(from Briefing)
Those who had hopes of a change in Labour's foreign policy when George Brown took over from Michael Stewart have had their illusions dispelled. In his first major statement on Vietnam over the weekend, George brown spoke in the language of the U.S. State Department, His call for the North Vietnamese to abandon the guerilla war in the South, totally ignores the facts as reported by impartial American and European observers: namely that the war in the South started spontaneously, and that the North did not send troops until after the bombing of the North started. George Brown's statement is in sharp contrast to that of Harold Wilson at the May Day demonstration in Manchester in 1954.
"It was right to issue a warning to the Government
not to go any further in the subordination of British
policies to the United States... I believe at the moment
the danger to a negotiated settlement in Asia is pre-
vided by a lunatic fringe in the American Senate ...
Asia, like other parts of the world, is in revolution,
and what we have to learn today is this country is
to march on the side of the peoples in that revolution
and not on the side of their opnmressors.
This years Conference should make sure that we return
to Harold Wilson's old policies.