Memorandum Hag 36/49 THE HAGUE, 24 January 1949
I forward herewith five copies of the speech [1] delivered by the Netherlands Foreign Minister, Mr. D.U. Stikker, on the occasion of the dinner following the annual meeting of the Netherlands Foreign Press Association on Saturday 22nd January last.
2. Mr. Stikker’s speech is noteworthy for the attention it pays to the American press. The lecture he delivered on the importance of impartiality was no doubt a reflection of Dutch dismay at the unfavourable attitude of responsible United States newspapers to Netherlands policy in Indonesia.
3. Also produced are the familiar arguments that oriental peoples have so far not attained sufficient maturity for responsible democratic self-government. To support his point, Mr Stikker has listed a number of countries in the East in which elections have been unsuccessful or where projected elections are arousing grave misgivings.
4. In his conclusion, Mr Stikker suggests that the world is leaving aside much more important problems in order to attack the Dutch for taking a step which they firmly believed was a right one. This point of view is very widespread in the Netherlands, and its prevalence explains to some degree Dutch resentment at the censure of the Security Council. Mr. Stikker’s comment on the proposal to set up a United Nations Commission in Indonesia is that such a Commission without the backing of a properly organised police force, would not have the moral and physical weight required to enforce its authority.
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1 Not Published.
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[AA : A1838, TS45/1/4/5, i]