636
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
C.O.882/11
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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8. Another thing we have learnt from Beatty is that the suggestion in para-
kongsi graph 35 of the Colonial Office memorandum is already being fulfilled. The Straits (syndicate) which Settlements Government has information of at least one (ás a result of the anti-smuggling activities at Singapore) is preparing to land opium from Amoy on the practically unguarded and unguardable east coast of Malaya, by fåst launches.
9. In this connexion Beatty has reminded us of another factor contributing to the increase in the consumption of Government chandu. It will be recalled that it was suggested in the 1924 Report that private retail and smoking shop licences were used as a cloak for the sale of illicit chandu and dross. Beatty is satisfied that this was the case, and that the private shops constituted the organization for distributing the As these shops were closed illicit opium which was being smuggled into the country.
or taken over by Government this distributing organization was disrupted, with the natural result that (pending the opening up of new channels for supplying coolies with illicit chandu) they have been forced, for the time being to buy more Government chandu. In support of this view he points to the fact that Government sales have progressively increased during the period in which the private shops have been closed or taken over, culminating in September when the Straits Settlements Government finally closed all the private smoking saloons. He further says, in support of this view, that the Government has information that about that time, certain large stocks of illicit opium which had previously been selling at $7 a tahil were reduced to $5 a tahil.
10.
We also gather that the Straits Settlements Monopolies Department is of opinion that its increased seizures of smuggled opium are due to the better information which the Department has been getting (leading to the interception of a greater pro- portion of what comes in) rather than to a great increase in the quantities suuggled in, as suggested in the Colonial Office memorandum.
11. Of course if the smugglers succeed in the attempts they are now making to land chandu at unguarded points on the coast, and at the same time are able to set up a new distributing organization, the sales of Government chandu may be expected to decline again pro tanto.
12. In the light of these considerations, I am very disinclined to send any despatch to the Governor unless and until the Interdepartmental Committee has been able to discuss the matter with Beatty personally, and I suggest that if another meet- ing of the Committee is arranged for this purpose, Pountney (who was Chairman of the 1924 Committee. and was Beatty's predecessor as Chairman of the Standing Advisory Committee in Malaya) should also be asked to attend.
13. On the other hand, in the light of Beatty's views, you may perhaps be prepared to accept the Colonial Office view that the best and wisest course (not only from the point of view of not causing further embarrassment to our Colonial Govers, ments, but also as the course which in the long run will lead to less criticism from America and elsewhere) would be for His Majesty's Government to take its stand on the Protocol to the Geneva Agreement and the line Lord Cecil took at the Conference, viz., that (while we recognize our obligations under The Hague Convention and are in fact carrying them out so far as is practicable" having due regard to the circum- stances" in the Colonies (ride Article 6)) in existing circumstances it is impossible not only to effectively reduce opium smoking but (we would now add) also to prevent an increase in consumption, such as (we might say we hope temporarily) is occurring just now. Our explanation would continue on the lines that though possibly we might try to institute measures which would reduce the sales of Government chandu, they would not reduce actual consumption (and so would not really be in compliance with the Convention). Moreover since these measures would seriously endanger not only the good government, but probably the peace, of our Colonies, we are not prepared to embark upon them. Further, these measures would in all probability so aggravate the situation as to postpone the time when effective action might otherwise be taken. 14. On the other hand, we are going steadily ahead improving our machinery of control (as well as carrying out what reforms are practicable in the meantime) so that when circumstances make it possible to do so we shall be in a position to take really effective action.
15. I submit that (failing the courage to denounce Article 6 of The Hague Con- vention as an impracticable undertaking) this would be the most honest line to take. and, taken holdly, ought not to be difficult to defend.
16. We were told at the meeting of the Committee that His Majesty's Govern- ment is in a difficult position, because it took the initiative in getting The Hague Con- vention brought into operation in 1920. Surely the answer is that we have now had six years' experience of post-war conditions in China, and that if we could have
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foreseen how difficult (if not impossible) it was going to be to suppress opium smoking (or shall we say, if we could have foreseen what a rigid interpretation would be placed on Article 6 in some quarters, in defiance of the wording of the Article itself) we should never have done anything so foolish!
17. Another thing, we are told that His Majesty's Government is so constantly taking the lead, not only in trying to secure the effective control of the drugs dealt with in Chapter III of the Convention, but also in urging "the more effective applica- tion of Chapter II," that we must make doubly sure that our own position is un- assailable.
18. It is well known that the most active member of the League of Nations Opium Advisory Committee is the British Representative. It was he (e.g) who took the initiative in 1923 in putting forward the proposals" for the more effective applica- tion of Chapter II of The Hague Convention which led to the summoning of the First Geneva Conference in 1924. In the past, the Colonial Oflice has acquiesced
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in these activities, largely (I presume) because it has felt that the matter was mainly Experience has one of foreign policy and therefore primarily for the Foreign Office shown, however, that the price we have had to pay for attempting to keep pace with those efforts at reform, has been to set our Colonial Governments by the ears.
19. The conviction has been growing upon us that this is too big a price to pay for the luxury of trying to appear as the keepers of the consciences of the world in regard to The Hague Convention in its application to the Far East. We feel, in short, that for the future so far as the observance of Chapter II (opium smoking) by other countries in their Eastern Territories is concerned, the policy of IIis Majesty's Government (to which of course the British Representative on the League Advisory Committee should conform) should be to refrain from provocative criticism, and to try to keep the question of opium smoking out of the limelight as far as possible; and, so far as our Colonies are concerned, not to demand from them more than they have already undertaken to perform.
20. This is not, of course, to be taken as meaning that we do not recognize our obligations to do what we can to keep our Colonial Governments up to scratch. For instance, we have to admit that in the matter of the arrangements made recently for the purchase of such large quantities of Persian opium, the Straits Settlements Govern- ment has not been particularly helpful We do not, of course, agree that (having been authorized to proceed on the lines of the Malaya Committee's Report, and having been specifically authorized to buy Persiun opium) the action of the Straits Settlements Government was wrong in principle. But we do agree that they ought to have set about But here again we the business in a manner less provocative of adverse comment. feel that the probable explanation of the indecent haste with which they placed such large orders in such rapid succession lies in their profound distrust of His Majesty's Government being able to appreciate the fact that local circumstances demand that supplies of chandu should not be restricted at the present time.
21. But this very feeling of distrust is symptomatic of a disease which we think can only be cured in the way I have suggested.
22. Nevertheless I propose to make it perfectly clear to the Straits Settlements Government that while I appreciate the difficulties, I feel that they have not been as helpful recently as they might have been. I think that a private letter to Guillemard would probably be more suitable than a formal despatch. I propose to point out how these large orders from a British Colony contributing to a rise in the price of Persian opium, at the very time when a League Commission is investigating the possibility of reducing the production of Persian opium, may well be embarrassing in the extreme to the representatives of His Majesty's Government if and when the matter is aired at Geneva. I also propose to take the Governor to task for allowing the Colony to lag so far behind the Federated Malay States in carrying out the very measures which he himself has urged are the only feasible ones.
23. Before writing to Guillemard, however, I would like to have your views generally on the issues raised in this letter.
24. I am having copies of this letter and the enclosed despatch sent to Sir M. Delevingne and to Lord Cecil.
25. This letter was prepared before the receipt of Lord Cecil's personal letter
to Mr. Ormsby Gore dated 6th December.*
* C. 20941/26 [No. 10]: not printed.
Yours, &c.,
L. S AMERY.