Mr.
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Loxo, HUED
PERSONAL AND CONFIDENTIAL
HKB 063
Ti
RECEIVED IN REGISTRY
Foreign & Commonwealth
Office
London SW1 2AH
IN
Sir David Wilson GCMG
HONG KONG
25 JUN1991
M
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Mr Saul or
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17 June 1991
√/22/
File: HKD
193
Dear Janid,
DEFENCE COSTS : PATROL CRAFT AND THE GULF
1. Thank you for writing on 3 June about the Hong Kong contribution to HMG's expenditure in the Gulf and the connection between that and the matter of the Royal Naval Patrol Craft.
2. You were right to recall that, in September last year, I mooted the possibility of a contribution from Hong Kong. That was a purely personal suggestion, not one stimulated by the office or indeed cleared with Lord Caithness at the time. As I recall it, it arose simply from the fact that Governments were having to handle the appalling problem of the large Asian populations who were being displaced from Kuwait, and I thought that Hong Kong could win some Brownie points by making a quick contribution. Of course, you had some convincing reasons why this would have been unwise.
3.
I was away in the Sub-Continent when the issue came back, at the end of the Gulf War, and you had exchanges with Robin McLaren. I was not fully privy to them, but I believe that the suggestion that Hong Kong should make a contribution arose directly from a much more vigorous campaign organised in the FCO, at Treasury and No 10 request, to get other countries to help defray the costs of the fighting. Needless to say, the sums of money then spoken about were inordinately greater than the costs of moving people around the previous September. The campaign was a rather confused affair, with Ministers torn between their keenness for others to share the burden and their reluctance to hand round a begging-bowl. Opinions were highly charged after allies such as Belgium made public their initial reluctance to get involved.
4.
I don't know what amount of arm-twisting you experienced, but I do know that, in the FCO at least, there was considerable recognition that a contribution from Hong Kong was not easy to secure and that it was a welcome gesture nonetheless. So you should not think that the effort went
unregarded.
/5.
PERSONAL AND CONFIDENTIAL