Civil Aviation.

In the light of the position disclosed in recent circular
telegrams from the Dominions Office regarding progress of the
United States in its bilateral talks with various Governments,
including India, we have under consideration the forwarding of the
following telegram to the Australian Accredited Representative,
London, and before doing so would appreciate your comments.

Begins:

1. Reference D.863 and D.973. [1] We are gravely concerned at the
present position. The initiative has passed to the United States
which is proceeding on lines likely to result in American
supremacy of the air through a series of bilateral agreements.

Negotiations since the October talks [2] in London appear to have
developed in a way which will make Anglo-American rivalry
inevitable with ill-effects on Anglo-American collaboration in
other matters.

2. We think you should speak frankly to the United Kingdom
Government along the lines of our telegram 72 of 28th May [3]
(telegram 102 to New Zealand) stating plainly that we could not be
expected to regard an International Agreement along the lines of
the Berle memorandum [4] as satisfactory; and that we think the
United States aims as disclosed in the Agenda for the Indian talks
in D.951 [5] and by the account of the Chinese talks in D.973
depart even further than the Berle memorandum from the spirit of
the United Kingdom draft convention. [6] We never regarded the
United Kingdom draft convention as more than the bare minimum of
international collaboration, nor have we accepted it, but even
this draft appears in danger of being discarded. 3. It is our view
that unless we achieve a large degree of international
collaboration now, vested operating interests will be set up to
endanger future consideration of the subject. Failure to
collaborate in this field or to apply the general principle of the
United Nations Declaration [7] to civil aviation will lessen the
prospects of applying those principles in other fields. Failure to
achieve a measure of internationalisation will mean either
commercial rivalries or acquiescence in American supremacy. In the
case of Australia the present lack of transport aircraft for
overseas service limits our capacity to participate in competitive
services but we cannot allow ourselves to fall into a state of
dependence in civil aviation. 4. Accordingly we wish to raise the
question whether it is possible to make a stand for a higher
measure of internationalisation than appears likely to result from
American initiative. We would suggest that a further exchange of
views with other British countries should precede any
international conference and that we should endeavour to associate
the international discussion of civil aviation more directly with
the consideration of the world organisation of security. Ends.