AUSTRALIAN DIPLOMACY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24401, 12 September 1940, Page 8

AUSTRALIAN DIPLOMACY

CHIEF VOICE IN JAPAN (From Our Own Correspondent) SYDNEY, Sept. 5. One of the most interesting pronouncements so far made in the Federal election campaign was that of Mr J P Abbott, chairman of the Australian Woolgrowers’ Council and a Country Party candidate for the Tamworth seat, now held by another Country Party member. Mr V. C. Thompson. He claimed that Australia’s foreign policy, instead of being shaped by Imperial necessity, should be wholly directed to maintaining peace in the Pacific. Australia’s interests in the East were so vital that he believed the Australian Minister to Japan (Sir John Latham) should speak not only for Australia, but for the whole Empire, “Peace in the Pacific and trade in the Pacific is my election slogan,” said Mr Abbott. “ I will urge that this be the irrevocable policy of Australia Mr W. M. Hughes sounded the note during the last war, when he said: ‘ Out of the Pacific comes life or death for Australia.’ ■ “The Pacific is a sphere in which Australia is vitally interested, and one where she may be able to play a decisive part. Ranged round the Pacific seaboard are four of the world’s mightiest nations—-Soviet Russia, Japan, U.S.A.. and the British Empire —all with different interests. If these mighty forces should clash in this ocean, we in Australia, although a unit of a great and powerful Empire, might be in a serious position. “No man is more fitted ban Sir John Latham to carry out the work of an ambassador of peace, providing he is backed by his Government. I believe the interests of Australia are so vital in the East, and in the maintenance of peace in these seas, that Sir John should be the senior Empire diplomat in Japan. Perhaps I am optimistic, but I believe that, even though our relations with Japan have deteriorated since 1914, when she was our faithful ally, the position is not irretrievable. An Australian diplomat of Sir John Latham’s calibre may be able to achieve what the diplomacy of Britain has failed to achieve.”