DISCUSSIONS AT QUEBEC

Timaru Herald, Volume CLVI, Issue 22998, 15 September 1944, Page 5

DISCUSSIONS AT QUEBEC

Dominions Will Take Part Democratic Nature Of Empire (7.50 p.m.) QUEBEC, Sept. 13. Mr R. M. Firth, acting New Zealand High Commissioner to Canada, and Sir William Glasgow, Australian High Commissioner, will attend the Quebec Conference in response to what is described as Mr Churchill’s “very warm invitation.” Mr Roosevelt, in a statement, said: “This is a conference to get the best results from the combined British and American war effort in the Pacific and Europe, and the co-ordinating of our efforts and those of our Allies, particularly the Chinese and Russians.” The correspondent of the Associated American Press states that simultaneously with Mr Roosevelt’s statement the conference’s global aspects were emphasised by the following developments: The announcement of New Zealand and Australian participation, the British Ministers Mr Richard Law and Lord Leathers attending, and also the Secretary to the Treasury, Mr Henry Morgenthau, and Admiral Land. Mr Stephen Early read a letter from Mr Cordell Hull, Secretary of State, intimating that the experts would soon have read a definite policy on the proposals for curbing international cartels. The official statement stated that rapid progress was being made by the conference, which probably would conclude this weekend. Mr Roosevelt and Mr Churchill were both anxious to return home at the earliest possible moment. The spokesman, replying to a question, said M. Stalin was informed in advance of the questions to be discussed. He added that if M. Stalin could have attended the meeting it would not have been held at Quebec. Mr Early also disclosed that the previous conference with M. Stalin would have occurred at Fairbanks, Alaska, instead of Teheran, but the Russian offensive developed, thus necessitating a postponement. Mrs Churchill, in a broadcast, declared that the meaning of the Quebec Conference is that the British people, mindful of the score they have to settle with Japan, are “resolved to see that through to the end with all the strength and devotion in them. All the glorious news in the last year gives us a fair reason to believe that the present conference will be followed by similar splendid successes in the Far Eastern theatre.”

Mrs Roosevelt mentioned the traditional friendship between Canada and the United States and urged the women of the two countries to draw closer together and work to preserve world peace.

American Comment The Quebec correspondent of the ‘New York Times” said the New Zealand and Australian representatives were invited to Quebec to remove any suspicion among the Pacific Dominions that they were being slighted or kept m the dark about the plans for Japan’s defeat. This incident is considered immensely significant for the guidance of all international affairs. As soon as New Zealand and Australian newspapermen learned of the impending conferences between the British and Canadian Prime Ministers and Chiefs of Staff, they insisted that their countries must also have a say, consequently their papers stirred up ‘ that sensitive pride characterising all peoples but the most vocal among those deriving from British stock,” which Mr Churchill, appreciating these susceptibilities, invited with the utmost politeness, Mr Firth and Sir William Glasgow. With their arrival the incident can be considered closed However, it served to emphasise that the Empire is still a democratic association of nations which the United Kingdom, as one Dominion, can speak only for itself, whereas other relatively small English-speaking nations are firmly determined not to permit even their best friends, however big, to plan the future for them in peace and war without themselves having a say in what is done or at least being informed. Moreover, the incident shows that politeness towards and consultations with all peoples who contributed to the victory of the Allies is the surest way of assuring the solidarity of any future organisation of nations for world peace. Official statements to-day made it clear that the conference is preliminary to another meeting of the British and American leaders with M. Stalin, which is likely to occur even more quicklv than the Teheran conference followed the Quebec conference Of 1943. Mr Roosevelt’s statement on the purposes of the conference left the impression of planning for another year many details of the vast combined British and American operations throughout the world for which the conference is regarded necessarily as a prelude to talks with Russia and China, neither of whom has undertaken combined military action with the United States in the same way as Britain.