A
FAR 071/1
CONFIDENTIAL
12
HKK abl
PARTY MO. 51
1 @ JUL 1978
Mr Munro
Defence Dept
DEAK OFFICER
INDEX
RESI TR
PA
Action T
No
Your Minute of 11 July: RAF LOAN SERVICE POSTS (LSP)
1. You are right to see a potential difficulty over Brunei.
2. We have only just secured agreement with the Sultan on our new Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation, as part of which there is to be an exchange of Notes on
the provision of assistance to the Armed Forces of Brunei to be initialled in September and signed in December).
3. If we made any move as regards withdrawing RAF pilots at the present time, the Sultan would smell a rat, and the whole Treaty could be at risk. During the recent negotiations he made a particular point of mentioning his previous disappointments over the supply of LSP. He was reassured by Lord Goronwy Roberts that we would fulfil our promises in future.
4
In view of the labour involved in getting the Bruneis to agree with us, and the consequences - not least for the Hong Kong garrison if the agreement falls to the ground (which MOD would not want), there is no alternative to treating Brunei as an exception to the procedure now proposed. We would certainly need to submit to Ministers if any alteration in the extent of our present commitments to the Bruneis were foreseen. It is unlikely that Ministers would agree to the change.
14 July 1978 Copied to:- HKGD (Mr Stagg. MED (Mr Major)
A M Simons
South East Asian Department
CONUTRENUTA E