFKL); Henderson to Secretary of State Rusk, 7 and 8 May 1964, “Bolivia, Cables, Volume 1, 12/63–7/63,” box 7, NSF-CO, Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library (hereafter LBJL); Lansdale to Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, 3 June 1963, “Bolivia, General, 4/63– 7/63,” box 10A, NSF-CO, JFKL. 3. Unless otherwise noted, all documents cited below are located at NARA. If no record group is specified, the document can be found in record group 59. 4. Barry Goldwater, quoted in “Bolivian Rule of Paz Rapped by Goldwater,” ChicagoTribune, 25 October 1963. 5. The better-known Granma did not begin circulation until 1965. Introduction 1. Sara Shahriari, “Bolivia’s Evo Morales Says ‘Adiós’ to USAID,” Christian Science Monitor, 1 May 2013; William Neuman, “U.S. Agency Is Expelled from Bolivia,” NewYorkTimes, 2 May 2013. 2. USAID, “USAID Bolivia,” 1 May 2013, http://www.usaid.gov/news-information/fact -sheets/usaid-bolivia, accessed 6 June 2013. Despite claiming to have set up operations only in 1964, USAID-Bolivia has been active since the agency’s founding in late 1961. Previously, development operations were carried out by the International Cooperation Administration (ICA). Modern Notes 198 N OT E S T O PA G E S 1 – 5 US development programs in Bolivia are best dated to a 1941 State Department mission led by Merwin Bohan, which called for economic diversification, particularly in the agricultural field. See Lehman, Bolivia and the United States, 183. 3. See chapters 3 and 4 in this volume. 4. Kennedy, “Speech before the General Assembly of the United Nations,” 25 September 1961, Speeches, Reference Desk, JFKL. 5. Kennedy, “NSAM 88,” 5 September 1961; “NSAM 119,” 18 December 1961, National Security Action Memoranda, NSF-JFK, JFKL. 6. Westad, Global ColdWar, 4. 7. Between 1953 and 1965, more than six million hectares of land was redistributed, benefiting more than 170,000 Indian families. A 1950 survey estimated total arable land at just less than thirty-three million hectares. Source: Departamento de Estadística, Servicio Nacional Reforma Agraria (8 February 1966), published in Melvin Burke, “Land Reform in the Lake Titicaca Region ,” in Malloy and Thorn, Beyond the Revolution, 303. 8. Bolivian Foreign Ministry to Embassy (Belgrade), 29 April 1963; RV-4-E-54, Archivo del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores y Culto (Archive of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Culture ), La Paz, Bolivia (hereafter RREE). Regarding the Soviet offer, Juan Lechín, “Comunicado,” undated (late 1960), Presidencia de la República (hereafter PR) 945, Archivo y Biblioteca Nacional (National Archive and Library), Sucre, Bolivia (hereafter ABNB). See also “Bolivia Weighing Soviet Aid Offer,” NewYork Times, 2 November 1960; “Soviet Assures Bolivia,” NewYork Times, 24 December 1960; “US and Soviets Battle over Bolivia’s Tin,” NewYorkTimes, 22 January 1961. 9. Between 1953 and 1964, Bolivia received $368 million in US foreign aid, roughly $35 million annually. In 2007 dollars, this represents more than $2 billion, or $187 million annually, the highest per capita amount given to any Latin American nation during that period. Kennedy increased aid to Bolivia from roughly $23 million annually to $51 million. By 1964, Alliance for Progress funds constituted around 20 percent of Bolivian GDP and 40 percent of the nation’s public expenditures. Sources: United States Agency for International Development (USAID), US Overseas Loans and Grants (Greenbook), available online at qesdb.usaid.gov/gbk. Bolivia data from USAID, Economic and Program Statistics, nos. 5, 11, supplemented by data from Bolivian Development Corporation , to calculate Bolivian government expenditures, and data from Dirección Nacional de Coordinación y Planeamiento, Bolivia cuentas nacionales, mimeographed (La Paz, January 1969). The Bolivian data are published in Malloy and Thorn, Beyond the Revolution, 370, 380. 10. Said, Orientalism, 20, 222; Ferguson, Anti-Politics Machine; Uvin, AidingViolence; Scott, Seeing Like a State. See also Escobar, Encountering Development; Mitchell, Rule of Experts. 11. Westad, Global ColdWar; Cullather, HungryWorld...