Ministers appreciated this dilemma and accepted a proposal, agreed to by the Chiefs of Staff, for its solution on the following lines: an overall Commander of all three Services in Hong Kong should be appointed; for the time being, at least, the Civil Governor's powers and functions should remain unimpaired, except that he should be given Instructions that, in the event of a clash of opinion between himself and the Commander, Hong Kong as to the necessity for. or execution of, any security measures, the viewsS of the latter should prevail. Formal Instructions to this effect, approved by the Prime Minister, reached me in Singapore, and on arrival in Hong Kong I made it my first business to acquaint the Governor with the nature of the Instructions of which I was the bearer.
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4. After dinner, on the evening of my arrival, I had two hours private discussion with the Governor, Sir Alexander Grantham. He had received a warning telegram from the Secretary of State for the Colonies, and I found him most approachable and in general responsive and understanding. I made it clear
to Sir Alexander that we had a full appreciation of his experience and great capacity in Colonial administration and his special local knowledge of the problems of Hong Kong, but that the possibilities arising from the rapid advance of the Chinese Communist Forces made it imperative to ensure that any military or security measures could be taken without delays which would go far to render them ineffective, and might lead to disaster in circumstances which would gravely affact the whole of the position in S.E. Asia. I indicated that it was felt that the cost in manpower and money of the additional re-inforcements, which H.M. Government had approved in principle, would be the subject of heavy criticism, and would indeed be unjustified if not supported in time by adequate security and intelligence provisions on the spot. It was difficult to reconcile in the minds of outside observers the complaints that the Government statement of May 5th had proved to be inadequate in re-establishment of reasonable feelings of confidence in the Colony, with the hesitancy to adopt such measures as overall registration, improvement of intelligence as to existing cells of Communist activity, (and their potential expansion with continuing infiltration), and plans
for
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