377
MR. CI UTTERBUCK agreed that the purchase would be
unlikely to take place for some time, and he enquired how
long it would be before a result could be expected from
the Foreign Office discussion with other signatories to
the Treaty.
MR. CAMPBELL stated that initiation of negotiations
would not take long, but it was of course impossible to
gay when a final result could be expected. The views sut
forward by Mr. Clutterbuck were generally satisfactory
to the Foreign Office who would prefer to delay acquiring
the land, The Foreign Office had in fact boen in the
curious position of being less particular on a point of
purely political interest than the Colonial office and the
Treasury The Foreign Office had in fact been willing
to stretch a point and allow the purchase of the land
owing to the views of the Service representatives and to
the suggestion that if the land was not immediately
acquired it might rise considerably in value.
if
COLONEL HUMPHREYS asked what the position would be
the negotiations with Japan and Amerio a failed, He
considered that it was absolutely essential for us to have
en aerodrome for possible use against China, and asked why
the question could not be tred ed in the seme way as the
question of the Movable Armament at Hong Kung had been,
namely that coast defences should not be mentioned and that
Jepan and America should merely be informed that we
intended to contruct an aerodrome.
In reply to Mr. Fass, MR. CAMPBELL stated that the
considered opinion of the Legal Advisers of the Foreign
Office was that the actual song trustion of an aerodroMƏ
might be a breach of the Treaty. At the same time they
thought that the chance of its being considerod so was very