Mr David Sumberg: Sir Percy, you have used the word 'confrontation' quite a lot; how then do you imagine one justifies the 15 sessions that Sir Robin McLaren has had in terms of negotiations over the last months, in terms of trying to come to an accommodation - in fact, as we understand it, having made concessions, in an effort to satisfy Chinese opinion? I cannot see that we have done any more than proceed in a proper manner with intense negotiations over a considerable period of time.
Sir Percy Cradock: I am glad you mention the negotiations, and I am glad you mention Sir Robin McLaren, for whom I have the highest respect. I am sure that he is a skilled negotiator, and if there has been any problem or any failing it certainly has not been on the part of him or his team, so I am very happy you have given me the chance of making that point. But I am afraid Sir Robin McLaren, like other officials and ambassadors, receives his instructions from Ministers, and the question is 'What are the instructions that he has been given?'. Now in this matter we began, if you remember, by a rather heavy-handed and public approach. I think if we had approached it quietly in October 1992 we might have extracted concessions which of course are out of the question after six months or so of trench warfare. I don't say they would have been big concessions; they would not, they would have been fairly small, but they would have been something.
So we started off like that; we had some months of shouting at each other, then fortunately sanity took over. At the time, if you remember, I advocated an end to
to confrontation and a beginning of quiet negotiation. That was much criticised at the time, but in April of this year we did get together and go back to the old pattern of negotiation, confidentially, between London and Hong Kong. It has to be that, Mr Sumberg; the Chinese will not have a three-cornered negotiation.
Unfortunately, because we had taken up such a attitude to begin with, we were hooked, and the Chinese since public
they responded publicly, or had to, were equally hooked. Neither side could carry out the necessary retreats and accommodations for settlement. I think the Chinese have been extremely
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