Melbourne, 23 May 1955
Confidential
Easily the most important international matter for Australia is our relationship with Asia—which is another way of saying our relationship with Communist China. This is the real reason why I want to spend a month in free Asia in October—rather than fiddle around at the United Nations in New York.1
We should begin to get our thoughts down on paper on the subject in a form in which I can take to Cabinet as a first shot—not with the idea of seeking any clearcut decisions, but rather in an effort to get peoples’ minds working on the realities of the situation. We may develop something more positive as a policy to work towards later. We might perhaps open the subject up with the summary of the results of the Bandung conference,2 that you are in course of getting drafted. This might form a springboard. Chou En Lai’s success at Bandung may well be the forerunner of his (and Peking’s) further diplomatic successes.
The results of the Singapore election3—and the known grip that the Communists have got on the Chinese youth of many free Asian countries through the Chinese schools, is another factor of real importance.
Maybe Lord Lindsay4 can help us in the factual presentation of the problem. I asked Crocker5 about him. Crocker tells me that he was responsible for Lindsay joining the National University. Crocker thinks Lindsay knows the Communist China situation better than anyone else.
I believe it is true to say that a large proportion of the overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia have a considerable and understandable pride in the achievements of the Communist Government of China—in that they have turned China from a nation of coolies into a modern progressive state in a few years. The bulk of the overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia are probably not Communist minded, but I would be surprised if most of them do not have a warm and sympathetic feeling towards the Peking Government, by [ words missing ] their having put the Chinese homeland on the map.
I was struck by a remark made to me by Harry Menzies (Australian Trade Commissioner at Hong Kong) lately ‘To all Chinese, there is only one China, their original homeland, where their ancestors are buried’.
The continued existence of Chiang Kai Shek’s forces on Formosa is a salutary corrective to any enthusiastic ambitions of the Peking Government, but this is a short time brake which must fade out with the years.
We (you and I) are due for a talk with Mr. Holt and his Secretary of Immigration6 on Asia and immigration, which we should try to bring about this week. It will have some relationship to the general problem of our relations with Asia.
All this adds up to the need for us (and others) to reach a modus vivendi with Peking. I would believe that co–existence with Communist China should be more possible than with Soviet Russia. This means recognition and a place in the United Nations. The difficulty as we all know, is the United States. Clearly we can only reach this by stages. The question is—what the stages are—or perhaps what the first step is—and when. The time is never likely to be really ‘ripe’. Unless we make a real effort, we’re likely to drift on, in the wake of unreal thinking in the United States, until Peking gets into the United Nations somehow or other, in spite of the American attitude, and we’ll be left with the enmity of Peking, which will be dangerous. The potential forces that Peking will be able to put into the field in ten years time are not pleasant to contemplate.
Would you please have someone put on to do some drafting on a paper to go to Cabinet in due course on all this. It will need a good deal of discussion between a few of us. But I’d like something on paper as a first rough shot, to put up at the Cabinet meetings that are likely to take place when the House rises.
[NAA: Al838, TS519/3/l, v]
1 On 6 September 1955, Casey announced that he would lead the Australian de.legation at the early stages of the United Nations Assembly commencing in New York on 20 September, attend the ANZUS Council meeting in Washington on 24 September, meet the leaders of free Asian countries in Karachi, New Delhi, Rangoon and Bangkok in October, attend the annual meeting of Colombo Plan Ministers in Singapore on 17 October and meet the Chief Ministers of Singapore and Malaya, the UK Commissioner-General for South-East Asia, the Governor of Singapore and the High Commissioner for Malaya.
2 The Asian–African Conference was held in Bandung, Indonesia, 18–24 April 1955. In addition to the five sponsoring powers of the conference, Burma, Ceylon, India, Indonesia and Pakistan, the following other countries participated: Afghanistan, Cambodia, the People’s Republic of China, Egypt, Ethiopia, Gold Coast, Iran, Iraq, Japan, Jordan, Laos, Lebanon, Liberia, Libya, Nepal, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Thailand, Turkey, North Vietnam, South Vietnam and Yemen. One of the main points of interest at the conference was the conduct of the PRC Premier, Chou En-lai, who took a moderate and conciliatory attitude on most issues and was at pains to impress the meetings with the peaceful intentions of the Peking Government. Chou’s offer of direct negotiation with the United States on the issue of Formosa made a considerable impact on listeners.
3 General elections taking place on 2 April in Singapore had resulted in a victory for the left-wing Labour Front, led by David Marshall.
4 Baron Lindsay of Birker, Senior Fellow, Department of International Relations, Australian National University.
5 Walter Crocker, Australian Ambassador to Indonesia.
6 That is, Harold Holt, Minister for Immigration, and his departmental Secretary, T.H.E. Heyes.