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Success in this kind of an operation would have been the greatest single thing we could have done to avoid any Cold War threat of major proportions from the countries to the south. Some sort of a clash was bound to come, and it was probably better if it came sooner with one· country, rather than later with two or three countries. 106/* The committee, however, failed to follow up on these comments by Mr. Berle to see if, in fact, similar sentiments had been expressed by, or were supported by, others most closely involved with planning the Bay of Pigs Operations. As noted in this chapter, Mr. Thomas Mann, the Assistant Secretary of State for American Republic Affairs until a few weeks before the time of * In this diary two days prior to his appearance before the Taylor committee, Ber1e indicated his particular displeasure about the failure of the Latin American nations to recognize the danger posed by the growing Soviet presence in Cuba. The diary stated: "The other American republics in general were not facing up to the situation. So~e sectors of their public opinion did not know that Cuba was now in effect a Sino-Soviet tool. Some sectors ~l1spected but did not wish to know. Some knew but wished to play that the problem was not there. A great many sectors including the politicians and intellectuals wished to hide behind cloudy un-realities. The doctrine of "non- intervention" was used as an excuse for not facing the savage fact that high intentions, good words and even good deeds would not stop Cold War activities carried on with agitation, money, bought demonstrations, and surreptitious organization of guerrillas with arms. To leave this situation without clarification merely meant that the process would go on. Then circumstances would probably be created whichm~ght require much larger military action. 107/ 108 ,t:.