Nelson Evening Mail TUESDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1940 OUR ROLE IN PACIFIC DEFENCE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXIII, 10 December 1940, Page 4

Nelson Evening Mail TUESDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1940 OUR ROLE IN PACIFIC DEFENCE

SIR ROBERT BROOKE-POPHAM, Commander-in-Chief in the Far East, hopes to visit Australia and New Zealand. This should serve to remind New Zealand—if any reminder is needed—that we are well within the orbit of Far Eastern defence and offence. No longer is New Zealand isolated. We must try constantly to think of ourselves as one of the Pacific Nations occupying a midway position between East and West, and materially affected by what East and West say and do. On one side of the Pacific Basin our interests are bound up with those of the Americas and Canada; on the other the policies of the two Oriental nations, China and Japan, as well as„Soviet Russia, must be studied by us and our sister Dominion, Australia.

It takes war, when security is uppermost in our minds, to bring these things home to us. The appointment recently of Sir Robert BrookePopham to command the Far East shows what importance the Btitish Government attaches to it as a possible future theatre of operations. Soon after taking over, the new Com-mander-in-Chief made two significant comments. One related to AngloJapanese relations, which most people will connect with his appointment. Sir Robert said there was no reason whatever for war, but he could not guarantee peace. What had happened in Europe could also happen in Asia. The other comment was on Far Eastern strategy. He had it straight from. Mr Chur-

chill himself, he said, that they must hold Singapore, no matter what happened. He was assured that there (would be a continuous and steady flow of men and munitions to the countries under hifc command and no effort would be' spared to make Singapore, Malay, and all other British countries as strong and as welldefended as was humanly possible. These are encouraging words for the Pacific countries of the Empire. The old days of vacillating far-east-ern policy are fast disappearing. Gone is the mistaken policy of appeasement by concession. Even the Burma road concession, made for the three rainy months—when the road couldn’t be used anyway—seems a long way off. But there is no intention on Britain’s part of baiting any nation. British policy, in the Pacific as elsewhere, is to hold what we have and to make it abundantly clear to everyone that we mean to do that. It is also plain where Mr Churchill stands regarding Singapore . He looks on it as the focal point of Pacific defence and asks that it be treated as such. But where does New Zealand come into all this? In miles we are a long way from Singapore, it is true, but to get at us, ocean-borne troops from the north Pacific would first have to pass the Singapore area. While we, along with the rest of the Empire, were woefully slack about defence preparations in the halycon days of peace, we can at least feel satisfied that we maintained our contributions to Singapore. We can now see more clearly than ever before that our contribution to Singapore was one of the best investments we ever made- But we are south of Singapore, and Sir Robert Brooke-Popham is virtually our Commander-in-Chief just as much as he is Singapore’s, for the whole defence plan of this wide area will need to be coordinated. That is why he is coming to Australia and New Zealand. We must not think of our insular coastline as our frontier, but let our eyes look across the sea to the outlying islands such as Fiji. In the defence of the Pacific it is necessary to take such a wide sweep to appreciate where our outposts of defence are situated. What New Zealand and Australia need to realise is that their share in the defence of the Pacific is a very responsible one and they must be ready to undertake it when their roles are assigned them. Doubtless this has already been done to some extent, but the visit of the Far East Commander-in-Chief should crystallise and clarify many matters now uncertain.