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Both Loyalist Leader Imbert and Caamaño said they would study the proposal. But Caamaño's rebels remained disdainful. When the OAS negotiators drove through the rebel zone, rebel youths chased one of their cars along the streets, pounding on the trunk and shouting "Assassins! Assassins!" After the OAS team had presented the peace plan, Caamaño stepped from his office and told a cheering crowd that he would "not yield one step" from his previous demands—including a return of the 1963 constitution written under deposed President Juan Bosch, and control of the Dominican military.
The U.S. and the OAS were giving him a chance to think it over—for awhile. In Washington, President Johnson called last week's shooting "totally unjustified, a flagrant violation" of the ceasefire. "These unprovoked attacks on the Inter-American force," said Johnson, "appear to have been premeditated by elements which seek to prevent the establishment of peace in Santo Domingo. Our forces there have no other mission. They will continue to observe the same soldierly restraint that they have shown now for more than seven weeks, in the face of more than 900 cease-fire violations." And 24 U.S. dead, 149 wounded.