CONFIDENTIAL APPENDIX to AUSTRALIA'S SECURITY RELATIONS WITH THE UNITED STATES 1957-63 .. by Hanno Weisbrod
The following is a Tecord of interviews with officials of the Australian and American Government. They were held between February 1964 and April 1967. The interviews were granted under the proviso that only . th~ three academic ex~miners wQuld have temporary access to the information offered by the respondents. The Department of International Relations of the Australian National Uni- versity has promised that all copies of the Appendix be kept secure from public scrutiny for fifteen years. Anyone who might b~ granted special access to the Appendix during that time must agree not to compromise -its confidential nature. Much information which would have been difficult if not impossible to obtain from public so~rces was derived from these intf;!rvi.ews. In most ca_ses, references .to the Confidential • Appendix were used to supplement the open sources. In some instances, assertions in the thesis could be substantiated only by reference to the material in the Aopendix~ The author recognizes that it cannot be assumed that the memory of these officials is infallible or their judgment wholly objective. To protect the identity of the respondents a consecutive paragraph numbering system has been employed.
''··:·. TABLE OF CONTENTS
Sir Philip McBride Pages 1 - 5
Sir Valston Hancock 6 - 18 Supplementary 18 - 19
A.P. Renouf 19 - 22
Doyle, Martin, John Shumate 22 - 24
D.W. Douglass 24 - 26
A.B. MacFarlane 26 - 30
Sir Robert Menzies 30 - 36
T.D. Younge 36 - 38
E.J.H. Howard 38 - 42
Sir Garfield Barwick 42 54
Sir Frederick Scherger 55 - 64
Geoffrey C. Kitchen 64 - 67
Sir Roy Dowling 67 - 76 Supplementary 76 - 77
K.C.O. Shann 78 - 83 Supplementary 83 - 88
Richard Wbolcott ·ss - ·go
Sir James Plimsoll 91 - 101
Alan Griffith 101 111
Sir Ragnar Garrett 112 - 113
Sir Hastings Harrington 113 - 115
Charles Wilbourn 115 - 120
-----oOo------CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH SIR PHILIP McBRIDE
Minister for Defence 1950-1958 *
3 September 1965.
Australian Defence Planning After Korea:
1. Sir Philip said there was a continuous review to "match
Australia's defence needs against the threat". The Government wanted to achieve a balance between the requirements for development and the spending on defence. Of course, it was
"only common sense" to concentrate on development while there was no immediate threat after the Korean war. In addition, the Government felt that Australia should develop a large defence production capacity, so that the availability of defence supplies would be free from enemy interdiction. Submarines were considered to be the greatest danger all through the
1950's, because they could possibly prevent allied help from reaching Australia.
US Acceptance of Australia's Role:
2. Sir Philip claims that while he was Mini&ter for Defence he never once received any criticism from any American
Gover·nment official. He said that all the people he dealt with in Washington had complete and sympathetic understanding for
Australia's development needs. Dulles told him, in 1957, that
Australia was a most valuable ally, and specifically on
Australia's defence effort the Secretary of State said,
'Within your field you are doing alright'. Sir Philip said,
"We did not pretend to be a big power. We did not have the money to maintain large standing forces. But we thought that
through our National Service Scheme we could provide a big pool
of partially trained reserves". Sir Philip denied that there was any "really deep criticism" by the US, but he said that
the cut-back of the National Service Scheme in 1957 was done
* See Personal evaluation at para. 11.
: ' 2.
in consultation with the Americans. But apparently to dispel
the notion that the Australian Government had done this under
pressure from the US Sir Philip quickly added that "All of our
planning is done in consultation with our. rnajor allies".
Standardisation with US:
3. He said, up to 1957, the Australian Services had bought
mainly British goods. The RAAF had favoured integration with
the Americans before this time. The Sabre fighters were bought
because the British had no planes which had the same range
capabilities. After the Suez crisis, there no longer could be
any question about buying British equipment only for sentimental
reasons. "We had to be hard-headed about this. The Americans
were the only ones who could supply us. The Canal crisis had
showed us how vulnerable Britain's presence in this area was."
4. He said in World War II the cost for -double equipment
was terribly high. Australia was determined not to let this
happen again. Standardisation was a necessity, and the US was
the logical choice. On the other hand, Australia also
wanted to maintain compatability with British forces because Australia
was in Malaya with the British, and while there depended
·largely on Bri·tish logistics.
Ruestow Mission:
5. Sir Philip emphatically denied that his trip to the
United States in 1957 was a "begging mission". He said the
Australian Government simply wanted some help from American
defence planners on how Australia should best allocate her
defence budget so as to get maximum value out of it. He tied
his trip to the programme of having continuous defence reviews.
"We wanted to get a technical evaluation by the Americans".
(I said that it had been reported that the Government wanted
help from the Americans in the form of a purchasing plan so
that when the St. Mary's munitions filling factory would be
completed it would not lie idle) . He denied that the Government
was embarrassed about the St. Mary 's project. Howe\rer, he i admitted that one of the primary pur{)oses of General Rues tow ,.,s ;I 11 : I I il 3.
J technical mission of 1958 was to look over Australia's defence production potential, "to see what production tasks could be assigned to Australia in time of war. Also it was conceivable that our factories could produce some things more economically and that the mission might recommend a purchasing programme".
6. One of the important results of McBride's talks with
the Americans was the working out of arrangements for American
logistics support if an Australian battalion was required in the SEATO Treaty area. The Ruestow Mission gave detailed advice on how best to standardise our equipment so that an
Army battalion could be integrated easily into the logistics programme of an American force in the same area. The plan to
reorganise the Army on a modified concept of the American
Pentomic Army organisation was also due to the Australian desire
to have forces and equipment compatible with those of the
Americans.
Defence Trust Funds:
7. Sir Philip said that as the tension lessened the Government
felt more and more reluctant to give in to the demands of the
Services for expensive equipment. He thought the story on the
F-104 Starfighter was a classical example of the Services
"always wanting the very best". The. RAAF had wanted this top
fighter plane, "because it looked like the best thing on the market". But when Sir Philip went to Washington in May 1957
and brought up the topic of the F-104, General Twining, the US
Air Force Chief of Staff, asked, 'What's wrong with your
Sabres? We consider them the best planes for your role'.
8. He said that one of the troubles with the Services was
that they always wanted the latest or the best. This often
meant that after certain pieces of equipment had been ordered
the Service people would demand modifications which would make
the equipment more expensive . Sir Philip said he grew very
impatient over this. In his opinion it was much wiser to get
· "something good rather than the best". "With Aust'ialia'·s
I I limited resources, it \vas next to impos sibl e to afford the M:$t",,
'I ,, 4.
He claimed that these demands for modifications also caused
delays in delivery schedules. Sir Philip and the Treasury took
the attitude that if certain eqtlipment did not arrive within a
specified budget period it was due to faulty planning of the
Service. He did not see why the Services should get away with
this. They should make detailed specifications and then submit
an order for equipment which most nearly fitted those requirements.
If they kept changing their minds after that, they should pay the
penalty for it. So whenever equipment did not arrive on time
and he felt that the delay was caused because new specifications
had been added, he forced the Service to resubmit the proposal
· for the next budget. He claimed:.most of the underspending of
those years was because the Services could not decide among
themselves how they were going to allocate the fixed sum total
for defence of around two hundred million pounds. Then their
demands for modification put back the delivery schedules.
9. Money which was unspent by the end of the year ,.,as put
into a Defence Equipment Trust Fund, pending an investigation
whether the inability to spend the money was due to reasonable
causes or whether it had been occasioned by bad planning or
sudden changes in the order. If the latter was the ~ase, the
Service would have to take it out of the following year's allocation.
(I asked him if he made the evaluation whether a delay was
unreasonable). "Oh, no, these things are much too technical
for me. I'm a woolgrower. Why I ever became Minister for
Defence I'll never know". The recommendation was usually
made by a group of technical experts from the Department of
Defence, the Treasury and the Defence Business Board.
Run-down of Service Conditions:
10. Sir Philip thought that with Australia's shortage of
labour, "the Govermnent 1 s demand for soldiers was always in
competition with industry". He admitted that there were conflicts
over adjusting pay scales according to skill and rank. The
Government did not want to deny industry sorely needed skills, 5.
but the Services did not want to lose their skilled people
either. "In the end we had to recognize that the whole
salaries system needed a top to bottom review." He thought
Sir John Allison did a good job in revising the salaries in
1958.
(PERSONAL EVALUATION:
11. Throughout the interview Sir Philip McBride was on
the defensive. He was especially sensitive about questions
on defence re-organisation, s~rvice conditions and the defence
trust funds. It took a lot of persuasion to get him to say
anything on these topics. The impression was that he felt
that to go into any detail on these matters on which he had
been relentlessly attacked in the press would have been to admit
that he was a poor Minister for Defence (though see his
admission on p. 4). Thus on the defence re-organisation he
took the line that this was the outgrowth of a programme of
continuous reviews; the deterioration of the service
conditions he blamed on the competition from industry; and
the accumulation of money in the trust funds was the fault
of the Services. His general attitude was that the needs for
development should have precedent over defence. · Thus· any
money saved on defence was a bonus.
12. On the question of the inter-connection between
American pressure and the dropping of the National Services
Scheme, he was vague, admitting only that there were joint
consultations. While saying that "at no time was there any
pressure applied by the Americans" for Australia to step up
her defence effort, he allowed, "I am sure they would have
liked us to do more." On his mission to the US in 1957,
he was equally defensive, and the impression was that he had
expected more from it.) 6.
CONFIDENTIAL I NTERVIE\VS WITH SIR VALSTON HAN COCK
Former Chief of Air Staff (1961-64) AOC Malaya (1957-59) AOC Operational Command (1959-61)
21, 23, 25 November 1.965.
Role of Strategic Commonwealth Force in Ha laya:
13. There was no doubt in anyone's mind that the Strategic
Force in Malaya was put there as an aid to SEATO, Butterworth was clearly put there for emergency use in the SEATO area and would be used for such a purpose. The force is under the control of ANZAM but in the Laos crisis of 1962, when the Sabres from
Butterworth were sent to Yubol, Thailand, the ANZAM Committee had nothing to do with the arrangement. The planes, however, had to be routed through Singapore.
14. The Commonwealth Reserve is never allowed to be associated publicly with SEATO, except for Menzies' initial statements that these forces were an important contribution to
SEATO forces. But it was no . secret that these forces were
Australia's contribution to the SEATO a rea. They were used for anti-Communist operations mainly to satisfy Malaya, though this was not their primary role.
15. Contingency planning . do ~ s provide for unified ·command, but Malaysia is excluded from the contingency planning. If the
Malaysian bases were denied to Australia it would be difficult for Australia to support SEATO, because no Australian bases are near enough.
Mirage Fighter Decision:
16. There were no political considerat~ons in the purchase of the Mirage. It was simply a case of comparative performance
characteristics. The competitor, the F-104 G had tremendous teething difficulties with its we apons systenlli. The requirements were for
1. interceptor for air base defence
2. to establi sh air supe riority
3. to make ground attacks. 7.
Comparatively speaking, the Mirage had better take-off characteristics which is important in Australia. It could get off faster from shorter fields. The F-104 G needed long, reinforced runways. Also the maintenance was better, and production was easier.
17. (In 195 7 the F-104 decision had been made. Scherger and Osborne cancelled it on the advice of General Thomas White.)
18. Compatibility with the United States only goes so far as buying American equipment ·where they have the item which will satisfy Australia's requirement. In the F-104 G situation, the requirements set up by the RAAF were clearly not met by any plane on the American market.
North West Cape:
19. The defence of the North West Cape communications station is not of immediate concern to either the Americans or the Australians. The risk of attack seems to be small at the present. Who would be willing to attack it? But the base would be ideal if developed for deterrence vis-a-vis Indonesia. RAAF thinks it is imperative, in the long run, to have an air base there. Though no necessity to garrison forces there, the RAAF believes in dispersal' and 'concentration for an emergency. The ·
RAAF can concentrate forces anywhere in Australia in 12 hours.
20. The initial proposal to set up the North West Cape station received fairly low priority in Australia. It was felt that this station would be of only indirect value to
Australia (though RAAF was also offered navigational aid through the station, which was rejected). Also .there was the feeling that Australia had no say-so in US strategic thinking, so what
the Americans did there was of no direct concern. No documents
on the station ever came before the Chiefs of Staff (from 1961 on), though Hancock was briefed by a special officer connected with the project, when he was AOC operational command at
Singleton. ·8.
21. Hancock has no direct ' evidence that Australia would have requested reciprocal SOFA, but thinks the idea originated here.
TFX, TSR-2, Vigilante, Phantom Evaluation and Decision:
22. The requirements in 1963 were for a tactical strike reconnaissance bomber. Main interest was in reconnaissance, and then bombing for interdiction. It would have to have terrain following, all weather, high precision bombing capability.
23. South East Asia and Indonesia \vere thought of as possible target areas for which an immediate deterrent force was sought.
Capability vis-s-vis Indonesia was thought of in terms of interdiction of supply lines in· case o'f·an attack in New Guinea.
24. . In early 1963, Menzies had called in Hancock and asked him if "you and your boys" had made up their mind on what plane to buy. Hancock told him that one could not buy planes from manufacturers' brochures, whereupon he was told to take a miss.ion to study the planes at first hand. By this time there were only five planes still in the running: Vigilante, Phantom, TSR-2,
TFX, and the Mirage IV. The Vigilante was the only one that was fully developed, the F-4C Phantom was being finished, but was not yet operational in its final form. The Mi~age IV ·was . . .. shortly rejected because it was not suitable for Australian specifications.
25. The TSR-2, the first plane that the mission looked at, was behind schedule. The costs had gone up to where the mission was told that the final price for 24 would be one hundred. and thirty million pounds. The prototypes of the TSR-2 were more advanced than those of the TFX but the big question was whether or not it would go into production. Hancock implied that had firm orders been placed for the TSR-2, when the mission got to
London or shortly thereafter, it might have made all the difference. The U.K. Minister for Defence had told him that the RAF would need about 190 of the planes, but this left
Hancock completely unimpressed, and he told the Minister that unless there was a production order placed before his mission '9. returned to Canberra, there was no chance of the RAAF opting for a plane, which did not enjoy enough confidence to have a production order placed for it. (Earl Mountbatten, Chairman of the Defence Staff was opposed to the plane) . The Ministry· for
Air did place a tentative production order for 30 aircraft three weeks later but by then other factors had come into the picture. It was thought by then that even if production were commenced the Americans with greater technical production capability would overhaul th~ lee\oJay, even though the production orders for the TFX (in May-June) were shaky.
26. But in a sense this was not so terribly relevant because the mission ·wanted an immediat~ · replac.erilent, and was only evaluating the comparative capabilities. In this comparative evaluation both planes were far from finished, but the TFX looked like a much better plane.
27. It would have a much greater range, greater versatility, more advanced weapons system. It had many of the characteristics of the TSR-2, but was even more advanced. Also it could use the ordinary unimproved 7,000 ft. landing strip.
Vigilante -
28. Th.e mission was very. impressed with the performance characteristics of the RC-5 Vigilan~e. It' seemed to fit
Australia's immediate needs for a reconnaissance and strike aircraft. Cabinet stressed the need for reconnaissance in case of trouble with Indonesia.
29. The Vigilante had the additional advantage that it was fully operational and could be tested.
Phantom .....
30. The principal drawback of the F-4C was its limited range.
The mission foresaw that to operate from Australia it would have to be refueled either by buddy to buddy, or by KC-135. But the
Prime Minister favoured the F-4C, because he thought it would do for Malaysia.
31. Hancock himself killed the Vigilante. Even though he 10.
recommended the Vigilante as an im:nediate r eplacement, he had
written such a glowing report about the TFX that it was
politically expedient for the Government to ignore the mission's
recommendation to buy the Vigilante. "The Cabinet in effect
gambled on the future being calm." (Hancock).
Delivery Dates:
32. The manufacturers had indicated to Hancock that the
plane would be ready by 1967 but the mission on their own
estimates had revised this to 1969, which would have meant that
the plane would be operational by 1970. The manufacturers'
"list price" was fifty-six million pounds but the mission re-
estimated this to come up to ninety-two million pounds. But
before the mission left the Defence Department sent a note to
Hancock, saying that the manufacturers' estimates were
unreliable. The Defence Department had said all along that it
would not be ready until 1970, which meant that it would be
·operational by 1971.
Townley' s Hiss ion:
33. Hancock felt there was no doubt that there was "considerable back-
scratching between Townley and McNamara". The Menzies Government
was facing an election and McNamara was in hot water over the
assignment of the TFX contract. "As you know, there were
hearings before Congress on this ... ".
34. To the mission's surprise Townley was told in Washington
that the manufacturers 1 estimates had been right after -all. Australia
would not have to wait until 1970-71, but only until 1967-68. Townley
also bandied about the figure of fifty-six million pounds, which
Hancock watched very carefully because he did not want the RAAF
mission to get blamed, if later it was found out that the price
would be much higher.
35. The most surprising thing, to the Air Marshal, was to hear that
the TFX ordered by Townley was only the bomber version of it.
The reconnaissance capability had been cut. Hancock thought that this
./ jl 11 , I ,'·.... 11 ·t" 11.
might be the reason why the Americans promised to deliver it earlier.
This was especially hard to understand because Cabinet had
attached so much importance to the reconna issance capability.
36. But Townley was considered a real· hero, because of the
good deal he got. He got the manufacturers dates confirmed,
which meant that Australia did not have to wait for 7-8 years
but only for 4-5 years. Also he brought with him the offer
of an interim bomber.
B-47 Bomber Offer:
37. When Cabinet had said no to both the Vigilante and the
Phantom, it had left itself in a vulnerable position. The
Canberra was considered to be obsolete, and a new plane would
not come onto the scene for another 4-5 years. It is little
wonder then that the Government jumped at the chance to cover
itself.
38. Sir Valston recalled that when the B-47 was first suggested
to him by the Americans, he had just laughed, and said, 'Oh no;
you are not going to pawn that old thing off on me.'
39. Commenting on the B-47 evaluation in Australia, Hancock said
that the whole thing was pure window dressing. The fly-overs and
the · public inspection of the planes were directed by the
Defence Department. The whole thing was arranged to give a false
sense of security. As a matter of fact, the RAAF had only two
of the three planes on \vhich to do the evaluation. One was
flying around from capital city to capital city for publicity.
Ambassador Battle had to intervene when the Government wanted
to fly one even to Hobart.
B-47 Evaluation:
40. The B-47 was given a thorough check-out. Most of the
technical evaluation was done at Amberley with RAAF pilots and
technicians flying and exchanging views with the American pilots.
The bombers were used for two air exercises, one at Sydney and
one at Darwin. (Sydney for low-level approach, one successful
one intercepted; Darwin for high-level approach, · which· was .,. ,I intercepted) . The RAAF felt that the B-47 was really only a long-range I ,I ! • I I' .{ 11 12.
Canberra. The B-47 had almost the same bomb loa d as the Canberra.
It was made to carry 20,000 lbs. of nuclear weapons, but its bomb bay could accomodate only about 7,000 lbs. of conventional bombs.
With extensive modifications of the interior this could have been raised to 10,000. The Canb erras have a bomb capa city of 6, 500 lbs. Thus clearly there was no significantly greater advantage. Without modification the B-47 would carry only one more 500 lb. bomb. But what would Australia need a big bomb capacity for? . The RAAF's main task would be tointerdict supply · and communications targets. There is no need to do saturation bombing for that. Any saturation bombing would have to be done by the Americans anyway because the RAAF would not be able to do it with its few bombers.
41. In addition, he felt maintenance and technical upkeep would be a difficult and long drawn out process. Technicians and air crews would have to be re-trained, the B-47 needed one extra air crew member.
This all to go on while the RAAF was expanding to meet the manpower requirements of the Mirage. The re just would not have been enough technical personnel. At any rate, by the time the RAAF could have them re-trained, the TFX would be comin·g on the scene.
42. The final decision not· to take the B-4 7 was left to the
Defence Department. The RAAF had refused to make a · recommendation; · and had sent only a comparative assessment to the Defence Department because of the involvement in politics.
Effects of the TFX Decision:
43. Hancock believed it probably cancelled out the need for aircraft carriers. In r e ality, the RAN would need three aircraft carriers if it wanted to have an attack carrier force. Therefore carrier power is much more expensive. The Navy was most unhappy about the purchase of the TFX. He said that Admiral Harrington even went so far as to sponsor a rumour c~~paign to discredit the F-111, by quoting an American Admiral to the effect that the F-111 would not be ready until 1971.
44. The Air Marshal claimed that the F-111 would give Australia a first class strike aircraft and a deterrent vis-a-vis Indonesia. 13.
Integration with U.S. Air Force:
45. The stories about the RAAF becoming Americanised were exaggerated. Spares and equipment are bought for the first twelve months.
46. The only advantage was that replacement and stores could be held in the U.S. to be called for as the need will arise.
But at the time of the interview it was still under discussion whether the RAAF would get its own stores or would have integrated stores. Compatibilitywith the United States would mean that complete reliance could be placed on U.S. spare parts. Nonetheless, it was always understood that Australia pay for its own parts.
But this .compatibility was useful when refuelling or when a spare part would be needed in a hurry because it would mean having the right equipment there. However, in both cases it had to be paid for, or the spare part replaced later with one out of Australian stores.
47. Commenting on the Government's 1957 policy statement to standardise with the U.S., Hancock said that the RAAF had always had the intention of buying American "everything being equal".
This out of the realization that,.if there were trouble in this area, Australians will be fighting aside the Americans.
48. This implies that there was political pressure to buy
British, if possible on the TSR-2, because Hancock said. that the most important reason why his mission could not recommend the
TSR-2 (this despite all the doubts) was that no firm production order had been placed.
Threat Pe rcepti on (mainly RAAF attitudes):
Indonesia
49. East New Guinea is not vital to Australia's defence, though the loss of New Guinea would b e embarrassing.
50. Indonesia is not a vital threat to Australia, however great a nuisance value. She could tie down a sizeable force of
Australian s ol die rs in New Guinea without imperilling
Australia's existence.
51. The Service attitude has been to try hard to stay 14. friends with the Indonesians. The Anny has given staff college training to Indonesian officers. This was not possible with
RAAF staff college, because the course contains much highly classified materials, which the RAAF shares with the U.S.
52. External Affairs' attitude from early 1962 to March
1963 was one of appeasing Indonesia. "Townley and Barwick both thought that the Indonesians could do no wrong. They often said we can't afford to have 90 million people as enemies."
Hancock said the services thought Barwick's attitude to be wrong, but had no recourse. However, in 1961, Hancock invited Arthur
Tange (Secretary, External Affairs Department) to come along on an air exercis!'!. .. Hancock said the RAAF really gave him the works:
"We snowed everything we had, and let him see our capabilities and our shortcomings.. After that, we had a friend in External
Affairs who supported us, and voiced his support for a strong deterrent force for the RAAF." (Unfortunately Tange was shortly thereafter transferred to New Delhi).
China
53. Clearly the main threat, China, has the power and the urge to expand. While Indonesia GOuld only be a nuisance,
China by slowly eroding away the Western position in · South
East Asia can become the long-term threat to Australia. There is no hurry, the Chinese feel they can \vait. That is why China has to be stopped now. That is why Australia has to support the
American effort in South East Asia now. If the United States pulls out, there will be no limits to Chinese expansion. None of the countries of the area will be able to maintain themselves.
If China took over Indonesia (after take~over of South East
Asia) then there would be little hope for Australia. It is doubtful that the U.S. would then come to the aid of Australia, after it had allowed itself to be jockeyed out of South East Asia.
54. Hancock said Australia felt it had to help the U.S. contain
China, if only to keep the United States in South East Asia. Therefore
Australia made the suggestion to the U.S. to help in Vietnam. 15.
Australia asked the U.S. what sort of help they wanted . The U.S. said to send advisers. Australia asked the U.S. about it at the time of the ANZUS Council Meeting of 1962, as suggested by T.B.
Millar in his book. Hancock said discussions had been going on for a long time in Canberra and in Washington and both at the political and at the Service level. The Vietnam decision was reviewed by the Australian Chiefs of Staff and the Defence Department before a political decision was made.
Defence Review 1963:
55. Between 1961-64 there \v.ere three defence reviews instead of the normal two which shows that there was an increasing concern with d~fence matters.
56. Reasons for the 1963 defence review were:
1. Increased threat;
2. Increased determination of the Government to do more;
3. Press was conducting vigorous campaign on the threat in South East Asia and on the lack of defence in. 1963-64: this \vas felt by both the Government and
the Services;
4. External Affairs, in 1963, switched its position .
Before 1963, External Affairs did not use its weight
(either in Cabinet or on the Defence Committee).
But then in 1963 it became concerned about backing
its policy with force, especially vis-a-vis Indonesia.
Vietnam:
57. Hancock insisted that Australia ask what help the U.S. wanted. Not from reasons of pressure from U.S. The 1962 decision on sending advisers was taken in the knowledge that escalation might require comb at troops .
Alliance Questions:
58. ANZUS is a promise. It is potentially the best safeguard
I that Australia has. But ANZUS h as no military t eeth.
59. The two main values are:
1. Potentially the best guarantee of Australia n security; 16.
2. Provides for exchanges of information.
60. The exchange of information is so good that there is a
good deal of satisfaction; a feeli.ng that the Americans are not
holding back, that they are perfectly frank.
61. Also the Americans have been very sensitive (at least
at the Chiefs of Staff level) to Australia 1 s views. "Many times we have been specifically asked for our views, and told that we
shouldn't think that because we are a small country that the
Americans would not be interested in what we have to say''. When
Australian officers go to Washington and express their views
frankly, Pentagon people usually have been grateful at the
identity of .views expressed~ There is · no feeling among senior
officers that Australia is being dictated to by the United States.
62. In the RAAF the open trust has been very flattering to its
professionalism. Contacts have been extended to where symposia are
held once a year to which top Air Force personnel from the U.S. and
Australia come.
63. Alliance with the U.S. has been growing stronger over the
past two years (1963-64). There has been a great influx of senior
American officers, which would indicate a realization in the U.S.
that Australia is .a genuine partner that will stick with them.
64. SEATO - military contingency planning is done through
SEATO, and none done through ANZUS, at ANZUS Council meetings only
position papers are produced.
65. ANZAM- The ANZAM Committee is strictly regional in
planning, i.e. only for the Australia-New Zealand-Malaya region.
In 1954 the Committee worked out the requirement that Australian
troops should go to Malaya. On the other hand, when in 1961
Australia sent Sabres to Ubon in Thailand this \vas no business of
AHZAM.
66. ANZAM initially looked like the hinge pin of Australian
security, because of the large British South East Asian interest.
But now it has strictly limited value, for a while it was even in
danger of atrophying completely. 17.
67. Operation Headquarters of ANZAM is Canberra. The ANZAM
Committee is incorpora ted into the Australian defence machinery with the foreign representatives of the ANZAM powers taking part in the deliberations. Meetings .are usually held prior to SEATO meetings ( 11 though this does not mean that ,.,e gang up on the SEATO
11 people, but we usually work out a common position ). ANZAM
Committee meetings are usually attended by the U.K. Chief of the
Defence Liaison staff, Ne,., Zealand usually s encis over its Chairman of the Defence Staff. At important meetings, the U.K. would send the Chairman of the Defence Staff.
Alliance with the U.S.:
68. 11 lt 'is difficult to say how relations could be closer between the two countries. 11 Australian staff in Washington is larger than American staff in Canberra. Exchange of information is very satisfactory (see paragraph 60). Seemingly, there is compl,ete mutual trust. Contacts improved in the last two years that Hancock was Chief of Air Staff (1962-64).
69. Alliance with U.K. is not weakening militarily, though on the political level the Commom.;ealth seems to be less cohesive.
In the Royal Australian Navy, there has been a positive move away from over-dependence on the Royal Navy, althougp al~ officers are still sent to the British Naval Col~ege.
Miscellaneous Questions:
70. Organization of Forces:
In Malaya the Australian forces are on the British organizational plan. In Australia the forces are on American lines of organization; the RAAF in Butten.;orth are a law unto themselves and do not follow any specific pattern, because they are self-contained.
71. The RAN is still very much on the British pattern, though some changes are coming in with the ne,., destroyers.
Australian Defence Machinery:
72. It has effective machinery, but it is extremely slm.; in
11 11 decision making. Bureaucratic delay ( tales of woe ) is caused by
the lack of staff. 18.
73. Access by the Services to the Minister for Defence is
very poor: he relies mainly on the Permanent Secretary or the
Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff.
Equipment:
74. The major problem is lack of balance, both among the three
Services and also within the Services.
Nuclear Weapons:
75. Hancock: Australia should not produce nuclear weapons,
or acquire them, you can have quite devastating strikes with
conventional forces.
76. Only if China took over Indonesia, then perhaps acquire
· weapons from the U.S. and U.K.
SUPPLEMENTARY INTERVIEW WITH SIR VALSTON HANCOCK
2 February 1966.
On Price of TFX:
77. He said there was no written memo from the U.S. Department
of Defense to the Hancock mission. However, there was a verbal
communication in which the mission was told that 1967 and $125
million were "unreliable" figures.
On T·ownley Is achievement in Washington:
78. Thinks that despite Townley's- heavy social life in
Washington, no one can take away the credit from him for getting
the delivery date advanced, so that Australia would get the TFX
at exactly the same time as the U.S. Air Force. Hancock felt there
was some help from Battle. I On being ab le to wait:
79. He said that it had been Sir Frederick Scherger's view that
Australia was able to wait. Now in retrospect he agreed it was
the right decision. It was always assumed by Scherger that the
Americans would provide the air power in any major conflict in the
next few years. Australia at the most would supply bases, services
and maybe some supplementary air support.
On the .B-47 Offer:
I 80, Hancock said that he suggested that SAC set up a base... . in ' Jl
!il
11 19.
Northern Australia. SAC was asked if they would like to station
planes at Darwin. But the Americans were "deadset" against this
because the Kennedy administration was carrying out a retraction of
overseas bases. He felt that Townley was serious about the B-47
offer, and had the Minister lived, might have insisted that Australia
get the bomber, despite the RAAF evaluation. Sir Valston said that
right from the beginning there was violent objection to the B-47
offer from the Air Staff. He defended the RAAF and said that they
could not object publicly.
81. Hancock also revealed the B-47's that were evaluated did not
have any reconnaissance capability. The RB-47's would have proved
far too complicated for the RAAF to handle, though the RB-47's were
initially offered.
On the rejection of the TSR-2 and the value of the TFX:
82. It was not so much the technical flaws of the TSR-2, or
its production lags that led to the rejection of the plane: "It
was the whole environment. It just was not the right plane for
us." On the other hand, on the TFX, Hancock said, "One could
almost say that we had a look at the TFX designs before we wrote
our specifications for a strike reconnaissance aircraft." That
was the main reason, of course, why he wrote such a glowing
report on the TFX. It was going to have everything that the
RAAF wanted, plus some more features which made it seemingly
perfect. He said his team realised that the revolutionary new
design would provide problems, but they did not consider these
insurmountable.
CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH A.P. RENOUF
First Assistant Se cretary, External Affairs, 1965
Minister, Australian Embassy in Washington, 1962-1965.
6 Januar y 1966 .
TFX Deal and the pre- e l ection vis it of Tmvnley to the U.S.:
83. It was quite clear al ready b efore Townley ' s visit that
the Australian Government was inter ested mainly in the TFX , and
that the financial end of the deal was much more i~po rtan t than
1 the technical end of it. 1 I' : , 11 ,, ·,., I[ I 20.
84. In fact most of the financial ends of the agreement had
been worked out before Townley arrived, so that when he arrived he was asked if the broad outline of the agreement met with his
approval.
85. Also there was no question of Townley coming to Washington
to try to get the Phantom or the Vigilante as interim bombers,
as this possibility had already been ruled out by U.S. Defense
Department officials.
86. Renouf said "Townley \vas tickled pink" over the terms of the
B-47 offer. Australia was to get them practically for free.
Embassy Air Attaches were strongly critical and derided the plane as
belonging . t~ the scrap heap.
87. As far as Renouf could see, the B-47 offer was made in
good faith. In fact the U.S. Defense Department seemed disappointed
"when I had to tell them that we were not going to . take the plane
in early 1964".
88. The primary reason \vhy Australia was able to get "such
good financial terms" \·las that McNamara \·lanted to sell the TFX.
Because of the general good reputation that Australian civil
and military aviation enjoyed in America and in the world, it
would be considered quite a compliment to McNamara'~ judgement
if Australia on its own evaluation chose the TFX. Another reason
for the favourable terms was that Len Hewitt from Treasury, ("an
immensely shrewd fellow,") did some hard bargaining.
89. Also he felt that the general overall co-operation and
friendly relations had been enhanced by the Menzies Government's
handling of the North West Cape controversy. This had made for
a good negotiating climate.
90. Also there was the desire to tie defence equipment
together, and the TFX which was expected to be produced in large
numbers would be a common denominator.
91. Renouf said in his opinion Townley's main reason for coming
to Washington was to look over the embassy and the residence,
because he had been offered the ambassadorship to replace Sir
Howard Beale. 21.
92. Hence, as far as he could observe Townley, who avoided the
press and made himself generally pretty inaccessible did very little
of the actual negotiating himself.
93. The way he saw it was: Townley arrived, approved the broad
outline of an agreement; submitted the proposals to Cabinet,
then flew to New York for personal reasons, and came back after
Cabinet had wired its approval and told Townley to go ahead and
sign it right away. There was nothing to the rumours that he
had gone to New York because ·some hitch had developed. He flew
there for personal reasons only.
Post TFX Co-operation:
95. Generally, there was greater co-operation, and in a
number of ways the TFX deal was a great assistance in
Australian-American relations. There was a general awareness
that the Menzies Government had given direct political assistance
to Kennedy and McNamara, and this was w~ry much appreciated.
Renouf added, "I would not be surprised if the B-47 evaluation
had been arranged to repay the political debt", (i.e. arranging
for maximum publicity at the height of the Australian election
campaign).
96." Renouf agreed that the U.S. had a vested interest in
seeing Menzies re-elected. He said· that U.S. officials often came
up to him at cocktail parties and asked him with some concern what
the ALP meant by its charges, whether they were really as anti-
American as all that, and whether they would carry out their threats to
re-negotiate the North West Cape agreement and cancel the TFX
agreement. Renouf claimed that he alwa~s pointed out to his questioners
that it had been Labor which had established the close relations
with the United States in World War II.
97. Renouf felt that Menzies had been striving for close
inter-personal relationships with American leaders. Menzies way
always willing to help the Kennedy-Johnson administration on a
. personal level. An example of this is the meat quota controversy,
. , during which Menzies privately reassured the Prei:i'ide·nt· that he understood
I !I I! I 22. the Administration's ticklish political problem, and told him that he would not kick up a fuss, though he expected that after the next election the restrictions would be eased.
Manus Island Controversy:
98. One of Percy Spender's first acts when he came into office was to unearth the Manus Island file and to leak the information to the press. He wanted to start in office with some favourable publicity, and he did it by unscrupulously building the Manus Island controversy into a scandal.
99. The other thing that Spender tied his reputation to was getting the Colombo Plan started.
100. Renouf felt that Spender's March 1950 speech on foreign affairs is the best elucidation of the principles of Australian foreign policy that has even been formulated by a Minister for
External Affairs. It is still with almost no changes, the basic policy line today.
CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIE'.J WITH DOYLE MARTIN AND JOHN SHUMATE
First & Third Political Secretaries at American Embassy
January 1966.
North West Cape:
101; The ffrst American survey team got permission to carry out a search for a suitable site withou~ any commitment by the Australian
Government. Martin speculated since the approaches for allowing the survey were carried out at a very low level, it is possible that neither the U.S. nor the Australian Cabinet were aware of it. The U.S.
Navy had to do the survey before it could approach Congress to get appropriations for the project. At that. time Madagascar was also considered as a site. The first approaches for this project were made as early as 1958-59. However, with the advent of a new admini- stration in 1961 the whole idea of the VLF station had to be submitted to the teams that Defense Secretary McNamara had set up to review all projects. The U.S. Navy had to re-justify its long-range plan of a world-wide communications network. When this hurdle was finally
. ' overcome, an official request was made to the Aus{rallan Government.
-~· 23.
102. At first it was thought that the agreement for the
communication station would be on a purely technical level and
it would be a fairly simple matter which would be worked out by
some legal experts from both sides. However, as the negotiations went on, it became evident that more and. more questions dealing with the intricacies of Australian and American laws had to be
resolved. These we re questions of duty free entry of certain
goods, of tax laws, of the entry of men connected with the
project as well as questions of conflicting laws in which the
West Australian Government had to be consulted (e.g. could
sentries wear guns?) and questions of insurance. Political
difficulties arose because the Commonwealth Government, of course,
tried to get the maximum benefit out of the station. Therefore
it wanted a maximum amount of dollars spent in Australia.
Questions of customs and taxes were important as the Australian
Government wanted to make sure that as much material as possible
was bought from Australian manufacturers. To allow tax-free
entry for American goods would have meant unfair competition for the
manufacturers. With all these problems it soon became clear that a
Status of. Forces Agreement (SOFA) was a prerequisite to the agreement
on the North West Cape. This gave rise to a great volume of
correspondence between the two Governments. One ·of the great
difficulties with this agreement was that a reciprocal SOFA for
Australian forces in the US was anticipated. Therefore there was
great restraint on the American side as privileges it accepted had
to be reciprocated, and there would be conflict with the American
law. Another intricacy arose out of the Defense Department's many
regulations covering US forces. All of these had to be considered
in the light of possible reciprocal arrangements, i.e. the
Australian service men in the US could not be given substantially
different rights than us service men.
Reasons for delay:
103. 1. Technical difficulties - the desire to improve on
the station in Maine and also the search for a site as Australian
i ./
: ,
./ 24. was not imn1ediately chosen.
2. The new Defence Secretary wanted to review all mili-
tary projects, and so the idea of VLF stations had to be re- justified. This had to be done several times before it finally
received McNamara's approval.
3. As the negotiations went on, it became increasingly evident that a SOFA would have to precede or accompany the technical agreement on the station.
4. The SOFA agreement was fairly cumbersome, because a
reciprocal agreement for Australian forces in US was anticipated.
Therefore all relevant US Defense Department regulations had to be brought in. The US could not ask for more than it could give under US lmv if a reciprocal arrangement was completed. It was also cumbersome from the Australian point of view because it had
to be in accord with both Commonwealth and West Australian laws.
CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH D.W. DOUGLASS
Captain, US Navy, US Sending Officer in Australia.
January 1966.
Legal Problems of North West Cape Agreement:
104. In 1956, a Congressional Report, the Knox Report, called
for-Status of Forces agreements (SOFA) with all countries in which
the United States had forces.
105. In 1960 the United States approached Australia to conclude
a SOFA to cover the forces stationed in Australia, but the
Australian Government showed no interest and there was very little
response. It was, however, the US who made the first approach and who wanted this agreement. When the agr~ement on the station first
came up, it was thought that, because of Australian lack of
interest, clauses concerning the status of forces would have to be written into the agreement concerning the establishment of the base.
Consequently clauses were drafted on criminal jurisdiction, for
example, which would have been included in the base agreement. In
the summe r of 1962, the Australian s ide of the negotiators, after
'·
.~·
: ' 25. montns of silence, finally submitted a counter draft on a SOFA.
This was miles apart from anything that the United States had proposed or would agree to. The major issues on which there was no concurrence of views were: base construction, criminal jurisdiction, and the approaches on claims.
106. In the following months, the US applied increasing pressure to conclude the VLF agreement, but with little response from the Australian side. According to Douglass, some reasons were:
1. smallness of the relevant Australian Government
departments and shortage of qualified legal personnel;
2. extreme repugnance by Australian civil servants to
commit their Government in writing; . . . 3. general bureaucratic delay, which seemed incredible
by American standards.
The negotiations did not really get down to brass tacks until after the issue had become a political weapon for Menzies. It was quite clear to the negotiators after the Menzies statement of
26 March 1963 that the reason for the rush was that the station had suddenly become a political issue. April was a real crisis month with messages being exchanged every .day, all day. Teams of negotiators worked around the cloc~ both in Australia and in the US.
They were to work out the· S·O{.'A and the Agreement before 30 Apr.il
1963, the deadline for signing the .agreement. The United States proposed to use the same format for the SOFA as had been used for agreements with the NATO countries and Japan. But Australia care- fully examined every paragraph to see if the standard formula would apply under Australian law. It was found that, due to peculiarities in the Federal system of Australia, the standard NATO formula could not be used under Australian law. For example, an international agreement in Australia is not binding on states, but only binding on the Executive unless special implementation legislation is passed to make it applicable to all states. Thus, the difficulty of applying the NATO SOFA formula was that the agreement would have to take into consideration state laws. This is different from the
US where international treaties and agreements are directly 26. binding on the states with same force as a statute.
Other Difficulties:
107. Co~nissaries- Australian forces had no commissaries,
Australian Government felt sensitive about American forces being allowed to buy things duty-free. Agreement still not finalized
(early 1966).
108. Buy Australia - conflict with Buy America Act (US Code 5) which was to restrict gold outflow. Australia used argument of unfavourable balance of trade with US to get around this.
109. Quarantine- much more strict.
Visiting Defence Forces Act of October 1963 to give effect to
SOFA but some clauses still need implementation.
CONFIDENTIM~ INTERVIEW WITH A.B. McFARLANE
Secretary, Department of Air since 1956
2 February 1966.
(Interview given at the request of the Hon. D. Fairbairn,
Minister for National Deve lopment, formerly Minister for ·
Air).
The British TSR-2 Bombers:
110. McFarlane claimed that the British were very eager to sell the TSR-2, and they had been sending technical representatives to
Australia since 1959 to keep the Department of Air informed about the latest developments on the plane. In May 1963, Quill (Managing
Director of B.A.C.) told the D.epartment that the TSR-2 would probably be ready later than anticipated. He mentioned then that the U.K.
Government might be willing to make V-bombers available as temporary replacements. It was not clear, hmvever, if this was a serious offer and if Quill had official approval of the Government to make such an offer.
111. The V-bomb er offer was never seriously considered, at least not by the Department of Air. By the time the Hancock mission report was completed, the TSR-2 was definitely out of the runni ng. The offer of the V-bomber as a temporary replacement never made formally to the Department of Air, though McFarlane had 27. good reason to believe that it was made at the highest political level - never got to the point where the Department of Air had to make a decision on it.
112. Hancock's report said that the TFX would be the ideal plane for Australia's requirements. He also said that ·the
Vigilante \vould do as an immediate · 'replacement'. Of course, if
Australia could get the TFX only in 1969, one had to think about the problem of an interim aircraft. But when the Government balked at getting the Vigilante, the Department had to see what could be done about getting the delivery dates advanced. The RAAF was fairly confident that the United States was favourably enough disposed towards
Australia that she would not have to wait for two whole years after the US Air Force started receiving their planes before they would give Australia 24. Twenty-four is such a small number when
considering the vast production programme that the Americans were anticipating.
On Ambassador Battle's role:
113. When the Government had taken the decision to wait for
the ideal plane, it was a calculated risk that there would be no trouble in the next five to seven years. Therefore it became
a political necessity to get the delivery date changed. The
Menzies Government w~s in a' fairly bad position on.defence with
the election coming up. Most defence advisors were surprised
to· find it one of the Government's campaign planks. As soon as
the Americans found out that Australia was seriously interested in buying the TFX, they were willing to do a deal, as some officials had anticipated. McFarlane felt that it was probably Ambassador
Battle who passed the word to Kennedy tQat Australia was interested.
No doubt he also did a lot to smooth the way for Townley's visit
to Washington.
On American willingness to help:
114. He felt that the Kennedy Administration was quite willing
to do the Menzies Government "a good turn". The Labor Government
had just made too many anti-knerican statements for the US
Government to be indifferent as to who won the election. Just 28.
how much help they were prepared to give the Liberals in the
election campaign of 1963 he, as a civil servant, did not want to
comment upon. There was no denying also that HcNamara \vas
tremendously pleased by the Australian evaluation of the TFX,
which vindicated his judgement and got him off the hook with his
Congressional critics. This influenced his willingness to advance
the delivery date and throw in the "fringe benefits" (i.e. policy
on spare parts, etc.). On the other hand, on prices, HcNamara was
"hard as a rock", and Australia received no special. price con
cessions, except on the method of payment.
On the B-47 offer:
115. "On the political implications of the B-47 evaluation
visit, the fly-overs and the public inspections, you had better
, talk to the boys from the Department of Defence, and specifically
to (Sir Edwin) Hicks. They were the ones who arranged those, we
had almost nothing to do with it·" He refused to comment further,
except to say that it was only common sense to assume that the
timing had political overtones .
. 116. He said that though many top officials in the Department
of Air had a "hunch" what the final results of the evaluation
would be, there was no way to· be sure until the RAAF had tested
the planes. He claimed there was nothing phony ab·out the
evaluation itself. The RAAF was keen to do operational . tests on
the B-47. At this point , the B-47 was still under rigid security
classification by the Americans, even though they had been
ready to scrap them. The RAAF ran a very exhaustive series of
tests . They drew up charts and graphs showing manpower r equirements;
i.e. how to phase out Canberra bomber c~ews, send them for training
in the B-47; how long they would be operating the B-47's before
they would have to be taken out for training on the F-111; cost
analyses of the double training programme of the crews and ground
handling personnel. Other factors considered were the significantly
higher operating costs, the expa nsion of airstrip facilities,
and so forth . Wh en a ll of these things we r e considered, and the
evaluation was not completed until Feb ruary of the following 29.
year (1964), the Department of Air felt that for the relatively
short time (i.e. mid 1965 to mid 1967) for which Australia would have
the B-4 7, the costs and manpover problems would be too great.
117. He denied that the delay in delivery dates for the F-111
announced in June 1964 was something which had been known in 1963
but concealed for political reasons.
118. He claimed that the decision later to delay delivery until
1968 was a conscious one, and it was not dictated by anticipated
delays. It was felt that it would be better to let the US Air
Force put the F-111 into operational service and iron out any
bugs that might develop. It \vould be pretty expensive for the
RAAF to fly the planes back to the factory every time some trouble
developed. This way Australia would be able to profit from the
experience of the Americans.
119. He admitted that the F-lllA ordered was the strike version
rather than the strike reconnaissance version. However, they \vould
have "button-on" reconnaissance capability.
120. The F-lllA Australia ordered would be identical with the
American one. It would have been silly to have done otherwise,
because the main reason for standardizing with the Americans has
been to achieve interchangeability .of spares and equipment. For
, . instance, vhenever one of ·the RAAF's C-130's needed a new engine,
or some other part, the cre\v could simply pick up a spare at an
American base, and then later pay or give them out of Australian
stores.
On Standardization:
121. McFarlane thought that the announced intention in 1957 to
standardize with the Americans vlas not a sudden decision. Rather it was
the culminations of a growing feeling that Australia's future
security lay with the United States. Also the Services learned in
World War II that the Americans \vere fairly impatient vith
Australian equipment problems, because it was not the same as theirs.
Thus the Menzies statement was only official sanction, as far as the
RAAF was concerned, to go further than Air people had been doing anyw ay. 30.
The Suez crisis of 1956 might have been a final deciding factor for the Government to do what to us (i.e. the Department of Air) was. obvious policy anyway.
F-104 G Fighter vs. the Mirage:
122. Commenting on the Mirage decision McFarlane said choosing the Mirage oveL the F-104 G did not contravene the policy to standardize with the Americans. The U. S. Air Force had not ordered the Starfighter, though several NATO countries had.
·Thus, in the absence of any suitable American plane with which to standardize, the RAAF chose the plane which best fitted Australia's needs. McFarlane insisted that the Mirage, as all the planes in the RAAF, was chosen straight on the strength of an exacting evaluation. He felt that the evaluation had been completely free from political considerations. He said the Lockheed Company had
I used heavy pressure on the RAAF to get the F-104 G, citing the
German order, and possibility of an order by the Indian Air Force.
There was no doubt about the fact that in 1960-61, the Mirage was the best plane in its class in the world.
CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH SIR ROBERT MENZIES
1 May 1966.
On ~liance Relationship:
123. Sir Robert said that it would be cynical to say that
Australia would agree with the US only for security reasons, or that the Government would make statements on public policy only to please the Americans. On the other hand, when there is an opp·ortunity to agree with the United States his Government was not afraid to say so publicly even when it meant alienating some others. "We have never been afraid to stand up and be counted."
124. Menzies said he realized that Australia has a different problem than Canada. When Canada boasts about her 3000 miles of undefended border, what she really means is 3000 miles of border defended by the US.
125. Because of this dissimilarity Australia does not have the same sort of independence to oppose and needle its -m~j~r ally, and his Government had been very careful in this regard "not to.~- ret too
I I 31.
many ripples of disagreement come to the surface''.
On Personal Contacts:
126. Sir Robert affirmed that he had always laid great store
in personal contacts. He said, "I believe that when you have a
problem it is best to solve it straight at the top. I have en-
couraged my ministers to make as many contacts in Washington as
possible, and it has paid off. There has never been a time when we
did not feel that we could talk over any problems in complete confidence."
Personal Alliance:
127. He agreed ~hat the relationship between Australia and
America developed more and more on a personal level, so that
one could say that the alliance was a "personal alliance" if one
wanted to use that phrase. Certainly every time he went in Washington
he was given to understand that it was a personal thing.
1963 Election:
128. He knew that the Kennedy administration would view a
Labor victory as a calamity. Not that they would ever publicly s,ay
so. He felt they are too intelligent for that. However, because
the leaders of the two countries were on such close personal bases,
th'is favourable attitude could be felt so distinctly, that his
Government knew they wanted him to win. He said Arthur Calwell .. was politically so inept, tlia't no one knew what he wanted, on s·uch
issues as the nuclear-free zone proposal. Or the Labor attitude on
the North West Cape, was so inconsistent as to appear crazy to the
Americans. With the Government there was no doubt as to where it
stood. Through the many personal contacts, and public statements,
his Government's views were understood completely by the American
Government.
On North West Cape Agreement:
129. He said the reason the Government brought the agreement before
the House, was not to embarrass the Opposition, but simply to guard
against a repudiation. Cabinet wanted to avoid having a succeding
Government throw out the agreement on the grounds that it had had
nothing to do with it. Therefore, it decided to put it before 32.
Parliament so that the agreement could be openly debated and
ratified by an act of Parliament.
On the lack of disagreement with the US:
130. One of the major reasons why there is so little dis-
agreement bet\veen the two Governments is that, Australians are in
on the ground floor when some policies are formulated. Because
personal contacts are so good, Australians are always there. They
know the basic rationales that go into a decision, so that the
Government was never in a position of being uninformed when something
is announced. "We \<7ere in there right from the start being
consulted and giving our vie,vs. I would not be surprised on that
sco.re if ~e. di~ better than anyone else."
131. He added proudly, "I have had personal talks with Truman,
Eisenhower, John Kenn.edy and Johnson and of course with all their
top advisors. \-le have always spoken very bluntly. The same has
been true with my ministers, and, as far as I know, with all the
other officials. We have never been treated in a condescending
manner".
·on US Understanding for Australia defence effort:
132. Sir Robert said he never .had any trouble in getting across
to the Americans that Australia had to balance her defence effort
with the needs for development. "They all understood that. They
never questioned it. After . all you have got to remember that
development in the long run makes us more able to defend ourselves.
Also our migration programme is quite expensive."
133. In addition Australia had a variety of commitments. First,
there was the inherent duty for the defence of East New Guinea, which
not simple. One could never know \vhat Sukarno or his successor
might do. Second, there was the commitment in Malaysia. Then later
Australia accepted one with the Americans in Vietnam. While it
might not seem like much to speak of a battalion or two of troops,
it must be realized that this represented the greatest part of
Australia's combat-ready troops. Australia had never had a large
standing army in peace time. He felt that the Americans had always
understood this. 33.
SPECIFIC ISSUES:
Chinese Off-Shore Islands Crisis of 1958:
134. Sir Robert said his Government was very displeased in
1958 when the "China thing blew up". He told John Foster Dulles
quite bluntly that he did not agree with him that these two
"miserable pieces of land" (i.e. Quemoy and Matsu)· were necessary
for the defence of Formosa. He had tried to point out to him
earlier that the Chinese had every right to regard these islands
as necessary for their own coastal defence and that in the hands
of the Nationalists they were just simply provocative. During the
second crisis in 1958 his Government had privately urged the
American Government to restrain Chiang Kai Shek and keep him
under control.
135. He admitted that his Government was quite concerned about
Dulles' initial statements on the crisis in 1958. Just as in the
1954 Indo-China crisis, it was not quite clear how far Dulles was
carrying his brinkmanship. He felt that Dulles liked to leave
things deliberately vague. It infuriated Eden, and his Government
was none too pleased about it because one was never quite sure
exactly how far Dulles was willing to go. Menzies had the impression
that the Secretary of State had the attitude that by making the . · threat as vague and all-inclusive as possib.le one would get
maximum benefits.
On smoothing over Suez:
136. Menzies during his visit to Washington in 1957, found there
was some uneasiness among officials. He could not help but feel that
a good number of them, now had changed their mind and thought that
the Australian Prime Minister might have been right, especially in
view of the slow negotiations with Nasser.
137. There was one thing that had really annoyed Sir Robert.
At the London Conference he had reluctantly accepted the task of
leading a delegation to see Nasser. When he got to Cairo and presented
the terms of the conference (SCUA), Eisenhower held a news conference
in ~ as h ingt on, in which h e was asked wh at wou ld happen if Nasser
rejected the terms of the conference. Eisenhower replied 'Oh well,
we'll have to think of s ome new ones '. Menzies felt that his whole 34. whole bargaining position had been cut away.
138. He also thought that Eisenhower did not realize what he had done because when Menzies later went through Washington and told him about it, the President had just smiled blandly and reassured him that everything would be alright.
On Summit Conference 1960:
139. When, at that Heads of State General Assembly meeting it was proposed - by the Indians - that there be a summit meeting between Eisenhower and Krushchev, Menzies opposed it. He proposed that it be made to include the Big Four. He said, "That was the proposal that I ultimately urged Eisenhower to accept."
Meeting between Eisenhower and Krushchev: . .. 140. When asked about the reason for this step, he said that he thought this was absurd. Eisenhower had only a few more months to go as President anyway. So he proposed an amendment that the summit conference be extended to include Britain and France again. Menzies said that though the amendment was defeated, the point was established that you could not force two leaders to hold talks on mutually unacceptable terms. Hence the whole thing was dropped.
On Common Market and US:
141. Because Australia is a great exporting country, access to the Common Market was of vital importance. Since the United
States is also a great exporter of the same basic food stuffs, the two countries had basically the same aim, i.e. of maintaining access to the Common Market. Menzies said he had had satisfactory talks, with John Kennedy and George Ball and reached complete understanding. He claimed that this is where the personal contacts at the highest level helped a lot. Potentially this could have been "a most treacherous sort of thing" for relations between the two countries, he added.
On recognition of China:
142. Sir Robert insisted that there never were any real disagree- ments between R. G. Casey and himself on the China issue. He said 35. that the Chinese have refused diplomatic contacts, except on their own terms. That meant that they would acc.ept recognition only if it included Formosa as a part of China. Thus there were several reasons why Australia could not change her policy:
1. Australia would never throw eleven million Taiwanese
to the wolves, so that would categorically rule out
recognition on China's terms.
2. It would strengthen the Chinese overseas communities
and orient them towards Peking. This would create an
explosive situation in Malaya or in Singapore.
3. It would weaken the non-Communist Governments throughout
South East Asia, which are none too stable anyway.
4. Because there is a tendency to see everything as a
bi-polar struggle such a diplomatic victory for the
Communists would either isolate or embarrass the US.
As all of these represented hostile movement towards Australia, it was not in the interest of Australia to allow this to happen.
Dutch New Guinea:
143. On the Subandrio visit in 1959, the Government felt it had nothing to lose and everything to gain.
144. Several factors: ...... 1. There had been rumblings in the Netherlands that they
might get tired of this commitment, so Australia had
to l eave herself a back door b ecause,
2. The British and the Americans were refusing to support
Australia in public, though the Government had private
assurances.
3. It was important for Australia to have it put on the
record that Indonesia would not use force.
145. He felt that the immediate success lay in extracting fram
Subandrio categorical assurances that Indonesia would not use force. In return Australia promised not to stand in the way of a peaceful agreemen t, , "arrived at in the absence of duress ," Si r
Robert stressed. He felt that the Government was in no way commi tted, 36.
as some people suggested, to initiate discussions or to pressure
the Dutch into negotiating. On the contrary, Cabinet thought they
had made it easier for the Dutch, because of the clause 'arrived
at in the absence of duress'.
146. The Prime Minister said his Government was very disappointed
when despite all their assurances the Indonesians used force after
all. But in 1959 and right up to the time that the evidence became
umistakable in late 1961, the Government was ready to believe that
they were sincere.
To the question why Australia did so little to foster
close co-operation with the Dutch, Sir Roberr replied:
services, there were conferences of people from both
administrations, a lot of advice was passed back and
forth on how to make administration easier."
147-148. Why did Australia not jump at the Dutch idea of an
independent Melanesia? He answered that Department officers said
that it would be bad to rush things the way the Dutch were trying to.
"I am glad we didn't;look at the Congo! Those people weren't
ready either."
149-150. What were American views on a Federation of Melanesia? He .. said American officials were less than enthushts.tic. They regarded
it as .a Dutch political move. They felt it would unnecessarily
cause more tension than solve anything.
(Sir Robert had to terminate the interview abruptly when
someone he was awaiting arrived.)
CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH LT. COLONEL P.D. YOUNGE
Australian Army, Standardization Officer in Canberra
under the ABCA St.andardization Agreement of 1963.
2 May 1966.
151. Younge thought the 1957 announcement by Menzies on
standardizing with the U.S. brought several problems with it. The
d bulk of the Army's overseas force in Malaya was standardized
with the British. That was one third of Australia's field
formation (i.e. one battalion). For instance, in artillery, 37.
when you do a gun drill, the British, the Australians and New
Zealanders have different operating procedure from that of the
Americans. There are also significant differences in forward
observations and fire control.
152. He felt that the important reason for not joining ABC
was that until 1963 or 1964 Australia and the United States were
not involved in any direct combined operations. The initial ABC
Agreement between the U.S., Britain and Canada was applicable for
equipment which was used in Northwestern Europe. Australia, on
the other hand, used equipment which was suitable for hot, tropical
climates. So when the initial ABC Agreement was signed, Australia
was not. in.fo~ed, nor did the Army show any great interest. Since
Great Britain belonged to it, and the Army had good flows of
information with the British Army, there seemed to be no urgent
need to join the Agreement. However, this meant that sometimes
Australia would get left out in the cold on so~e new things for
quite long periods of time, while the other armies prepared for
the adoption of an item or a procedure .
. 153. He felt that in reality the 1957 decision meant that
Australia was going to buy more equipment from the U.S., rather than
a s pecific, or systematic programme to standardize with U.S.
< forces. As the Prime Mi nister put it quite clearly. this was
mainly for logistics purposes. But at that stage there was
no incentive to standardize across the board with the Americans on
equipment, material or procedures because of the close working
contact with the British through the Commonwealth Strategic Reserve.
But in general from 1957 on if non-U.S. items were procured it was
mainly for technical reasons or if the items were not available in
the States.
154. Prior to Australia joining the ABC agreement the two
countries held an annual LOG-X. About six (6) Australian officers
every year would go to the Logistics Exercise in the U.S. At
these exercises there would be a theoretical but realistic
logistic problem. The locale is usually somewhere ~n South East
' Asia. 38.
155. Younge said Australia was asked by the Washington
Standardization Officers (WSO) to join the ABC Agreement in
December 1962. It is important to remember that the initiative came from WSO rather than from Australia or the United States.
156. To the question .Qf whether he thought it possible that
Australia had asked to be asked, he replied that while he could not be absolutely certain that this had happened, he was reasonably sure that the initiative had not come from Australia.
He based this conclusion mainly on his observation of how surprised the senior Australian officers had been at the time. Most senior Army officers had regarded ABC an an international agreement that ~Qn .ce~ned mainly the NATO powers. The speculation at the time was that Australia was being asked to join mainly because of her jungle training skills, and because the U.S. with her increasing commitment in Vietnam wanted to make use of these special skills.
This seems to contradict the earlier statement that he did not think that the initiative came from the U.S.
158. He said that after Australia joined, there developed two almost entirely separate concepts of operation in which either
Canada or Australia played odd man out. There really had to be separate concepts for .operations either in North West Europe, . . the area of the original ABC, or in South East Asia. Australia had almost no interest in the former and Canada had no interest in preparing for war in South East Asia. But both the U. S. and
Great Britain had commitments in each area.
CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH BRIGADIER E.J.H. HOWARD
1st Australian Washington Standardization Officer
under the ABCA Agreement
and
COLONEL P. RICHARDSON
his assistant in that job.
Jn initiative for Australia to join: ,, 159. Howard was sure that the main reason was that the different governments felt we had something, though he could not be sure which
Army or which country took the initiative to get Australia to join.
''"'; ..
-= 39.
(Under the rules of the ABC Agreement all three Armies had to
concur.)
160. Ever since World War II the Australian Army has had a
reputation as being an expert on South East Asia. By location
and by definition, its policy had been oriented toward South
East Asia, and the ABC Armies knew that it had adopted techniques
and equipment which were specially suited for this area. The
Americans, especially, were interested in Australian light
weight tropical equipment. The Australian Army had been aware
of their increasing interest in Australian jungle warfare
training methods.
161. . Looking back he felt that Australia had been considered
for membership for some time, while the three Armies went through
their Chiefs of Staff, Departments of Defence and Governments
to get approval. However, when the offer to join was made in
December 1962, it came as a complete surprise. He thought that this
was just one example of how good security within the ABC was
and is now within the ABCA. There was no initiative from Australia,
simply because this was not the sort of thing an Army could ask
to join. The original ABC was like a very exclusive little club
of NATO, with the three Armies having 'an almost complete exchange
of information, to which no one else was privy. The Australian
Army was very pleased and flattered to be asked to join. Its
work load increased tremendously and for quite a time it was
seriously understaffed at certain levels.
Advantages:
162. Howard said that the biggest intangible advantage of
membership was that it established a relationship of intimacy
that did not exist before. Australian officers, prior to this
time had always felt that. Australia enjoyed a privileged status,
(i.e. most of the information requested in the Pentagon was
given). He felt the reason for the goodwill was because so many
Americans came through Australia in World War II. At the Government
level it was because they appreciate and are grateful for Australian
foreign policy backing. 40.
163. Despite all this closeness, the change after the Army
joined the ABCA was truly amazing. Despite the privileged nation
treatment before ABCA, American officers would often at least
pretend to have reservations. After being "admitted to the club"
so to say, it was literally like going into the Pentagon by a
different door. Previously the Australian attaches had to ask for
specific pieces of information and, of course, since the ABC powers
did not admit anyone to their meetings, were barred from sharing
ABC information except with the unanimous consent of all three, and
there was a general nationalist reluctance to share research and
development secrets, this meant that quite often Australia would
not ~now w:hat to ask for. Howard claimed that after joining "all
barriers of classification were lifted,"and Australia automatically
and systematically got reports on research and d~velopment, weapons
testing, proposals for new concepts and procedures, etc. The Army
was enthusiastic at first, and the enthusiasm grew as it found how
intimate this relationship was actually turning out to be.
Actual .Work:
164. Until Australia joined the ABC was a little club within
NATO. Its emphasis was mainly on fighting in Europe. Now with
Aus t ralia in, it meant that the exclusive club embraced two major
treaties with two entir ~ ly different concepts of fighting. For
the NATO concept of warfare, weight considerations were not so
important. But in the SEATO area, which does not have such good
road systems as Europe, weight was important. In the different
committees, Australia always raised the same objection "How will
it work in the tropics? Is it light enough? Is it weatherproofed
against tropical climate?" In this way Australia has been able to
exercise a tremendous amount of influence on the development of
weapons, equipment and on concepts. This was of tremendous importance
to the Regular Army because the more equipment is developed for the
tropics the more money Australia would save. In this respect
Canada has a very similar problem - a small capacity to produce
defence equipemnt and a limited amount to buy equipment. But
; because much or most of their equipment is American, they are intent i I on achieving the greatest degree of commonality possible •
.....______- 41.
165. Australia's contribution initially was mainly in equipment and procedures for tropical warfare. For example, the Americans were very much interested in Australia's tropical lightweight gear for the individual infantry man (e.g. special sleeping bag and pneumatic air mattress). One of the first major achievements in standardization of procedures was the preparation of a common artillery training manual. The British and American systems of fire direction had been completely different; they will now be the same.
170. Relations between the ABCA representatives were so close that the Army officers could feel the envy of the other Australian servi~~ . re:pr~sentatives in Washington. The ABCA Army representatives even formed their own social world, which created even closer ties. The other services felt left out in the cold and they were envious of the unhindered access the Army had in the Peatagon.
Pent ropi c Army:
171. Colonel Richardson thought the ABCA Agreement hastened the demise of the Pentropic army organisation. It would not be logical to have two units of different sizes and firepower operating side by side. A pentropic battalion at full strength of 1,300 could not operate well. together with a U.S. battalion of only 800, since in combat it is best to operate with ·units of approxi- mately the same military significance. The Army was not only standardizing equipment but also endeavouring to adopt standard procedures across the board. Also because in 1963 the likelihood of Australian troops fighting in South East Asia with the Americans had increased, the Pentropic organisation had to go.
On Townley's visit to Washington in September 1963:
173. Aside from recounting a lot of details of Townley's hectic social life while there, both Howard and Richardson felt that Townley did not do much negotiating. They felt that he had come there mainly to put his signature on the deal.
174. Supplementary questions put to COLONEL J.F. WHITE, who had
preceded Howard as military attache in Washington from mid 1960
' t~ : • 42. to October 1962.
175. He said that he found almost no difficulty in getting any secret information he wanted, though he would never get any informa- tion automatically and always had to ask whenever he wanted specific information. He thought that the greatest advantages of the ABCA
Agreement were the automatic flows of information and the voice
Australia obtained in influencing weapons, and equipment developments for tropical warfare.
CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH SIR GARFIELD BARWICK
Chief Justics of the High Court
formerly Minister for External Affairs
· from ·December 1962 ·until April 1964.
11 May 1966.
Laos:
176. Commenting on the 1959 crisis Sir Garfield felt there was not much that Australia could have done militarily. At any rate, since everyone realized that Laos would be a difficult place to maintain troops, all one could do at that stage was to support the Royal Laotian Army and hope for the best. Anyway, any SEATO intervention was impossible because the French were opposed. In the later c:r, isis in 1962, Australia was very active to prevent a complete collapse. Barwick took credit for first having urged the Americans to promote the idea that action under
SEATO could be taken unilaterally as well as collectively. That is why the Australian Government immediately declared its support for the Rusk-Thanat communique which cleared the way to get around the French opposition. Barwick claimed that the formula revitalized the Alliance because SEATO was a good cover for action.
177. In 1962 Australia sent a Sabre squadron to Northern Thailand as a show of force. But it was more than a bluff, though, he thought since it showed that the United States and Australia meant business. At any rate it worked. The Russians did pull back their support, and they have stayed out. He said there was no intention of Australian forces going into Laos.
178. The crisis was also very important in focusing attention 43. on Northern Thailand. Australia took the opportunity to urge the Thais, and urged the United States to push the Thais into developing Northern Thailand. Barwick personally was responsible for getting the Thai King to visit the area for the first time.
A road building programme was started, partly for strategic reasons but also to help the farmers in the area to get their produce to market. He was worried that if Laos had to be given up, Northern Thailand with its predominantly Lao population, over which the Thai Government at that time exercised very little control, would be very vulnerable to subversion.
179. Barwick thought the experiment of agreeing to let
~~uvanna Phouma form-a gove!nment worked out quite well. Sur prisingly well, in fact. Both the U.S. and Australia had mis givings at first but thought that it was the only compromise available. It had long been determined that Laos would be an impossible place to fight in (i.e. logistically) and so there was really no other choice. Sihanouk in Cambodia, on the other hand, seems to have gone exactly the opposite way. Barwick had realized that he was fairly unstable and immature, but basically friendly towards the West. Though he was even then fairly irrational about the Vietnamese.
Indonesia:
180. Barwick had long held that the Dutch New Guinea issue was an impossible situation. How the two countries could get so blindly opposed to each other seemed beyond belief. He thought that internal politics and national pride played a large part.
Certainly the Australian attitude had its origin in domestic politics. When Evatt took a pro-Indonesian independence line this was not so much because he conceived this to be in Australia's national interest, but as an issue into which the United Nations could
sink its teeth. One must remember that Evatt had this grand
United Nations outlook. The Liberals took up an anti-Indonesian
policy mainly as a'· result of being in opposition, i.e. because 44.
Evatt was for it the Liberals were against it. In addition, the
Communist-inspired refusal of the waterside workers to service
Dutch shi.ps was decisive in making the Liberals pro-Dutch. The
Country Party was even more rabidly anti-Labor, anti-Indonesian
and pro-Dutch. Thus when "through the incredible blunders of the
Labor Party in 1949, the Liberals suddenly found themselves the
Government," it was impossible for them to change their prejudices.
Barwick felt that this is how the rigid support for the Dutch and
the opposition to Indonesian claims to Dutch New Guinea originated.
181. Barwick thought that the sad thing about the whole affair
was that the Dutch did not realize until the end that they could
not ke~p Dutch New Guinea as .a colony, though that was exactly
what they wanted to do. When the Dutch, in 1957, announced that
they wanted to develop Dutch New Guinea towards ultimate self-
determination, no one believed that they were sincere. They cer-
tainly did not convince the Americans. As far as joint development
into one nation of the whole island was concerned, Barwick just could
not see it. Barwick foresees difficultues to mould even Australian
Papua and New Guinea into one nation. Joint development ideas be-
tween the Netherlands and Australia were started much too late, and
they were never really carried out. Earlier in time it might have .. been possible to internationalize the issue of D'utch New Guinea
by handing the territory over to a U.N. trusteeship. He felt this
might have been possible up to as late as 1956, since the Americans
would have supported it then.
182. But in October 1961 when the Dutch proposed to hand res-
ponsibility to the U.N. Trusteeship Council there was very little
sympathy at the U.N. The United States would not support it. In
the end, the Dutch had to withdraw the resolution, and accept an
admonishment by the U.N. to resume negotiations with the Indonesians.
The principle of self-determination was almost forgotten. After
India had taken Goa and the United Nations had done nothing about
it, it was clear that Australia had to act quickly to help find a
way out of the Dutch-Indonesian impasse.
On change of policy:
183. Barwick admitted that Australia's change on New Guinea was 45.
the most difficult problem of his tenure as Minister for External
Affairs, especially from a public relations point of view. Though
some of the newspapers gave him quite a lambasting, there was no
doubt in his mind that the policy must be changed, on the whole,
he thought there was little opposition from the Australian public.
Australians were uncomfortable about it, but in general he felt
they recognized the need of being on friendly terms with Indonesia
in the long run.
184. After all it was not Australia's place to interpose
herself and say to the Indonesians, "We won't let you have it"
(i..e. Dutch New Guinea)? No one else was supporting the Dutch
any~re. He thought it ridiculous that the situation should have
been stalemated for so long without Australia taking the initiative
to· bring about a solution. Australia was acting against its own
interests by backing the Dutch, and thus prolonging the dispute.
This was causing bad relations with our closest neighbour. There
was no getting around the fact that geography had placed Australia
where she will have to live side by side with Indonesia.
Indonesia as a threat:
185. In response to having his attention to repeated statements
by Casey that Australia wanted to keep the Dutch there and the • . Indonesians out · because 't.he military advisors of the Government were
afraid that a Communist-oriented Indonesia would use West New
Guinea as a springboard for aggression, Sir Garfield replied that he
believed that the idea of Indonesia moving large concentrations of
forces in the 1950's was fantastic. They just couldn't do it since
they did not have the wherewithal to do it. They had all this
Soviet equipment, but from the reports Australia received they were
far from able to handle it or to maintain it. Though he conceded
that the Indonesians have an effectively trained army, and they have
very good Czech weapons, he did not think it credible that they
could move even a division and keep it supplied in as rugged a
country as West New Guinea, especially when one thinks of all the
trouble they have in inter-island communications with their 3,000
, islands (of which West New Guinea is probably the worst off). 46.
Even if Indonesia became Chinese-controlled, it was difficult to see
how they could maintain a line of supply, as they lack the seapower or
the amphibious landing craft for any large scale attack. In World
War II Australia saw how the Japanese came down the island chain
with relative ease, but as soon as the United States built up its
Pacific Fleet again, the Japanese were quickly isolated. Today
with the Americans as the dominant naval power in the Pacific, it
it difficult for him to visualize how such an experience could be
repeated. Even if they could land in Australia from New Guinea,
it is difficult to see how they could maintain themselves. There-
fore he did not think that Indonesian possession of Dutch New
Guinea posed a strategic threat, just as he does not think that
Indonesia will ever pose a direct military threat to Australia.
Indonesia is much too fractionated and has much too much trouble
just to stay together to pose a military threat to anybody.
186. Barwick was convinced that the fighting in 1961-62 was
just a sham war. The Indonesians knew that the Dutch would not be
able to bring in many troops. The Americans had refused Dutch
planes the right of over-flight, and the British had turned down a
request for the British Navy to help the Dutch. The Dutch were
starting to embarrass everybody by hanging on to their colony. He
thought that Foreign M ~ 1 i ster Luns just refused . to- recognize what
was going on in all the countries around him: that as the European
colonial powers got rid of their empires they became stronger
economically. The Dutch were getting very little in return for
the millions they poured in every year. After the oil profits
had dried up, there was no economic reason why the Dutch should
have held on. New Guinea was very backward and would have needed
tremendous amounts of money to bring it towards self-government.
(I heard it said that Sukarno was very depressed by the back-
wardness of the place when he went there for the celebration of
the liberation of West Irian.) Unfortunately the dispute had gone
beyond reason and the whole issue was very emotion-charged and the " Dutch had nothing but bitterness for the Indonesians.
On U.S. Policy:
187. He was aware that the Dutch also were fairly bitter
:r.::- 47. about the Americans. They felt that the Americans were at fault for encouraging Sukarno. This was not quite correct, he thought since up to the time of Kennedy, the Americans - or perhaps only a group within the Government, like the CIA, and others too - made quite serious attempts to split Indonesia. Even after Kennedy had come in, he felt there were still some advisers in the U.S.
Government who had the lingering hope that Indonesia would break up, and who were trying to replace Sukarno. He claimed that this ran completely counter to the assessment of the Menzies Government which felt it to be in Australia's interest to see Indonesia unified.
It· rec.ognized that Sukarno was the man who unified Indonesia, and that: it \vas :f,mportan~ for .the unity of Indonesia to keep him there.
188. Barwick gave the opinion that Ambassador Howard Jones was a "tragedy". He represented the opposite end of . the spectrum of
U.S. policy. His assessments of Sukarno were completely wrong. He
thought he completely understood Sukarno because he knew him so well, and he thought he could buy Sukarno. The U.S. would have
profited by an earlier realization that they could not get what
they wanted out of him, by buying Sukarno's friendship with economic
aid. On the other hand, Barwick thought he made a mistake when he
ur ~ e d the U.S. in October 1963 to stop all rice shipments to Indo- nesia. He thought this would bring Indonesia's already precarious
economy to a halt. Barwick said he was told by State Department
economic advisers that the Indonesian economy just wasn't a normal
type of economy and that this would not make any difference. In
retrospect he feels that this was right.
189. The Australian Government realized that Indonesia desperately
lacked skilled managers - most Europeans had been kicked out during
the early anti-Dutch riots - but Sukarno couldn't care about this.
(Barwick at one stage urged the Australian Institute of Management to
see what they could do to help.) Nevertheless, the Governntent recognized
that Sukarno was responsible for two great achievements: that is achieving
unity, and setting·'up a very good educational system. Barwick felt
that whatever his shortcomings, it was better to keep him on and 48.
prevent Indonesia from splitting up. The faster this West
Irian problem was settled the less likely that extremists would
gain control in Indonesia. That is why Barwick worked very
actively, directly in talks with the Dutch, and indirectly at the
U.N. and in persuading the U.S. to help, to bring about a quick
solution of the Dutch New Guinea dispute.
Confrontation of Malaysia:
190. To the question of whether he was disappointed and angered
when Sukarno turned against Malaysia, Sir Garfield replied:
"No, not really. I could see the rationale behind it all."
He thought Indonesians were afraid that the setting up of Malaysia
could be potentially disruptive to their own national unity. They
have always been suspicious, and with right, judging by the 1958 acti-
vities of the CIA, that someone was going to take away Sumatra.
Sumatra not only is the most productive island, in that it earns most
of Indonesia's foreign exchange, but its people also are more akin
to the Malays than they are towards the southern Indonesian islands.
The Indonesians thought that Malaysia was being set up as a magnet
to draw Sumatra away.
191. Barwick tried very hard at this stage to mediate and he
thought a solution had been found in the Maphilindo Agreement. But
· · then the British blew u ~· over the clause about the removal· of all
foreign bases.
192. To the question i f the clause had been put in by Indonesia
Barwick said that to his knowledge, it was the Filippino Foreign
Minister Lopez. He did not think it was at the Indonesians' request.
It was just mischiev i ousness, or maybe internal politics. The
Tunku had accepted it as a vague statement of principle, and he
was sure that the Filippinos were not serious about it either.
Both countries had a big economic stake in the ma intenance of the
bases in their count ries. But the British blew up. From then on
they regarded anything the Indonesians did as part of a plan to
sabotage the Federation. They became more det ermined than ever
that i t s hould succeed, and t hey announced that the Feder a t ion
would be formed on 16th September anyway, no matter what the outcome
I I, 49. of the U.N. plebiscite. And they refused to let the Indonesian observers fly in by military plane.
193. According to Sir Garfield, all this convinced the Indo- nesians that this then was a plot. A neo-colonialist plot to restrict Indonesia, to sandwich her between the British in the
North and Australia in the South. They had always been suspicious of the British, and now they were afraid that this was a new effort
to slice off Sumatra. Barwick lamented, "If only the British had not been so clumby about it." He said they completely ignored or were unaware of these sensibilities. The haste with which the
British pushed the plebiscite made Sukarno suspicious. The Minister
said that Sukarno had told him in 1963 that he is pretty good at
fixing elections himself, and that if he had had a chance he could have swung the elections the other way from what the British got.
All you had to do is to convince the head chief by bribe or other- wise and then he would tell the rest of the village how to vote.
But when the British refused to let all the Indonesian observers in,
Sukarno thought there was something foul going on.
194. Barwick does not believe Sukarno's aims in confronting
Malaysia were expansionist or that this was a Communist ploy. He
said that one should remember that General Nasution was even more . . confrontation-mirided tha ft .Sukaind. He feels that it was this feai
and suspicion and also, of course, the insult, that led them to
confrontation.
Australian support for Malaysia:
195. Barwick mused "I tried to reason with Sukarno before I went to Kuala Lumpur, but we were just talking right past each other.''
196. Of course once Malaysia was established, Australia had
no choice but to support it, mainly for reasons of unity and ties
of the British Commonwealth and all that. The way Sir Garfield said
this left the distinct impression on the interviewer that this for
him was a necessary but highly unpalatable decision.
On U.S. support:
197. Barwick claimed that Australia had no prior assurances of
American support whatsoever. They told his Government that this was
:a Commonwealth matter. He did not think they particularly approved i 50. of the way Malaysia was created, and they kept completely out of it.
It was not until Harriman came to Australia in June 1963 that the
Government received any sort of an assurance for a possible conflict with Indo~esia; but that was only for New Guinea. On the other hand,
Barwick felt that this was not really necessary because the Government was confident that between the Britains and Australians, they could handle the situation.
On U.S. pressure over Vietnam:
198. Barwick said the first decision to send Australian advisors to Vietnam came out of the May 1962 ANZUS Council Meeting. He recounted how Dean Rusk had approached him and asked what Australia would do to help in Vietnam. At first Barwick had told him that
Australia could not do anything. But when Rusk continued to press him further saying that all the U.S. wanted was for Australia to show the flag, Barwick told him that his Government could not commit itself unless it had an absolute guarantee that the United
States meant to see this thing through. Sir Garfield said he made it clear that Australia could not afford to go in there "unless we knew that the Americans meant business and were not going to pull out as the French did." Barwick insisted that only after Rusk gave him a categorical guarantee - that is as categorical as was possible in the absence of the President - did he promise him that Australia would send a handful of advisers. In the end Australia sent first a batch of thirty and then raised it to about one hundred. Barwick felt that it was a most effective way of showing the flag.
199. Barwick related that when he went to Washington later that year (i.e. September 1962), McNamara tried to take him to task about
Australia's defence spending. Barwick claimed that McNamara pointed out the differences in percentages spent on defence between the U.S. and Australia and tried to put the squeeze on Barwick. Barwick said that he just told him very bluntly that one could not make this sort of comparison, since Australia was not fully developed or industrialized, and had a population,, and labour shortage. When McNamara had persisted, Barwick said he put him off by telling him that he would have to see his defence advisers about this; he refused to get into an argument 51.
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October 1963, McNamara again "tried to put the squeeze" on him about a greater Australian defence effort. He told him then that his
Government was in the process of enlarging the defence establishment.
He claimed McNamara had asked for troops for Vietnam, but Barwick had flatly refused him and told him that Australia was tied down with confrontation with Indonesia and did not have any troops for Vietnam at the time. He said he again referred McNamara to his military advisers when he wanted to know when Australia would have some troops ready. Barwick claimed that when he talked to John Kennedy, he was reassured that America meant business in Vietnam, despite the political turmoil after Diem's death. Barwick said hP. told the
President too that Australian troops were out of the.question then.
The Minister told him that the subject of Australian troops was also raised by Roger Hilsman, when he came to the AlPS Summer
School on Australia's defence in January 1964. He related that he had had quite an acrimonious exchange with Hilsman over this.
General relations with U.S.:
204. Aside from the encounter with Hilsman, Barwick felt that
U.S. and Australian officials always had the best of personal rela tions. He confirmed that it was deliberate Government policy to sponsor personal contacts, and he conceded that Menzies, was a master at ·it. He denied that there were ever any misunderstandings between the two Governments. He added, "We always talked everything out in a frank and friendly way. I don't think there was any issue in which we did not see eye to eye or at least understand and res pect each other's views."
ANZUS Council:
205. The Mlr,ister thought that the ANZUS Council is an extremely useful institution in that respect. Everyone says exactly what he thinks and you get a very useful exchange of opinion out of it. It is not a place where major decisions are made, but more a forum where the three Governments tell each other what is on their minds.
Barwick said that ~p fact most decisions are made on a bilateral level. New Zealand was not nearly as active diplomatically as Australia.
206. Barwick claimed major credit for Australia's initiative in 53. smoothing over the rift in SEATO when Pakistan threatened to walk out. He felt that his country was well suited for that role. Australia could reason with the Pakistanis while the Americans and the British could not. According to him it was not only the Pakistanis but also the Filippinos that Australia convinced to stay in. On that score he was quite proud of Australia's record of diplomacy.
Australian support for U.S. policy:
207. To the question whether it was a conscious policy of
Menzies to be the first to line up publicly with the United
States on major policy issues, Sir Garfield said that it was in
Australia's interest to "line up and be counted," since the United
States often single-handedly ·represented the interests of the West.
It was in Australia's interest to see that she felt that she was not standing alone because the greatest tragedy would be if the
United States retreated into isolationism. Therefore his Government took quick action to encourage the United States whenever it saw it in Australia's interest to do so. He did not doubt that in the back of Menzies' mind there was this idea of being extra quick to strengthen the bonds between the two countries. Overall statements of support were given only when the Government felt that it was in the national interest to back the principl ~ on which the U.S. was acting.
As an illu'stration it was important that the United States defend the principle tha t small states have the right to expect outside help against aggr ession or subversion. Another pa ramount interest was that the United States stay _in South East Asia. If she did not, there was no question in Barwick's mind that Chin~ would expand outward.
North West Cape:
209. Sir Garfield said his department (Attorney General) had quite a wrangle with the Americans over the Status of Forces Agree- ment. It was all very friendly and good-na tured, though there wa s some hard bargaining.
210. The rea son f or the initial delay was that several Government depart ments here we_re handl ing separ a t e points of the Agreement and the SOFA , and t hey coul d no t agree among t hemselves. The Prime
Minister fina lly wa~t ed to know the reasons for the del ay. Barwick told hi m t ha t no one was in charge and t hat ther e was no co- ordina t i on 54. of the efforts of the separate departments whereupon the task wa s given to Barwick, who claimed that agreement was reached shortly thereafter. The stickiest point was on car insurance for U.S. vehicles. The other thing was on commissaries. Barwick did not think they are equitable since you will have Australians and
Americans working side by side. One would have these special privileges and the other would not. I 211. Barwick said he and Rusk reached agreement on a SOFA in
Paris. Sir Garfield was vehement in his utterances that Austr·alia would not accept the same sort of SOFA that the U.S. had imposed on NATO countries after World War when the U.S. was in a dominant position.
213. sir Garfi.eid reminisced about wliat an exciting time his tenure as Minister for External Affairs had been. He said he would have liked to stay on another eighteen months, but when the opening to the Chief Justice-ship came along he could not pass it up. He denied that he had "been kicked upstairs" because of his utterances at the April 1964 press conference. He insisted that his statements had been "gold right" as would be shown by the
transcript of the press conferences. He agreed that the timing was most unfortunate. But he felt, and the Cabinet agreed, that
i ·t would have been foolish to · proceed with the p],.am'1 ed trip to
Moscow etc.lf he were to leave office immediately thereafter. He
claimed that one important reason why the Cabinet felt he should
take the job right away was that Sir Owen Dixon's legal opinions
were starting to become embarrassing to the Government, because of
his growing senility.
214. He felt there was no one else qualified to take the posi-
tion of Chief Justice. Also he was filled with the importance
of the task of guiding the nation's destiny by shaping the
development of the Commonwealth Constitution. He thought he was
more indispensable in guiding the constitutional affairs than the
external affairs of the country. 55.
CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH SIR FREDERICK SCHERGER
Deputy Chief of Air Staff 1947-51
Chief of Air Staff 1957-61
Chairman Chiefs of Staff Committee 1961-19 May 1966
16 May 1966.
Standardisation and Strategic Outlook:
215. In Sir Frederick's opinion the Prime Minister's speech on equipment standardisation in April 1957 had the important proviso "so far as possible" •. It was the beginning of the policy to···standardise, btit Australia ha·d two important planks on which all her military procurement was based:
1) If some equipment of interest was not in use in the
country of origin for exactly the same .tasks that the
Services wanted to use it then Australia would not buy it.
2) Australia's strategic interest now lay in South East
Asia. This meant that she would no longer think in
terms of sending troops to Europe as automatically as
World War I and World War II. When the Japanese came
South in 19.42, it wa o. realized .that the Near North
was Australia's area of danger. At that time Australians
were tremendously grateful for the American. aid. However,
it was also realized that the United States was here not
so much in aid of Australia, as in self-interest. She
needed a secure base from which to start the counter
offensive against Japan.
216. In 1949 there was a strategic re-assessment which made official many of the lessons learned in World War 11. Another
"intuitive or spontaneous response" to send troops to help
Britain fight a war in Europe was out of the question. Australia's area of strategic interest now lay directly north of the continent, roughly as far north as the Tropic of Cancer and east as far as the
Philippines and west as far as the Bay of Bengal. In the re-assessment of 1949 it was determined that Australia had no resources for 56. fighting outside this area. The sending of a Sabre squadron to
Malta in 1953 was the only variation to this rule and that was only because Australia had a short term agreement with Great Britain about the protection of the Suez Canal. The Sabres only stayed there for about a year.
217. In 1950, Australia sent forces to Malaya to help the
British put down the Communist insurgency. Hard on that came
Korea. The Korean commitment was completely separate from the
Malayan one. The Australian Government determined that Korea was a war which the country could not stay out of. At the same time,
Australian men remained in Malaya because it was recognized that the Mal~¥an peninsula was a vital approach route to Australia.
When the Commonwealth Strategic Reserve was formed, Australia contributed forces to that. Usually there was one battalion of troops; at least two R.A.N. capital ships were always assigned to the Strategic Reserve, operating with the British Far East
Fleet; and the RAAF had had two fighter squadrons, one bomber squadron
(Lincolns), a radar control unit and a maintenance and support group. As far as he knew, Butterworth was never seriously considered as a SEATO base, nor intended as such. It was purely for the ·
Commonwealth Strategic Reserve, and there was no SEATO connection.
McBride's visit to Washington i~ 1957:
(Sir Freder i ck Scherger accompanied Sir Philip)
218. He thought the main purpose of the visit was to find out how prepared the United States was to help Australia with technical advice and defence knowledge in equipping Australia's forces. I f McBride had any hopes of ge tti ng direct f inancial a id from the Americans he was quickly disabused of this. Scherger recalls conversations with American officer s which indicated how r elieved Americans were to hear him say that Aus t ral ia was not coming for aid, but simply wanted advice on how to best allocate her small resources. He said that the U.S. Administration at that point was in no mood f or f ur ther handouts .
219. The Ruest ow mission was as much i n Australia ' s i nterest as in America's. It came to look at the defence production potential. 57.
The purpose (as far as the Americans were concerned) was to evaluate the production potential of Australia's secondary industry in time of war, to see how much Australia could produce, how production could be augmented, and what assistance such augmentation might need.
Sir Frederick said the mission received a very favourable impression.
Australia had progressed a long way from World War II. ll 220. The other purpose of the McBride mission was to look '• over aircraft. The F-104 Starfighter had been chosen by McAuley, the previous Chief of Air Staff, but Scherger on closer examination became very much opposed to the F-104. He felt that Australia needed something which could perform the same sort of ground support duties as th~ gooQ World War II fighters. The F-104 was not anything like that. Furthermore, the U.S. was not going to use it for the same purposes as the RAF wanted to. In fact, the U.S. Air Force had not ordered any great numbers. For Australia it would have been an extravagent expense, especially because all runways would have had to be strengthened and lengthened by about 3,000 feet. The preliminary recommendation to cancel the F-104 decision had already been made in April by the Minister of Air, Mr. Osborne,who .had gone through Washington on his way back from the Independence cele- brat ions in Ghana. It was not a matter of cancelling a contract, it was only an internal decision. When Menzies made the final decision, it was quite a relief to Scherger.
Mirage Decision:
221. In 1960, when the RAAF evaluation team went overseas, five aircraft were considered: 1. the Swedish Saab Draken; 2. the French Mirage Ill; 3. the American F-104G; 4. the N-156
(later the F-5); and 5. the F-105.
222. The team was most impressed with the Swedish Draken and the Mirage Ill. "Both aircraft were thoroughly tested and were found to meet our operational requirements." However, the Mirage had a slight edge in several technical aspects. Sir Frederick felt that his judgement was vindicated when the Swiss, a short time later, held an international competition to choose an aircraft for
.their own Air Force, which would have to perform under the particularly 58.
difficult conditions of that country. The Mirage Ill won that
competition against all other entries, including all of those that
the Australian team tested. He denied that there had been any
pressure from other Government departments, including Trade, to
buy from the French. In fact, he felt if there had been any
pressure it would have been through the British to buy the Draken,
because Sweden was in EFTA, and SAAB was using some British parts.
He said that the Australian Ambassador to France was overjoyed when
told of the decision because the French previously had made some
polite representation about their adverse balance of trade with
Australia. But Scherger reiterated that the choice was made only on
techn~cal ?nd financial grounds by the RAAF and was totally un-
connected with any political considerations. Once the Mirage
decision was made, the British pressed Australia to put a Rolls
Royce engine into it. Australia agreed to a competitive evaluation
of the Rolls Royce and Atar engines. The British and French shared
the costs of the test programme. In the end, Australia benefited
because the French produced a better version of the Atar engine.
223. The other planes looked at were all American. The team
had gone to Germany and found out from the German Air Force how
far. behind the production schedule was and in what a "hopeless mess"
the F-104G programme was the Canadians had ordered some at that stage. The F-104G was eliminated almost before the evaluation began but it was given an extensive going over. Partly this was done to give the Australian test pilots a chance to look at and fly as many different types of aircraft. The American plane that aroused considerable interest was the Northrop N-156 (F-5). Only two had been built, but they looked very good. The major draw-back was the U.S. Air Force had no plans at that time to buy the plane. Australia was told that if she wanted this aircraft she would have to pay for the development of further prototypes and then for the production. Scherger said "Financially this was just out of the question." .The F-105 initially was designed for nuclear capability and would not have been of much use to Australia. For Australian purposes it would have had to be extensively re-designed. I L 59. Indonesia and Dutch New Guinea: 224. Sir Frederick never considered Indonesia as a serious strategic threat to Australia. He certainly did not think it was an open military threat to Papua and New Guinea. The only threat was the possibility of subversion. He admitted that earlier the Chiefs of Staff had been worried. He, however, had realized that as long as Papua and New Guinea remained Australian, the ANZUS guarantee would operate. Therefore, he felt that the whole thing was nonsense. "It was illogical to think of Dutch New Guinea as a strategic necessity. It was a canker in Indonesia's side, and the longer the Dutch held on to it the worse the situation was going to get." .· .. 225. Scherger firmly believed that the Dutch initially wanted to keep West New Guinea as a springboard for going back into the islands after Indonesia broke up. Later on they hoped to find oil, but when that did not materialize there was no economic reason for the Dutch to stay. They were pouring about fourteen million pounds a year into the colony. He felt that the main reason for Dutch intransigence was the permanent and deep-seated hatred between the Dutch Foreign Minister Luns and President Sukarno of Indonesia, which prevented the two sides from going to the conference table. 226. In December 1961, at the request of Barwick, the Chiefs of Staf f were asked to submit a militar y assessment of the strat egic value of Dutch New Guinea. The report submitted stated that the Chiefs of Staff saw no strategic necessity for keeping West New Guinea out of Indonesia' s hands. They were inf luenced in their decision by the assessment that as long as Australia had Papua and New Guinea, the United States, under ANZUS, was obligated to help (see above ). Also they felt tha t Indonesia did not have the capacity for any large-scale military operations. Logistically she could not manage it. He said tha t the Chiefs of Staf f were not opposed to Bar wick' s policy ch ~nge . He , f or one , was del igh ted. He had been sur prised t hat Aus t ral ia had not changed earlier. He felt t hat Aus tralia's posture had been "preposterous". He asked, "What were we 60. going to do? Was Australia going to fight Indonesia to keep them from getting what they considered their property - and rightfully so?" TFX Decision: 227. Sir Frederick thought that the "Indonesian threat" politically was the most important factor in the decision to -get a deterrent strike force. Though, as far as he was concerned, it was marginal. His approach was on all defence spending matters to ask himself: "What is the imminence of the threat? How long does Australia have to prepare?" When it came to the actual choice of major defence items, the questions were: (a) What would a beleaguered Australia need and with what could it best defend itself until help came? Would the weapon-or weapons system under consideration make an effective contribution to the allied effort, and could it be integrated into the allied effort? 228. On the choice of a bomber to replace the Canberra, he did not share Air Marshal! Hancock's sense of urgency. He said Hancock felt that Australia couldn't go around naked. "Well, it wasn't a case of being naked at all. We had the Canberras and they were still being used by a number of air forces. We did not think they stacked -up unfavourably against the Russian Badgers. I saw no reason why Australia should try to be bes·t dressed in this part' of the world.'' The Government decided (he concurred) that Australia was able to wait. Therefore, it rejected the recommendation of the Hancock mission to get the Vigilante immediately. It would be better to get an entirely new generation of aircraft. The estimate was that in an unstable future Australia would need a bomber with an inter-continental range. Air bases in South East Asia - or even Northern Australia - might easily be put out of action, so that the bombers might have to operate from secure home bases. 229. On Townley's trip to Washington, Sir Frederick. was reticent to say anything for the record, and only after I had assured him that the information would be regarded as entirely confidential did he comment frankly on this and on the B-47 bomber offer. He said that Townley's visit to Washington was "entirely political". A 61. procurement team had already arranged the major details of the purchase. But because there was an election campaign, in which the Government had chosen defence as a major campaign issue, the Government had to do something dramatic to demonstrate to the country that it was doing something about defence. Townley's trip, therefore, was a political stunt. He conceded that an additional reason was that Townley knew that he was going to take over the ambassadorship in Washington and get a knighthood in the New Year's Honours List. Sir Frederick said that, as far as he knew, Townley had only one business meeting with Defence Secretary McNamara. He voiced the opinion that Townley's inability to refuse an invitation and his excessiy~ly heavy social schedule in Washington were the reasons for his fatal heart attack a short while later. 230. He said the revelation of the price was also a political move. McNamara had told Townley that if everything went exactly according to plan, if there were no hitches or delays, and if the current order of 1,700 planes was maintained, then the cost would be what the manufacturers said it would be, i.e. $US 125 million. Sir Frederick admitted that he and his colleagues were aware of the U.S. Defense Department's revised estimates which had put the cost "very close to what the current (1966) cost estimates are". In fact, he felt that his evaluation team had e'stimated the costs and ti~e deiays fairly a'ccurately, just as the cost of the Mirage had been projected very well. They knew that the fly-away cost of a plane was usually 50%-100% higher than the original cost estimates, and so the RAAF had dismissed the t 56 million figure for 24 planes as unrealistic. 231. He felt the British had good reason to be outraged when Townley named that price. They knew very well that it was not a realistic estimate. He felt that in their anger they tried to hitch their luck on the fortunes of the Labor Party, in the hope that if the ALP won the election, it might reverse the decision. The price the British named for the TSR-2 of under t 2 million per plane was "pure baloney". The RAAF's price estimate was for t 5.6 million. In the pricing of aircraft, one had to remember that the price was never only for the actual aircraft but also for such ancillary things as the first 62. year's maintenance and spare parts, crew training, etc. He said Australia had become stuck once with buying spare parts "for the life of the .plane" for the P-2V7 Neptunes. He said there were two huge warehouses full of spares at Darwin, which included everything from spare binoculars, which have since gone out of use, to extra scratch pads and pencils. The maintenance on the _Neptunes, of which the RAAF had lost only one, was so good, however, that they have only used a fraction of the spare parts. For this reason they had insisted that the RAAF should not be forced to stockpile spare parts for the TFX. Instead the RAAF would have the right to draw on American stores on a "highest priority" basis. (This means that Australia would have equal ,access even if there were a heavy American demand.) He said . - ...... the availablity of these spare parts all around the Pacific was what made the TFX contract so attractive. The TSR-2 bomber had been rejected mainly because it was of an earlier generation and because it did not have inter-continental range. The. B-47 offer: 232. Sir Frederick said that on the occasion of his trip with McBride to Washington in 1957, it had been suggested to him that Australia might like to ge t the B- 47. He had thrown up his hands in hor ~ r then, he said. He had a terrible fear of buying a plane which had already gone out of pr oduction. It would be very difficult to get spares. The only way one could get them would be by dis-assembling other planes. This is what Australia had to do with the Dakotas. That system had worked only because there were enough old Dakotas around. 233. He felt that the B-47 offer of 1963 came about when Townley asked McNamar a wha t t he United States could gi ve Aus tralia i f ther e wer e trouble in this area before delivery of the TFX. Scherger was sure that the initial offer was contingent upon the possibility of trouble. But then poli tics entered i nto i t, and the Government made it look a s if it were serious about accepting it as an interim bomb er. 234. Sir Frederick "fought this like hell". He argued that if the Indonesians wer e· goi ng to make trouble Au s t ral ia would not be i n i t alone. If conflict broke out over Malaysia, Britain was comm itted. If it should break out over New Guinea, the United States was bound 63. to help under ANZUS. If trouble should break out elsewhere, a few extra bombers would not add anything significant to U.S. air might in the Pacific. The costs in terms of crew training, runway lengthening, drain of technical personnel, etc., would be prohibitive. At any rate, he felt since the conventional bomb-load of the B-47 was so' close to that of the Canberra bomber, there was absolutely no advantage in getting an aircraft which could operate only from Darwin and Amberly. In addition, they had one man, in the RAAF (Wilson), who had flown the B-47 before when he was on exchange duty with the U.S. Air Force. "He thought they were lousy." 235. When asked why, in view of the objections of himself, the Chief ?f . A~r Staff (Hancock), . the Secretary for Air (A.B. MacFarlane), and several other high ranking officers, no action was taken to prevent the RAAF evaluation of the B-47, he replied that the evaluation was only undertaken to satisfy the political situation. In any case, as public servants, they could not publicly voice their opposition. Since they felt that the rejection was a foregone conclusion anyway, they might as well go ahead with the evaluation as ordered by the Government. He left no doubt that the timing of bringing the B-47's to Australia in October 1963 was influenced by the impending election. He said, aside from the serious intention of the Government to get a replacement . . . bomber, the subsequent actions by both American and Australian officials came under the spell of the election and the desire to give dramatic proof that the Government was more defence-minded than the Opposition. 236. He felt that Ambassador Battle's role in arranging the terms for the TFX was a minor one, Battle's later claims about phone calls to Kennedy notwithstanding. All the negotiations were done by a crack procurement team. On general co-operation with the U.S. Air Force: 237. From the time he had commanded both Australian and American Air Force units in World War II, he had been an advocate of standardising names and procedures. It only caused confusion when the Americans came up against a t .erm like Senior Air Staff Officer which was the same as today's Chief of Air Staff. The British ties had never been revived after the Australian-American experience in World War II, and since the 64. only logical air ally would be the U.S. he felt it imperative to standardize most procedures and titles. It was one of his specific aims upon assuming the post of Chief of Air Staff in 1957 to foster the closer orientation of the RAAF and the USAF. 238. He felt Australia had to recognize that the American Air Force was "big brother and you had to accomodate yourself to his ways." If the Americans "had trouble understanding you, they were just not going to bother." Then' Australia might be "dropped back into a garrison role" in their strategic thinking. By adopting their ways, the RAAF found that the two Air Forces developed close rapport and mutual professional respect. Also there was a high degree of cross- fertil;izat~on_of ideas which was invaluable. He took satisfaction in the success at standardizing most procedures and titles even before the Air Standardization Agreement of 1964. CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH JEFFREY C. KITCHEN Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Politico-Military Affairs, AND · SEYMORE WHITE, Chief of the Policy Planning Section under Kitchen. .. 29 J une 1966, American View of Australia: 239. Kitchen and White felt that at their l ev el in the State Department Australia did not loom large in policy formulation. Kitchen felt that this was partly because not enough was known about Australia, and partly because Austra lia had not made enough of an effort either diplomatically or militarily. This was also true in regard to American planning on Vietnam. The US Government did not expect any large troop commitment from Australia . It was r ecognised that Australia had a problem of under-popula tion, and therefore the ar gument that the country could afford to send troops only to the Malayan area was accepted for a long time . (Again.. ma inly because of the ignorance about Australia ) • Kitchen and Whi t e had been "amazed" at how sma ll t he countr y' s defence effort was and that Australia ha d only introduced conscription in November 1965. 65. Co-operation on Indon.esia: 240. The Kennedy Administration, like the Menzies Government, felt that Indonesia must be kept united. But "we felt that the Dutch intransi~ence over West New Guinea was driving Sukarno into the arms of the Conununists." Kitchen said many in the State Department believe that the Sukarno regime would not have moved as far towards the Communists had it not been for the Dutch New Guinea issue. It was felt that ! , ' Sukarno's obligation to the Conununists over that issue later forced him into a rigid anti-Malaysia line. Kitchen claimed that many American planners felt Australian fears over Indonesian possession of Dutch New Guinea were unrealistic. 241. . ·. · ·After Barwick became Minister f~r External Affairs., there was almost a complete "confluence of opinion" on Indonesia. Kitchen said there was high regard in Washington for Barwick, especially for his change of policy on Dutch New Guinea and his approach to Indonesia. "Basically there was accord that a firm but cautious line towards Indonesia had to be followed, over the Malaysian issue. Neither Government thought it could afford to have a permanent breach with Indonesia. Indonesia was just too important to let go to the Communists by default". When Indonesian opposition to Malaysia became more pronounced in 1963, th ~t~ American Government instructed Ambassador Jones to issue some strong warnings. Kitchen said he did not know all the details, but "it appears that Jones always softened these warnings when he delivered them." 242. Bob Kennedy's trip had two main aims: (1) to tell Sukarno that an armed invasion of Northern Borneo would not be tolera ted; (2) to see if he could force a cease-fire and get everyone to the conference table. He s aid tha t ther e was never any question tha t in case of a ma jor conflict in the area over Malaysia, the United States would be involved. Kitchen s aid that Hilsman, his inunedia te superior in thE! State Depa rtment, had given an a s surance to Barwick a t Kua l a Lumpur tha t the United Sta t es ' "-::- 66. would honour its ANZUS commitment if large-scale fighting were to break out over Malaysia. On the other hand, he knew that Hilsman believed that Sukarno was the best guarantee against the Communists and that as long as he was in power Indonesia would not make a drastic move. Containment of China: 243. On China there was parallel thinking. The US Government was aware of · the Australian desire to have America interposed between China and herself. He thought there was a direct correlation between the Menzies Goveernment's aim to keep the US physically committed to the · ma~nland and t~e greater willingness to commit some Australian forces ~o Sou~h East Asia, so as to prove that Australia was doing I l something. Many in the State Department felt that Australia's military role would always be relatively insignif~cant, but that she could play a greater diplomatic role in the Pacific. The way Australians were ·often regarded as 'white-skinned Asians' was seen as a great advantage. It was felt that Australia could play a moderating influence in Asia, conciliating anti-Western feeling, and possible .promoting a feeling of unity. 244. Kitchen did not think this feeling was shared by the Defence De~ 1 rtment, and in fact he knew that McNamara .was dissatisfied with the Australian defence effort. In general, defence co-operation between the two countries was very close. American military personnel all had very high regard for the professionalism of the Australian military services. This respect among the senior officers had senti- mental reasons dating back to memories of fighting on Bougainville and Korea. He felt that it was probably an over-generalisation to say that Australian-American relations were closer than American relations with any other country, since it depended on what you were talking about. In many respects the Anglo-American relationship was a 'special' case. Certainly in terms of influence, the British were much more important. On the other hand, you could say that as far as personal, friendly relationsare concerned, the Australians had a dear place in the heart of those with whom they came into contact. They seem to be 1 on the same wavelengths with us. I i 11 ------67. 245. But Kitchen stressed again that, in terms of policy consi- derations, Australia was just too small and too insignificant in terms of power to be of any importance. He did not exclude high level representation on specific issues. Reasons why US accepted low defence effort: 246. He said very few people in the U.S. government knew anything about Australia's defence effort. Few, if any, Congressmen had any .I notion. It seems that McNamara became aware of it in 1962 according to the memoranda and questions he kept shooting over to Hilsman's desk. He felt that dissatisfaction with Australia's defence effort at the .highest level was glossed over by the excellent rapport that Menzies and his Cabinet officers had with Kennedy, Rusk and, later on, . ~ Johnson. In this respect, the policy of support for America's action in Vietnam would be politically much more valuable than any previous statements of support. Certainly Menzies' quick support for the US in the Cuba missile crisis was appreciated. But he felt it was not crucial in that situation. Because it came at the height of the crisis when so many things were happening the impact of it .was lost. 247. He said that politically the Australians were popular for certain defence purchases. In this regard,. the purchase of the F-111 at the height of the Congressional investigations did much to make the Australians "the darlings" of the Kennedy Administration. CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH ADMIRAL SIR ROY DOWLING Chief of Naval Staff, 1957 Chairman of Chiefs of Staff Committee, 1959-61 . Australian Delegate to the SEATO Military Advisers Groups. 3 August 1966. Defence Underspending and the State of the Services: 248. Sir Roy Dowling had very strong views about the way the Government deliberately had inhibited defence spending during his tenure. He said the Government positively made it difficult for the Services to spend all their allocations within a fiscal year with ,its procedural red tape. At the beginning of each financial year, :· 68. the Services would have to submit their requests for equipment to the Treasury Department. Treasury would hold them for three months before giving approval for a sealed-down version. This would mean the Service Departments would have to readjust everything and another three months would elapse before orders could be placed. As there usually was a six to nine months delivery time, often the bills for the items would not come in until after the end of the financial year. 249. The idea of the defence equipment trust funds was initially endorsed by the military Services, as this seemed to be the only way of getting around the statutory requirement that all unspent moneys had to be returned into th~ Consolidated Revenue Fund at the end of the budget year . . But Sir Roland Wilson ·(Secretary of the Treasury Department) completely subverted this original intention by now allowing the Services to draw upon the trust funds and by forcing them to take the money out of the following year's budget. This meant that besides the absolute ceiling imposed on the Services, money would be subtracted at the beginning of the ye ar to pay for the equipment ordered during the previous year and money allocated for specific equipment during the current year would be subtracted at the end of the year if it did not arrive in time. Dowling thought it was a "wicked thing". The Services were being starved since the value of the pound wa·s depreciating while the cost of military equipment, especfally aircraft, was going up at a fantastic rate. With a ceiling of less than two hundred million pounds the pur- chasing power in 1957 wa s much l ess than i n 1950-51. 250. Sir Roy Dowling was very critical of Sir Robert Menzies in this regard. He said Menzies took a "calculated risk" that there would be no threat f rom Sout h East Asia. Tha t wa s why Australia was corn- pletely unprepared when the Indonesian threat materialized at the end of 1961. All the arguments tha t the def ence chiefs put forward such as "if we wan t help then we hav e got to do some thi ng ; we have to pull our weight; or the Americans don't want to help those who don't do anything for themselves", were met with the standard reply that Aus tralia had t o concentra t e on her development needs . In the meanwhile, the Government was goi ng t o rely on ANZUS and SEATO as t he first line of defence. 69. 251. Dowling thought the public would have support~d a bigger defence effort if the Government had given leadership in that direction. Dowling did not think that defence spending and development were all that incompatible. It would have had serious effects on the capital situation if Australia had bought all her equipment from the United States or Great Britain, but the country had a fairly vigorous defence industry which could have produced a great range of defence goods while at the same time adding to the wealth of the country. 252. Dowling, however, had opposed the filling factory at St. Mary's for technical reasons. The thinking among the Chiefs of Staff was that this factory was on far too grand a scale. Australia, with it.s reduced military establisment, could not absorb ·its production capacity, and moreover since the Chiefs of Staff did not foresee a long conventional war, the factory would be of only limited use even in war time. Nuclear weapons were said to have made general war unlikely, and so there would be little scope for World War II type saturation bombing which would require a huge filling capacity. Of course, there were also fears that the enormous costs of the factory would divert money vitally needed for the upkeep of the Services. Service Problems: 253. As far as he could remember f~om the mid-1950's, all the Chiefs of Staff had been opposed to the National Service scheme of those days. There were several reasons why it was kept on: (1) It swelled the numbers of ranks of the Army and made the total strength figures look very impressive. (2) There was a general lag in defence thinking at the political level, which despite declarations to the contrary, still believed that the country had to have a large partially trained manpower pool for a general war. (3) The RSL and right-wing backbenchers kept up a steady pressure which kept defence officials from acting for a long period, including "the ridiculous interim period from 1957-59". 254. Of course;' the big problem was that the scheme was wasteful and expensive, and for all its cost produced only half-trained men. Beyond that there was not enough equipment for these people to train with. 70. Many National Servicemen never saw a ship in the RAN or ·an airplane in the RAAF. In some cases men literally used broomsticks instead of rifles for drill. Moreover, the National Service scheme _diverted too many career specialists for training that there was not enough trained manpower for manning the ships, or to make up combat units. He said the defence reports issued by the Government each year on the state of the forces were laughable. For the Navy, for instance, the reports would list every boat afloat from the smallest tender to the RMAS Melbourne and give this as the fighting strength "Well, it was just ridiculous". The same thing went for the RAAF where every plane, whether flying or not was shown. 255. . ·. · "The situation got worse and wors.e so that by 1957-58 the Service establishments (excluding National Service) had gone down to 11,000 for the Navy, 14-15,000 for the Air Force, and about 19-20,000 in the Regular Army. He thought the conditions might have remained unchanged in view of the Government's apathy, if the newspapers in the two political centres of Sydney and Melbourne had not started a vigorous campaign to expose the scandalous conditions. The Sydney Morning Herald and the Melbourne Herald in particular, "with some • undercover help from the Chiefs of Staff Committee", did a lot to bring. . about the reorganization and the salary revie\-~ . Australia's staffing of SEATO Secretariat: 256. _When asked whether he thought the Government had tried to cover its defence inadequacy by being very active in SEATO and by sending only top-notch Service people to represent it and to help staff the Secretariat, Sir Roy said he had no specific evidence if this was a conscious policy at the political level but he had suspected it. Certainly when he was Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Committee, he always made an effort to get the very best people assigned to SEATO. Australia was not disproportionately heavily represented on the SEATO staff, but he could easily see why one could get that impression. The Government always publicized every little act of part!- cipation as a 'contribution to collective security'. "But then the Govern- ment was always much better in public relations than in providing the real stuff." Australian-British Naval Co-operation: 257. The Commonwealth Chiefs of Naval Staff met in conference 71. annually or bi-annually to discuss matters of common interest. The Australian Navy was an off-shoot of the Royal Navy and all its customs and traditions are derived from the latter. In fact, with minor modification, the Queen's Regulations hold for both Navies. In general, the contacts between the RAN and RN were much closer until recently than between the Australian and American Navies. There was much more exchange service, and all the officers still went to Great Britain for staff college training. 258. On the world-wide Admiralty system, he explained that when an RAN vessel steams into a British base it technically comes under the authority of the British Commander of the area. The same holds t.rq.e toThen a British warship ~omes into an Australian ·harba.ur. Sir Ray Dowling never saw any written conventions governing this procedure, but thinks that it is covered by custom and habit. When Australian vessels steam into British ports requiring petrol, oil or lubricants, they just simply pick it up and the bill is then sent to the RAN in Canberra and same goes for British ships in Australia. Similarity to Radford-Collins Agreement of 1951: 259. This same system also applied between the Australian and American Navies under this agreement, which was concluded between the American CINCPAC, Admiral Radford, and the Chief of the Australian Naval Staff, Admiral Collins, in 1951. The Australian Government initially wanted a Government to Government agreement, but the Americans were unwilling and it was concluded at the Service level. The resulting Radford- Collins Agreement was a contingency plan for time of war. It had several purposes. One was to split up the Southern Pacific into sectors of responsibility for anti-submarine convoying operationgs as well as sea-air rescue operations. There was also a provision for petrol, lubricants and oil (POL) pick-up points and procedures. The contingency planning embodied in the Agreement was geared to the possibility of a general war in the Pacific, but it arose out of the Korean War situation. Though intended mainly for wartime, the Radford-Collins·' Agreement is still the basis for co-operation between the Australian and American Navies. 72. ANZAM: 260. Sir Roy thought that Australian interest in ANZAM planning dropped off sharply after the end of the Communist threat in Malaya, and was not revived again seriously until Indonesia started threatening North Borneo. The United Kingdom was much more interested and had to prod the Australian Government to keep the interest alive. ANZAM was kept deliberately separate from SEATO because the use of Commonwealth troops in Malaya for SEATO purposes was complicated by the attitude of the Malayan Government. Both the Tunku and Tun Abdul Razak had spoken against SEATO and had declared that their country could not be used as a base for SEATO operations. Ultimately ther~ had _to be ·a separate Agreement so that if Australia wanted to use forces from the Commonwealth Strategic Reserve, they had to be first transferred to Singapore and then restarted from there to their ultimate designation. This was the procedure that was used in 1962 when Australia sent a Sabre squadron up to Thailand during the Laos crisis. 261. Another reason for keeping ANZAM and SEATO separate was that the two involved two different concepts. The support for Malaya, and later Malaysia, was considered mainly a Commonwealth mat ter and the United States did not want SEATO to get involved in this. SEATO: 262. At the military advisers' level, Australia and the United States always were in accord. He always saw eye to eye with Admiral Felt, the CINCPAC Commander. He said that this was not because Australian officers were servile and wanted to please the Americans. 11 Rather it was that we had the same outlook on most matters. 11 263. The big weakness in SEATO was France. He felt that because France had been kicked out so ingloriously of Indo-China, they seemed 11 11 to play the role of a bad loser • But they still had a strong interest in maintaining some influence in Indo-China, and this was probably the reason why they kept a nominal contact with SEATO. When they thought that SEATO was harming their image in neutralist , South East Asia, they withdrew more and more. Progressively this 73. became a greater problem until the requirement for unanimity was neatly sidestepped by the Rusk-Thanat Communique in March 1962. 264. In 1960, the situation had become so bad that when Dowling had sprained his sciatic nerve just before the May 1960 meeting of the military advisers, which he was chairing, the Australian and American Government thought it so important that the French representa- tive should not be allowed to chair the meeting, that he was flown to Bangkok on a stretcher in a special American plane. 265. The French attitude seemed to be that SEATO action had to be avoided at all costs. Pakistan was another weakness of SEATO, and sh~ only wanted defence aid against India, but showed very little interest ~n South East Asia. The other countries in SEATO, however, did not want to see a conflict between Pakistan and India developing into which they might be drawn. Great Britain, by 1960, had also become one of the "anti-action" countries. 266. Among the pro-SEATO action countries were the Philippines, who had very few forces, and New Zealand, which had even fewer (though there was less enthusiasm on the Government level under Prime Minister Nash. But this did not affect the military advisers "who continued to see eye to eye with us".) "Thailand also was st~ o ngly pro-SEATO, though it had no first rate forces. Then there was Australia, which wa; very keen and, of course, 'the United States, which was the mainstay of the organization." SEATO Permanent Force: 267. This came up many times in varying contexts. The SEATO military advisers seemed to be generally in favour of it. (Dowling was for it.) But there was political opposition to the idea. Australia was opposed to it because either Australia would have to take her forces out of Malaya, which the British opposed, or Australia would have to commit herself to a greater defence effort, which Menzies and the Treasury opposed. But there was also the fear that if a permanent SEATO force were set up the Communists might counter by establishing permanent standing forces in North Viet-Nam and by keeping heavy concentrations of troops along all the borders between ' China and South East Asian countries. 74. Australian Participation in SEATO Exercises: 268. The Australian Navy was quite eager to participate in the naval exercises. As time went on, this participation increased until by 1960-61 it had gone to the limit of what the RAN could con tribute. The SEATO exercises were mainly naval manoeuvres with some amphibious landings in the later years. But participation by I I the other Services was minimal. It was usually the Navies of the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia which co-operated in these exercises. The other countries either did not have much in the way of modern naval vessels or, like France, would not participate. The SEATO exercises were important both for the partic~~ating Governments and for the Services: firstly, they were exercises in co-operation between various countries. Secondly, they were demonstrations of support and interest in SEATO. Thirdly, the Australian Navy received valuable experience in the latest procedure and methods of naval warfare. Sir Ray Dowling said that the despatch of the Australian naval contingent to the Commonwealth Strategic Reserve usually coincided with the beginning of the SEATO exercises. This meant that the maximum number of Australian warships would be in the SEATO area for the manoeuvres. The major RAN· con tingent was in the Malayan area usually only for about four months · ~ut of the year. SEATO and Laos: 269. In both the 1959 and the 1961 Laos cr isis , t he SEATO military advisers were for action by SEATO, but for political reasons, mainly French opposition, military action was impossible within a SEATO context. 270. In the 1961 Laos crisis, Dowling had made the statement: 11 0ur guiding principle is that if a r equest for aid were r eceived within the context of SEATO, our 'response woul d be immediate. Australian troops could be moving into Laos within hours. 11 Contrary to r eports which suggested tha t Sir Ray had emba rrassed the Australian Government, he g o ~ the impres s i on that this s t atement had he l ped Menzies against pressure which demanded strong SEATO action. The Prime Minis ter was glad that Dowli ng had said what the Australian 75. Government would have liked to see done by SEATO but did not dare to say so publicly. He said that the Minister for Defence, Townley, also defended him. The ALP, of course, which was dead-set against any SEATO action, lambasted Dowling and demanded that the Government publicly rebuke and repudiate him. Sir Ray claimed that Menzies personally thanked him for making a strong statement because he thought the threat of SEATO action might have a good deterrent effect. 271. In the 1959 Laos crisis, the Australian Government did order the Australian army forces in Malaya, which were scheduled to return on a regular rotation in September, to remain for a few weeks, because a request for assistance from Laos to SEATO was .~pected at any rgoment. The Au.stralian Government a:t that time was quite willing to respond to such a request to prove the worth of SEATO. Menzies believed that an effective and quick response would do much to deter the Communists in the future. 272. On the question of how the SEATO military advisers regarded the confused political situation and especially the question of which of the three rival governments to help, Sir Ray Dowling said that the military advisers never discussed this in their meetings. However, when Admiral Felt in 1959 stated rather strongly that . the Laotian. anti-Communist regime deserved support, Dowling presumed he was expressing the official view of the American Government. But Sir Ray claimed that this did not affect the contingency planning of the advisers. The Threat of Indonesia: 273. On the question of how much the Australian Chiefs of Staffknew about the American involvement (i.e. CIA, CINCPAC, etc.), in the 1958 rebellion against the Djakarta regime, Sir Ray Dowling felt that Australia was being kept in the dark deliberately about these activities. On the other hand, he and his colleagues always suspected that there must have been, at least temporarily, some direct American aid. 274. The Australian military advisers thought that Indonesia would pose a threat if the Communists in Indonesia would continue to build up their strength, and if there were a general alignment 76. with the Communists. Subversion in Viet-Nam: 275. After the collapse of the 1960 Summit conference, there was a general feeling among the SEATO military advisers that the threat of subversion by the Communists had increased tremendously. There was an awareness that the North Vietnamese had stepped up their infiltration into South Viet-Nam, but it was not known at the military advisers conference in mid-1960 that a liberation movement had been officially launched. SEATO Aid: 276. Though this was not a question which the military advisers dealt _with directly,. it was a problem that came up repeatedly. The Filipinos and the Thais felt that, as loyal members of the alliance, they should get more economic aid than non-member countries of South East Asia. SUPPLEMENTARY INTERVIEW WITH SIR ROY DOWLING 17 March 1967 Radford-Collins Agreement as amended in 1957: 277. Sir Roy said that the Government had been quite worried that the allied disunity over Suez, and a British contraction of power in the Pacific, could have severe destabilizing effects. In early 1957 the Menzies Government had asked the United States to spell out what it would do in the event of a general war in the Pacific, but the Americans had refused this request. He felt that they did not want to give any binding assurar.ces on a Government to Government level. Instead, it was recommended that contingency plans be worked out on the Service level. 278. The Radford-Collins Agreement of 1951 specifically dealt with the problem of a general war in the Pacific. But it was an 11 awful hash of papers, memoranda, sheets of paper referring 11 to other bits of paper • It covered most of the ground of what Australia wanted, .but it was a disorganized mess. In March 1957, on his way to the Commonwealth's Chiefs of Naval Staff Conference, Dowling stopped by in Honolulu and had a long talk with Admiral Stump. 77. On the return trip he stopped by again and took a high-ranking CINCPAC staff officer with him to Melbourne. There Captain Ramsey, Commander Beale, and Commander Phillips, and a few others, worked on systematizing the big file of loose papers which comprised the Radford-Collins Agreement. Most of it was rewritten and brought up to date and in line with the current fleet strengths of the United States, Britain, Australia and New Zealand. 279. The meat of the matter was division of the areas of responsibility for convoying duty in the event of a general war. There were two maps which showed the sectors in the · Pacific· for which each party wae; to assume primary and secondary responsibility. Petrol, oil and lubricants (POL) stations were demarcated and assigned for upkeep to different countries. Australia reduced her garrison force on Manus Island, though maintaining naval facilities and the airfield for possible quick expansion. Except for the Singapore-Malaya area, the British retained responsibility for the Indian Ocean. Because the British were in a financial squeeze, they wanted to reduce the large troop concentrations in Singapore. So they built up the Gan airfield in the Maldive .Islands to become a forward staging port for airborne reinforcements. 280. After the working drafts had been initialed by Stump and Dowling, the papers were bound into pamphlet form. The final exchange of signatures between Stump, as CINCPAC, and Dowling as Chief of Naval Staff, was done by post. Copies were also sent to the United Kingdom and to New Zealand. Sir Ray did not think that either the British or the New Zealand Navies became separate signatories, but they were associated with it. 281. He said the name 1 Radford-Collins Agreement 1 was kept because it was considered that the 1957 revisions had merely con- solidated and updated the earlier agreement. 78. CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH K.C.O. SHANN Australian Ambassador to Indonesia, 1962-1966 External Affairs Officer, London, 1959-1962 Australian Minister, then Ambassador, to the Philippines, 1955-1959 23 September 1966. Australia and the PRRI Rebellion: 282. He insisted that Australia, in 1958, took no part whatso- ever in helping the rebels. He said Casey felt that Australia could not in good conscience help the rebels as long as she recognized the Sukarno regime. Casey thought Australia should not fiddle in such an internal squabble partly because he had a hunch, based on his know- ·ledge of Asians, that the · rebellion'would not succeed. Shann said that this is completely aside from what Casey felt personally about Sukarno. As Minister for External Affairs he was uncomfortable in Indonesia, and somehow felt that he could not get on the same wave- length with the Indonesians. Shann related that Casey was a little baffled by this because he thought he had a good capacity for under- standing Asians. Australian Attitude towards U.S. help to rebels: 283. He said that the Australian Government did not approve of the American aid. Part of this f ame from the belief that when you have recognized the Government of a country you should not scheme behind its back to overthrow it. Also, despite the repugnance with which Casey (and Menzies) viewed Sukarno, there was the feeling that he was the national leader of Indonesia who had brought unity and national consciousness to the disparate elements of the island republic. 284. He said that he did not know how much the Government learned from the U.S. about its aid to the rebels. But he, in Manila, was very well informed of the large extent of it. It was no secret in Manila. Indonesian Colonels in uniform were seen on the streets, and it was common knowledge that Clark Field outside Manila was being used for the bombing runs. His own personal opinion was that the operations were so large that· they could not have occurred without the approval of Dulles and Eisenhower. He discounted the 'Invisible Government' theory of Wise and Ross. 79. Change of U.S. policy in 1958: 285. Two main factors: (1) Howard Jones, the new U.S. Ambassador in Djakarta from February 1958. He had been the head of the U.S. Development Agency (the old counterpart to AID) in Indonesia a few months before: his view was that the United States had to deflect valid Indonesian grievances in order to tone down nationalist extremism on which the PKI could seize. So Jones, from 1958 on, constantly urged the U.S. to pressure the Dutch and the Australians to give up West New Guinea. He also harped on the theme that Sukarno was the West's only hope against a Communist take-over. Sukarno, as th~ only national leader with wide popular support, was the best bulwark against Communism. Therefore the West had to maintain links with Sukarno to safeguard against the Communists winning too much influence.* (2) U.S. feeling of guilt: The U.S. Administration was em- barrassed by the Pope capture and felt that it had to atone for its past sins by giving lots of aid. This was reinforced by Jones' reports about "genuine grievances", etc. Australian attitudes and efforts to keep Dutch there: 28. 6. In August 1957, when Casey held a meeting of Heads of Mission in Singapore, t1e put the view forward that Australia should see to it that the subject of Dutch New Guinea should continue to be kept in cold storage. Shann felt Casey was taken aback when the career diplomats violently disagreed with him. They unanimously gave expression to the fear that the Dutch would not stay very long. They thought that External Affairs should think of alternative actions rather than continue the rigid support of the Dutch. Some even felt the Dutch had a repu- tation as bad colonialists, and that Australia, by association, was damaging her reputation. * Shann's personal view was that, up to 1961, Sukarno's influence, on balance, had been a good thing. But after 1961 he acted contrary to Indonesia's interest. He let the economy go to hell, borrowing money everywhere to pay off debts, "but worse than that he disseminated his own warped philosophy into the pyramid of sycophants with which he had surrounded himself, he had discarded the moderates,and hardly anyone was telling the truth anymore". Shann himself had had such a violent argument with Jones about his view of Sukarno, that Jones had written home to say that he thought Shann was ill. 80. 287. He thought the idea of a Melanesian Federation might have worked at a very early stage, but it foundered on the aversion that the Americans and the British had to anything that might look like an obviously colonialist venture to set up a heavily dependent artificial creation. Both countries were reluctant to underwrite the Dutch presence in New Guinea. Britain because she seriously feared that she would lose her considerable British investment in Indonesia. The United States was concerned mainly with its image in Asia. After Howard Jones' influence had become marked in Washington, the United States was not going to do anything at all if Indonesia would use force. On Dulles' warning in October 1958: 288. On good authority the Australian Government knew that Dulles ·•. . had given a warning to Subandrio, that if Indonesia continued screaming on Dutch New Guinea, the United States would cut off all U.S. aid. Basically the Casey-Subandrio communique was a reflection of the American attitude. It was a change of policy from Spender's previous position. It did signal that Australia no longer saw herself as a party principal. It was opening the way for stepping aside. Throughout this period Australia was never prepared to do any more than take a complaint to the Security Council if the Indonesians used force. Even that was no longer considered in ~961 when the infiltrations started. Afro-Asian . . ... opinion by then was too solidly behind Indonesia. The Du t ch, with their poor reputation as a colonial power, just did not have a leg to stand on. 289. In March 1961, when Menzies came to the Prime Ministers' Conference in London, he had talks with Foreign Minister Luns in Geneva. He was then told of the Dutch plan to internationalize Dutch New Guinea. He was dead-set against it. He pointed out the danger of such a course, i.e. once they threw the issue into the international forum, they would lose control over it. That would be the beginning of the end. It would be giving up their legally strong case on sovereignty. Furthermore, if the U.S. did not support the Australian-Dutch joint development plan in 1957, what reason had they to hope that they would receive backing now? 81. 290: Shann said that ri~ht up to the time of the U.N. Assembly in October 1961, Australia tried to talk the Dutch out of it. Menziee had, in the meantime, learned from President Kennedy that the United States was no longer sympathetic to Australia's argument that keeping Dutch New Guinea out of Indonesian hands was essential to Australia's security. Great Britain was "also not coming to the party" (i.e. would not support the Dutch plan) for basically the same reasons as she refused to back the Melanesian Federation. She wanted to safe- guard the British investment in Indonesia, and the Dutch proposal looked too much like a plan to thwart Sukarno. Therefore support for it would have aroused anti-British sentiments. Menzies feared that the Dutch_,. if. thc~y received no backing at the U. N., would pack_ up and leave as the Belgians had done in the Congo. Menzies on Sukarno: 291. Shann had said the Prime Minister had the same attitude towards Sukarno as Eden had towards Nasser. He often referred to him as a Nasser. In that regard, the 1959 visit did nothing but confirm his suspicions about Sukarno. Menzies was worried not so much about the Dutch leaving New Guinea as he was about whetting Sukarno's appetite for expansionism. That is why he wanted the Americans, the British and everybody to take. a hard line with Sukarno. He thought the sooner . . .. people laid down the line to him the better. Later the British had to do it to Indonesia over Malaysia. But Malaysia was entirely different. The British had a much stronger position than the Dutch ever had. The creation of Malaysia was widely regarded as an act of orderly de-coloniza- tion, an attempt to create a viable State out of several non-viable colonies. Maphilindo Agreement: 292. Barwick made considerable behind-the-scenes efforts to avert trouble over the formation of Malaysia. The Maphilindo Agree- ment was largely due to his efforts, but it was doomed to failure because of Sukarno's intransigence. Barwick tried very hard just two days before the Malaysian Federation came into being to convince Sukarno that his opposition w-ould be fruitless. Shann who was at the meeting said, it was quite a heated exchange. Sukarno lost his temper ' (<.. : 82. and just would not listen to reason. 293. Barwick's policy was that Australia must get on with Indo- nesia. "At all costs we had to keep our bridges up. But on the other hand we would not appease. Our response would be graduated, until finally when there was no other way we were shooting at each other in Borneo." Indonesia's view of Australia: 294. He thought the Indonesians had quite a lot of respect for Australian military strength though he personally felt out of all proportion with Australia's military effort. He agreed that, because Australia did not mobilize in response to Indonesia's military threats - to Dutch New Guinea, relations ·remained much friendlier than they would have been otherwise. A stepped-up defence effort in 1960-1961 specifically directed against Indonesia most probably would have had serious conse quences for Australian-Indonesian relations. Melanesian Federation: 295. "It was never on." When John Kerr first suggested it, it was already too late. The U.S., the U.K. and Australia would have been regarded as three white nations trying to keep colonialist holdings under the guise of strategic necessity. He did not know any details of the machinations of ~ate 1959 when the Dutch were said to be interested in reviving the idea. On Australian-Dutch Co-operation: 296. Shann felt it never amounted to much. The Australian Government was careful not to get involved in any co-operation scheme which might lead to an inextricable joint venture. It only wanted to give the appearance of joint venture to strengthen the Dutch claim. On Menzies' visit in 1959: 297. Confirmed Menzies' suspicions about Indonesia. He vowed that he would never go again. Shann said that before he left to take up his posting in Djakarta in 1962, Menzies told him that he would not have to worry about another Prime Ministerial visit. Shann thought that Menzies did i good job on his visit despite the dislike he had for tropical travel and for Sukarno in particular. There was no enthusiasm on either side about Sukarno's proposed return visit to Australia. 83. On the British arms sales to Indonesia: 298. Australia had protested strongly about the sale of the Gannett aircraft. At first, the British agreed not to sell any. But then later, they announced that they would sell only unarmed Gannetts. This was accepted by the Australian Government, and it contented itself with making only a weak protest. Then the British shipped the aircraft to Hong Kong where the armaments which had been left off were installed. SUPPLEMENTARY INTERVIEW WITH K.C.O. SHANN 10 November 1966. Indonesian Motives on Malaysia: . . "299 . . . Shann thought that basically the Indonesian attitude was that they should determine what went on ,in the area. Their aims were not expansionist, but they did clearly want. to have political hegemony over the entire Malayan region. Therefore Indonesia not only insisted that she had a right to be consulted on all affairs within the region but also that she had the right to approve or veto any moves. Strictly speaking, Indonesia was consulted by the British before the Malaysian Federation was planned, but Sukarno and Subandr ~o claimed they were only notified. They expected the British • to sit down and work ou.t . the plans for the Federation with. them, rather than to just be told how the British were disposing of parts of their colonial empire. The Indonesians naturally had a real phobia about the disposition of territory which was contiguous to their own country. 300. Shann's role in Djakarta more and more became one of convincing Indonesian leaders that Malaysia was not "a dagger pointed at the heart of Indonesia". Shann told Indonesian leaders that it was foolish to fear that the Malays were trying to cut off Sumatra. In his three years in Djakarta, Shann had a total of 91 interviews with Sukarno, mainly on Malaysia. 301. He thought that .prior to the Brunei revolt, Subandrio had been ready to give grudging approval to Malaysia. Shann insisted that the Brunei rebellion came as a surprise to Subandrio and Sukarno. He claims that both jumped at the chance to use the Brunei rebellion 84. as a basis for opposition to something they did not like _anyway. It was after the Brunei rebellion that they became dead-set in their opposition. Everything they did after that had been only tactical moves. Basically they tried to frighten everyone off. Shann does not think that they were sincere in their initial acceptance of a United Nations survey. They did not regard Malaysia as a threat to their own existence, though they often said this. Rather, it was that they regarded a Western-oriented, stable, Malaysia as a threat to their pretensions at hegemony of the region. This political hegemony was their long-range ambition. Tactically Subandrio would do anything to achieve this, whether it was "lying, reneging, or twisting anything to . his '~dvantage. If Y.OU caught Subandrio in contradiction, he would wriggle out of it somehow keeping a perfectly straight face. He was the most slippery character I have ever dealt with". 302. Barwick's dealings with Subandrio centred around the principle of Indonesia's right to consultation. Barwick was willing to concede Indonesia the principle if in return Subandrio would agree to regard such negotiations "without prejudice". In other words, Barwick, in return for arranging Three Power consultations, wanted an assurance "that Indonesia would not seek to amend, delay or destroy" the concept of Malaysia. In Manila, Barwick received just such an assurance f rom Subandrio. (Shann was in Manila for the talks). On 15 March, Barwick sent the Tunku a long telegram informing him of Subandrio's promise and asking him to agree to the talks to "explain Malaysia to Indonesia and the Philippines." ••• "But at all times did we make it clear to Indonesia that Australia would not brook any attempt at obstruction by Indonesia". 303. Shann said Australia did not express prior military support for Malaysia" because it just was not our habit to commit ourselves militarily to something hypothetical". He agreed that the British would have liked to have seen a prior public pledge of military support, but said Britain understood Australia's reason: "we were reluctant to guarantee something which did not yet exist. We had reason to believe that the Federation might not come into being." 85. · Therefore it would have been imprudent to declare support for any thing more than the concept of Malaysia. One could not commit mili tary aid to something which did not exist. Shann thought a public statement of military support, as demanded by the newspapers, irrele vant, because the Indonesians had been told privately many times "of our unequivocal support". Shann thought that there was never any doubt that Australia would extend its association with the United Kingdom to cover the Borneo territories once they were included in the Federation. 304. Shann said that disagreements over the handling of the situation never changed this basic agreement. The way the British handled the last stages of the creation of Malaysia caused a great deal of exasperation (Shann put much of the blame for the clumsiness on Duncan Sandys). The main concern was that the British were giving Indonesia a substantial cause on which to pin their opposition. The Americans were also annoyed. They felt that if the situation had been handled so as to give minimum offence to Indonesia, it would make it easier to support Malaysia and to put pressure on Indonesia. 305. Shann said that Australia at first welcomed the Maphilindo Agreement. The clauses calling for a U.N. survey of the Borneo territories did not give any alarm a t first because the Agreement specifically stated that the ascertainment would not affect or delay the formation. "Of course, everyone had a different conception of the Maphilindo Agreement". The Indonesians saw it as a pan-Malayan move in which they would have hegemony. The Indonesians also hoped to be able to use the U.N. survey to delay the Federation. The Brunei rebellion had given them hope that something similar could be repeated. Macapagal saw it as a way for the Philippines to play a part in Asian affairs. (Shann regarded Lopez, the Philippine Foreign Minister, as a "little man full of poison" who put the clause on the removal of foreign bases into the Maphilindo Agreement to embarrass the United States). 306. The Tunku saw it as a way of placating Indonesia. He was not worried about the clause on the removal of bases since it had no specified time limit. Shann said Australia concurred in this 86. opinion. Barwick regarded the clause as a vague assertion of a nationalist principle. Lee Kuan Yew considered the pan-Malayanism of Maphilindo as a threat to the Chinese minority. 307. The British were most upset of all. They were furious at the Tunku for having agreed to a U.N. survey and they took offence at the clause on foreign bases. Shann felt that the British behaved far too irrational after this. They were under pressure from the Malayan extremists to go ahead as planned, and they distrusted the Indonesians. The continuation of incidents in Borneo was proof to the British that the Indonesians still wanted to disrupt the Federation. Shann thought the British handling of the Indonesians observers "was stupid." Australian Private Diplomacy: 308. (On a question about Australian protests over the British handling of the situation, we got side-tracked on the general conduct of Australian diplomacy during disagreements with its allies). Shann said it was a cardinal principle of Australian foreign policy not to air disagreements in public. He said this had become an iron-clad rule after the Suez fiasco, although the principle had generally been in operation long before that. The Government did not mind the charge of being a lackey of the United States "because we knew that they did not consider us that way. We have had some violent disagree ments over policy, especially over .Indonesia." 309. To a . certain extent this also held true about Indonesia. Shann said all the demands for a "get-tough" policy towards Indonesia were misguided. Australia was always frank· and outspoken in private. This is the way the Indonesians wanted it. Subandrio had often told him that he did not mind what the newspapers or anyone else in Australia said about Indonesia, as long as the Government did not publicly criticize his Government. Indonesia could not tolerate such interference and would be compelled to reject pro forma any such statement. Shann said every time Menzies allowed himself to show some moral indignation over Indonesia's behaviour it would trigger an immediate trucculent response. Nothing was to be gained by 87. publicly laying down a hard line and much to be lost by it. Barwick understood much better than Menzies that you could not threaten Indonesia. 310. Shann, who always accompanied Barwick in his conversations with Sukarno, and other Indonesian leaders, thought Sir Garfield was most circumspect in his dealings and mindful of Indonesian nationalist sensitivities. 311. Shann said that Barwick did not mention ANZUS or the United States in his interview of 13 September 1963 with Sukarno. "It would have been stupid of him to threaten Indonesia." He said Sukarno that day was in a foul temper and looked sick. He said very lit.tle· a.nd . only .once burst ou.t . saying that Indonesia woul.d crush Malaysia no matter what. Sukarno himself brought up the subject of the United States, saying that he was aware that conflict over Malaysia would bring the United States to opposition to Indonesia. He said he did not care about that. Shann thought that undue emphasis has been placed on the American factor in Australia's relations with Indonesia. In his opinion, Australia would have gone on to support Malaysia whether or not ANZUS applied. He said it was true that the Government usually consulted with the Americans but that did not mean .. that his Government dook action only if the .Americans approved or went along with it. While he did not have certain knowledge about this, he did not think that Australia had any guarantee from the U.S. on Malaysia. He said the Americans considered this to be the Commonwealth's affair. And rightly so. It was a British _problem of decolonization and why should the Americans get involved in this. They had enough on their hands with the trouble in Viet-Nam. 312. Shann felt there was nothing unusual in Barwick's state- ments of April 1964 on the applicability of ANZUS to the Australian troops in Malaysian Borneo. The Minister merely said that the ANZUS Treaty would come into operation. He did not say that this would mean that American troops would come rushing into Borneo. All this meant is that the ANZUS countries would consult if Australian troops in Malaysia came under serious attack. That much was evident from a 88. reading of the Treaty itself. Shann doubts that the U.S. had given any specific guarantee as regards Borneo, though he does not doubt that if Indonesia and Australia had come to serious blows the U.S. would have supported Australia and that Barwick had an American assurance on that. "But all that was quite hypothetical because the British and we could handle the situation". Shann did not see any connection between Barwick's April 1964 statements and his resignation. Effect of Djakarta Conversations on Barwick: 313. Shann thought that the talks in Djakarta on 13 and 14 September were quite a shock to Sir Garfield. When Barwick questioned Nasution on the guerillas in North~rn Borneo, the General had been evasive or deceitful. In general, he got the impression that the Sukarno regime was completely oblivious to reason on the Malaysia issue. Barwick became convinced that only a quick and complete cut-off of all.Western aid would bring the Indonesian leaders to their senses. Instead, the Americans only went half-way. They refused to consider any new aid projects while confrontation went on. But they continued to give over $150 million worth of aid, including a complete military telecommunications network, and also new rust-proof fuel tanks for tneir(Hercules) C-130's. The military· aid made the Australian Government furious, because it directly enhanced Indonesia's capability to carry on confrontation. CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH RICHARD WOOLCOTT Department of External Affairs Press Officer (Under Barwick - was attached to him as personal press liaison officer.) 5 December 1966. Barwick's April 1964 Statements on the Applicability of ANZUS to the Australian Commitment in Malaysia: (Woolcott had accompanied Barwick as his personal press officer on the trip to the S.EATO Conference in Manila.) 314. Woolcott thought Barwick' s pri mary a im was to de t er Indo- nesia. The statements on ANZUS were designed to "hit the Indonesians 89. over the head with the prospect of the Americans coming in to back up the Australian commitment." He did not think that Barwick went too far in view of the "pretty strong assurancesli Rusk had given Sir Garfield in Manila. Woolcott said, one could question his judgement in making the American commitment public. Since the Indonesians already knew about it from other sources, it is questionable that the statement had any deterrent effect. Secondly, the Americans who had given private assurances to Barwick might not have been happy to have him say so publicly. On the other hand, Woolcott thought Barwick expressed himself so carefully that he did not say anything over which the Americans could take offence. He really only restated .. what ANZUS said and· then added· that this applied to Borneo. Unfortuna- tely only a few of the newsmen at the press conference realized that what Barwick said had to be treated with extreme caution. Most of them raced off and wrote their own hazy impression of what he said. That is why he was so badly misquoted. Relationship between Barwick's Resignation and the Political Furore over the ANZUS Statements: 315. Woolcott said that on the plane to Manila Barwick had discussed with him the possibility of becoming Chief Justice. He was torn between the choice. H ~ liked the External Affairs port- folio. But the legal profession was his first love and he had the ambition to go to the top in that. The trip to Europe and Moscow, etc. (set to commence on 23 April) was planned in the hope that an announcement of the appointment to the High Court could be delayed until after Sir Garfield returned. When Barwick left with Woolcott for Sydney on the evening of 22 April, he told Woolcott that he had just been at a Cabinet meeting at which his appointment as Chief Justice had been confirmed. He said that he hoped that the announcement could be delayed for a month and a half, but that Cabinet, which was still sitting, might decide later that night to cancel the trip. He told Woolcott not to mention anything to the press and to go ahead as planned. The next morning Woolcott found out that the trip was off. 90. 316. Woolcott said Barwick explained that the Cabinet had felt that the news of his appointment might leak out while he was gone. Menzies was said to have viewed this as potentially embarrassing to the Government and to the prestige of the office of the Chief Justice. 317. Woolcott said Barwick never expressed any bitterness over this decision, and seemed to have accepted Menzies' reason at face value. The Minister was disappointed that the trip could not take place, but had understanding for the Cabinet's view that charges might be levelled at the Government for sending the Chief Justice-designate on a trip around the world. 318~ Woolcott himself was not quite sure what to believe. He said there had been rumours that Menzies did not like Barwick's independent way of making foreign policy. Barwick was making major policy decisions and announcing them without consulting Menzies or the Cabinet. He felt that it could have been possible that Menzies forced the timing in the end in order to forestall Barwick going off on another independent foray. But he rejected the idea that Barwick was kicked upstairs. Australia's Commitment in Viet-Nam: 319. Woolcott said that Australia's commitment in Viet-Nam had < its origin in another s uch instance of independent action by Barwick. Menzies was overseas when Barwick made the agreement with Rusk at the ANZUS meeting in May 1962 to send Australian advisers to Viet-Nam. He also made the announcement without referring back to the Government. Woolcott said he was not quite sure whether Barwick made the agreement to ensure a continued Arneri- can presence in Viet-Nam or whether he gave in to intense Arneri- can pressure only after having been assured that the Americans would stay in Viet-Nam. It was probably a combination of both, because Barwick had a fixation about wanting the United States committed to the mainland of Southeast Asia. 91. CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH SIR JAMES PLIMSOLL Permanent Secretary of the Department of External Affairs from 1965 on. Previously Assistant Secretary of External Affairs, 1953-59; Permanent Australian Representative at the United Nations, 1959-63; Ambassador to India, 1963-65. 14 February 1967. Australia and the Security of South East Asia: 320. Sir James said that the immediate post-war worry of the Australian Government, as well as its people, was the revival of Jap~n. ANZUS was in a large way an assurance by th~ Americans that Australia would have help if there were a resurgence of an aggressive Japan. But ANZUS was not limited to Japan, nor was it intended to be restricted in such a way. Australia would have liked to have seen Britain included in this grouping, but was no"t going to insist on it when it did not suit the Americans. There was the ANZAM Agree- ment which, from Australia's point of view, provided a satisfactory link. The two were "overlapping circles." But Churchill did not like the exclusion and "made noises" to be included. 321. In 1954 Casey was in favour •of a neutral Indo-China, and he was reluctant to have a meeting of SEATO powers before the Geneva Conference in Indo-China. He was thinking initially of an organisa- tion to underwrite the neutrality of the Indo-Chinese States. One of the main aims of the Government was to get the United States committed to the defence of the South East Asian mainland. He says Australia did not want a NATO for South East Asia. Thinks that all the writing which has claimed that the Government wanted a strong military organisation for SEATO is just wrong. Australia was quite happy with the strong guarantee under ANZUS. The main reason that the Government did not want SEATO to become a stronger or more ·corn- prehensive organisation was that it did not want to assume obliga- tions for any larger area. The United States had bilateral mutual security pacts with Japan, Formosa and Korea. It would have been pointless for Australia to be associated with such pacts. The 92. obligations under SEATO were bilateral as well as multilateral. 322. When I questioned him whether this was generally considered to be so by the members of SEATO prior to the Thanat-Rusk communique of March 1962, he pointed out that even before that it had been recognized that there could be individual (or bilateral) action in pursurance of the general treaty aims and commitments. Much of Thai- American security relations were conducted this way. Indeed Australian- American security relations have been almost exclusively bilateral. Casey and Subversion: 323. Plimsoll asserted that Casey clearly saw that the immediate threat to the Treaty area would be indirect aggression. He was not sur-e what cquld be ~one ~bout it, . but he was determined that something should be done about it. At every SEATO Council meeting he pressed for improvements in the detection methods of Communist activities. It took four years to get the SEATO Research Centre (on subversion) going. Most of the countries agreed with Casey that subversion was the main threat, but continued to regard it in terms of conventional military thinking. One of the difficulties was that you could not take international action to combat subversion, because of the charge of interference. Also there was s ensitivity that the anti-subversion c{auses would be used by the Governments in South East Asia to get rid of left-wing opposition, or all domestic opposition. 324. He said Australia offered to give training to police and security off icers, and some of this training was carried out in Australia and some in the countries which requested it. He says ther e was no conflict with the Americans over this, though he did feel tha t the American mi l i t ary planners plac ed a greater emphasis on planning for military security, i.e. drawing up contingency plans for dire ct attack. After the fighting in Laos began, planning against open aggression took prec edence. After Casey' s departure as Minister for External Affairs, there was no longer the same drive behind efforts to get some thing done about subversion. Real concern wi th that did not begin again until 1964-65 . He mentioned tha t Pote Sarasin, the SEATO Secret a ry General, had shown little inter est in the problem. 93. Australia and China: 325. Sir James thinks that Albinski's thesis* that China was the largest factor in Australia's thinking is only partially correct. China has certainly been considered as a long-term threat, and as of late as the main threat. But this was always in conjunction with the threat from the Soviet Union. In other words, it was China and the Soviet Union which intervened in Korea. It was Russia and China which backed the Communist movements in South East Asia. In the 1950's Chinaa was not thought to be able to act independently of the Russians ... American force levels in the Pacific were always geared to what the Russians could do, not what the Chinese by themselves could do . ..International Communism was consid~red to be one thr~at of which China was the most dangerous representative in this area (i.e. South East Asia). It was not until the Sino-Soviet split became very pronounced that the two were thought of separately and in terms of a greater and lesser threat. The Chinese attack on India was certainly a turning point, though even there the Russians sat on the fence until early 1963. On Indonesia, he felt that the fear in the late 1950's was that it would go Communist; not that it would go Chinese Communist. Australian Attitude ~0wards Dutch New Guinea: 326. (We got on to this subject by discussing the Indian action to take Goa, and Australia's comparatively -mild protests over this.) Sir James said that Australia basically had no sympathy for the Portuguese on this issue. The Government felt that they should have reached some sort of an accommodation with the Indians long before the trouble started. He regarded it as "indefensible colonialism". When asked to explain the difference between this distaste for Portuguese colonialism and Australia's support for the Dutch in New Guinea, he said that the two cases were not comparable. The natives of New Guinea were not of the same race as the Indonesians, and there was genuine concern in Australia about handing over these people from one colonial··power to another . He said that, under the Dutch, * H.S. Albinski, Australian Policies and Attitudes Toward China (Princeton, 1965) :J 94. at least they could look forward to eventual self-government and independence. 327. He claimed there were a lot of misgivings among the Africans in the United Nations that a race of black people was going to be delivered into the hands of another race. Also the hope was that the two parts of New Guinea might eventually become independent as one unit. He did admit that the Dutch lagged behind the Australians in their efforts to educate the natives. He feels that Australia entered into the Dutch-Australian co-operation agreement (November 1957), with the view of making it easier for the ~wo halves to become independent as one unit. He admitted that the t~tal a~ount of coop~rative effort was minimal. There was doubt that the Dutch would stay to see West New Guinea through to independence. Australia did not want to be co~itted to the idea of one unit, because this might form the basis of a claim by Indonesia to all of New Guinea. He said Australia urged the Dutch to negotiate with. the Indonesians in the early years. Plimsoll felt that the Indonesians, mainly Sukarno, did not want to reach a reasonable settle- ment, but wanted to keep the issue alive as a nationalistic unifying factor. ~~ 8. Sir James denied that the American$ were against Dutch < possession of New Guinea. He said that Dulles supported the Dutch presence and agreed that the Indonesians had no valid claim. He admitted that Ambassador Howard Jones was taking a different line, and said that on this issue the United States was speaking with several tongues. CINCPAC commanders were quite strong in their views that the Dutch should remain in New Guinea and that they should maintain an adequate defence posture there. He claimed that Australia felt the same, and as long as the Dutch were not going to keep West New Guinea defenceless, the Menzies Government was going to support them. On the other hand, the Government did. change its view somewhat when Subandrio visited Australia in 1959. That agreement (i. e . Subandrio-Casey communique) allowed that Aus tralia would not oppose any peaceful settlement b e tween the parties principal. The Indonesians considered this a considerable advance because they 95. thought that if Australia was not going to interfere they could convince the Dutch. The Australian Government thought it a diplo- matic coup because it apparently guaranteed natives' right to self-determination, and it also contained a pledge by the Indo- nesians that they would not use force. 329. Sir James thought that Indonesia showed bad faith. "They were always in favour of self-determination for everybody else, but not when it came to New Guinea." He did not think it unnatural that Australia should have supported Dutch sovereignty as long as she did. Again he stressed that Australia was opposed to handing the natives over to Indonesia. Another important factor, he said, why . the Government. did. not ch Party was violently opposed to any change. Evatt had decried the Casey-Subandrio communique as appeasement, and it is quite likely that even after all the indications were that the Dutch had changed their minds and that the Americans were no longer support·ing the Dutch, Menzies did not want a sudden change before the election. He said even Barwick did not change the policy from one day to the next. He prepared the public for it, by talking over the desirability of a policy change with some journalists. Plimsoll admitted that there was a split in External Affairs over what atti- • • 401> • • tude Australia should take towards Indonesia, but he claimed that it was not as clear-cut as it had been made out, i.e. the Indonesia-philes against the Indonesia-phobes. (From the conversation, I received the impression that he belonged to a group which counselled a tough line, vis-a-vis Indonesia.) Antarctic Treaty: 330. Plimsoll said that the idea for an Antarctic Treaty originated in Australia. He said he once overheard Dulles saying to Casey "if you had not kept after me Dick, I don't think I would ever have become interested in this." Australia wanted a treaty mainly for security purposes. While Australia was not worried about the Russian scientific activities during the International Geophysical Year (IGY), there was concern about how the Russians were going to 96. behave after the international scientific venture was over. He said once discussions got going, it was the Americans that raised most of the objections. The Soviets wanted to make the Antarctic a nuclear-free zone, but the Americans were afraid that unless there were inspection proposals included, a treaty which prohibited nuclear tests in the Antarctic might set a dangerous precedent for a "non-inspection-type" arms control treaty. In the end, there was a clause inserted about each power having the right to inspect the stations and activities of any other power. 331. The other big problem was the handling of claims. The United States wanted all countries to renounce their territorial claim·s: : Chile and Argentina ~ere comp~etely unwilling to. do this, and Australia also had reservations about it. That was solved by freezing all claims without prejudice. He thought the Antarctic Treaty was an important foreign policy gain for Australian diplo- matic i.nitiative. The internationalization of the Antarctic was an important safeguard for Australia's security. 1959 Laos Crisis: 332. He said that the Australian Government took a lively interest in the events in Laos in 1959 because it felt that it could be a testing p~ ace for the resolve of SEATO to act on behalf ~ . of the protocol states. He said that the Australian Government was interested in a neutralist Government, but· Plimsoll then interpreted neutral in such a way as to indicate that Australia could not be sympathetic to a "neutralist" Government which included the Pathet Lao~ He agreed with Sir Garfield Barwick's assessment that "the experiment" under Souvanna Phouma worked out surprisingly well. He said that Australia's sympathies were not made as obvious as those of the United States because Australia was not supplying arms to the different factions, but was simply accredited to the Head of State, viz. the King of Laos. Sir James said everyone heaved a sigh of relief when the United Nations Security Council, on a procedural vote, set up a committee to investigate the charges of the Laotian Government. Also he felt that after the Americans had made some military moves, the Soviet Union concluded that Laos was not worth a 97. big war. Another reason given for the fading out was that Khrushchev was starting a visit to the United States at that time and wanted to show good will. Australian attitudes towards the United Nations: 333. "There never was any reliance on the U.N. for collective security. The veto by the Soviets in the Security Council made that impossible." Australia was against by-passing the Security Council and throwing things into the General Assembly. "Opinion there is so unreliable." He thinks that as the membership increased the bloc voting became more akin to herd instinct behaviour. "Some extre~ists would take up a position and everyone else (in the African bloc) would have to follow suit, or be accused of not being a good anti-colonialist." 334. He thinks the 1960 Session was a big l~sson against "surnrnitry", i.e. having meetings of heads of state to thrash out the problems of the world. The Five Power resolution which called on Eisenhower and Khrushchev to meet was the perfect example of this. He said that Nehru, Tito, Sukarno, Nasser and Nkrumah "had thrown their thunderbolt," and they considered all attempts to change the resolu- tion as a personal affront. No one except them wanted that resolu- t~ o n to pass. The Soviets had indicated that Khrushchev would not e talk to Eisenhower unless he received a complete apology, and Eisen- hower had made it clear that he did not want to meet Khrushchev on those terms. But it was impossible to approach any of the original movers to withdraw the resolution. Plimsoll had learned that the Yugoslav delegation, including their Foreign Minister, tried to get Tito to agree to a change, but it had become a point of honour and all five remained adamant. Plimsoll related that Menzies had the idea that if no one else was game enough to move an amendment he was going to do it, because he believed it would be ridiculous if the Fi ve Power resolution, which nobody wanted, would be passed. 335. Sir James was very evasive about what happened next. However, he intimated that. Menzies ignored warnings from Australia's U.N. staff. He also evaded a question on whether the United States refused 98. to round up support for the Menzies amendment, but the impression was that no one wanted to support the amendment because they were afraid of offending the Big Five Neutrals. He said Nehru after wards felt sorry for having launched such a bitter attack on Menzies. He said the voting indicated what a complete mess the whole thing was. The United States, France, and the United Kingdom, voted for it while over half the rest of the countries, including the Soviet Union, abstained. 336. He did not think this issue affected Australia's image abroad. He said even during the Suez crisis when the Australians voted with the British, there was grudging admiration that Australia, q.s ·a small country,· would ptick by· the United Kingdom in an unpopular situation. Australia's Role: 337. He thought Australia was perfectly suited for the role of an intermediary in world affairs. Because Australia was a small power, new nations dealt with Australia on a basis of equality. When asked if countries resented Australia as a seller of the American line, he replied that, although there was an overall parallel approach to most issues, Australia differed on some issues. When asked to name a few issues, he said that two examples were given by Gasey in his October 1958 speech to Michigan State University, in which he said that Australia viewed socialism and neutralism differently from the United States. In general, Casey, and later Barwick, played a useful role in allaying Asian suspicions about American policy moves, about SEATO, and a host of other issues. 338. Australia was well liked for her aid policies. Australian Colombo Plan projects were welcomed and appreciated: again, he feels, largely because other countries knew that Australia was still trying to attract capital herself to encourage her own industrial growth. Australia was also able to avoid the criticism directed at the United States over the SEATO aid issue. The Asian countries felt that their membership in SEATO should be rewarded by getting more aid under the auspices of the alliance. However, the U.S. 99. Government continued its bilateral aid programmes, and only some of the military aid was labelled as being given under SEATO. Australia, on the other hand, specifically designated some aid to be under SEATO. It was never direct military aid. But it was also not economic aid, because the Government preferred to give that through the Colombo Plan. That is why Australia invented the name 'Twilight Zone aid' for it. It was aid that was designed to strengthen the recipient country's capacity to resist aggression of subversion. It was under this that Australia offered training for security forces and police. But that was later switched to come under the Colombo Plan because of the sensitivity of several non-:-~EAT? recipient countries. Australian-American Relations: 339. He repeated that there were realTy only differences in emphasis in the outlooks of both countries to world problems. Though there were disagreements such as the Suez crisis, the handling of the Formosa Straits off-shore island crises and trading matters, these never affected the basic good relations between the countries. He thought the Americans had a healthy respect for Australian opinions, and he believed Casey or Menzies often had influenced the handling of specific U. S. foreign policy matters. Instances ...... he listed were when Casey was present in Washington during the off- shore island crisis of 1958, or Menzies' advocacy of a Summit conference in 1959-60. 340. On the Suez cleavage: "it is true that Menzies was furious with Eisenhower for undercutting him." Sir James felt that American policy at that time was v ery confused, and had it not vacillated there might have been some solution without the use of force. Menzies had not advocated the use of force, but had concluded, after the British had sent the invasion force, that there was no reasonable alternative left, and that he had to support the British. Similarly, Menzies' main criticism of Kennedy's first Cuban Bay of Pigs disaster was. that the United States did not s ee it through. 341. He said that Menzies and Kennedy "got on very well". Menzies had a tremendous amount of respect for Kennedy. (Sir .,. : 100. James Plimsoll usually accompanied Menzies to Washington or saw him in New York while he was the Permanent Representative at the United Nations.) He said that he knew that the Prime Minister was not happy with the new Administration's sympathy for the Indo- nesian claim to West New Guinea. But that was only one issue among many, and it did not affect the basic relationship. A much more important issue in 1962 was British entry into the Common Market. The Americans at that time went out of their way to woo Menzies, "and Menzies, of course, was fully aware of it." ' He enjoyed every bit of the Red Carpet treatment in Washington. Visit Diplomacy: 342,. . Plimsoll told how Casey had the feeling that he had to keep in touch with what was going on. Governments changed from one year to the next and he wanted to meet new peopTe. Casey got on well with the Asians; his trips were quite successful. He did a lot to maintain the image that Australia was a country which was directly interested in the problems of other countries. Because Casey had such a wide range of experience behind him, the leaders of the Asian countries never took offence when he gave friendly advice. "That is how we differed in the eyes of these people from the United States." lk thought that if the Americans had tried t.o give advice the way c . Casey did, it probably would have been labelled as unwarranted interference in their internal affairs. Barwick also had a good touch, and he carried on in the same tradition as Casey. He thinks that the criticism by the Sydney Morning Herald and Don Whitington (in The Rulers) of Barwick as a disastrous emissary of Australia is false. It was based partly on the dislike of the Fairfax syndicate for the change of policy over New Guinea. It probably also rested on the first unfortunate encounter that Barwick had with Lee Kuan Yew in 1961.* In general, Barwick was widely respected and well-liked. * This incident has been repeatedly described to me by others in the Department of External Affairs. The gist of it seems to be that when Barwick was due to meet Lee Kuan Yew he was ushered into what Barwick con sidered to be an ante-room. He was immediately engaged in conversation by someone in shirtsleeves and open-necked shirt. Barwick took part in the conversation only distractedly, and finally with impatience announced that he had an appointment with the Prime Minister of Singapore. Thereupon the casually-clad fellow said, "Who do you think you have been talking to for the last few minutes?" Neither man was ever to have recovered from this. II 101. 343. Sir James also went to considerable length to dispel the "myth" that Menzies did not like Orientals or that he hated to travel in Oriental countries. (He accompanied the Prime Minister on his 1957 trip.) He said that this particular trip went off very well. Menzies did quite well in Japan, and in Bangkok and Manila. In the last two places it was extremely hot and humid. Despite this, he performed extremely well and seemed to enjoy it. Then he flew to New Guinea where the programme was so crowded with activities, meetings, dinners, speeches, that even a much younger fellow would have been exhausted. The day-time temperatures were around the century mark. No wonder that the Prime Minister had . ~o ·take. . to his bed after ~hree days of hectic chasing _back and forth from one end of the island to the other. He also thought that Menzies' trip to Indonesia, in 1959, went extremely well. He felt that Menzies had good reason to come back more suspicious than before he left. CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH ALLAN GRIFFITH Assistant Secretary for External Affairs and Defence in the Prime Minister's Department. (Formerly .. Deputy in this Office since 1952) 5 April 1967. On the Suez Crisis: 344. Mr. Griffith said the most important thing to keep in mind about Australia's involvement in the Suez crisis is that this was "purely a Menzies show." Right from the beginning of the negotiations of the Canal Users Conference, Menzies' role in negotiating with Nasser, his alignment with the Eden Government over the invasion, to his angry reaction to America's rigid line which gave the British no chance to make a graceful exit, the Prime Minister was acting alone. He did not have the support of the Department of External Affairs, nor of the advisers on foreign .J affairs in his own Department. Hence, Griffith felt, that although Menzies spoke for Australia, the rest of the Government or the rest {.: 102. of Australia was not involved in the dispute with America. For this reason it would be wrong to say that Australia had a dispute with the United States which involved her national interests. Menzies may have seen it that way but he had very little backing. 345. The crisis was a test of the alliance, but not in the sense that it nearly broke down and had to be rebuilt again. It was a test of how close the alliance really was. He said that at no time did Australian officials feel that the relationship had been impaired in any way by Menzies' disagreement over Suez. He claimed that most people in Washington understood that the strong statements by the Prime Minister represented nothing more than the "fu:lm;LnatiOflS of an empir_ e-orient~d man. 11 346. Griffith acknowledged that Menzies made a special effort not to have any public disagreements with the Americans thereafter. He said that on one or two occasions he even enjoined McEwen, the Minister for Trade and Industry, to tone down his statements. He said Menzies was extremely good at cultivating personal relationships with top U.S. leaders on a basis of equality. Orientation towards the United States: 347. Up to the Geneva Conference of 1954, Australia had ut:ually sided with Great Britain in foreign .policy matters where . ~ there was disagreement with the Americans . Most notably the Government had r e fused to support the American plan to go into Vietnam in 1954 mainly because the British were not in it. At that stage, Australians could not see themselves fighting anywhere without the Bri tish. But Geneva came as quite a shock. Australia suddenly realized tha t if the United States lost inter est all of South East Asia might be subverted or negotiated away. ~herefore the Government became vitally concerned to ma intain an American sphere of inf luence . Ther e wer e s till latent fears about the resurgence of Japanese militarism if the United States were suddenly to pull out. But the biggest worry was ·about l eaving a power vacuum in Indo-China . That i s why Austr al i a was 100 percent behi nd t he Ameri cans on SEATO, while the British were not. I \; 103. SEATO and the Australian Defence Thinking: 348. Up to the setting up of SEATO, most of Australia's defence planning was quite haphazard, and had no focus. There were vague plans that the country would have to contribute something if a con- flict broke out, but they had no substance. In this regard ANZUS was meaningless, because it had no machinery and no contingency planning. So after SEATO was set up there was a re-appraisal of Australia's defence policy. The thinking in the foreign policy section of the Prime Minister's Department was that Australia should orient her defence effort towards making a contribution to SEATO. That is why the Australian Government became the prime mover t .o get . some SEATO machinery es-tablished. He said it took almost three years of constant pushing and prodding before the permanent Military Planning Office of SEATO started functioning. He claimed this was of immense value to Australia because military planning could be carried out within a predictable framework. 349. Up to 1957, Australia had spent a fixed amount of money on the Services every year without any specific concept or aim in mind. The only rationale then among the Services was to watch jealously that one Service did not get too far ahead of the other one. In 1957 there was an attempt to rationalisf a l l of this aimless spending and to . . . concentrate on what Australia could best provide for a collective defence effort. The Prime Minister's policy speech of April 1957 (which Griffith claims was inspired mainly by Allen Brown and him- self) had in mind that Australia's defence effort would be oriented towards mobile forces. He and others feltthat Australia's best con- tribution would be men. They believed that the Navy did not add much to the overall strength of the American Navy, and the same was true of Australia's Air Force. 350. Griffith lamented that the policy guidelines laid down in that 1957 speech, though repeated thereafter, did not prevail. The Navy, through Senator Gorton fought like hell to retain their fl<~et air arm. (Griffith thought it should have been scrapped and replaced by a submarine service.) The R.A.A.F. wanted to get new fighters and 104. then later insisted on getting a bomber. (See below). Then there was the nationalist pressure that demanded that Australia keep up all three Services. This appeal to nationalism was very important in helping the Service Ministers to push through such major pieces of 'show' equipment as the Mirage fighters, the Adams destroyers and the TFX bombers. The Minister for Defence did not have enough authority or enough vision to keep to these guidelines, and the Chairman of the Chief of Staff Committee also went along with requests for individual services either for partisan reasons (i.e. Scherger and the bomber) or because they wanted to be fair and give each service an even share. 351. The result of all this was that it was politically un- profitable to push the Army to the detriment of the other two. So the Army limped along far behind the target figu~es that SEATO mili- tary planners were reckoning with. Defence planning interms of the SEATO orientation after an initial realization that this would be the logical thing to do, became blurred again. "The nationalist and political pressures for keeping up all three services were too strong." 352. In Griffith's opinion the three-months National Service programme that had been introduced in 1951 also made sense only -as lo ~~ as there was no definite focus for Australia's defence planning . . c Defence thinking was th ~n still of the World War Ir" type, i.e. to provide forces for general war. After the signing of SEATO, this made no sense any more. National Service was related to SEATO by saying that Australia· would maintain a large pool of reserves. This was nonsense, he felt, since the National Servicemen of those days could not serve overseas, and even if the law were changed, it would have taken a minimum of from six to nine months to get these reserves ready for the field. Politically the National Service scheme was popular because it was good citizenship training for young men. Finally, by 1957, Government planners had convinced the Prime Minister that the National Service scheme had to be given away. United States Pressures in 1963: 353. Griffith related that it was terribly difficult to get any 105. one in the Services to buy a re-introduction of the National Service scheme. The trouble was that the Army could not get itself to think in terms of anything else but the old system. The External Affairs and Defence Planning Section in Prime Minister's Department on the other hand, knew that the old system would be of no use to Australia or to her allies. These planners often put up the idea of a two year National Service scheme along the American line as the only workable solution, to the Army's manpower problem. But the Chiefs of Staff did not support them. They could not bring themselves to think of National Servicemen as part of the Regular Army. He felt that from 1963 the sit~ation became unworkable: The Malaysia commitment .might l).ave re.quired ~roops . instantly, but Australia just did not have .. them, and recruiting was not bringing them in. Then in late 1963 the Americans started asking '"hat Australia could do to help in Vietnam. They suggested that the Government drop the distinction between Regular Army volunteers and conscripts, so that both could serve overseas together. Griffith's section was glad to get this American support as this was what they had been advocating all along . . Griffith claims that his section made a new series of submissions stressing that it was politically imperative that Australia do her sh~r e, and pointing out that Americans were beco~ing impat i~nt and showed little understandi ng for the country's reluctance over National Service. He said that it took a whole year because the Service Chiefs were still opposed to it, and most Cabinet members thought it would be political suicide. They feared the Government would be thrown out on its ear at the next election if it introduced con- scription for overseas service. 354. Griffith was not quite sure at what stage Menzies started to lay plans for the change to a regular conscript Army. In retro- spect, he suspects that the series of questions in 1964 asked by the backbenchers in the House on the effectiveness of voluntary re- cruiting were indirectly inspired by the Prime Minister. The aim was to show that recruiting just was not giving the Army the numbers it wanted. But apart from this preparatory work "the Prime Minister played · his cards very close." He thinks Menzies deliberately did not foster 106. any discussion in the Government on this, because he feared that a big internal debate would not only have been fruitless but would have leaked out to the press and would have given the Opposition a chance to whip up emotions and demand another referendum on the issue. 355. Griffith said the final decision was made very suddenly "at the highest level" in November 1964 and "handed down" to the rest of the Government without prior debate. Griffith admired Menzies' political judgement that the Australian people would accept this new National Service as a practical and political necessity. Australia's Interest in U.S.-British Presence: 356. Griffith mentioned that in his submissions to the Prime Minister Qn National Service; his most important argument }:lad been that Australia had to "do her share" and that by far the most effective contribution that Australia could make would be in troops. The argument was not that numbers were going to be of tremendous significance. It was the techniques. Experience in dealing with jungle warfare from the Malayan experience that Australia could bring. 357. Griffith tied Australia's Vietnam commitment to his belief of the essentiality of the American presence on the South East Asian mainland. He said that Australia's primary concern was that there should not be a polit i~ al vacuum in the area. The Government's one • • 0 . firm policy objective was "that there be no sell-out". One Geneva (i.e. 1954) was enough, another could be disastrous." In reply to the question if he considered Australia a hard-line advocate, he said "of course, Australia's policy had to be more uncompromising. We want no negotiated withdrawal of American influence. We want them permanently between us and China." Therefore it was not in Australia's interest to support any moves which "would get America off the hook". He admitted that Australia's security interest lay "not in getting the U.S. into less trouble; (but) only in getting them to stay there." 358. Similarly Australia did not wish to see a British withdrawal, since the British presence in the area is "tremendously valuable". He believed that British administrative know-how, their diplomatic experience coupled with a willingness to abandon their role as a colonial r-, :. 107. power, were "indispensable" for stability in the former British territories. Australia and Confrontation: 359. He thought the skill with which the British handled Confrontation was proof of how necessary it was to maintain a British sphere of influence. On the other hand, for the United States to have become involved would have been a "mis-application of U.S. power." It was much better to have the U.S. keep her sphere of influence separate (i.e. Vietnam). At any rate, he felt if the Americans had come in over Confrontation, this would have raised the danger . of escalati.on into a major power conflict. ;360. ' · He said that. Australia uncler ..Sir Garfield Barwick tried to "waffle" (i.e. equivocate) over Confrontation. He felt Barwick had "mishandled Maphilindo". He thought it was a big mistake to have acquiesced on the inclusion of the phrase on the expulsion of foreign bases in the Maphilindo area. He believed that Barwick should have registered an immediate protest. He claims that Barwick "never got into the same policy position (towards Indonesia) as Menzies". He implied · that Menzies would have liked a much harder policy towards Indonesia. He thought that Hasluck handled confrontation with the requisite fir.nness that was demanded by the situation. Griffith strongly believed . c that to allow Indonesia to question Australia's determination "would have made for continuing insecurity in our sphere of influence". The Indonesian raiding was a challenge which could not be ignored. The Meaning of ANZUS Council Meetings: 361. He felt that consultation on a day-to-day basis is so close that the ANZUS Council meetings are really not necessary. He asked "But if we did not have any meetings what would ANZUS mean?" He personally felt that "all this talk about Foreign Ministers getting to know each other's mind at ANZUS Council Meetings is silly. These people see each other so frequently that it is an imposition to force someone like Rusk to fly out here." 362. He thought that Menzies was more of a realist about this in 1960, when the Prime Minister also was Foreign Minister. He 108. claims Menzies once said that to hold these meetings merely for exchanging strategic appreciations was 'boy scout stuff'. On the other hand, the Prime Minister was well aware of the political value of ANZUS and he was grateful that Rusk did fly to Canberra direct from the NATO Council meeting at Athens in 1962. 363. Griffith was dubious about the military value of ANZUS. Since it had no infrastructure or planning staffs, it was no more than a "forum for saying nice things about each other." He expressed the opinion that the guarantees in the ANZUS Treaty were no more than statements of good intentions. However, he added, "the political achievement is its charismatic power in our political system." Any Government action, any policy connected in some way with t~e United States that could be explained in terms of ANZUS, would end a political argument with the Opposition. He said on a number of occasions "the A.L.P. was batted down" and criticism stifled by reference to ANZUS. Australian Defence Policy: 364. He thought it wise that economic development should have been put first during the time when the threat was low. Australia was building the economic base for the much greater defence effort that she is making now. That wouldn't have been possible if in those quiet . . . . ' years the Government had spent 5 to 6 percent of the Gross National Product on defence. If more expensive equipment had been bought, Australia would have been saddled with a lot of obsolete junk now. He said that on principle his section in the Prime Minister's Department invariably opposed any purchases of major items. The criterion on which he and his colleagues judged was whether this or that equipment would make a contribution to collective security. In general they only favoured strengthening the Army. But he said his section was often over-ruled because political and nationalist pressures demanded that all three Services get an equal share (see above). The F-111/TSR-2 Controversy: 365. He claims· that the Prime Minister initially wanted to buy the TSR-2. Griffith was a strong advocate of the British plane, and still thinks today that his Government made ~ mistake in buying 109. the American F-111 (TFX). He said that the Government will be paying as much for the F-111 as it would have cost for the TSR-2, "and we wouldn't be getting a plane with as many untried features as the F-111." He felt that Sir Valston Hancock had made a serious mistake, when the latter claimed because Earl Mountbatten (Chief of the British Defence Staff) expressed doubts to him about the future of the plane, Australia could not be sure that the British Government would go ahead with the production. Griffith claims Hancock was unaware that Mountbatten was grinding his own axe. Mountbatten did not want to see any more resources go into the Bomber Command, but wanted to strenthen the fleet air arm. Griffith felt certain that if Australia had opted for the 'TSR-2, ·the British would have gope ahead with the production of the plane. 366. In Griffith's opinion the need for a bomber was questionable. The decision to go ahead ·and get one was political. He said because everyone demanded that something tangible be done about the threat from Indonesia, the Prime Minister gave his okay. "But then Menzies got his own back when instead of buying the Phantom (F-4C), he ordered the TFX." He said the R.A.A.F. had wanted the Vigilante right away as a replacement for the Canberra. Griffith thought since .Hancock . wanted to jus ~l fy his rejection of the TSR ~2 he wrote.. .. a glowing report on how much better the TFX would be. 367. There were many reasons, he said; why Menzies in the end decided to get the TFX instead of either the Vigilante or the Phantom. The fact that the bomber would not be ready until 1968 was glossed over by the publicity that Australia would be getting a real glamour plane, the latest in aviation concepts. Then there was the "cover-up of the B-47 bombers being available, if we needed them." He did not want to go into any detail on the politics involved in the deal but said, "It was quite simple. McNamara was in trouble with Congress. We were vulnerable to criticism on our defnece effort. There was an election coming up. You draw your own conclusions." ·' Griffith was disgusted with the way the Government made use of the figure of i 56 million as a price for the twenty-four 110. TFX, if only because it was grossly unfair to the British. On North West Cape: 368. Griffith claimed that the delay in the negotiations was not caused by bureauc.ratic inefficiency, but rather by the unwillingness of the Australian Government to be financially responsible for the provision of housing and infrastructure associated with the upkeep of the base. Papua and New Guinea: 369. He said there was a tacit agreement between Calwell and Menzies that the administration of territories would not be made a party political issue. Therefore questions in Parliament were limited by- mutual consent. Personal Evaluations: 370. He considered Menzies a master politician. He defended the Prime Minister's active role in foreign affairs, saying that so many things are done at the Heads of Government level that a Prime Minister had to keep himself informed. He also had strong opinions on having the Prime Minister's Department (rather than the Department of External Affairs) retain control over Australia's representation in Great Britain. Among the reasons he listed were: (1) Every technical a ~m . of the Australian Government is represented in London. Since External Affairs would not have the authority to co-ordinate these activities, they would have to be referred to the Prime Minister's Department anyway. (2) Similarly, all six State Governments are represented there, and they would not accept being under External Affairs. (3) The legal and constitutional tie with the monarchy "had to be" through the Head of Government. (4) Similarly, there were Commonwealth Prime Ministers' conferences but no conferences of Foreign Ministers. The'se had a "tremendous educative effect" in letting Prime Ministers know what was going on in other parts of the world. 111. 371. Griffith considered Casey a political "light-weight". Very susceptible to ideas and whims. He claims that Casey's advocacy of anti-subversion techniques for SEATO "was taken over from our section." 372. In his view, Barwick "was kicked upstairs" into the High Court as Chief Justice. On reflection, however, he modified this to say that because Barwick "did not have the political touch" he opted for the High Court. He felt that if Menzies had thought him indis- pensable, he would have tried to keep him in the Cabinet. Griffith knew that Barwick and Menzies got on very well personally but the latter felt that Barwick's "arrogant way" with the Opposition "and in other things too" were a political liability. (Comment: Prominent throughout the 4 1/2 hour interview was an undercurrent of the rivalry that obviously exists between the Depart- ment of External Affairs and Griffith's "External Affairs and Defence Section" in the Prime Minister's Department. It seems that the two were constantly competing for the Prime Minister's ear, often with con- flicting policy recommendations. Griffith admitted that he and Sir Arthur Tange, (the Permanent Secretary of the Department of External Affairs from 1954-65) "did not get along very well." He often made slighting references to "those boys in E.A." who think they knew all . . . . the angles. He felt that External Affairs personnel often got out of touch with the reality of domestic politics because they were out of the country for so long. He insisted that his section, on the other hand, had a grasp of how to fit foreign policy into what was politically feasible. Another pet peeve was that his section's views on the allocation of defence resources were not accepted. He felt very strongly that since Australia could not afford "a self-sufficient defence programme which would not only safe- guard Australia but also her approaches," the Government should have concen- trated on making the most effective contribution to the plans of other Govern- ments which were also interested in the defence of the area. Australia's best contribution would ·'have been soldiers. He was bitter that the policy recom- mendations of Menzies' 4 ·April 1957 speech were not implemented and that so much money got "side-tracked" for "show-piece" equipment. Mr. Griffith consciously evaded questions on Dutch New Guinea three times.) 112. CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEH WITH SIR RAGNAR GARRETT Chief of General Staff - 1958-1960 31 August 1965. Only One Battalion Field-Ready: 373. Sir Ragnar said that when he became Chief of General Staff in 1958, he had a study initiated on the combat-readiness of the Australiart Army. In his appreciation to the Minister for Defence (P.A.M. McBride), he stated that the Army barely had one battalion available for immediate service overseas. McBride was shocked because the general belief was that one brigade was always ready to go. But according to Garrett, Australia could at that . .time.-field one battalion, . and that would have been wi~hout logistics and without immediate reinforcement capability. Laos Crisis in 1959: 374. In describing how Australia since 1955 had always rotated its three Regular Army battalions between Malaya, and training duties at home, Sir Ragnar related an incident during the 1959 Laos crisis. In September 1959, he had just returned from conferences first in London and then in Hawaii, when he learned that the Cabinet had decided to hold up the rotation of the Australian battalion from . Malaya. and its replacGment with the First Battalion from Queensland . The reason given to him was that the battalion in Malaya had to be kept on operational alert, in case there would be a call for allied action to save Laos. Sir Ragnar said he was annoyed with this decision. He argued that the orderly rotation of troops would not impair the troops' effectiveness, but holding the battalion in Malaya would lower its morale. He was successful in reversing the decision and the troops sailed only about 10 days late. Garrett claimed that he used the inci- dent to press his argument that Australia should have at least one Brigade, complete with logistics support ready for brush-fi~e wars. Reliance on U.S.: 375. Garrett said that McBride's assumption was that, if Australian troops were used in South East Asia, the U.S. would provide not only logistics but also reinforcements. The Minister saw nothing wrong with 113. that, but Garrett was determined that the Australian Army should not be a liability rather than an asset. Sir Ragnar claimed that when he brought this to McBride's notice, the Minister was quite alarmed and told him to do something about it. Garrett then told him that the major problem was the National Service scheme, which was draining the Regular Army of vitally needed manpower. He felt that this was probably the decisive argument later for the abandonment of the National Service scheme. He did not favour a complete cut-off since the C.M.F. was considered useful as a basis for expansion. Pentropic Division: 376. Even before he became Chief of General Staff, Garrett had ·been.· interest'ed in the American Pentomic organization and had thought that it was suited for Australian needs. Australia needed an Army that could be used for both brush-fire wars or be turned into dis- persed groups in a general atomic war. He set up a study group on the Pentomic Army in late 1958. It made a unanimous recommendation in 1959. In 1958 U.S. General G.D. White demonstrated a Pentomic battle group in an impressive ground display to Garrett when he visited Honolulu. Sir Ragnar sai,d his aim was to closely relate the Army organiza.t ion to the American, because "it was quite clear that, if we • were to fight, it would be alongside the Americans. Our d e: :> ign was "'. . . to be able to fit in, and replace if necessary, one American battle group." He said there was a lot of opposition from the old soldiers and the C.M.F. But the reorganization was carried out by mid-1960. CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIEW WITH SIR HASTINGS HARRINGTON Chief of Naval Staff 1960-65 17 August 1965. Lack of Interest in Defence by Government: 377-379. Sir Hastings felt that one of the main problems that the Services had all through the fifties was that the Government was not interested in defence. The. Prime Minister was not at home in defence matters or, for that matter, in South East Asia. For example he thought that Sir Philip McBride was a man of many and varied interests, but he , did not know much about defence. This suited Menzies well since the 114. Defence Department was in Melbourne and McBride· spent most of his time in Canberra. The Admiral recalled with some bitterness that the Government seemed happy to let the services wither in the 1950's. Menzies was following public opinion on this rather than leading it. Budget ceilings were established, which were just high enough to prevent serious trouble from the R.S.L. and the Services. 380. Under the Menzies Government the conditions of the services deteriorated rapidly. Sir Hastings felt that this was allowed to happen quite purposely, in order to reduce spending even more. Re-engagement percentages were as low as 6% in 1957-58, in the Navy. This was due mainly, if not wholly, to the bad conditions of servt~e; such as poor housing, _inadequate pay etc. Mirage Fighter Decision: 381. Sir Hastings thought while foreign exchange considerations may have entered into the decision, one of the primary reasons why the Mirage was chosen over the F-104 was that the Mirage was easier to manufacture in the Australian aircraft factories. The Government wanted at all costs to keep the Government factories going. 382-383. Harrington claimed that the Mirage fighter had turned out to be not a ground support aircraft after all. He said the French also had found out th ~ t a fast jet fighter like that was inefficient for ground support. He also thought that the Mirage has also turned out to be much more expensive than anticipated, because of -all the modifications to adapt it to Australian facilities and needs. 384. In response to questions on Australia's fleet air arm, Sir Hastings related that the reason given for the proposed decommissioning of the HMAS Melbourne in 1963 was that it was thought that the Gannet and Meteor aircraft would have worn out by then. Instead the Navy had made certain that they did not wear out by that time, and Harrington expressed pride that they were still flying at the time of the inter- view. 385-386. He also told of the campaign that Senator Gorton, Minister of the Navy, had waged to convince Cabinet that the DDG destroyers should be purchased at all. The main argument for them was that there needed to be a replacement for the HMAS Melbourne in 1963. 115. Otherwise the Navy would have no anti-aircraft defence. In answer to questions why the R.A.N. did not choose the Hampshire class destroyers, he sa~d that the British design was not the right kind and also the Sea Slug missile was proceeding much slower in develop- ment than had been anticipated. The R.A.N. thought the Tartar missile system to be much better. Australian Ships to patrol Vietnamese Coast: 387. Sir Hastings recounted that during a meeting with the American CINCPAC in 1962, Admiral Felt asked him what the Government would think of sending Australian ships to Vietnam to patrol the Vietnamese coast in a show of allied solidarity. Hastings replied .t~at in _principle, this sou~ded . fine, but that Felt "should consider a hypothetical shooting situation, in which a junk force overwhelms an American warship called for help. It would not do to have the Australian Navy vessel simply relay radio calls. It might have to participate in the fight. Therefore, one could not have patrolling for "show" without giving specific orders under what conditions the R.A.N. ships would fight and unless one was completely prepared for the possible consequences. He told Admiral Felt that at that stage the Australian Government was not ready to be drawn into hostilities. CONFIDENTIAL INTERVIE\.JS . WITH (U. S. N.) Analyst, J-2 Section (Intelligence), CINCPAC 1956 - 58 Chief of Staff, J-2 Section CINCPAC, 1962-64 17 February 1964 18 April 1967. American Strategic Views on Far East: 388. Captain Wilbourn said Admiral Felt was quite concerned about a possible British withdrawal from the Far East. This would throw the burden on the United States to fill the vacHum. He left no doubt that the United States would intervene to take Singapore if a Communist Government came to power and tried to kick out the British. 389. On ending the war in Vietnam, Captain Wilbourn said there 116. were two views (both military) floating around in 1962. Pentagon planners had come up with a scheme to put a big landing force ashore in the Red River delta and capture the port and airfield of Haiphong. This would force the North Vietnamese to cease the intervention in South Vietnam. The proposal put forth by Admiral Felt that the J-3 Staff (Operations) was to use tactical nuclear weapons to destroy North Vietnamese supply bases and airfields. The Russians would not retaliate because they would not wish an involvement as far afield as Vietnam. The Kennedy Administration in Washington would not accept either of these "solutions". Instead official policy was to. give aid to South Vietnam and intervene with combat forces if n~cessary .. American Views of Australia (Mainly CINCPAC): 390. Australia is seen as a good intermediary for the United States. Wilbourn's impression was that the Menzies Government had a much more hard-nose attitude on the Cold War than the United States. He felt Australia was pushing the U.S. not to back down in Laos, not to back down :i.n Vietnam. It seemed to him that the . United States had modified its view on the East-West struggle, but Australia had not. Yet it was the U.S. that got blamed for per- pe ~u ating the Cold War tensions. Australia, on the other hand, can . t almost pass as an Asian nation. For example the Australian Government can talk to some Asians who would not even the the U.S. in the door. That is why Australia was valuable as a diplomatic front. 391. Captain Wilbourn said that up to 1962 little attention had been given to Australia's potential as an active military ally in South East Asia. It had always been assumed that the Australians would enter any major conflict in the area. The Maxwell Taylor mission in October-November 1961 proposed that the United States increase its military adviser force in Vietnam to over 10,000. It also recommended that America's allies be asked to contribute more aid. Australia was singled out specifically. General Taylor's report took note of Australia's successful jungle fighting experience in Malaya, and it urged that Australia be asked to contribute jungle ' warfare experts to advise the South Vietnamese Army. I L 117. 392. Captain Wilbourn could not remember when this request was first communicated to the Australians. He did, however, remember that when the idea. of Australian advisers came to the attention of Admiral Felt, he had the J-2 section initiate a study of Australia's defence capabilities. He said that was when he became aware of Australia's tiny defence effort, and he pointed this out in his briefing to Admiral Felt. Felt thought it would be worthwhile to ask Australia to put two or three destroyers on station with the Seventh Fleet in the Gulf of Tonkin. Wilbourn said the briefing took place in the first half of 1962, but he had no knowledge whether CINCPAC ever acted on the suggestion about the destroyers. He 9i.d know that from 1962 on ctNCPAC and Government officials made it a point to at least raise the subject of Australia's defence effort whenever they met with Australian officials. He denied that any direct pressure was applied. Technical Co-operation: 393. In June 1962 he accompanied an American military mission under General Yorke to Australia. It looked over Australia's scientific defence and technical laboratories. He personally went to Woomera, but another mission went to the Canungra Training Centre. Shortly after the visit, the United. States started to use some of the Woomera facilities for chemical, bacteriological and radio- logical (CBR) experiments. Tests of weapons effects were conducted in the Queensland jungles. Indonesia: 394. The situation in Indonesia was a perennial topic on the agenda of every CINCPAC intelligence briefing conference. The big worry was the possibility of a take-over by the PKI. From late 1957, J-3 started to produce staff studies on the use of atomic weapons in Indonesia if the country went Communist. Wilbourn said there were elaborate projects in which special experts from RAND were called in to make studies on the effects of blast and radiation in different areas of Indonesia. To the question of whether these studies could be regarded as an indication of Washington intentions or whether they were merely CINCPAC- originated, he 118. replied, "The Americans were pretty shaky at that time" (i.e. 1957-58). He claimed that as soon as something happened anywhere in the Pacific, the question was immediately brought up, 'Shall we drop the bomb?' Wilbourn said this "trigger happiness with the nukes" stemmed from the unwillingness of the military to become bogged down in another Korean type ground war in Asia. In that respect he felt that John Foster Dulles' nuclear "big stick" policy was taken much too literally at CINCPAC. Wilbourn claims that CINCPAC even wanted to use atomic weapons in the off-shore island crisis of 1958. Most CINCPAC planning in the 1950's (until he left at the end of 1958) presupposed that Washington would leave .the o.perational aspects, including . the power to use atomic weapons, to the discretion of the Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific. 395. Wilbourn commented that this delusion about being omnipotent was characteristic of several CINCPAC Commanders. Admiral Stump "acted like a viceroy". On many important matters, Stump made autonomous decisions and then forwarded them to Washington for information purposes. Only when the President or the Secretary of - State objected strongly would CINCPAC reverse a position. The PRRI Rebellion and American Involvement: 396. Captain Wilbourn said that a major part _of his time c . (from 1957-58) was taken up with analysing the intelligence reports about the internal disturbance in Indonesia. American intelligence officers were in daily touch with the dissidents. Most of the rebel groups had received American communications equipment. Wilbourn ventured the opinion that the PRRI rebellion would not have got under way without American support. Though he was not involved in the details of operational planning for aiding the rebels, he knew from the questions that were sent to his section that the Department of the Army, the Central Intelli- gence Agency, the Unconventional Warfare, and the Cold War Activities Section under J-33 and J-3 were heavily involved in supplying the rebels. Similarly the Nationalist Chinese played a very active part. Mainly they were used as a front I I ,for the American activities. He declined to give any specifics, I \, 119. saying that the whole affair was still highly classified and very sensitive. As far as he knew the whole question was so "super- secret" that most of Washington did not know about it. He did not think that any allies were informed. 397. In general, he thought, CINCPAC was preoccupied with the security of the South China Sea and the situation around Formosa. In this regard, Australia's fears about Indonesia going Communist were influential in focussing "undue attention" on this area. He thought the problem of Vietnam was neglected "until suddenly in 1964 we found ourselves faced with the possibility of a North Vietnamese success at lopping off the norther half of South Vei.tnam. The ignorance of Vietnam affairs was so great that until early 1964 we thought everything was under control. CINCPAC considered it a local affair which could be handled by JUSMAAG (Joint U.S. Military Assistance and Adviser Group). President Diem was backed because no one else was trusted. According to his contacts the South Vietnamese military held that Diem's way of running the war was ridiculous. They were concerned with effectiveness. Plots to overthrow Diem started as early as 1957-58, "but he had his spies ever)T\o7here to foil t ll em." < . .. Malaysian Confrontation : 398. CINCPAC had been ordered by Washington to maintain a strict hands-off policy. The J-2 section only did background area studies on the situation for the Pentagon. One of the things he remembered was that Sir Allan Jolly wanted to put Gurkha troops into Indonesian Northern Borneo to clean out the Communist infiltrators. Laos: 399. The Americans supported Phouma Nosavan from 1957. Wilbourn claims he was put into power by the CIA, who had infiltrated the Government. Under the cover of Air American Company, they bribed people left and right. They perpetuated or put into power the most ineffective military commanders. 120. Each of the successive crises was considered more serious than the previous. In response to queries about Australian willingness to use SEATO forces in Laos, Wilbourn said he had heard (while stationed in Washington) that the Australian Government had offered to send troops to Laos in 1959, but knew no details about the offer, i.e. whether it was serious or posture. h : .