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Supplies and Personnel.
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12. When the fleet sailed into the harbour on the 30th August the waterfront was lined with tens of thousands of Chinese. An observer remarked that the watchers betrayed no interest in whether the ships were British, American, Russian or Chinese; all they said was: "Now we shall eat". One of the Administration's first obligations, therefore, was to temper to the Chinese community the hard fact that the liberators had brought nothing which filled stomachs or furnished houses. Adequate supplies had been promised, and the promises were duly passed on to the anxious community, but for the moment the Colony was entirely dependant on the foodstuffs left behind by the Japanese and the slow trickle of local commodities which was beginning to find its way from the hinterland and the delta. The non-Chinese population was fed from service rations. On the 16th September the Colony had a reserve of rice sufficient for ten days consumption. At no time during the first three months of the Administration did the reserve position materially improve. By the 25th October, Hong Kong had received a total of 6,000 tons of rice shipped from S.E.A.C. territories, compared with an estimated minimum requirement of 21,000 tons for the 7-week period. By the end of November, supplies received had risen to 17,000 tons against a minimum requirement of 36,000 tons.
13. The general supply position differed from that of rice only in a somewhat less degree of urgency. The developing situation can best be illustrated by a series of extracts from confidential reports covering the period September to January.
October 31st. "After eight weeks there are very few problems which the arrival of reasonable supplies would not go far to solve".
Nov. 9th. "From now on until supplies reach us we lose
ground".
Jan. 13th.
"Since the beginning of November practic- ally every condition of normalcy has obtained except freedom of supply".
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Jan. 23rd. "The general fall in the price level which has been continuous since last October has now been halted; the reason is the continued shortage of all supplies".
Jan, 30th. "Most of our improvisations on arrival were designed to cover up a supply situation which we supposed would be relieved within three or four months. The danger is that, approaching our sixth month still without supplies, we are in a fair way to being found out”.
14. The technique of improvisation in the first few months was to despatch special missions to all contiguous countries where it seemed possible that urgently needed supplies might be obtained without doing too much violence to the established regional supply machine. By the end of October individual officers or parties had been sent to Borneo for firewood, to Shanghai and Hongay for coal, and to Kwongchowan for peanut oil. In December a representa- tive mission was sent to Australia for building materials and household supplies, and in January officers were sent to India in search of cotton yarn and to Okinawa and New Guinea to negotiate for surplus war equipment. These sorties were in only one case marked by conspicuous success but they serve to illus- trate the unremitting efforts which were made to relieve a supply situation which remained precarious throughout the whole period of the Administration.
15. A succinct commentary on the personnel position lies in the fact that the officer who went to Borneo to negotiate for supplies of firewood had to be amputated from a Police Branch already 85% under strength. By the 15th November, the overall establishment had been implemented up to 18% of its approved figure. At the end of January the number of available personnel stood at a possible minimum; never during the whole period was it satisfactory. One result of this was that all ranks posted during the early months were cruelly overworked; another was the virtual disintegration of a carefully planned War Establish- ment, since officers who had been selected for and posted to departments which it was considered unnecessary or undesirable to revive, such as those dealing with censorship and immigration,
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