490.008/11–2651
The Department of State to the British Embassy
Aide-Mémoire
The Government of the United States has received the aide-mémoire of November 26, 1951 setting forth the steps decided upon by His Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom to implement the recommendations for action to suppress contraband arms traffic in Southeast Asia which were contained on the report of the Tripartite Military Staff talks held at Singapore in May 1951. The Government of the United States is most pleased that His Majesty’s Government has taken the initiative in this extremely important problem affecting the peace and security of the area concerned.
With reference to Indonesia and the Philippines, the Government of the United States is entirely in accord with the desire that arms purchases by these two countries should be strictly limited to such supplies as may be required for the preservation of internal security. With particular regard to Indonesia, the only arms which have been provided by the United States are the small amount which were made available to the police forces. The end use of these supplies, as in the case of all arms provided to any country in Southeast Asia under the Military Defense Assistance Program, is closely supervised by American military observers so that such supplies shall be used only for intended and previously agreed programs. The Government of Indonesia has expressed an interest in acquiring additional supplies upon a reimbursable basis. The Government of the United States, subject to availability and priorities, is perfectly agreeable to these requests in the event that the Government of Indonesia can satisfactorily demonstrate a need for the supplies and, furthermore, will agree to such supervision as may be necessary to insure their proper utilization. And of course all such arms shipments would require the usual export licenses. In this sense the objectives of His Majesty’s Government and of the Government of the United States would appear to be in harmony.
With regard to the Philippines, it is the opinion of qualified American military observers that that country is now receiving from the United States all the arms it requires for the restoration and preservation of its internal peace and security. The Government of the United States is therefore gratified by the action that has been taken by His Majesty’s Government and wishes to assure it that American arms now being provided the Philippines are being put to the use for which they are designed. There is of course the continuing, although drastically reduced, problem of the arms which were abandoned by American [Page 126] forces in the Philippines at the end of the war against Japan and which has in the past been a matter of serious concern. Evidence available to the Government of the United States now indicates that any illegal traffic in these arms has been reduced to such a small flow, if any, that it no longer constitutes a serious threat to the security of the area. If His Majesty’s Government has any specific evidence to the contrary, the Government of the United States will be most anxious to receive it in order that proper, energetic, and prophylatic measures might be taken. The Philippine Government has been displaying every evidence of a desire to cooperate to the fullest in the liquidation of this troublesome problem.
The suggestion by His Majesty’s Government that other members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the Commonwealth countries which are not members of NATO, as well as the Governments of Switzerland and Sweden, should in due course be advised of the dangers of excessive arms purchases by Indonesia and the Philippines and asked to take appropriate steps in order that these two countries do not accumulate more arms than they require appears in principle to the Government of the United States to be of sufficient merit to warrant further consideration. The Government of the United States would be most pleased to give serious consideration to any paper on this problem which His Majesty’s Government might wish to prepare. As suggested above in the case of the Philippines, the Government of the United States is also most anxious to receive any concrete information available to His Majesty’s Government concerning illegal arms traffic elsewhere in Southeast Asia and it would hope that the proposed paper would include reference to such evidence.