The Unmonolithic Approach

Britain and the Commonwealth decided to have a go at the Southeast Asia mess. Last week a group known as the Commonwealth Consultative Committee on Economic Aid to South and Southeast Asia, composed of 70-odd delegates from all Commonwealth nations except South Africa, met in Sydney, Australia, and produced a program. The Commonwealth nations decided to 1) set aside a fund of $22,400,000 for technical and medical aid to the countries of Southeast Asia during the next three years; 2) set up a bureau at Colombo, Ceylon, which will deploy technicians from Commonwealth countries wherever they are most needed in Southeast Asia and send youths from Southeast Asian countries to be trained in Commonwealth universities and industries; 3) invite all Southeast Asian countries to draw up six-year plans for industrial development, modernized agriculture, etc., for which the Commonwealth would consider further assistance this fall.

The Australians had wanted more spectacular aid immediately, but the British held back. Said "a British delegate, stooping to picking up a phrase which the U.S. State Department had at long last thrown away: ". . . We should let the dust settle . . ."

Another conference on Southeast Asia will convene this week in the Philippine mountain resort of Baguio. At the invitation of Carlos Romulo, newly appointed Philippine Secretary of Foreign Affairs, delegates from the Philippines, Korea, India, Pakistan, Siam, Indonesia, Australia and New Zealand will discuss economic and cultural cooperation and a vague proposal for a Southeast Asian union. According to Host Romulo, the conference would be "nonCommunist" rather than "anti-Communist," which was another way of saying that in all likelihood it would produce doubletalk instead of concrete action. Romulo himself last week gave a preview of the doubletalk. Said he: "The conference will be unmonolithic in nature, but multilingual, cultural and religious."

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