INDONESIA

My telegram No.129. [1] After drawing up a long list of objections
to the Cochran proposals [2] the Netherlands Government now
apparently have decided to put forward two only namely
(1) That the proposal to hold free elections at the present time
is impossible and so a Constituent Assembly could not be set up in
the way proposed.

(2) Impossibility of securing Parliamentary sanction here for the
Cochran plan as it stands.

2. Last night I talked to the Secretary General of the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs and tried to impress on him the futility of their
present purely negative attitude. If they felt that the situation
in the Republic made elections impossible they should put up the
very best alternative. If they allow the situation to drift they
will find themselves back in the hopeless situation of 1946.

3. Lovink accepted my criticisms in good part and said that the
Government had decided to try and find a way out of the difficulty
and would be putting forward a proposal of their own within the
next two or three days. I expressed the hope that the proposals
would be practical and based on the situation and not drafted from
an extremely [3] juridical angle trying to protect every possible
right.

4. The Minister for Foreign Affairs arrived at Paris this
afternoon.