Excerpt of "U.S.-Vatican Relations, 1975–1980"

U.S.–VATICAN RELATIONS, 1975–1980 A Diplomatic Study An ADST-DACOR Diplomats and Diplomacy Book

P. P E T E R S A R R O S University of Notre Dame Press Notre Dame, Indiana

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Copyright Š 2019 by University of Notre Dame Notre Dame, Indiana 46556 undpress.nd.edu All Rights Reserved Manufactured in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

The opinions and characterizations in this book are those of the author and do not necessarily represent official positions of the United States government, the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training, or DACOR.

∞ This book is printed on acid-free paper.

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CONTENTS

Preface Acknowledgments

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ix xiii

One

The Year of Three Popes and the Transformation of U.S.–Vatican Relations

1

Two

Beagle Channel Mediation: Diplomacy and War Prevention

37

Three

The Vatican, Italy, and Eurocommunism

53

Four

Vatican Ostpolitik: Diplomacy of Rapprochement with Communism

76

Five

The Vatican and the Helsinki Process, 1975–1980

100

Six The Pope, the Neutron Bomb, and NATO Modernization

119

Seven

The President, the Pope, and the Crown of St. Stephen

136

Eight

The Vatican, the United States, and Lebanon’s Civil War

158

Nine

The United States, the Vatican, the Middle East, and Jerusalem

183

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viii  Contents

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Ten

The Pope and the Iranian Hostage Crisis: The Limits of Papal Power

202

Eleven

The Vatican, Liberation Theology, and the Central American Imbroglio

228

E p i l o g u e

254

Notes Bibliography

Index

260 398 403

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Chapter One

THE YEAR OF THREE POPES A N D T H E T R A N S F O R M AT I O N O F U . S . – V AT I C A N R E L AT I O N S

This chapter describes the momentous events at the Vatican in the second half of 1978 surrounding the death of two popes, the conclaves to elect two new popes, and their inaugurations. It also analyzes the effect of these events on the Vatican as an institution, its foreign policy structure and posture, and its bearing on U.S.–Vatican relations.1 Since 1978 was the midpoint of my tenure as the Rome-based U.S. envoy to the Vatican, the discussion serves two purposes. It provides the focus for analyzing the U.S.–Vatican relations retrospectively and prospectively, and it also offers an opportunity to provide a synopsis of the major contours of the past and future of these relations in their historical context.2 The events of 1978 underscore the uniqueness of the papacy as an international institution, which, during most of its two millennia of existence, has exerted enormous spiritual and temporal power.3 Although the papacy’s territorial and temporal power has significantly decreased since 1870, when the Papal States disappeared, the pope’s spiritual power has progressively increased. It has continued to be felt in the international arena. In the 1970s, the pope was the spiritual leader of more than 700 million faithful and exercised temporal power over the Vatican city-state,

1

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comprising 108 acres and a population of fewer than 1,000. Under international law, by virtue of the pope’s spiritual power and certain accoutrements of sovereignty, such as sovereignty over Vatican City and the papal diplomatic corps, the pope plays a unique role in international politics.

In this context, the events of 1978, though essentially ecclesiastical in ­nature, also had important political dimensions and interesting international ramifications. The focus in this chapter is their influence on international relations, with special attention to an analysis of how the U.S. presence and the diplomatic encounters of U.S. and Vatican officials at these four events led to a significant transformation of U.S. relations with the Vatican. They provide the institutional setting for the conduct of the other ten diplomatic encounters that form the core of this book.

THE YEAR OF THREE POPES IN THE CONTEXT OF U.S.– VATICAN RELATIONS

In the annals of Christianity––and perhaps of Western civilization––the year 1978 will be known as the “year of three popes.” During that year, in Rome, there unfolded in sequential solemnity the drama of two papal funerals, the intrigue of two conclaves for the election of new popes, and the pageantry of the inaugurations of two new popes. Only one other time in the last millennium, in 1503, were there three popes in one year, and the last time a non-Italian was elected pope was in 1522. Although these events were essentially ecclesiastical, they also had unique and important political dimensions and strategic international ramifications of relevance to the U.S. government. When these events began to unfold in mid-1978, I had been posted at the Vatican for more than three years. In 1974, Amb. Henry Cabot Lodge, the president’s special envoy to the Vatican, had selected me to be his assistant. In May 1975, I assumed charge of his Vatican office in Rome.4 It fell to me, as the officer in charge of this small mission, to observe and report on the evolution of the historic Vatican events during the year of the three popes. It was a unique opportunity and the most treasured of my thirty-two-year diplomatic experience as a Foreign Service officer (FSO).

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The Year of Three Popes and the Transformation of U.S.–Vatican Relations 3

The special mission to the Vatican represented a rare bright episode in a historically turbulent and irregular relationship between the United States and the Vatican. For most of its history, the United States had followed a policy of benign neglect of the Vatican.5 Up to 1975, the U.S. government had normal diplomatic relations with the Vatican for a span of under twenty-three years, 1846 to 1868. During most of its history, the United States maintained consular relations with the Holy See, but it adopted a policy of benign neglect or established limited, quasi-­diplomatic relations with the Vatican. A synopsis of those relations reveals six different phases: exclusively consular relations (1797–1846); normal diplomatic relations (1846–68); benign neglect (1868–1939 and 1950–1970); and quasi-diplomatic relations (1939–50 and 1970–84). The following sections describe the principal contours of these relations.

U.S. Consular Relations with the Papal States The United States maintained reciprocal consular relations with the Papal States from 1797 to 180.6 There were eleven consuls general accredited to the Papal States. Among these was the colorful and notorious Nicholas Brown (1845–49). His pro-republican virtues led him to welcome the takeover of Rome by Giuseppe Garibaldi and his Italian troops in November 1848 and the proclamation of a republic in February 1849 under Giuseppe Mazzini. Brown, concurrently serving as chargé of the American Legation in Rome, defended his unauthorized and undiplomatic act, defiantly informing the U.S. secretary of state in his dispatch of February 12, 1849: “I thought it my duty as an American citizen to do homage to the principle of popular sovereignty, of which our glorious republic is the living incarnation. Accordingly, I accompanied the splendid procession [of the Constituent Assembly to the Cancelleria] in my official uniform and witnessed the proclamation at the Capitol of the Roman Republic.”7 One other consul general deserves mention, David M Armstrong. It fell to him as the last U.S. official in Rome to report, in his last dispatch of September 23, 1870, the fall of Rome to the Italian troops and the demise of the Papal States, which had occurred on September 20, 1870.8

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During the years of consular relations,9 the Holy See accredited six consuls general to the United States: Ferdinand Lucchesi (1826-27); N. Edward Fowls (1827–29); Giovanni Sartori (1829–33); Peter A. Hargons, (1833–41); Daniel J. Desmond, (1841–50); and Louis B. Binsse (1850–77).10 Era of Diplomatic Relations of the United States and the Vatican The election in 1846 of the reformist Pius IX, who liberalized his government by naming a lay prime minister and introducing a liberal constitution for the Papal States, encouraged President James K. Polk to establish diplomatic relations with the Holy See with overwhelming congressional approval. Polk’s action was supported 36–7 in the Senate, and 137–15 in the House of Representatives. In the twenty years of diplomatic relations, from 1848 to 1868, the United States accredited seven ministers11 to the Papal States: Jacob L. Martin12 (1848); Lewis Cass Jr. (1849–58); John P. Stockton (1858–61); Andrew W. Randall (1861–62); Richard Blatchford (1862–63); and Gen. Rufus King (1863–68). From the very beginning, the United States made it clear that it had established diplomatic relations with the pope in his capacity as temporal head of the Papal States, not as head of the Catholic Church. Thus, Secretary of State Buchanan instructed U.S. diplomats to Rome that in carrying out their functions in Rome, they should avoid engagement in any ecclesiastical activities.

During this period, there were two major bilateral issues: one relating to the U.S. attitude towards the Papal States during the revolution of 1848– 49 and the effort at Italian unification; and the other relating to the Holy See’s position regarding the U.S. Civil War and the attempt of the Confederacy to gain recognition from the pope. The United States did not recognize the Roman Republic. The U.S. chargé d’affaires, Lewis Cass Jr., arrived in the midst of the revolution in early 1849 but deferred the presentation of his credentials until November, when the pope was restored to power in Rome by French troops.13 During the U.S. Civil War, the American Legation deflected the pope from recognizing the Confederacy, and after the war obtained the extradition of John A. Surratt, who was accused of being involved in the assassination of President Lincoln.14 De-

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The Year of Three Popes and the Transformation of U.S.–Vatican Relations 5

spite these acts of loyalty and friendship, the American Legation near the Holy See ceased operations at the end of 1867. The U.S. Congress on February 28, 1867, acting on misinformation that the American Protestant church was forced to move outside the Roman walls, terminated funding for the maintenance of a diplomatic mission in Rome beyond June 13, 1867.15 Secretary of State Seward wrote Minister King that the action left the mission “still existing but without compensation.” King agreed to serve, hoping that his reports on the religious situation in Rome would bring congressional reconsideration. King informed Seward on May 7, 1867, that the pope characterized the action as “hasty and . . . groundless” and an unkind and ungenerous return for the goodwill the pope always manifested for the U.S. government and the American people.16 King finally left Rome at the end of the year and tendered his resignation on January 1, 1868. Leo Francis Stock, an American historian, characterized the termination of relations this way: “It was neither a courteous exit nor a dignified ending of this chapter of American diplomacy.”17 Era of Benign Neglect I: 1868–1939 The controversial manner in which diplomatic relations were suspended, marked by the closure of the American Legation in Rome, ended the first diplomatic rapprochement between the United States and the Vatican, and there followed a long period when the Unites States adopted a policy of near-total benign neglect. The only major official contact in the next seventy years was the uneventful visit of President Woodrow Wilson to the pope at the Vatican in 1919.18 Wilson made the visit to the pope reluctantly, mostly to mollify American Catholic opinion. Moreover, Wilson had consented to the decision by the Allies not to invite the pope’s participation in the Versailles Conference in 1919. This accorded with the terms of a secret provision in the 1915 Treaty of London on the entry of Italy on the side of the Allies in World War I. Wilson also had been the spokesman for the Allies in rejecting Benedict XV’s 1917 appeal for peace, because the Allied powers felt that the pope was pro-German and wanted to preserve the Austro-Hungarian Empire. During the period of benign neglect, there was also a clash in values between the United States and the

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Vatican,19 symbolized by the adoption in 1864 of the Syllabus of Errors, which had denounced liberalism, democracy, and modernity, and the pope’s 1899 denunciation of the “Americanism” movement within the American Catholic Church, because of its liberal orientation and acceptance of the principle of the separation of church and state.

Era of Quasi-diplomatic Relations, 1940–1950 President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) initiated a new era in U.S.– Vatican relations in December 1939, when he appointed Amb. Myron C. Taylor as his personal representative to Pius XII,20 thereby ending seventy years of official neglect of the Holy See. Despite some opposition by Protestant elements, FDR justified his appointment as a temporary measure to enlist the pope’s “parallel” efforts in a diplomatic campaign to stop the spread of World War II, particularly to dissuade Mussolini from entering the war as an ally of Germany. Taylor presented his credentials to the pope in February 1940. He then established an office in Rome with his assistant, FSO Harold Tittmann. Taylor served as the representative of FDR and then Harry Truman until January 18, 1950, when he resigned for health reasons.21 In December 1941, after Mussolini declared war on the United States, FDR upgraded Taylor’s assistant, Tittmann, to chargé ­d’affaires, so that he could move into the Vatican until June 1944, when Rome was liberated by the Allies.22 It is interesting to note that one of the principal reasons for upgrading the status of Tittmann was the wide reputation of the Vatican as a prime diplomatic listening post. Attesting to this reputation was the fact that in 1939, thirty-nine countries had diplomatic representatives at the Vatican, and the Holy See was represented in seventy-­two foreign countries.

Ambassador Taylor resigned on January 18, 1950, for health reasons.23 He had made six visits to the Vatican under President Truman (1946–49).

Truman’s nomination of Gen. Mark Clark as ambassador to the Vatican, October 20, 1950, was not acted upon by the Senate because of strong Protestant opposition to the appointment as breaching the wall between the separation of church and state, and the personal opposition of the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Clark’s nomination was withdrawn January 13, 1952.24

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The Year of Three Popes and the Transformation of U.S.–Vatican Relations 7

Another Era of Diplomatic Neglect: 1950–1970 From 1950 to 1970, the United States adopted a second era of benign diplomatic neglect towards the Vatican. Upon closer investigation, however, it was not as nearly total as the 1868–1939 period. The United States did not have diplomatic relations with the Holy See, but the papacy and the Vatican continued to exert influence in international politics. Moreover, this influence increased dramatically with the accession of John XXIII (1959) and then Paul VI (1963), and the opening of the Catholic Church to the world with the reforms of the Vatican II. The United States, therefore, could not ignore the Vatican or its opinions.25 Although the Vatican did not allow U.S. diplomats accredited to Italy direct access to its officials, the American Embassy to Italy gradually developed discreet informal contacts at the Vatican, which enabled the Political Section of the embassy to provide the U.S. Department of State with periodic reports on important Vatican developments (e.g., the Vatican role in Italian politics or the convening of Vatican II).26 On occasion, the U.S. ambassador to Italy transmitted messages between the pope and the president (e.g., John XXIII’s message to President Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, and exchange of messages between President Johnson and Paul VI on the search for peace in Vietnam). Moreover, presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson were granted private audiences by the pope.27 Eisenhower and Kennedy also sent presidential delegations to papal funerals and inaugurations.28 Johnson had met Pope Paul twice and also sent many special emissaries to confer with the pope on Vietnam peace efforts.29

THE GENESIS OF THE SPECIAL AMERICAN MISSION TO THE VATICAN

President Richard M. Nixon, imitating FDR, reestablished direct contacts with the Vatican in 1970.30 After a hiatus of twenty years, Nixon named Amb. Henry Cabot Lodge as his special envoy to the pope. Lodge was a U.S. statesman, a war hero, had served two terms in the Senate, and ran

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as Nixon’s vice presidential candidate in 1960. Lodge also served important diplomatic posts: UN ambassador under Eisenhower, ambassador in Saigon under Kennedy, ambassador to Saigon (for a second time), and ambassador to the Federal Republic of Germany under Johnson.31 He had met with the pope in 1965 and 1967 to explore paths to peace in Vietnam, had collaborated closely with the papal nuncio in Saigon on peace initiatives, and had a special appreciation of Vatican diplomacy. Nixon, by creating this channel for a dialogue with the pope and the Vatican, ­recognized that the pope’s observations, judgments, and opinions were accorded extensive international prestige,32 which was reinforced by powerful Catholic institutions, both ecclesiastical and secular, throughout the world. Nixon’s mandate to Lodge also imitated FDR’s mandate to Ambassador Taylor. Lodge was to visit the Vatican “from time to time” to exchange views on international issues of common concern to the United States and the pope and the Vatican.33 Lodge was authorized to maintain a permanent office in Rome, staffed by an FSO and a secretary.34 The mission remained tiny throughout 1975–80 and operated inconspicuously, but it was highly valued by the Vatican. The pope explicitly stated his ­satisfaction with the special envoy channel during his audience for Vice President Mondale on January 27, 1977.35 Lodge was succeeded in October 1977 by President Carter’s appointee, David M. Walters, a successful Miami lawyer, prominent lay Catholic, and an important fundraiser for Carter during the election of 1976.36 He was named personal representative of the president 37 and entrusted with visiting the Vatican from “time to time.” Walters resigned in August 1978, and in December 1978 was succeeded by Robert F. Wagner, the former mayor of New York City. Walters and Wagner both retained me as their assistant.38 The Office of the Special Mission, although physically separate from the American Embassy to Italy in Rome, depended on it for administrative support, and collaborated closely on matters that affected the Vatican’s and the Catholic Church’s activities in Italy.

As the officer in charge of a mini-embassy, in addition to assisting the special envoy in his comprehensive periodic exchanges of views with the pope and senior Vatican officials, I maintained day-to-day Vatican contacts, exchanged information on important international events, reported on Vatican policies on international issues, and as instructed consulted

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The Year of Three Popes and the Transformation of U.S.–Vatican Relations 9

with the Vatican to obtain its support for specific U.S. policies. I also arranged papal audiences for senior U.S. officials and congressional delegations and accompanied them to the Vatican.

Among our major activities during my first three years were assisting in the visit of President Ford to the pope on June 3, 1975; reporting on the Vatican’s role in drafting the Helsinki Final Act (HFA),39 which marked the reemergence of the Holy See as an active participant in the European political scene for the first time since the Congress of Vienna in 1815; and monitoring and reporting on Vatican’s Ostpolitik, which endeavored to expand the modus vivendi (the accommodation) of the Church with the Communist governments in Eastern Europe that was inaugurated

by John XXIII in 1961, preceding the Nixon/Kissinger policy of détente by more than fifteen years. We also reported on the reengagement of the Vatican in the Italian elections of 1976. This helped prevent the Communists from achieving their “historic compromise” of entering in the government of Italy. This important Vatican effort paralleled our own strong and publicly enunciated policy against the “historic compromise.” Furthermore, I was active in persuading the pope not to condemn the neutron bomb. President Carter initially considered it as a means of restoring the military balance in Europe in the aftermath of the Soviet development and deployment of the SS-20 medium-range missiles that could hit targets throughout Europe. The other mission achievements related to coordinating with the Vatican the resettlement of Southeast Asian refugees and promoting U.S. foreign policy objectives in the Middle East and Lebanon, the war on drugs, and the Panama Canal Treaties.40 Notwithstanding the success of our diplomatic activities, the mission maintained a very low public profile.41 As instructed by Lodge, I carried on my activities with “extreme tact and circumspection” and “religiously” avoided press interviews.42 We avoided discussion of ecclesiastical matters pertaining to the Catholic Church in the United States. This reflected the religious sensitivities in our country and also accorded with long-standing U.S. diplomatic tradition.43 The mission operated in relative obscurity, sub rosa, and by “stealth.” The entry to our office on the fourth floor of an old palazzo at Via di Porta Pinciana, no. 4, was not adorned by the American eagle or the U.S. flag; we had no letterhead paper for our communications. These precautions successfully kept the mission off the

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public radar. This was reinforced by the State Department’s replies to the public regarding the mission. The boilerplate replies emphasized the obscurity of the mission by stating that Lodge had no official title, received no official salary, and his exchanging of information with the pope did not represent U.S. recognition of the sovereignty of the pope or the Vatican.

Nevertheless, the office pleasantly overlooked the beautiful Villa Borghese gardens and had one more extra benefit. It was near the Jesuit compound (at no. 1) that housed the intellectual powerhouse that was the staff of its journal, La Civiltà Cattolica. The Vatican’s Secretariat of State closely vetted the contents of the journal, and it therefore often represented Vatican positions on important issues. This proximity enabled me to seek clarifications of Vatican pronouncements or to get their observations on Italian political events.44 The Vatican accorded Ambassador Lodge, given his preeminence as a U.S. statesman, former ambassador, and ex-senator, unprecedented access to Vatican officials and to the pope. The pope insisted on seeing Lodge whenever he was in Rome. I, as Lodge’s alter ego, had unprecedented access to two of the pope’s highest officials in the Secretariat of State:45 the sostituto, or deputy secretary of state, Archbishop Giovanni Benelli (1975–77), and his successor, Giuseppe Caprio, in 1977, and the foreign minister (Archbishop Agostino Casaroli).46 The Secretariat of State acted as a combination of the office of a prime minister and that of the Foreign Ministry. Furthermore, our diplomatic profile was consonant with Vatican demands for strict observance on confidentiality. We strove to be discreet at all times, and the effectiveness of our consultations were commensurate: We conducted friendly liaison with Vatican officials on emerging or developing international issues or events, and we made discreet and precisely timed representations on behalf of the highest level of U.S. officials.47 The Historic Significance of the Year of Three Popes The year 1978 was both ecclesiastically historic for the Roman Catholic Church and transformative in U.S. relations with the Vatican. It was historic because the last time there were three popes in one year was in 1503 and it was also historic because there had not been a non-Italian pope

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