DEFENCE PACT IN PACIFIC

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27340, 4 May 1954, Page 11

DEFENCE PACT IN PACIFIC

Senator Knowland’s Comments

WASHINGTON, May 2. The Senate Majority Leader, Senator William Knowland (Republican, California), said today that the United States should move at once towards forming an anti-Communist defence coalition in Asia even if this meant acting without one of the major Allies. An Associated Press correspondent who interviewed Senator Knowland said that although the Senator had not mentioned Britain by name, he was obviously criticising British policy. Senator Knowland did not specify what the countries should be in the proposed defence coalition, but the United front proposed by Mr Dulles would include the United States, France, Britain, New Zealand, Australia, the Philippines, Siam, and the three Indo-Chinese States of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. “No Single Nation a Veto” “I flon’t believe we should give any single nation a veto over the vital security interests of this country,” Senator Knowland said. “Our socalled allies should be called upon to indicate in advance just what they are prepared to do in collective action, but we must move despite any position they take,” he said.

Senator Knowland said the Communists had made it clear at Geneva that their price for a peace settlement would be American withdrawal from Jaffan, the Philippines, Okinawa, Formosa, and most of the Pacific. He said there could be no settlement on any terms such as these, which were comparable to those a victorious country would lay down to a defeated opponent. “In my judgment, if there is appeasement at Geneva, this country itself might well become a continental Dien Bien Phu. The free world would lose all Asia and, in my mind, the fall of the remainder of Europe to the Communists would only be a question of time,” said Senr.tor Knowland. &f--.