our military installations there) to compensate for the
economic effects of our military withdrawal.
That withdrawal will not make it impossible for us
to extend military aid in the future since, as I explained
to our House of Commons when in January 1968 announcing
our policy of military withdrawal East of Suez, "we shall
retain a general capability, based in Europe including
the United Kingdom
Ma
which can be deployed overseas as,
in our judgement, circumstances demand, including support
for United Nations operations". As the Minister of State
at our Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Lord Shepherd, told
the SEATO Council at its meeting in Bangkok last May, we
hope where possible to take part in SEATO exercises,
as well as to carry out from time to time training and
other exercises in concert with our Commonwealth allies
in Malaysia, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand.
A major such exercise is due to take place next year.
But we see our role in Asia increasingly as a non-
military one, in the fields of trade and aid, and of
educational scientific and technical co-operation.
these fields the knowledge of one another, and the
experience of working with one another, which is a legacy
of Britain's past, great involvement in Asia, should be
to our mutual advantage. And our co-operation should
In
be facilitated not hindered when there is no longer a
local British military presence to remind us of the days of
imperialism, which, as a Socialist, I am glad to relegate
to the past.
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