INDONESIA

1. When the High Commissioners' meeting resumed this morning Bevin
was present as well as Noel-Baker. Menon, Goonetilleke and I
repeated briefly what we had said yesterday [1] and enlarged on
the concern we felt at the effect of the United Kingdom attitude
on British interests in South East Asia.

2. Egeland for South Africa said he had no instructions but that
while the Dutch had been stupid he personally felt that the Dutch
Prime Minister was completely sincere and that 'many wild charges'
against Dutch were unjustifiable and deplorable. He said Dutch
honestly believed they were preventing spreading of Communism
which I had said was one of the results of their policy. He said
that the Indonesian Republic represented only a 'small pocket in
Indonesia'. Robertson of Canada said he agreed with much that
Egeland had said but that he did not know what instructions the
Canadian Representative on the Security Council would have for the
forthcoming meeting. Rahimtoola (Pakistan) associated himself
strongly with what India and Ceylon had said.

3. Bevin said he did not regard the matter as Regional. Britain's
interests in the world are indivisible and the United Kingdom
Government did not consider matters piecemeal i.e. it did not
determine policy in relation for some other geographical interest.

The tests are two-
(A) What is right;

(B) What can be done.

4. Bevin recalled that at the meeting of British Commonwealth
Prime Ministers [2] he had suggested that there should be some
regular means of consultation between Commonwealth Countries
directly interested in South East Asia. He took full
responsibility for all that representatives of United Kingdom at
Security Council had said and criticised Hodgson for using wild
language [3] which did not help, but beyond saying that he thought
Falla's action [4] in abstaining on resolutions of which he had no
notice and giving the Dutch a further 4 hours for reporting the
action they proposed to take in relation to Security Council
resolutions was justified, he did not specifically attempt to
define Falla's statements. Menon yesterday had criticised Dening's
reference [5] in Security Council to Soekarno's collaboration with
the Japanese 'as prejudicing fair consideration of the issues'.

Bevin said that Dening had stated facts and Soekarno had been
responsible for the assassination of British Officers and troops
after the Japanese surrender which explained hard feelings he,
Bevin, might have about Soekarno.

5. After recapitulating how Dutch had broken their undertakings
Bevin said that the fact that Dutch enjoyed sovereignty in
International law in the East Indies seemed to be overlooked by
some members of Commonwealth. He then at great length defended
British policy in Security Council in a number of matters
including especially Palestine so as to show that the United
Kingdom was not undermining the Council's authority. He went on to
say that he had opposed sanctions from the start because it had
always been plain that the Security Council shrank from the idea
of sanctions-it did in the case of Kashmir, Hyderabad and
Palestine. He had no doubt that Commonwealth countries if
sanctions were decided on would attempt to carry them out but said
that there would be no serious attempt by any other Nations. (High
Commissioners interjected that their Governments had not proposed
sanctions.)
6. I am bound to report that Bevin tried to avoid some of the real
issues by treating the criticisms made by British Commonwealth
Governments as attacks on him personally and defended his honesty
and sincerity quoting in the end a telegram from Nehru of
yesterday paying tribute to 'the sincere efforts of Attlee and
Bevin' in the matter of Indonesia. We insisted that his honesty
and sincerity were never in question and both Menon and I repeated
that the public impression was that United Kingdom's policy on
Indonesia was not as firm as the statements that have been made to
the Dutch. Was felt therefore that he had been misrepresented. He
replied that Dening's statement in Security Council was perfectly
plain adding 'I was excitable as a young man but I am becoming
more cautious in old age'.

7. Bevin promised that all we had said would be reported to the
Cabinet with which he would be discussing the whole question early
in the week.

8. I should also mention that the Ceylon High Commissioner towards
the end pressed that the Governments which would be represented by
their Prime Ministers at Delhi should be told as soon as possible,
what United Kingdom policy now was. This provoked some fruitless
exchanges on the purposes of the Delhi Conference which were
clearly embarrassing to Menon and Bevin because Nehru had kept
United Kingdom fully informed of his plans in relation to the
conference and there is no substantial conflict between India and
the United Kingdom on the matter.

9. I raised specifically the report [6] of Wells of the New York
Times and Bevin promised to look into it immediately.

10. You will receive from United Kingdom High Commissioner,
Canberra, the text referred to in paragraph 8 my 6, 7th January
1949.