DEFENCE TALKS IN WELLINGTON

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28231, 20 March 1957, Page 12

DEFENCE TALKS IN WELLINGTON

Conference With Lord Home

(New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, March 19. The Prime Minister (Mr Holland) discussed defence problems for an hour with the British Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations, the Earl of Home, this morning. Air strategy figured largely in the talks. The discussions between Mr Holland and Lord Home will continue tomorrow when Lord Home will also meet the full Cabinet. The Minister of Defence, Mr T. L. Macdonald, was present for part of the time and Lord Home was accompanied by the British Chief of Air Staff, Chief Air Marshall, Sir Dermot Boyle, and Major-General W. H. A. Bishop, Chief of Staff to Lord Home. “Air Marshal Sir Dermot Boyle gave me a picture of the place Britain occupies in the world today and the changes that are taking place,” said Mr Holland. “He ran over the map of the Pacific referring to various countries including Malaya and Hong Kong. He also went over developments in aerial strategy. The Prime Minister said that Lord Home and his advisers had been very generous in praise of the work being done by New Zealand servicemen in Malaya.

Value of SEATO “In Britain we have always attached as much value to SEATO as to NATO and the Bagdad Pact, because we have realised that the threat of communism is universal,” said Lord Home today. “The Communists are ready to switch the offensive from one front to another at their convenience. In these days, Australia and New Zealand are just as vulnerable to attack as is Britain.

“We have to make it clear that an attack on any member of the Commonwealth by the Communists, or the isolation of one of the members of the Commonwealth, would be a blow from which the whole would not recover.

“Therefore ,an attack on New Zealand or Australia would be as real to us as to your own islands. That is why we try to play a full part in all the regional military pacts made within the Charter of the United Nations.”