Kennedy Weighed Possible Military Intervention in Brazil
Former U.S. President John F. Kennedy mulled possible military intervention in Brazil one year before the 1964 coup that ousted then president Joao Goulart, according to archive documents released Tuesday.
An audio was released on journalist Elio Gaspari's dictatorship archives website (http://arquivosdaditadura.com.br) containing a collection of documents relating to the 1964 establishment of a military dictatorship that lasted 21 years.
At a White House meeting on October 7 1963, 46 days before he was assassinated, Kennedy asked his ambassador in Brasilia, Lincoln Gordon: "What about the ...Do you see a situation coming where we might be, find desirable, to intervene militarily ourselves?," according to a public transcript published on the website.
"Well, this is the other category, which I call 'Dangerous Contingency possibly requiring rapid action'. This is the very problem," Gordon responded.
Earlier, the U.S. diplomat said the White house should await clearer signs that Brazil was moving toward the Fidel Castro model in Cuba -- Washington's nemesis in the Western Hemisphere -- to justify an intervention.
Such an operation proved unnecessary as the Brazilian military moved in April 1964 to depose Goulart, and Washington quickly recognized the junta.
The conversation took place during two days of talks Kennedy had with members of his cabinet to assess developments in Brazil and Vietnam, according to the website.
The audio was part of a set of secret tapes ordered by Kennedy of all his White House meetings since 1962.
The first tape was of another conversation with Gordon in which the option of a coup in Brazil was also raised.
Nicknamed Jango, Goulart was in power from 1961 to 1964. He officially died of a heart attack in Argentina in 1976, when Brazil's neighbor likewise saw a military regime seize power.
An autopsy was never carried out on his body and he was buried without state honors.
Last November, his remains were exhumed to determine if Goulart was poisoned.
He is suspected of having been poisoned under the Condor plan, a program of repression Latin American military re
Source: Agence France Presse
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