WAR IN MALAYA

Press, Volume XCI, Issue 27637, 19 April 1955, Page 12

WAR IN MALAYA

Warning By Former Officer POSSIBILITY OF CHINESE THRUST INTO SIAM (New Zealand Trc:s Association) Cl. '.ORNE, April 18. Altho- gh : _• shooting war was pr'? :rr; cut in Malaya, the Communists had retired to the Siamese border to wait for forces from China to help them,- said Mr T. B. Hart, a former military intelligence officer and rubber planter in Malaya, in an address to Gisborne Rotarians today. “And there would be nothing to stop them, absolutely nothing,” Mr Hart said. “If the Chinese decided to send one of their famous route armies down through Siam only huge forces rushed to Siam within a week could check them,” he said. “Atomic bombs might stop them, but they would not be fully effective in the jungle.” The Siamese, he said, did not want the Chinese in their country, but they had neither the material, the men, nor the will to fight, because they were a peaceful people. He said the Allies must help Siam, and that was the purpose of the South-east Asia Treaty Organisation

“Siam and Malaya are the key to the Eastern situation,” said Mr Hart.

“If the people of Malaya and Siam embrace communism it will not be through love of it, but for selfpreservation.” Formosa’s value was not tactical so much as moral, he said. “Every little bit helps.” he said of New Zealand’s airborne commando force for Malaya, but he added: “I think it would have been a good thing if we had sent a battalion. If Australia had sent two battalions and New Zealand one it would have shown our determination to prevent further Communist encroachment in Southeast Asia.”