Before leaving Australia for the Geneva Conference on Korea and Indo-China, the Minister for External Affairs¹ stated that of the two issues, Indo-China presents the greatest risk, in that war is actively going on; that it is important that any settlement should not be on terms which mean that Vietnam (and possibly Laos and Cambodia) are swallowed up soon afterwards into the Communist empire; and that in both Indo-China and Korea the Australian Government policy is to give very great consideration to the views of the people of these countries. ‘In each case’, he said, ‘our aim has been to defend the independence of the people themselves, and to allow their national development in accordance with their own wishes, free from fear of outside invasion or the imposition of alien Communist domination upon their old and distinguished culture’.

There are many different interests now concerned with Indo-China; one might say seven, the Chinese, Soviet, American, French, British, Australian and that of the Associated States themselves; and there is not so much an interest as a definite point of view shared by India, Burma, Thailand and Indonesia.

To begin with the Associated States: under agreements made in 1949, France granted internal autonomy to the three Associated States, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Foreign relations were to be conducted in consultation with France, and Vietnam appointed diplomatic representatives in Washington, London, Rome and Bangkok. If a foreign state wishes to appoint a representative to one of the three Associated States, agreement is sought from the State and also the President of France as President of the French Union. However, the French retained all the old colonialism and foreign trade remained largely in French hands because of exchange control. Altogether apart from Communism, which in Asia is mainly an empty-stomach plea for something better, there is a fairly general resentment against France in all of Indo-China. The wise solution would have been for France to get out of Indo-China as the Dutch got out of Indonesia. French prestige prevented this, since the existence of the three States within the French Union means that France may still regard itself as a world power. The alternative second-best solution would have been for France honestly to have implemented the realities of dominion status to the three States; but France feared repercussions in North Africa. Yet, were it not for the cost in money (one-quarter of the annual French defence budget, despite that America has paid more than half of the French costs in this seven-years’ war), and in manpower (185,000 French troops have been poured into Indo-China and the cream of the officer corps), France would today be on its feet; its economy would be in balance; its fear of Germany would lessen.

In a recent conversation, Mr. Casey mentioned to me what he thought were the complications hindering transfer of power to the States, i.e. (i) Dislike of each other by the three States; (ii) the French have had to keep the direction of the war in their own hands as otherwise they would risk allowing the Vietminh to move in as they moved out; (iii) there was no real policy in Paris due to the frequent changes of Government; (iv) there was reluctance on the part of the French officials stationed in Indo-China to hand over; and (v) the inability of the States to run their own affairs efficiently. The position was not as in India where the Congress Party reflected national feeling. The only party capable of taking over efficient control would be the Vietminh, which, Mr. Casey said, was under definite Communist direction.

Washington has long since regarded Indo-China as necessary for American defence; President Eisenhower stated so in his radio report to the nation on August 16th, 1953. If Indo-China goes, he said, the Malay Peninsula would be hardly defensible. Mr. Dulles’s recent call for a joint warning to Peking on the consequences of direct Chinese intervention, coinciding with threats of more direct American intervention, has been followed by the declaration of Mr. Dulles and Mr. Eden that they are ready to take part with other countries principally concerned in an examination of the possibility of establishing a system of collective defence to assure the peace, security and freedom of South-East Asia and the Western Pacific within the framework of the United Nations.

The Australian press takes this to mean that Asian countries will be included in an Asian NATO ‘for their own salvation’. Such countries as India, Burma, Thailand, and Indonesia do not see it in that light. The diplomatic representatives of these countries in Canberra are in agreement that if the Western powers wish to bring democracy to Asians, they must try something more tactful than beating them over the ears with it. Democracy started out in post-war Asia with the tremendous handicap of being identified with colonialism. Communism started with the tremendous advantage of never having been tried in the area, and consequently, Communist promises stood a far better chance of being believed than democratic ones. They are agreed that Ho Chi Minh² represents the mass of the people of Vietnam, who are not Communists but want to live in Vietnam and to exploit their own resources. They regard the French as colonial exploiters and the Americans as interested in using their country as an American defence outpost. In brief the Asians do not see their ‘salvation’, in anything like the light in which it is seen by America and Australia.

The Australian position is firmly based on fear and powerlessness; hence Australia’s insistence on America’s underwriting the defence of Australia in the ANZUS treaty.³ That a Liberal Government had to do this, through Australia’s fear of Japan, and that Britain took it so sorely, weighs heavily on the Liberal Party’s conscience. When announcing the Dulles-Eden statement,⁴ the Acting Minister for External Affairs, Sir Philip McBride,⁵ said that while the proposed new Asian and Western Pacific organisation was not an expansion of the ANZUS Treaty, the first step in the direction of establishing a system of collective defence for the Pacific area was taken at the initiative of the present Australian Government in 1950, when negotiations began with the United States and New Zealand for the ANZUS Treaty.

China has traditionally regarded Indo-China as within its legitimate sphere of interest; and, while prevented by lack of means from giving to Ho Chi Minh, on purchase or loan, anything like the war supplies given gratis by the United States to France, is none the less determined that Indo-China will not become an American Asian base. Japan wants to stay out of all commitments in its building-up period. Indonesia is interested in standing aside, having its own internal difficulties in the settling-down period, and its potential clash with the Netherlands regarding Irian, or Dutch New Guinea.

There is a large body of Catholics in Indo-China, who have been Catholics since the 17th century and who have their own Indo-Chinese bishops. Vietnam has a Catholic population of 1,435,740 almost as large as Australia’s; ministered to by 1,534 priests and some 3,500 nuns. One in ten of the population is Catholic. Foreign priests are not numerous and almost all of the nuns are Vietnamese natives. The position, therefore, is not as in mission countries, like Japan and China. A Columban father who had been on Monsignor Dooley’s staff and has recently returned to Sydney told me that the French had largely neglected education of the people and the French missionaries were not much interested in building schools, which, they argued, would probably be taken from them by the French Government if they became important. The most educated people are the native Catholic priests, and the Delegate finds it difficult to keep them out of politics, as their education makes them the natural leaders of their people. The majority of the best Vietnam civil servants, he said, have long since gone over to Ho Chi Minh.