DEPARTMENT OF EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
FOR THE PRESS CANBERRA
RELEAAD ONLY IN C-Y-ERRA PR 110
2. . D h 6
UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSVJBLY
Porliamentary Statement by the Prime Minister and Minister
for External Affairs
The Prime Minister -nd Minister for External Affairs,
Mr. R. G. Menzies, made the following statement leave in the
House of Representatives on October
I arrived at the United Nations General Assembly on the
afternoon of Friday, September 30th. The general debate was on.
President Soekarno spoke for two hours. He circulated a copy of his
speech. The speech consisted of 66 pages of foolscap. There was an
added slip circulated. It was marke d, " Vital," and was tc be inserted
at page 65. This sheet contained the terms of the proposed five-power
resolution of vyhich I became aware for the first time, the five powers being
Ghana, India, the United Arab Republic, Yugoslavia and Indonesia. The terms
of the pro-osed resolution were these
The General Assembly, deeply concerned with the recent deterioration
in international relations which threatens the world with
grave consequences, aware of the great expectancy of the world that
this Assembly will assist in helping to prepare the way for the
easing of world tension, conscious of the grave and urgent responsibility
that rests on the United Nations to initiate helpful efforts, requests,
as a first urgent step, the President of the United States of America and
the chairman of the Council of M. 1inisters of the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics to renew their contacts, interrxpted recently, so that their
declared willingness to find solutions of the outstanding problems by
negotiation may be progressively implemented.
For some reason, my distinguished friend, the Prime Minister of India, rose
at the end of President Soekarno's speech and formally moved the resolution.
I was, I confess, greatly conce'rned about the terms of the resolution, not
because of its opening paragraphs, with which everybody wuld agree, but
because of the operative clause, that operative claize being the request that
the President of the United States of America named as suoh and the
Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics should renew their contacts.
That was a very, very important proposal. First of all, it had
defects and it had dangers. " To renew their contacts, interrupted recently"
was a clear reference, if to anything, back to the Paris conference when there
was to be a Summit Conference, when the four people were to meet. That was
the only period of interruption, and the contacts which were interrupted were
interrupted at Paris when those four great men were to meet. Yet, Sir, the
resolution moved by Mr. Nehru did not call for a Summit Meeting of the four;
* 2. it called for something quite different. It did not call on the four great
men, the four responsible men, the four men who led atomic power, to meet
again; it called on two people out of the four. That seemed to me to lend
colour to what I believe to be the false but no uncomming propaganda that the
real world issue is between the Soviet Union and the U. S. A.
The first real step was to get the four atomic powers, the four
powers which have it, beyond all understanding, the great powers of peace
and war in their hands, to meet. I would have thought that that was the first
thing to get those four people to come together, not because of some oddities
about Great Britain or the United States or France not at all but because
they happened to be the people who had atomic weapons and who, therefore,
had enormous powers of life and death for all the rest of us in the world.
Something could come, from my point of view, of a meeting between the four;
nothing could come of a resolution which said that two out of a resolution which
said that two out of the four ought to meet together.
That resolution was moved, and the the distinguished Prime Minister
of Great Britain, the Rt. Hon. HaroldMaaillan, and I he very naturally, end
I by some chance were invited to come to Washington to see the President of
the United States early on Sunday morning, October 2nd. Very naturally we agreed.
We said we would go.
On Saturday, October 1st, I had lunch with Mr. Macmillan and with
Lord Home. We had a little talk and we then flew to Washington. I dined with
them at the Australian Embassy with our Ambassador, Mr. Howard Beale. We dined
and we talked about these matters. Like me, they were troubled about the
resolution, and they were troubled about it for very obvious reasons. Straight
out support of the resolution would be travelling, we all thought, in the wrong
direction. Here was a resolution which said, " Let two people get together
and then everything may be arranged". But, on the other hand, straightout
opposition if we all voted " no" would be misinterpreted. People would look
at the first three or four recitals in the resolution, all in favour of
pease, and then, if we voted " no", we would be told that we did not want peace.
Therefore, straightout opposition would be misinterpreted.
That was a very difficult problem, Sir, I suggested on the Srturdnay
night that an amendment in positive terms might be put, and my el. stinguished
friends Mr. Macmillan and Lord Hone having heard what I had to say about this
matter, said that they would like to think it over. On the next morning, at
9.30 a rather intolerable hour on Sunday norning, we went to the White
House. My colleague my former colleague, our distinguished Ambassador,
Mr. Beale, was there, and we had a close discussion President Eisenhower,
Mr. Herter, the Secretary of State, Mr. Macmillan, the distinguished Prime
Minister of Great Britain, Lord Home, the Foreign Secretary, and myself.
I think, Sir, that I might be allowed to say that that morning,
and under those circumstances, the Americans were worried about the position
that had been created by the five-power motion. The President hinself had
received letters from the five powers India, Indonesia, Ghana, Yugoslavia
and the United Arab Republic enclosing the resolution, The President had
been working on a draft reply setting out reasons why a personal and special
meeting with Krushchev was not in the then atmosphere acceptable. I would not
wish honourable members to believe that this was a rather dour attitude on
the part of the United States of Amercia. All honourable members who have
witnessed these things know that Kr: u.-':. hev had made it just about as difficult
as anybody could make it for a meeting to occuro
In the course of the talks on the Sunday morning I said and let
me say at once that I take full responsibility for this that I thought it quite
useless to be coning down in favour of a resolution which on the face of it drid
some wrong things, as I understood them, or to be coming down flatfooted against
the resolution, in which case a lot of people would misinterpret the vote and
misinterpret the views, for better or for :-crse., and I s3-21" thir: for
better, I said " This kin-of reslutio i o J can
flat-footedly oppose or flat-footedly support.
* OWhy do we not have an amendment of this resultion which will bring the whole
of the United Nations back to the realities of the position?"
I say this,. because I understand there are some people who think that
I was a sort of fall guy. I think that is the term. On the contrary. I have
great pride in being the Prime Minister of this country and in having views of my
own on behalf of my country. Therefore, I said to them, " Well, why not have an
amendment? Why meet this thirgfull face? Let us have an amendment which in
positive terms will say what we believe to be the truth?" Wehad a discussion
about that. I do not want anybody to believe that they all agreed at once with
what I had to say, but at least I said it.
I want honourable members to understand that the Urnited States of
America was itself deeply concerned about this matter. It knew that to have a
resolution passed which put the whole onus on the President of the United States
was wrong. The Americans knew that this was putting the whole situation out of
balance. They knew, as I believe, that this idea that the whole conflict in the
world is between the United States and the Soviet Union is a false idea, a wicked
idea, something that has been devised and promulgated by people for no good
purpose. Therefore, they were deeply concerned. So, Sir, after an ahour and a
half of discussion that morning, I said that I thought we ought to have an amendment.
I did not care very much who moved it, but we ought to have an amendment. There we
were the President of the United States of America; Mr. Herter, the Secretary
of State; Mr. Macmillan, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom; Lord Home,
the United Kingdom Foreign Minister,. and myself. WLc were all discussing this
matter to and fro.
In the meantime, President Eisenhower had received a letter from the
five powers, signed by Dr. Nkrumah of Ghana, and containing the resolution, about
which I will say something later. The President himself had been, for the previous
S 24 hours, discussing with his advisers the problem of how this letter ought to be
Vanswered. For better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, I came in with my
idea that you could not deal with a problem of this kind by saying " yes" or " no"
that you might deal with it by saying, " Here is a positive proposal". And the
positive proposal that I htd to make was that there ought to be a renewed effort
to get a Summit Meeting of the Four not some theoretical meeting of the Two,
but a positive Summit meeting of the Four.
We debated that and they said, " Well, do you have an amendment in mind?"
I said, " Yes". They said, " What is it?" I indicated it in a rather vague way,
and said " All right. I will go away and draft it." This is very interesting. We
__ finished at 11 o'clock on Sunday morning. I went off, having promised to draft
V an amendment and to send it to the Secretary of State, Mr. Herter, at lunchtime
and to Mr. Macmillan and Lord Home, they got it by lunchtime. There it was. With
some small amendment, that was the amendment that I moved in the United Nations
General Assembly. They received it at lunctime and after luch we met at the British
Embassy the British Prime Minister, Lord Home, Mr. Herter and I. They had the
V terms of this proposed amendment. By the time we had talked it out on the Saunday,
I understood I have no reason to believe now that I had been wrong that they
approved of it. I think it is proper, Sir, to tell this House in my own country what the
proposal was. In the early part of the five-power resolution there had been three
paragraphs with which nobody could quarrel. My amendment was designed, not to
omit the earlier paragraphs, which-were quite good, but to omit the last paragraph.
The amendment was in these terms'
Omit the last paragraph of the draft resolution submitted by Ghana,
India, Indonesia, the United Arab Republic and Yugcolavia ( A/ 4522),
and substitute theref or the following:
I must ask honourable members to forgive me for this strange form of words used in
the United Nations
RECALLING that a Conference between the President of the United States of America,
the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics, the President of the French Republic and the Prime Minister of the
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland was arranged to take place
in Paris on 17 May, 1960, in order that these four leaders should examine matters
of particular and major concern for their four nations,-I think that is something.
that every honourable member would agree with Recalling the fact that the four
great leaders had met, not to discuss all the problems of the world,, but to
discuss matters on which they, as the leaders of the four great atomic powers,
might have something to say. The amendment continued
RECALLING FURTHER that the Conference did not actually begin its work,
NOTING that the President of the United States of America, the President of
the French Republic and the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Northern Ireland thereupon made a public statement in the terms
following:
I quote the words of three out of the four
" They regret that these discussions, so important for world peace,, could
not take place. For their part, they remain unshaken in their conviction
that all outstanding international questions should be settled not by the
use or threat of force, but by peaceful means through negotiations. They
themselves remain ready for take part in such negotiations at any suitable
time in the future".
I think it is not a bad idea to recall the minds of honourable members to the fact
that three out of the four leaders of the powers at Paris used those words, and
meant them. I went on from that to say in my amendment
BELIEVING that much benefit for the world could arise from a cc-operative
meeting of the Heads of Government of these four nations in relation to those
problems which particularly concern them,
Obviously, those problems were, for the atomic powers, Berlin and all those things
which are flsh-points of international affairs
BELIEVING FURTHER that progress towards the solution of those problems would be
a material contribution to the general work for peace of the United Nations,
URGES that such a meeting should be held at the earliest practicable date.
I would have expected, Sir, speaking in my own Parliament and among my own people,
that nothing would be said against that view. Here it was. Here was a call to
the four great powers to sit down together and try to make the world more safe for
ordinary people.
I out in my amendment. That was on a Monday. At that moment, it was well known
that Krushchev was not going to meet Eisenhower, unlcss, of course, Eisenhower went
through the remarkable performance of apologising about the U2 incident and withdrewing
all his claims about the PB47 incident and that the President himself had said
that he was not going to meet Krushchev on those terms. Therefore, the position was
that the current Prcsident of the United States and the current if that is the
right word head of the Soviet Union were not willing to meet personally without
conditions which mutually were completely unacceptable. On top of all that and lot
us be sensible about this matter at the very time at which we were having this
debate, a new President of the United States was about to be elected, and what he
would do or say, who would know?
I want to pause here, Sir, to make n few observations, because I have been tcl.'
by my friends nobody is so frank as a friend that some caonLints have been
voiced in Australia. I have tried to understand them because I am really a tclcrablbroad-
minded fellow. I understand that the first complaint is that I was being used
by the United States and the United Kingdom which, happen to be the two greatest
powers in the free world and our most powerful and devoted friends. I hope I hrve
answered that complaint. For better or for worse, the proposal for an amendment was
mine, no theirs. I thought, in my new-found innocence, that Austrlia was entitled to
a mind of its own. Indeed, I have been told br some of my fliends opposite in the
past that their great complaint is that we do not have a mind of our own. As I h-vo
said, I thoughtthat we were entitled to a mind of our own. Believing that a certain
course was right, I advocated it. I need not add any words to that.
In the second place, I gather from the critics that, in the interests of Austra! ia,
I should have preferred pleasing the five nations which I have named by supporting
something with which I strongly disagreed and with which I utterly disagree at this : o
ment to acting in c-ncert ' ith our most powerful and most ancmbiguous friends.
If that is the price of admiralty, then I resign from admiralty. I have
learnt, perhaps, very little in my life but I have learnt to know who are
our friends. Contrary to my expectation, it was ruled that the five power
resolution and my amendment should be discussed separately from the general
debate on Wednesd~ ay morning, 5th October. My major speech which appears to
have missed firedhere, for some reason or other, had been listed for the
afternoon. Therefore, unlike anybody else at the United Nations, I had to
make two separate speeches, instead of one. Therefore, on Wednesday morning,
knowing that on Wednesday afternoon, I had to make my most considerable speech,
I moved my amendment. This morning at question time, when I was treated so kin* dly, my
distinguished friend, the Deputy Leader of the Opposition ( Mr. Whitlam) said
to me, " I would like to know what you said on your amendment."~ I want to say
at once that I have arranged that the full text of what I said shall be made
available to members because, unhappily, it does not appear to have been rather
widely reported. I shall permit myself the luxury of quoting a few of the
things that I said that morning to the cold and unresponsive audience of the
United Nations General Assembly. I think I shculd do so. A motion had been
put down in the name of five powers and I was moving an amendment. ' Among
other things, I said
Let me say at once thc). t nobody can more warmly appreciate the high
motives of the 3ponsors of the resolution than I do. They feel, no doubt,
that it would be a bad thing if all the heads of state and heads of government
departed from this assembly without leaving behind some visible
evidence in the shape of a decision. They believe, no aoubt, that the people
of the world would be disappointed and, perhaps, disillusioned if we all
departed and nothing at all emerged. They, therefore, introduced this
resolution and part of its purpose, as it has been explained to me, was to
try to take advantage of the presence in north America, at the same time,
of President Eisenhower and Mr. Khrushchev. But if I believe, as I do, that
the effect of the resolution, if carriedwould be undesirable, then I am
bound to say so.
I hope that honourable members will realise that that was an authentic
Australian voice upon this matter. I went on to talk about the conference in
Paris, the conference which did. not occur, the conference which broke down
because of Khrushchev's attitude. I said
Many of us have thought that the discussions about nuclear tests
could have been brought within reach of finality.
I still believe that
After all, the great nuclear powers were not so widely separated
on this issue thaLt some effective lead could not have been given. But the
Paris conference failed even to begin, because the leader of the Soviet Union
would not participate. I have my own view about his stated reasons, but at
this moment I do not desire to debate them.
This was said in the morning
The material and relevant fact was that the leaders of the United
States, the United Kingdom and. France, promptly made a statement in which
they said:
I trust that this will be remembered for years but not, I hope with fears.
" They regret that these discussions, so important for world peace,
could not take plice. For their part, they remain unshaken in their conviction
that all outstanding international questions should be settled not by the use
or threat of force, but by peaceful means through negotiation. They themselves
remain ready to take part in such negotiations at any suitable time in the
future."
My speech continued This, it will be agreed, was a fair enr'ugh proposition, goodtempered
ana tenacious in the cause of peace. Should it be rejected now?
If we have now reached a point in our discussions when we feel that talks of
this kind should proceed, why should we not say so?
6.
Why should we, by carrying the five-nation resolution, dismiss the
United Kingdom and France from the first act? I went on to say this
it is worth remembering Mr. Nehru himself has frankly stated that
there are serious limits to the usefulness of bilateral talks; but
what I would wish to know is whether any valid reason can be
advanced for supposing that in some way the President of the United
States was the stumbling block, and that therefore in any renewed
discussions he should be the one leader of what we call the western
world to be brought under persuasion or pressure.
My own view is that we should incourage the resuoption of these
summit talks. No doubt, a meeting at the summit cannot be arranged
quickly or without preparation. We shall have to feel our way forward,
and a way may be found. But it will not be found in the next few days.
I doubt whether it can be found by trying to rush at it. The Australian
amendment reflects what I believe is the view of the majority here; that
we should try to rocalBure the hope that was offered to us in the early
part of this year when we were moving towards a summit meeting. I
concluded this excerpt by saying
There may indeed by other amendments. I should like to say for
myself that I am much less concerned about the details of
draftsmanship than I am to avoid the perpetuation of the motion
that the world conflict is between the United States and the
Soviet Union.
Before the morning session ended, in the course of which I regret to say
that my distinguished friend, Mr. Nehru, made a somewhat remarkable
commentary upon my amendment and my speech, the President indicated that
two further amendments were being circulated and that the matter would be
concluded at the night's session. This was on Wednesday. I will bypass,
for the moment, the afternoon session. At the night session Cambodia,
which after all is an Asian country, indicated that it would have
supported my amendment as a separate resolution. This was a merely
technical objection to its form. For some reason or other, and I still
do not understand it, because in these United Nations affairs I am a new boy,
the foreshadowed further amendments that had been referred to by the
President in the morningierenot submitted. So, the first thing which
happened after Cambodia hLi said this, vias th. t we vt-, on the AuBtrali-n
amendment. Of course this has given immense pleasure to a few people.
I do not kn.. w why they should be so pleasci that an . ustralian amondm. nz
should be defeated. Still, one lives and learns. So they voted on my
amendment. It was supporte, on the vote, by France, by the United Kingdom,
by the United States of . imurica, by Candada and by ourselves not a bad
voting group, I think. There w.: re 45 pc; ple who voted and 43 who
abstained. Very interestingly, amcng the people who abstained and who
said neither " yes" nor " no" were the Soviet Union, the entire Soviet bloc,
Japan, Laos, the Philippines, Thailand .' nd Cambodia, for the reason I
have referred to. It vcs then proposed that separate votes should be
taken this is a highly technical but fascinating problem for us who
are parliamentarians on the inclusion in the 5-power resolution of the
words " the President of" " The Chairman of the Council of inisters of".
This, of course, is something which we in our innocence in this
Parliament know nothing about. .' nyhow,, it was proosoe that separate
votes should be taken, and my distinguishoe friend, the Prime Minister
of India, Mr. Nehru, objected, I thought, vwith groat force, that if t'hose
words were omitted the 5-power resolution would be meaningless because, ., f
course, diplomatic relations had not been cut off between the United States
of Amorica and the Soviet Union. They had never beun interrupted. I
might say I thought he had a great deal of force in that but, as I Cdi
not likethe 5-power resolution, I remained relatively unmoved, except
intellcctually, by this argument. ' hat happened? Separ-te votes wcr: -u;
to the vote of the Assembly. I want to nmntion this to honorable members
because some people rather foolishly have trica to make it a:' pear that I,
representing you in t. is Parliament, had done someithing foolish an: d ad
been loft out on a limb. But when the separate votes worc rut to the vote
these in favour of separate votes in other words those who must be
regarded as being not in favour of the 5-power resolution as a whole were 37,
and against them were 36, with 22 abstentions. It is lovely, you know.
Some of you have been there but I had not been there before. Somebody
says " abstention" and somebody, being brought up in the French language,
says " abstentia", but it amounts to the same thing. There were, 37 in
favour of separate votes, 36 against and 22 absteitions. Those in favour
of separate votes and I mention this because some silly fellow who has
tried to pretend that I am bcooming bad friends with the Asian countries
has suggested the contrary included Pakistan, China, Japan, the
Philippines and Thailand. And if I may permit myself to say so, I do not
mind finding myself standing, as to three of these countries, alongside
our colleagues in the South-East Asian Treaty. When the separate votes
were taken, because it had been decided that there ought to be separate
votes, those in favour of retaining what I will call the " separate phrases",
the President of the United States of America, the Chairman of the Council
of Ministers of the Soviet Union, were 41 in favour, with 37 against and
17 abstentions. The President ruled that there should be a two-thirds
majority. There was not a two-thirds majority and the President's ruling
was upheld. All this was going on in the one day when oddities of all
kinds, Heaven help met were being published in my own country.-Those
who voted against the retention of these personal phrases, in other wor'. s
those who voted against the idea that we should betelling President
Eisenhower and Chairman Khrushchev to get together, included all of the
South-East Asian countries. That, I think, is something worth noting.
After all this argy-bargy I think that is the expression Mr. Nehru, the
very distinguished leader of India, stood up and said that, having rig8
to the voting, the five-power resolution would be withdrawn. So at
one o'clock in the morning of the same day the five-power resolution had
gone. You may ask what happened to my amendment submitted on behalf of
Australia. Many people have been eager beavers to say that my amendment
was just ridiculous and that I had made a fool of my country. When
I make a fool . of this country I hope that you will expel me. The fact
was that by one o'clock in the morning the resolution to which my
amendment had been unsuccessful alternative had been withdrawn. Withdrawn
because other amendments had been moved or other procedures had been adopted
which persuaded its sponsors to withdraw it.
I want to stress to honorable members that this is not a party
political matter. iall of us are Australians and we want to feel that our
country counts. The fact is that by the end of that day two remarkable things
had occurred. First, the proposal sponsored primarily by Yugoslavia, the
United Arab Republic, Indonesia and others had gone. It had been withdrawn.
In the meantime, in the course of the voting four atomic powers, the only four
atomic powers, had been called to the ballot. You may think that I am rather
foolish, but at any rate I called them to the ballot. Four of them. Great
Britain, France, and the United States had voted unhesitatingly for a convening
of the Summit conference as contained in my amendment, and the Soviet Union
had not voted but had abstained from voting. Four days later, under
circumstances which vexed the honorable members for East Sydney ( Mr. Ward) I
had a talk with the head of the Soviet Union Mr. Khrushchev, in which he made
it abundantly clear that he wanted a Summit conference. That was who he had
not voted against my amendment. He wanted a summit conference and by one
6' clock after midnight that day I went back feeling in my simple vanity
that at any rate we had now got to a state of affairs in which there would be a
after the American presidential election a Summit conference. It is very
difficult even for such an old hand as myself to understand why this achievement,
because it was something of an achievement, should be regarded as in some way
discreditable to our country, to which most of us were born.
To sum up, my amendment was lost, but the resolution was withdrawn.
Three atomic powers had voted for a Summit meeting and the Soviet Union had
abstained. Not one of the four atoiic powers was opposed to a Summit meeting.
I pass on from that. I made a speech thatafternoon. In my simplicity
I thought that that was the major speech, and my distinguished colleage the
Treasurer ( Mr. Harold Holt) whe was present probably God bibss him thought
likewise, because the speech in the morning was on this technical problem. As
I have said, I made a speech in the afternoon. It lasted for about 40 minutes.
It is very interesting for an Australian to go abroad and make a speech on the
great itfdrations platform. This was the only occasion in my life when the
American press swept a speech of mine into its columns. But that did not
0 8.
in the afternoon I had made up my mind that if Mr. Khrushchev were to come
and bully people taunt people, and beat things on the table, including
his shoes it was really high time that somebody speaking for 10,000,000
people that is all should make it quite clear to him that we are not
frightened. Therefore I let myself go, as you might say. But of course,
what happened in the United Nations Assembly, apart from all the beating on
the table and the wearing out of boot leather, which was all very funny from.
our point of view? I think thatMr. Khrushchev wanted to persuade or terrify
new nations into coming into his camp. We know nothing about that. We are
not easily persuaded and we certainly are rot easily terrified into somebody
else's camp. But that seemed to be his id3a. He had his heelers with him.
There were with him about half a dozen representatives from his satellite
nations who would not dare to applaud without first looking round to see
whether he gave the high sign. Wonderful: I wish that I could organize
that sort of thing some day' Mr. Khrushchov talked about colonialism. He
tried to read into the mind of some of the delegates a bitterness about their
old status. He was talking for the most part to people who represented
countries in Africa, which, by wise provenance on the part of the United
Kingdom, had ceased to be colonies and had become independent nations.
I thought that was a monstrosity. Anyhow, he did it. Therefore, I thqught
on your behalf if you do not agree with what I did you will say so/ ought
to use a few words mildly about this situation. Lot me quote one or two of the
words that I used, because apparently there has been some difficulty in
reporting them. I said
I bog of all these distinguished representatives I was referring
to the representatives of the new countries, primarily in Africa
to put bitterness out of their minds. So far as they are concerned, the
past has gone. The dead past should bury its dead. It is the present
and future that matter. Most of them know that political independence can
be won more swiftly than economic independence.
I pause here to repeat the last sentence because some rather silly fellow has
said that I was not on the same wave-length as the now countries. I leave
it to the House to decide. I said
Mostof them know that political independence can be won more swiftly
than economic independence. And yet both are essential to true
nationhood. Under those circumstances, nations which are older in
self-governmont should not be looking at new nations as people whose
support should be canv. issod, but as peo-ple who noed objective assistance
with no strings if the material prosprity of their people is to be
inprovod. It is one, of the significant things in contemporary history that
the advanced industrial nations arc, because of their scientific and tcchnelo-ical
advantages, improving their standards at a phenomenal rate; while loss
advanced countries, lacking the sane techniques on the same scale, are advanciat
a slower rate. This is not one of. the facts of lifo which one may observe an.;
having observed, forget. Its significance is that the gap between the adv:. nc
and the relatively unadvancod tends, unless we do som: thing about it, to .; row
wider every year. It is not a state of aff; irs which civilized and hu. ran;
thinking can indefinitely tolerate.
I said this on Australia's behalf, and I am sure that no
Honorable nmmber will disagree with it.
If in this Assembly and in the nations here repros'nted we will constant-t
remember that our trust is for humanity and that, indeed the United N-. ti
itself has no other reason for existence, we will more and more concertr. t_
our efforts on providing economic and technical help for new nations
very limit of our capacity; not because we want, to put it crudely, t. Ouy
then into our own ideas things, not only because we really and pas3: ion...-
ely believe in independence and frcddo);, but also becaus e believe that
our fellow human beings everywhere oa., entitl,;! to docont conditions of
life, and have enjugh sense to know th-t indepondence and freedom
and mere words unless the ordinary people of free countries have a chance
of a better life tomorrow.
This point of view seemed to me to underlie the temperate and
persuasive speech of Mr. Macmillan and other speeches made by democratic leaders.
But there are others who have so far misunderstood the spirit of
the United Nations as to resort to open or veiled threats, blatant and in scme
instances lying propaganda, a clearly expressed desire to divide and conquer.
They should learn that " threatened men live long", and that free nations,
however small, are not susceptible to bullying.
I am still quoting myself, which is an ill business. I continued
" I will permit myself the luxury of developing this theme,
though quite briefly, in the particular and in the general."
I hope non mcibcrr will not think me boring but this was a phase of my speech
which, I believe, had an irimense impact on the Assembly. I said
" In his opening speech, Mr. Khrushchev made his usual great play
about " colonialism". Ax Mr. Macrillan reminded us, the answer to much of
his story is to be found in the presence of this Assembly of many new
nations, once colonies and now independent.
Mr. Khrushchev said among other things: " Nations who oppress
other nations cannot themselves be free. Every free nation should help the
peoples still oppressed to win freedom and independence". This was, in one
sense, a most encouraging observation. It made me wonder whether we were
perhaps about to see a beginning of an era in which the nations of Europe,
which were once independent, and now are under Soviet Communist control, are
going to receive the blessings of freedom and independence. What a glorious
vista of freedom would be opened up by such a policy! How much it would do
to relieve the causes of tension, and promote peace!
I venture to say that it is an act of complete hypocrisy for a
Communist leader to denounce colonialism as if it were an evil charactcristic
of the Western Powers, when the facts are that the greatest colonial power
now existing is the Soviet Union itself."
This brings ec now to the point. I said
" Further, in the course of this Assembly, Mr. Krushchev was good
enough to r. ikc some references to my own country and its position in rclation
to the territories of Papua and New Guinea. He calls upon Australia to give
imediate full independence and self-govcrnment to New Guinea and Papua. As
a piece cf rhetoric this no doubt has it points. But it exhibits a distur-bir
want of knowlcdge of these Territories and of the present stage of their
development. Nobcdy who knows anything about these Territories and their
indiginous peoppe could doubt for a moment that for us in Australia to
abandon our responsibilities could be an almost crirminal act."
I am quoting this part of my speech because, subject to correction, I feel
that these vords impress themselves upon our friend. I said
" Here is a country which not so long ago was to a real extent
in a state of savagery. It passed through the n. cst gruesome experiences
during the last war,, It came out of it without organized administration,
and, in a sense, without hope.
It is not a nation in the accepted tense. Its people have no rcl
structure of association expect through our acmninistration. Its groups arc
isolated among mountains, forests, rivers and swaaps. It is estimates thr. t
there are cmre than 200 different languages."
Probably my distinguished colleague, the iinistcr for Territories ( Mr. Hasluck)
would tell me that I underestimated the number. I continued
" The -work to be done to create and foster a sense and organism of
community is therefore enormous.
But, v& th a high sense of responsibility, Australia has attacked
its human task in this almost unique area.
Since the war some form of civiliscd order has been establishc'd
over many thousands of square miles which were previously unexplored."
S.-LU. We have built up an ex ensive administration service...
Really, I do not need to trouble honourable members about this. I told them
the simple, dramatic and moving story of what has been done in Papua and
New Guinea, and I ended by saying
I could go no like this almost indefinitely.
The achievement has not been without cost, We have put many more
millions into Papua and New Guinea than have cvcr come out.
We have established many local government councils, democratically
elected on an adult franchise, and we have set up a Legislative Council on
which there is a gowing number of indigenous members.
Mr. Khrushchev includes us in his diatribe against " foreign
administrators who despise and loot the local population". I have
shown how exactly opposite to the truth this is in our case. His further
extravaganza about " the overseer's lash" and the " executor's axe" must
relate to areas with which he is more familiar than he is with New Guinea
and Papua. We do not need to be lectured on such matters by a man who has
no record whatever of having brought colonial people into freedon and
self-government. We indeed are proud to be in the British tradition
Sof the 20th century a tradition which has by sensible degrees
and enlightened administration brought the blessings of self-government
anda seat in the councils of the world to many former colonies.
I also spoke about neutralism, and I inflict this on honourable members
Neutralism is, of course one of those rather rotund words which
does not readily admit of definition, If, when we say that a nation is
neutral, we mean that it will not under any circumstances take arms in
any conflict which does not concern the protection of its own immediate
boundaries, it seems to be a notion hard to r econcile with the Charter
of the United Nations which contemplates under certain circumstances the
use of combined force in terms of the Charter itself.
Mr. Nehru, the distinguished leader of India, has not; think used the
word " neutral" in this sense. He and his government maintain largedefences
ia their own ccuntny, and are active supporters of the Charter. What
he has consistently made clear is that he stands for non-alignment, in
the sense that he will not engage in any special military or quasimilitary
alliance.
My own country does not subscribe to this view, since we are party,
for example, to the South-East Asian Treaty with the military
associations which are either expressed or implied in it. But we do not
quarrel with each other about these matters. I would think it impossible
to believe that some of the greatest leaders of so-called " neutral"
countries would regard themselves as being neutral in the great conflict
of ideas.
Sir, having said all that at, I am afraid, too great length, I now turn, quite
briefly I hope, to some genural observations about this rather historic
General Assembly meeting. First of all, a determined attack was made by the
Communist powers upon new nations to encourage what I have already dscribed as
" retrospective bitterness" I do not think that on this matter the tablethumping
succeeded.
In the second place, attempts were made todbfeat or to undermine the
Secretary-General. In particular, a very remarkable proposal was put forward
that there should be three secretaries-general instead of one; and for some
very odd reason, one ought to be from what we would call the Commnist group
but what Mr. Khrushchev-I apologize to my friends opposite calls the socialist
group, a second from the neutralist group and a third from the capitalist
group. of whioh, no doubt, I was one of the representatives. There ought to be
three secretaries-general, and everybody would have a veto on everybody else,
and therefore, of coursenothing would happen, and therefore the United Nations
would come to an end. He did not get very much success with that remarkable
proposal.
But there are some aspects of his general campaign about which
I think I should report to this Parliament. First of all, I believe that
what he has been saying and what he has been doing are designed to divide
the United Nations into the disunited nations. After all, if there is one
thing about the United Nations that matters, it is that it possesses
a sort of universali ty As I said in my own speech, hewants to produce a
result like anci" cn our late respected friend, Julius Caesar reported
that all Gaulwas divided . nto three parts. This manwants to divide the
United Nati. ns into three parts and therefore into the Disunited Nations.
One of the groups in this disunited body that he ants to produce is
what he keeps on describing as the neutralist groupo What is a neutralist
group. Sir, one of the things that I beg all honourable members on both
sides of the House to avoid is this f allacy of easy classification. So and
so is an African, therefore he must think like all other Africans' If one
African is neutralist, therefore he must be neutralist9 This is an insult to
people. Does anybody suppose that because people were born west of the
Soviet boundary in Europe, whether t hey are Germans, Frenchmen, Englishmen
or Italians, they a re t he same kind of men with the same kind of ideas?
This, of course, is utter nonsense. You may go overt he whole zone of
Africa andt ell me that so-and-so, so-and-so, and so-and-so must think the
same way because they are all Africans and they are all African leaders.
Sir, I tell you that the greatest speech made at this General Assembly was
made by the Prime Minister of Nigeria. He is a most remarkable man, and
his speech made an unforgettable impact on the minds of all of us. It would
insult this great man, the head of the Government of the greatest single
nation in the whole African continent, a nation of 40,000,000 people, to be
told that his country must be classified, along with other countries, in a
group or bloc. No one could have been more explicit than he was about the
need forevery nation to live its own life, to face its own future, to accept
its own responsibilities. The people who want to denigrate the whole of
modern independence and to treat new nations as if they were merely groups
to be bought like bunches of bananas, make a very great blunder. That
was perhaps the greatest blunder that Khrushchev made.
Let us consider the ways in which Mr. Khrushchev failed.
He failed to undermine the Secretary General, He filed to destroy the
work that has been done with regard to the Congo. Ho failed on
occasionafter occasion, and I will not take up the time of the
House in recounting them all, because I have already taken up far too
much of its time, He had some success, no doubto He may have
frightened somebody and he may have weakened a little the position of
the Secretary General; I do not know. You and I in this House
are fortunate to have grown up in such an atmosphere that we can
laugh at nonsense and not be frightencd by it, so how am I to know
to what extent Mr, Khrushchev succeeded inf rightening people?
He tried to disunite the United Nations, He tried to introduce some
strange dogma about neutralist groups. He ha d some points, I suppose.
He said that when the U. N. was c stablished it had 50-member nations,
that now it has nearly 100, and that therefore there ought to be some
reconstruction of thestructure of the organisation. I do not object
to that suggestion, so long as it is underst-cd that one of the
cangers that have grown up in the modern wcrld is t hat the General
Assembly, which has relatively little power, has become tremendously
important because the heads of Government attend it whereas t he chief
executive body and I am not using the word executive" in a
technical sense the Security Council, has been put rather on one
side. The Security Council, Sir, must continue to include in its membership
people who represent the great powers, which themselves are the
backbone of the U. N. and which themselves carry the major responsibility
for peace. But, subject to that proviso, I do not object to the
suggestion that a reconstruction of the UN, should be considered.
V 12.
I want to say one or two things more. I had the very valuable
opportunity of seeing, on your behalf, a number of world leaders.
I would not wish any member of this Parliament, on tiehter side, to
believe that I was being exclusive, talking to this side and not to
that side. In the course of rather less than three weeks I had the
closest discussions with President Eisenhower, with the American
Secretary of State, Mr. Herter) with Mr. Macmillan and Lord Home and
with Mr. Nehru. I had a long interview with Mr. Khrushchev. I
sought the interview, and I tell you quite frankly that the main
reason why I sought it was that I thought that if I cmoback here
and my friends, or friendly opponents, who sit opposite asked me
whether I saw Khrushchev and I replied that I had not, they might
think it rather odd. So I sought an interview with Mr. Khrushchev.
I had already expressed myself, as hon. members-wi-l have gathered from
what I have already said, with a certain degree of clarity.
Neveitheless, I had 70 minutes with Mr. Khrushchev, and I want to
say to the Hoixse that I came away from the interview quite
satisfied that he would like a summit conference. Being more
interested, as I am, in substance than in form, and as what I was
trying for from the day I arrived at the U. N. was the substance of
a summit conference, I am very pleased to say that three of the
atomic powers voted for a summit conference on my amendment, and
that the fourth, through Mr. Khrushchev, has indicated to me in the
clearest possible terms that a summit conference is considered a
good idea. I saw, of course, the Prime Minister of Ethiopia who is an
old friend of mine. I had a talk with President Tito. I spoke to
Mr. Luns, the Foreign Minister of the Netherlands. Dr. Subandrio,
of Indonesia, was a guest of mine, and I had a long talk with him.
Indeed, one would be surprised at the number of people who concern
us in this world with whom, in the course of a fortnight or three
weeks9 one can have useful talks.
I have occupied the time of the House long enough. Having
said that I believe that Mr. Khrushchev wants summit talks, and
that I think something might come of them, I would like to conclude
by saying that I have by no means been disposed to defend myself
on the matters about which I have spoken. I believe in my heart
and in my mind that I pursued the right course at New York, and
that I spoke and acted in the best interests of my country.
I move