TNAG-0476-FCO40-541-Strength-of-garrison-in-Hong-Kong-1974 — Page 199

IV

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS

SECRET

104. Many of the conclusions reached above relate only to particular areas. But there are some recurring themes, which are examined again in this final section. These may be summarised as follows:

A) the importance of decisions about Hong Kong;

B) the importance of decisions about Cyprus;

C)

the significance of our reinforcement and airlift etc

capability;

D) the importance of consultation, in particular with the

E)

HONG KONG

United States;

the need to decide what line to take with other governments and with the press.

105. If it were decided that a guaranteed "all-red" route for the rapid reinforcement of Hong Kong in an emergency were no longer necessary; then the need not only for air lift capability but also for facilities in a number of places would be significantly reduced. In particular if this requirement no longer existed, it would probably be impossible to justify the retention of facilities on Gan, very difficult to justify the retention of facilities on Masirah, and more difficult to justify their retention on Cyprus. Putting it another way, the costs which might reasonably be ascribed to the Hong Kong commitment are probably considerably larger than the "functional cost" of £37m for 1973-74 quoted by the MOD.

CYPRUS

106. Decisions about Cyprus will depend partly, but by no means wholly, on decisions about Hong Kong. But on the decisions about Cyprus will

We cannot decide how to in turn depend the decisions on other things.

handle the question of CENTO until we know what we are doing about Cyprus, since our aircraft assigned to CENTO are based there, and since our relations with one of the CENTO members, Turkey, will be very much

We cannot decide whether to affected by our decisions about Cyprus.

stay in Masirah or Gan without knowing whether we are staying in Cyprus because if we gave up the first link in the "all-red" route, the value of the other links would be correspondingly diminished. Finally, although the issues of the SBAs and of the British contribution to

SECRET

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/UNFICYP