Asia-Pacific alliances defended

Press, 20 June 1984, Page 9

Asia-Pacific alliances defended

NZPA staff correspondent Washington

New Zealand’s Secretary of Defence, Mr Denis McLean, yesterday defended alliances such as A.N.Z.U.S., saying they were a way for small countries to speak bluntly to the United States, breaking through American perceptions of the world, and a means to assume “low-key” regional responsibilities.

New Zealand continued to support collective security in spite of the demise of the South-East Asia Treaty Organisation and the “failure” in Vietnam, he told a meeting of the United States Asia Institute, which is holding a conference in Washington on security in Asia and the Pacific.

“What might the United States expect to gain from A.N.Z.U.S.?" he said.

“The views of partners, particularly those not

averse to blunt expression, are an important antidote to strictly intramural perceptions of the world. “It must also be an advantage to be able to assume regional responsibilities for the resolution of regional problems, “The scale of the United States may not, for example, always be in tune with the sort of low-key problems which can arise, for example in the Pacific.” It was rarely possible or desirable with such considerations to build up a formal balance-sheet, Mr McLean said. The balance in Asia and the Pacific was held by “an uneasy quadrilateral of forces” centring on the interests of the United States and the Soviet Union, as well as those of Japan and China, he said. “It would be my contention, however, that behind the contest of the heavyweights, solid, often unremarked work has been going on which has largely changed the international scene in Asia and the Pacific. “New Zealand would claim to have contributed its due measure to that struggle.”