The Press MONDAY, JUNE 27, 1966. S.E.A.T.O.'S Future

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31096, 27 June 1966, Page 12

The Press MONDAY, JUNE 27, 1966. S.E.A.T.O.'S Future

The Ministerial council of the South-East Asia Treaty Organisation (5.E.A.T.0.) is meeting in Canberra at a time when the worth of the organisation is being questioned—not for the first time, but now especially in the United States, the country that gave the treaty birth. S.E.A.T.O. led an oddly aimless life for some years, though there was a burst of activity in May, 1962, when American, British, Australian, and New Zealand forces went into Thailand to protect it from aggression by the Pathet Lao threatening to cross the Mekong river. But the tenth anniversary of the Manila Pact which created S.E.A.T.O. seemed to Thailand’s Foreign Minister, Thanat Khoman f an occasion “ to review whether the strong urge which “impelled eight nations to set up in this region a “system of collective defence has kept its vitality “ or whether, with the passage of time, it has waned “to the vanishing point for the simple reason that “ some may have lost interest in the original concept “ or have been reluctant to discharge their responsi- “ bility In the following year France’s dissenting role in the alliance became clearer; and last year a split became apparent when France decided to take no part in the S.E.A.T.O. council meeting in London, apart from sending observers.

The cancellation in January this year of a planned S.E-A.T.O. exercise for which member nations had pledged more than 10,000 men was followed by a statement by the S.E.A.T.O. SecretaryGeneral, Mr J. M. Vargas, in which the Filipino statesman announced a “new look” for the organisation: S.E.A.T.O.’s emphasis, he said, was to be shifted from “ military preparations ” to “ collective “ action against Communist subversion Some observers interpreted this as a polite way of putting S.E.A.T.O. on the shelf. In the United States S.E.A.T.O. was rediscovered—and became highly controversial—when the Secretary of State, Mr Dean Rusk, cited the S.E.A.T.O. treaty as the fundamental source of President Johnson’s authority to commit manpower and treasure to the war in Vietnam. This viewpoint was hotly contested by influential Senators, some of whom, now attention was drawn to 5.E.A.T.0., fiercely criticised the organisation’s activities—or alleged lack of them—in the Vietnam war.

Yet it is evident from the weight of representation by leading statesmen at the Canberra meeting that S.E.A.T.O. is highly valued by the majority of members who obviously want to keep it in being. This cannot be because S.E.A.T.O. is vital to the rather loose collection of regional security arrangements in the Pacific, several of which overlap. In military terms the American commitment to South Vietnam and the British commitment to Malaysia are what really count; the United States has a pact with Australia and New Zealand which is completely separate from S.E.A.T.O. and separate treaties with Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and the Philippines. In fact, S.E.A.T.O. presents a confusing picture: nations in South-east Asia which support its purposes are not members (Malaysia, which has the main base of S.E.A.T.O. members on its territory, is one); an Asian nation (Pakistan) belongs, but because of its involvement with India, takes little part; France, which once had strong colonial interests in the region is now clearly more interested in developing its contacts with Peking than with S.E.A.T.O. The participants may be hoping that the current meeting will help in a search for means of transforming S.E.A.T.O. into an effective organisation and a means of shoring up the antiCommunist positions in South-east Asia. Without a clearly-defined role and the means to fulfil it, S.E.A.T.O. can hardly survive much longer.