Security in the Pacific Area

Abstract

A report by a Chatham House Study Group and issued by the innstitute of International Affairs, under “The Pattern of Pacific Security”, at the region is not in itself an area possesses natural defining boundaries by which tne political cartographer can almost automatically draw regional frontiers on the map of security. While there are certain interests and problems which are mainly Pacific in character, most of the Powers concerned in the region are also Powers with substantial interests elsewhere. Accordingly, the Pacific Ocean must be treated as an area which cannot be considered apart from others, and the whole argument of the report reinforces the view that a system of security in the Pacific can be established only on the wider basis of world organisation, the mainstays for which are the United States, the British Commonwealth, the U.S.S.R. and China. The thirty-four specific conclusions of this study are set forth in its final chapter, following chapters in which the Pacific area is considered as a region, the main features of a design of security are outlined, and the position of each of the four major Powers is examined under the sub-title “A Speculative Appreciation of Certain Power Factors in the Pacific”. British interests in the Pacific are discussed in a separate chapter, leading to the conclusion that Great Britain is a Power with so substantial a concern in the region that, in partnership with the Pacific Dominions of the British Commonwealth, she is bound to play a large paffrin the future history of that Ocean.