PM Transcripts

RENAMING OF U. S. NAVAL COMMUNICATION
V00 4f AT NORTH-WEST CAPE, W. A. SEPTEMBER 1968
Speech by the Prime Minister, Mr John Gorton
I must begin, your Excellency, by thanking the President of
the United States, through you, for the message, which through you, he
delivered to us today. It is a unique thing for a United States Naval
Communication station of this kind to be named after the national of another
country. But I thin'k for a number of reasons, it is entirely fitting that in
this case it should be so.
For one thing, it is fitting because I do not think that there was
any Australian statesman or any statesm ' an from any other nation who
established such warm, close, personal relations with a President of the
United States as were established by Harold Holt. And this is a matter
which goes beyond a mere personal satisfaction in such relations and
extends into national benefits that flow from them.
It is fitting too because this station, as part of a giant network
keeping watch and ward on all the oceans of the world, is a station which
will enhance the military capacity, not only of the United States but also
of our own nation, Australia.
Military caepacity can be used in many ways. It can be used to
subjugate peoples and overthrow feeedom as we saw it used by Hitler and
Mussolini. It can be used to stifle freedom of expression as we recently
saw it used in Czechoslovakia. It can be used for invasion and aggression
as we saw it used in Korea, and as we are seeing it used by North Viet
Nam in South Viet
But military capacity can be used in other ways. It can be used
as a shield for freedom, It can be used as a method of deterring aggression,
of maintaining freedom, of succouring the weak. An d the United States
and Australia has used, and in my belief will always use, its military capacity
merely for the latter purposes. So it is fitting again that these purposes
should be served by a station named after a man who had these ideals as
those he would wish to see all over the world.
Finally, Sir, it is also fitting that this should be a Naval
Communication Station because the late Prime Minister was a man who loved
the sea and who was happiest when close to the sea.
We feel honour, Sir, at what you have done. We feel confidence
in what this station will help our countries to shield, and we remember that
a year agq the man after whom this station was named stood here and opened
the complex. I hope you will convey to your President the gratitude of the people
of Australia that this gesture has been made, and the resolution of the p eople
of Australia that in co-operation with the United States, we shall seek to
secure that peace with freedom of which, Sir, you have spoken.
I thank you.