J.A. Lyons, Prime Minister of Australia, 1932-39, presided over twin policies of conciliation and rearmament in a search for peace. The thesis discusses his individual world-view, one chiefly constructed on principles of consensus, and analyses the foreign and defence policies of his government, thereby re-evaluating suggestions that Lyons was chiefly interested in only domestic policy. / The foreign policy of the Lyons years was primarily directed at the Asian-Pacific region, especially at Japan. It consisted of an Australian variety of ‘cunctation’, superseded by the variety of ‘appeasement’ found in the Australian Eastern Mission of 1934, arguably the first time that appeasement was applied in East Asia and the first of three significant external policy initiatives of the Lyons years. Lyons himself lobbied in favour of appeasement in the broader imperial context from 1935, recognising that it needed to be targeted at Rome and Berlin, as well as at Tokyo. Any Australian government could not apply appeasement in Europe directly, in the absence of an Australian diplomatic service, although Lyons sought to advance conciliation through ‘personal diplomacy’ in certain foreign capitals. It was not, however, until the premiership of Chamberlain, after May 1937, that London and Canberra were united in the desire for the application of ‘wider appeasement’, the policy adopted at the 1937 Imperial Conference. At this gathering, Lyons presented a second major initiative, the proposal for a Pacific Pact of non-aggression; his magnum opus and the ultimate opportunity for his regional peacemaking. / The Imperial Conference had also discussed and endorsed measures designed to enhance the process of imperial consultation and once Whitehall subsequently began to apply appeasement in Europe, Lyons was keen to ensure that the voice of his dominion was heard. This was especially so during the first Czech crisis of September 1938 in which, it is argued, Lyons and his appeasing circle sought to play a significant consultative and intermediary role. These efforts seemed to have been rewarded by the climax of European appeasement: the 1938 ‘Munich Pact’. Appeasement was, however, everywhere dissolving from late-1938, as was the mechanism of imperial consultation, and the response of Lyons as prime minister was to initiate the process of establishing an independent Australian diplomatic service, something long considered by his government, but hitherto delayed. This initiative came too late to prevent his reluctant admission of the failure of appeasement, in March 1939. / The policy of conciliation was accompanied from the beginning of the Lyons years by a muscular defence policy. That policy involved five separate rearmament programs, September 1933-December 1938. Although mindful of imperial needs, this policy was chiefly directed at the requirements of home defence and the Lyons government remained wary of the Singapore strategy. Lyons’s character was stamped on it by his decisive opposition to conscription, 1938-39. Although it was his misfortune, as a leading Australian appeaser, that conciliation was everywhere overshadowed by rearmament, the considerable defensive preparations of the Lyons years ensured that a sufficient state of readiness was attained to match the hostile scenarios envisaged in defence planning after 1932. The attempts made to secure a level of joint, imperial defence planning, however, resulted in failure. / In its examination of the foreign and defence policies of the 1930s this thesis augments the revision underway in current scholarship. It demonstrates that an identifiable Australian foreign policy existed and that it was chiefly a regional one - even if the application of that policy was retarded by the absence of a diplomatic structure and by the consequent reliance on London. It nonetheless adhered to the patterns of external policy that had evolved since Federation. When combined with an examination of the robust defence measures of these years, Lyons emerges as a vigorous premier with a clear vision of Australia’s place in the world. It is argued that the search for peace of the ‘Tame Tasmanian’, 1932-39, was sustained and considerable.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/281262 |
| Date | January 2004 |
| Creators | Bird, David Samuel |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
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