10 - Palm and Pine: New Zealand and Singapore

Summary

Prelude

The comfortable relationship which grew up between New Zealand and the Republic of Singapore in the second half of the twentieth century played a decisive part in introducing New Zealand to Asia. This, though, was one of history's happier ironies. For much of that century New Zealand looked to Singapore as its protection from Asia, first from the ambitions of Japan and then from those of Chinese-backed communism.

In the years between the two world wars New Zealand, a loyal son of Empire, had no intrinsic interest in East Asia, then largely ruled by the European colonial powers. It did, however, become increasingly concerned about the ability of the British navy to continue to guarantee the security of the Pacific. Worried about the rise of Japanese militarism and with few hopes of an isolationist United States it looked anxiously for a means of sustaining British power in the Pacific. It seized on Britain's compromise proposal to send its main battle fleet to Singapore in the event of trouble in the region. Wellington immediately offered £100,000 in 1923, scouting any suggestion that we should instead rely on the League of Nations for protection, and in 1927 committed the substantial sum of £1 million to complete the Singapore base.

This became in effect New Zealand's defence policy. New Zealand's first Defence White Paper, in 1935, called Singapore the key to local defence, leaving New Zealand only to find the capability to deal with sporadic raiding vessels. But as the European outlook darkened it became alarmingly apparent that Britain had to “defend a two-hemisphere empire with a one-hemisphere navy”. After Munich the New Zealand Prime Minister was advised that the assumption of a strong British fleet at Singapore had become unrealistic. In April 1939 Walter Nash asked a British admiral what could be done if the Singapore strategy failed. His reply, “Take to the Waitomo caves”, was not reassuring. A year later, after the fall of France, Britain informed Australia and New Zealand that a fleet could no longer be spared. The Waitomo caves would have been crowded but for the US naval victories at Midway and the Coral Sea.