§ 48. Mr. Hector Hughesasked the Prime Minister if he will make a comprehensive statement up to date specifying the Government's present policy on the hostilities now taking place in the Far East relating to Formosa and the islands off the Chinese coast, which have been referred to the United Nations organisation.
§ The Prime MinisterA very full statement was made by my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary on the 14th of this month and I have only somewhat general observations to make upon this anxious subject today.
There is a great difference between the coastal islands of China and the island of Formosa. As there is no question of our being involved militarily or indeed of our being needed in the defence of the coastal islands, we should be careful of what advice we should offer our friends and Allies upon it.
The decision on whether or when these particular islands should be evacuated is not one the burden of which falls upon Her Majesty's Government and we must recognise the natural preoccupations of other Governments who are immediately affected by the threatened attack from Communist China. This is especially true 159W at a time when the Chinese Communists keep stridently asserting that the islands are to be regarded as a stepping stone to the seizure of Formosa itself, with all that that must mean for the Chinese Nationalists under Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, who have been given shelter and protection there by the Unitied States, and to whom the United States are bound by over 14 years' comradeship in war, both against the Chinese Communists and the Japanese invaders of China.