492
The Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs to the Prime Minister of New Zealand

Your telegram of 7 September on the proposed British Commonwealth Occupation Force for Japan.

The proposal was mentioned by our Joint Staff Mission in Washington to the United States Chiefs of Staff on the instructions described in my telegram of 13 August [No. 476], and the United States Chiefs of Staff replied that they accepted in principle the participation of British ground forces in the occupation of Japan, and that details of size and composition would be a matter for later determination.

– 522 –

Accordingly, we are making our own plans on the basis that there will be participation by British Commonwealth ground forces, whether by separate forces, as proposed by Australia, or by a joint force to which, as you will have seen from my telegram to Australia of 31 August,¹ we hope the Australian Government will agree. We greatly hope that we may count on New Zealand participation in either case.