Page:Pentagon-Papers-Part-V-B-3b.djvu/139

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Declassified per Executive Order 13526, Section 3.3
NND Project Number: NND 63316. By: NWD Date: 2011
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Associated States, Thailand and Malaya. Australia and New Zealand, while concerned about the effect on the ANZUS organization, would probably be willing to participate in a broader organization for the defense of mainland Southeast Asia. The U. K., already disturbed at its exclusion From ANZUS, and in general ready to support U. S. intervention in Indochina, would be prepared to enter a South East Asian regional grouping which carried with it U. S. guarantees for Malaya. Thailand, if given lasting U. S. defense commitments, would also participate in such an organization and would probably provide bases and facilities for support of military operations in Indochina and possibly modest military forces. The Philippines would also support a regional organization and might provide modest military forces. The Nationalist Government of China and the ROK would seek inclusion in any regional organization which sponsored military action in Indochina, in the hope of an extension of hostilities to Communist China. For this reason, their inclusion would probably be opposed by at least the UK and French governments. Such a regional grouping would almost certainly be less inclined than the UN to respond to plausible Communist peace offers, and more likely to persevere to an acceptable solution in Indochina.
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