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their case too far. If I pursue these points a little, I am sure you will appreciate that it is not for the purpose of prosecuting an inter- departmental vendetta but merely in order to achieve the right solution to our practical difficulties. In the first place, it has on more than one occasion been urged by the Treasury in discussions over recent months that the provisional arrangement which was made in March, 1946, for dealing with "hangover" supplies was only intended to last for a few weeks in order, as it were, to give people time to think and that some new arrangement was to be made ther after for any "hangover" supplies still outstanding. As usually happens on these bothersome questions, the relevant records seem to be much less full and explicit than could have been wished, but everything which we have on our files not only fails to confirm the Treasury contention as stated above, but points clearly in the other direction. Thus telegram No. 10471 0.A. 13, addressed by the War Office to SACSEA and a number of other recipients (the document does not seem to bear a date, but was evidently sent in the last few days of March, 1946), states categorically that requirements accepted as valid Civil Affairs requirements before the first of April, 1946 but still outstanding would be met, if possible in full, as a military commitment, though it is added that "all financial implications of this decision are not yet clear". The note of a meeting held in the War Office on the 20th March, 1946, and attended by James on behalf of the Treasury is equally clear in the same sense. The possibility of subsequent financial adjustment was carefully kept open (the Colonial Office have no wish to deny this fact,) but there can be no doubt that the arrangement made towards the end of March was intended to cover all "hangover" supplies, however much they might be delayed in shipment.
It was agreed, it is true, that the Crown Agents should shortly take over the physical arrangements for shipping these supplies, but that does not affect my immediate point. It is also truc, no doubt, that the shipment of the supplies in question dragged on longer than anybody had expected (they did not finally dry up until November, 1946) but this can provide no grounds fcr altering an arrangement in principle which was agreed upon by all Departments concerned and was intended to be comprehensive. That agreement, at the risk of repetition, was that all cutstanding stures which had been originally accepted as Civil Affairs requirements should be carried as a military commitment in the first instance, subject to a possible financial adjustment at a later stage.
4. The second point on which we cannot accept the Treasury contention as urged in recent months concerns the delay in getting this whole matter settled. At some of our discussions it has been said by the Treasury representative, in so many words, that the Colonial Office must take the consequences if they are now faced with the unpleasant necessity of exacting large sums of money from the Far Eastern Cclonial Governments at a very late stage, since they have none but themselves to blame for the fact that they did not apprcach these Governments many months ago when the Treasury first urged them to do so. Here again, I must emphasise that I am not taking up these remarks by the Treasury representative for the sake of scuring a debating point, or of vindicating the honour of the Colonial Office on a purely historical question at the expense of other Government Departments. Certain dclays have undoubtedly occurred in this matter, and the Colonial Office does not claim to be blameless in this respect; but if it can be shown that the delays were simply due to the great pressure of work in Whitchall generally and not to the unique fault of the Culonial Office, it will make a big difference to our practical consideration of the question, since it can then be legitimately urged by the Colonial Office that the delay should be taken into account in reaching a final settlement. And on this point I find that the records are as emphatically in our favour as on the other. you will look at paragraph 8 of the enclosed nute, you will see that the
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Treasury