SECRET
the fence). (See Carter's letter to Cowperthwaite
of 26 March 1969).
But in your letter to Carter
of 9 April 1969 you said that the fence was a
separate issue (I am not clear what you meant by
that and in his letter of 2 October 1970
that ar
Jeaffreson said - "we consider the fence to be a
matter of external rather than internal security
and thus a proper charge on HM Government."
went on to ask us to approach the Treasury on
your behalf.
<<
Since by that time we were well
and
into the negotiations over the defence contribution
we decided that it would be wiser from everyone's
point of view not to run the risk of complicating
those already difficult negotiations by introducing
this extraneous factor.
4.
We now have to approach the Treasury since
we are being pressed by MOD for reimbursement of
their votes; and my purpose in writing is to let
you know how we in the FCO view the situation and
to agree with you the line we should take in our
disucssions with the Treasury.
5. The Frontier Fence. Our information of the
purposes for which the fence was built comes from
Hong Kong telegram number 1320 of 29 August 1967.
Frankly, we are not at all happy about Hong Kong's
position over this item. Although it was stated
in the telegram that "the object of this obstacle
will be to stop land incursions of all kinds" there
seems to us to be little doubt that the primary
/purpose
(13) on
с Уний 10)4
D HKK 10/9
A
Don Hars 10/17
3
twis
E
10/16.
SECRET
NOTHING TO BE WRITTEN IN THIS MARGIN