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again including local employees, by about one half. He was still considering how this should be effected but was, of course, taking account of the changes
in our equipment and, in particular, of our greatly increasing air reinforce- ment oapability. His general feeling at this stage was that it would be
most scnsible for our forces in Malaysia and Singapore to be mainly maritime
and air. In this way Britain would provide the sophisticated and expensive
backing which Malaysia and Singapore would find it difficult to provide for
themselves. Morcover, we had to take into account Malaysia's growing
capability and effectiveness on land.
3. Tun Razak interjected that this seemed good sense but he was really
concerned about our long term intentions. Mr. Healey asked whether Tun
Razak thought it seemed sensible that Britain should concentrate on naval
and air forces. Tun Razak replied that it seemed entirely sensible though
some of his military advisers were keen on a land presence. Mr. Healey
said that we were still discussing with Australia and New Zealand whether
the Commonwealth Brigade should remain in existence and so far no decision
had been taken about this. The Australians and New Zealanders seemed
anxious that it should remain in existence though we had doubts about it and,
of course, it ran counter to the air and naval approach we had outlined.
Tun Razak and Dr. Lim again indicated a preference for the air and naval
approach.
4. The High Commissioner said that it was important that the Malaysians
should understand that the manpower reduction in Malaysic itself would be
much more than 50%. Mr. Healey said that on our present concept there was
no land forces at all in Malaysia by about 1972, that reinforcement could
well take longer, and that in defence terms at least this would mean that
the interdependence between Malaysia and Singapore would increase. The re
would, however, be the amphibious force with its commanders.
5. Mr. Healey turned to the longer term question and said that the British
Government's view was that the right planning assumption to take was that by 1975/76 no British forces would be based on the mainland of Asia. He
explained that it was very necessary that we should plan ahead not only for
military reasons, for example, decisions about new weapons and the size and shape of the British forces, and also for political reasons. The political situation in Asia was developing rapidly. It might well be that by about the middle of the 1970s there would be some form of Asian grouping on the
lines Tun Razak had discussed with him on his last visit. The United States
had already publicly made it clear that once peace was assured in Vietnam
they had no intention of keeping their forces on the mainland of Asia but would follow what had been called a peripheral strategy from their bases
in Guam, Okinawa and elsewhere. There had been no final decision yet as to whether there should be an announcement about the longer term position
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