DOMINION'S WAR EFFORT

Chronicle (Levin), 2 April 1946, Page 8

DOMINION'S WAR EFFORT

-Press Association

LORD MOUNTBATTEN'S TRIBUTE HIGH REGARD FOR FORCES

By Telegraph-

WELLINGTON, April 1. The tasks of postwar adjaiinistration were dis.eussed briefly by -Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten. afc.tlie State luncheon in his honour today. Admiral Mounlbatjten paid a tributfe to the war egbrt of New Zealand whicb, he said, moant much to the Allies and even more to the British Empire. No one had any hesitation in putting the Donunion at the rop of tlie list of Allied . tountries for its war offort. With a population of only 1,600,000 not mor.e tlian half of^whom were men of military age, it sent 135,000 men overseas. The casualties per capita were the higliest. for any of the Allied forces. Ry 1945, 62 per ceiit of Ihe nation 's manpower between the 'ages of 18 and 45 had been in the Armed Forces, and he \\ as confident that that was a ligure no other eountry could touch. In Nortk Africa and Italy the New Zealand troops shared in all the deeisive battles, and in 1943 Field-Marshal Alexander expressed the opinion *to hira that the New Zealand Division was the finest of which he had any knowledge. , That opinion was shared by Field-Mar-shal Rommel. In an Inteiligence raid, papers had been secured showing Ihe order of merit in which Rommel placed the division in the 8th Army, and New I Zealand headed the list. I Admiral Mountbatten also paid a j special tribute to tlie Maori Battalion, j u300 members of which served overJ seas. lie went on to refer to New Zea.land's part in his own theatre. "Out of 340 New Zealand airmen in my command," he said, "no fewer than 40 received decorations for gallantry. No l'ewer than nine of my R.A.F. squadrons were commanded by New Zea-lande^-s. " He mentioned that >«iirg Commander Harding, of Wellington, commanded an important transport squadron which hew over 1,000,000 miles without mis- - hap, and added that tlie present Allied i uir commander, Air Marshal Sir Keith Park, who carne from Oamaru, would be visiting New Zealand soon. The navy also had been an efficient, cnthusiastic unit. Jn peacetime it coni sisted ot only 900 men, but before the war euded ihere wer.e 10,000 New Zea- | land sailors in the Royal New Zealand ' Navy and the Royal Navy. As well as I manning its own sliips, New Zealand j had succeeded alvvays in producing 1 slightly more than the quota that could : tio talien for training in the Royal Navv. Beoause the standard of the men I was so high", most had been u.sed for ' highly technical radar work. Wlien one j went into a ship and savv the radar i ] operator and said, "What part of New | j Zealand do you come from?" one was. j nearly always right. (Laughter). | Admiral Mountbatten ret'erred ap- 1 J preeiatively to the fact that New Zea- ! j land had accepted food rationing and j | hau continued it after tjLe war, when i food was scareer than ever in Britain. 1 "What you send makes a nreat dilfer-

ence, " he added. ! Postwar Problems.. Discussing postwar administratiou, j Admiral Mountbatten said he had ! adopted a time formula to help him in , making diific.ult deeisions. He rejoieed ! himself in imagination at least 10 vears i forward in time and tlien looked baak : to see where the tlecikions he was ahout i to make were likely to lead. He tried ■ to imagine that he was reading the history books of 1936 and to give a ■ ciear, iogical decision on that basis, ( without being alfected by the heat and i vvorry of the moment. » The Netherlands East Indies had | been by far the greatest headache he l had had to suft'er. Through no one's t'ault he had had no idea of what .nad been going on in Java. However, since ! the arrival cf the senior British AmbasJ sador, Sir Archibald Clark-Kerr, con- ; siderable progress had been made. It | had been arranged that Sir Archibald, witli tlie Lieutenant-Governor . of the ! Netherlands East Indies (Dr. Van | ; Mook) and representatives of'the Indo- 1 : nesians should. go to The Hague to con- j ! tinue the discussions, and he hoped that ; a soiution of the difficulties would be ; achieved on the lines of Freneh IndoCliina. j Mataora was being handed over to civil government that day, and he exj pccted that Singapore would be handed ! over on Wednosday and Borneo next mon th. Burma had lieen handed over j on Oetober 16, and Freneh Indo-Chinaj ' had already been handed back to ■ France. He hoped that next month the | Governor-General (Sir Malcolm Maej Donald) Avould take over the responsiI bility of coordinating British territor-

ies in Southeast Asia. The Prime Minister (Rt. Hon. P. Fraserj extended a cordial weleome to Admiral and Lady Mountbatten. Admiral Mountbatten, he said, had had a distinguished .and useful career and had taken a keen and praetieal interest in all he had set his hand to. The future to a large extent depended on how dit'lieult and dangerous matters were dealt with iu th,e area wliieh" he commanded. On the present-day understanding of human beings, with all their perplexities, depended tha p.eace and prosperity of tlie world. He felt certain that Admiral Mountbatten 's knowledge of human natu-re and understanding of liberal prijieiples had gone to help in making his command such a sueeess in both the military and civil sides. He' had justiRed the trust Mr. Cliurehill and the War Cabinet liad placed in him, showing that he possessed the ability, knowledge and tolera^ice that his task required. He realised that the world liad moved rapidly, and that solutions that were all right before the war were eompletely opt of date today — that it was neeessary to shape things aceordingly to retain the greatest friepdship and eooperation between peoples. "The United Nations have been fo.rtunate in having in coinmand of Sou-th-east Asia a man not only proficient in his own profession of arms but also with insight ip.to human beings and an S appreeiation of the real principles of1 statemansliipj" said Mr.. Fraser,