ies. Mexico was forced to arrange barter deals with Italy, Germany, and Japan. The oil trade with these nations was interrupted by World War II. In 1940, the so-called Good Neighbor Policy of the United States became dominant in Mexican politics. This policy involved close cooperation with the United States in commercial and military matters. Mexico agreed to allow the United States Air Force to use Mexican airfields and also agreed to export critical and strategic materials (mostly minerals) only to countries in the western hemisphere. Consistent with its policy of cooperation with the United States, Mexico severed diplomatic relations with Japan, Italy and Germany in December 1941. In May 1942, after the sinking of two Mexican ships by submarines, the Mexican Congress declared war on Germany, Italy, and Japan. Later that same year a trade agreement, establishing mutual tariff concessions, was negotiated by Mexico and the United States. In 1944, Mexico agreed to pay U.S. oil companies $24 million plus interest, for oil properties expropriated in 1938. In June 1945, Mexico became an original member of the United Nations. The government stabilized the peso in with the aid of loans from the Treasury of the United States and the International Monetary Fund. In 1950, the problem of Mexican laborers who entered the United States to seek seasonal farm employment became a matter of grave concern to the two governments. Official agreements between Mexico and the United States provided for the legal entry of a specified number of such workers annually. Approximately 1 million, however, crossed the border illegally every year. The problem was further complicated by the demand of the Mexican government for guarantees against the exploitation of its citizens by U.S. employers and by the hostility of U.S. farm labor organizations toward the competition of Mexican migratory laborers willing to work for substandard wages. In March 1952, the Congress o...
