CO129-592-8 Future Policy in Hong Kong 1-1-1945 - 26-11-1945 — Page 185

Org ~ Defener Bill

THE ROYAL

INSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL

CONFIDENTIAL:

FOR PUBLICATION

NOT

AFFAIRS

Chatham House, 10 St James's Square,

London, S.W.1.

182

United Kingdom Brief No. 3.

Institute of Pacific Relations Conference. 1945.

I asked Mr. Warren Swire to let me have

a short note on the importance of Hong Kong to British business interests trading with the Far East. He has been good enough to do so, and I am circulating it for the confidential information of the Group.

I.S.M.

HONG KONG

Whatever its value as a fortress, the Colony should be kept under the British flag as a trade base and symbol of our Far Eastern interests. Without it our valuable trade with China would be gravely endangered.

1.

2.

While the surrender of extraterritorial rights was the only sound policy for us to pursue in China, it has made the reten- tion of Hong Kong more than ever necessary as an oasis of law and order,

where commerce can be carried on normally and a man and his possessions are safe. It must not be forgotten that the Japanese occupation has set China back many years and that disorder is bound to be rampant there during the period of reconstruction.

3

For the reasons given in (2) above Hong Kong will mean even more as a transhipment port than in the past to British ocean tonnage and therefore to British exporters. It will mean efficient port services, the protection of the law and freedom from discrimina- tion, while it will give the merchant safe storage for his goods and the use of efficient British coastal services from Hong Kong to the terminal port on the coast or even to Hankow. In view of the ex- clusion under the treaty of the British flag from cabotage rights the need for keeping Hong Kong British is obvious, as it follows that ships under the British flag can at any rate trade between Hong Kong and the Coast ports.

4. With the exception of those in Hong Kong there have been no modern shipbuilding or repair facilities between Singapore, where they were poor, and Japan. The Hong Kong yards did work, which before this war was beyond the powers of the rest of the Empire outside Great Britain, and the post itself is geographically a con- venient point for ocean ships as well as coasters to do repairs and overhauls.

Hong Kong always has been an important centre for British insurance and under the new conditions in China it may well become of absolutely first-rate importance and even the British insurance centre for the whole of the Far East.

5.

6.

So far its airport has been inferior; but in view of its geo- graphical situation that should and can be put right.

Its University, backed by shipyards and technical establishments, makes it a first-class training centre for Chinese, who can be of service to China and thus spread British influence and a demand for British capital goods.

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