New Zealand's Security Problem in the Pacific, 1939-1951

Abstract

The chief characteristic of New Zealand's foreign policy in the years following the second world war may be said to have been a conscious quest for security. This sprang from the realization during the early years of the war that Britain, which had always been relied upon to protect New Zealand from potential enemies, was no longer capable of doing so in time of global war. The loss of the sense of absolute security stimulated New Zealand's interest in the hitherto rather neglected pacific. Many new relationships were formed with countries in that area, in particular with the United States of America, but their working cut was a slow and, at times, painful process, complicated by the persistence of strong economic and sentimental ties with Britain. The history of New Zealand's efforts to meet the situation, and to maintain her prosperity and her identity as a European community in the face of it, forms the subject of the present thesis. The sudden failure of the Royal Navy in 1940, when it had seemed so staunch a defender is the past, was only a symptom of a deeper change effecting many other countries besides New Zealand. The over of Britain had declined greatly as the industrial lead she had established early in the nineteenth century disappeared in the face of industrial development in other larger and richer countries, with it the system of order in Asia and Pacific, imposed or at least maintained by Britain, had slowly crumbled at the foundations, and the blows dealt by Japan in 1941 and 1942 reduced it to a shambles. All the countries of the area dependent in one way or another on the Pox Britannica were set adrift in a troubled time to seek their salvation where they might. Among them was New Zealand, the country which had relied most heavily throughout its brief history on the power and wealth of the British Empire.