Guide to the Papers of Garry Woodard
MS 10135
National Library of Australia View Catalogue Record
Created: 2016
Collection Summary
- Creator
- Woodard, Garry, Mr
- Title
- Papers of Garry Woodard
- Date Range
- 1944 - 2014
- Collection Number
- MS 10135
- Extent
- 2.7 metres (17 ms boxes)
- Language of Materials
- English
- Repository
- National Library of Australia
Introduction
Scope and Contents
Personal archive of Garry Woodard documenting his diplomatic and academic career in Australian-Asian relations (1950s-1990s), including personal and business correspondence; personal reminiscences, a memoir, notes and correspondence relating to Sir Arthur Tange; and research notes and papers recording Australian participation in the Vietnam and Iraq Wars. The material also documents major figures in Australian international relations such as HV Evatt, RG Casey, Garfield Barwick, Paul Hasluck, Gough Whitlam and other important Department of Foreign Affairs personalities, together with papers relating to Australian foreign policy in China, Japan, Burma and the ANZUS alliance.
Related Materials
The National Library holds two oral histories, related to service in the Department of External Affairs (later Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade) and Department of Defence (in intelligence assessment), with Michael Wilson TRC 2981/2 1993 and with Gary Sturgess TRC 6440/5 2012.
Finding Aid Source(s)
Please note: This finding aid may comprise or contain desciptive information provided by donors, researchers and/or volunteers.
Biographical Note
Charles Garrard (Garry) Woodard was born in Adelaide on 3 July 1929, graduated in Law from the University of Adelaide in 1951, and entered the Department of External Affairs in January 1952. From 1970 to 1973 he was the first head of the National Assessments Staff in the Joint Intelligence Organisation, Department of Defence. He was Ambassador to Burma 1973- 75, to China 1976-80, and High Commissioner to Malaysia 1980-83. He was DEA policy adviser on the US and on East Asia 1975-6, when negotiations were concluded for a Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation between Australia and Japan, and 1985-6. He spent 1984 with the Westpac Bank under the Business Interchange Program. He retired in 1986, took an honorary appointment in the then Department of Political Science at the University of Melbourne, wrote widely, and maintained an active contact and correspondence with former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam and former Secretary of the Departments of External Affairs and Defence Sir Arthur Tange. He served for 15 years as a part-time member of the Federal Administrative Appeals Tribunal, and held positions on various boards, including the Australia-Japan Council, the Museum of Victoria, and the International Advisory Board of Wrights Investors Trust USA. He was active on a range of social issues and in the Australian Institute of International Affairs, of which he was national president from 1991-1993.
Item Descriptions
Class 1. Consignment received 2015
Series 1. Personal
Personal papers, 1980s-2000s (File 1) - Box 1
(1) Vice-Regal & other correspondence; (2) AAT, Unimelb, RMIT, Victoria University, LaTrobe, ANU, UCQ, Deakin, Museum of Victoria Council; (3) WESTPAC, Wright Investors Trust
Series 2. Reminiscences
'Reminiscences' complement two oral histories in NLA related to government service, together with attachments, and photographs from postings in Burma, China and Malaysia, and a summary record of public activities from 1986.
Addendum 2014 to NLA Oral Histories (214 pp); with: reference & photograph attachments (68), 2014 (File 9) - Box 2
Series 3. Sir Arthur Tange
Woodard worked directly to Sir Arthur Tange in his last two years as Secretary of the Department of External Affairs and, more tangentially, in his first three years as Secretary of the Department of Defence. He met and corresponded with Tange from 1989 until 2000, the year before Tange's death. They cooperated in securing publication of an article by Tange in the Australian Journal of International Affairs, in obtaining a grant from the Pratt Foundation for secretarial support for Tange's Defence memoir, ultimately published in 2008, and in arranging an honorary visiting professorship for Tange at the Australian Defence Force Academy. Much of the correspondence and conversations were related to Woodard's publications about Australian foreign policy and provided the basis for his Memoir on Tange, with Notes and Annexes, which are supported by a significant number of documents, mainly from the National Archives of Australia, and some provided by Dr Bill Hudson and officers of the Historical Documents section of DFAT with the support of the Secretary. These documents help to trace the history of Australian foreign policy from 1945-1986 and support what might otherwise seem to be unconventional judgments about Tange's part in policy-making and public administration. During the period of their conversations and reminiscences, Tange provided some of his papers, particularly relating to drafts of an oral history. By letter and in his will he gave Woodard privileged access to his papers, now lodged in the National Library of Australia (MS9847). Major subjects of discussion were Tange's Ministers and his relations with them, Dr. John Burton, and relations between the Departments of External Affairs and Defence. Tange's memoir published in 2008 shows that the discussions were of mutual benefit.
Memoir (159 pp), 1990-2006 (File 18) - Box 4
With correspondence (26 letters from Tange and his son) (1) and notes (2): A. A profile in courage; B. Tange’s Papers in NLA (att: the Pentagon Papers). (2) And Annexes (6): ‘Ministers and Mandarins’ 2000 (correspondence Ashton Calvert, Bill Hudson) Conference in Washington Room, DFAT 1994 (& correspondence); Security issues in DEA (pp.8, atts 7); Tange in DoD in the Whitlam era (pp.39, atts 10); UK’s first application to join the EEC 1961-3 (3 attachments); Tange: The Father of Policy Planning 1963-5 (21 attachments); (3) And memoir references (111).
DFA’s relations with Defence in the 1940s: article ‘Cold War Down Under’ (APSA 1997) and correspondence, 1993-2005 (File 21) - Box 4
Series 4. Australian decision-making on going to war: VIETNAM
In the year after Tange's death, Woodard began researching how Australia got into the Vietnam War, turning up new documents which validated Tange's reminiscences and his view that if Sir Garfield Barwick had not retired in April 1964 Australia would not have committed troops to Vietnam in the period December 1964-April 1965. The coincidence of writing on those decisions with Australia's decision to go to war in Iraq and the similar features provided the basis for an appendix to the book Asian Alternatives: Australia's Vietnam decision and lessons on going to war, for a number of articles and lectures etc., and for the formation of the Committee for an Inquiry into the War in Iraq, with the aim of making decisions on going to war more inclusive and transparent.
Papers relating to Asian Alternatives: Australia’s Vietnam decision and lessons on going to war (MUP E-book 2004) & correspondence, 2000-2010 (File 33) - Box 7
Correspondents include David Anderson, Robin Ashwin, Anne Blair, Peter Busch, Hal Colebatch, Bob Furlonger, Len Gilnour, Stuart Harris, Gordon Jockel, Kim Jpnes, Matthew Jones, Paul Kelly, Fred Logevall, Ian Macphee, Stuart Mcintyre, Bruce Miller, Robert Rabel, Peter Timmins, June Verrier, Mack Williams, & MUP.
Series 5. Australia in the IRAQ War
Series 7. Material relating to figures mentioned in Series 2 and Series 3
Writings and bio material about figures mentioned in Series 2 and Series 3. Material on Ministers of Foreign Affairs 1941-1973 including publications, research, and in some cases correspondence (particularly with Gough Whitlam). The Evatt papers include correspondence with, and material related to, Dr. John Burton, as Secretary of the Department of External Affairs, 1947-50.
Herbert Vere Evatt, R G Casey, 1943-1990 (File 39) - Box 8
(a) Anzac Pact 1944, & Correspondence - Angus McDonald, Frank Corner and Denis McLean (NZ), Paul Hasluck, Sam Atyeo & John Hood, Don Willesee & Bill Hayden, others & conference & US documentation (b) Study of Evatt by Prof Owen Harries, correspondence (c) John Burton (d) Correspondence with Bill Forsyth (e) Universal Declaration on Human Rights 1948: articles, & correspondence, Gough Whitlam, Elizabeth Evatt, R Brucken, R Harry; (a) Review of ‘A Delicate Mission’, by Carl Bridge, AJIA (b) Casey conference (AIIA) 2010, and correspondence
Garfield Barwick, 1987-2009 (File 42) - Box 8
(a) Covering notes (2) (b) Obituaries (2) (c) Konfrontasi articles (d) Other articles (3) (e) Correspondence with Barwick (and son) (f) Correspondence regarding (g) Reference material by and about (h) Photographs
Series 8. DFA personalities
Series 8 contains two commission biographical notes and published and unpublished writings on Australian heads of mission in Asia, plus correspondence with them and on them and supporting documentation.
Australian ambassadors in Asia, 1952-2002 (File 48) - Box 9
(i) Jim Plimsoll (in Korea); (ii) Mick Shann (in Indonesia) (iii) Noel Deschamps (in Cambodia) (iv) Walter Crocker (in Indonesia, India), including comments on holdings in Barr Smith Special Collections (v) Macmahon Ball: (in Japan and in SEA), correspondence on published articles in Age and AJIA- Tom Critchley, Jenny Ellis, Bill Forsyth, Jim Jamieson, Sue Langford, David Lowe, David McNicol, Alan Rix, Dick Rosecrance, Michael Sawer, Francis Stuart, Eric Ward, documentation, & Melbourne University functions
Series 10. Australian foreign policy in Asia
Almost all the papers in this series were commissioned and written in Woodard's academic capacity after retirement from DFA.
Publications, 1991-2010 (File 54) - Box 11
(A) Paper for the Asia Society, New York 1993 (B) Paper for AIIA (Vic): Australia and Asia 1992 (C) Indonesia: 'Best Practice in Australian Foreign Policy – Konfrontasi', AJPH correspondence Tom Critchley, R O'Neill; 'Strengthening through Adversity'; 'AIDA'; comments on paper on Richard Kirby (D) Article for CIIA, Timor 2000 & correspondence (E) Pacific Community 1984, G20 & APC (F) 'Australia and Asia', in Deakin U Study Guide, Exploring Asia 1995 (G) Articles, lectures, reviews AJIA - Middle Power Dreaming 2013, etc
Human Rights, 1989-1997 (File 56) - Box 11
Comprising 1 Articles; 2 Articles by AIIA (Vic) working group; 3 Lectures & conferences; 4 China & SEA; 5 Correspondence; 6 Mackie & Sheridan. Australia played an active role on human rights in the drafting of the Universal Declaration and in ensuing debates when Herbert Vere Evatt was President of the United Nations General Assembly. There was then an hiatus until Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser took up the anti-apartheid cause in South Africa. This coincided with a new emphasis on human rights in American foreign policy under President Jimmy Carter. Human rights in ipso gained salience in Australian foreign policy in the 1980s under Bill Hayden and Gareth Evans, and their departmental heads Stuart Harris and Mike Costello. Key developments were the emergence of the democracy movement in Burma (q v) after 8.8.88 and the Tiananmen massacre in China in June 1989. A counter-attack based on Asian values was mounted in the region, especially by Singapore and Malaysia, and muddied the waters. Samuel Huntington's The Clash of Civilisations also played a part and was strongly criticised by Australia. The most notable Australian defence was by Prime Minister Paul Keating in a speech in Singapore in 1995. Much heat was taken out of the debate in 1997 by the Asian financial crisis. In 1888-9, and in the first half of the 1990s. Woodard wrote on these subjects, including on Dr Evatt's contribution (q v), convened an AIIA visitors workshop in 1993 (q v), and a small working group under the auspices of the AIIA (Vic), which led to publications, delivered a course of lectures in the law and political science faculties at the University of Melbourne, participated in conferences ,worked with activist groups or individuals in regard to Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore as well of course as Burma and China, and conducted correspondence; that with Prof Jamie Mackie (ANU) and a review of Greg Sheridan raise some of the thorny issues debated in the 1990s.
Series 11. China
Documents in this series relate to Woodard's period as Ambassador to China, 1976-80, and responsibility for China in DFA before and after, and to his time on the staff of the University of Melbourne from 1986
Series 12. Japan
Woodard was also responsible in DEA for Japan and the Koreas in 1975-6 and 1985-6
Australia-Japan Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation 1976: monographs, correspondence, and photographs, 1976-1989 (File 63) - Box 12
Australia-Japan Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation 1976: monographs, correspondence, and photographs, 1971-2006 (File 64) - Box 12
Series 13. The Koreas
Korean War (Oxford - Australian Politics), Draft history of Australian-DPRK diplomatic relations and references, Correspondence etc with and participation in the Federation of Democratic Leaders of the Asia-Pacific, at the invitation of South Korea's first democratic President, Kim Dae-jung, with particular attention to human rights and specifically to Burma, Articles, 1973-2009 (File 67) - Box 13
Series 14. ANZUS
As is common enough, the United States was at the forefront of much of Woodard's career as diplomat, policy planner and head of intelligence assessments. The US figures prominently throughout series 2-13. In retirement, Woodard spent time in American archives and also in New Zealand, where he was greatly assisted by the departmental historian Malcolm Templeton, and taped interviews with all New Zealand's most senior diplomats.
US-Australian relations, US, including William Bundy review on H-Diplo, Bush in Asia (3), correspondence Paul Kennedy (& review), James Kelly & John Dorrance, miscellaneous postings on H-Diplo, ANZUS (v. also 11.7), 1986-2014 (File 68) - Box 13
New Zealand correspondence, 1946-2011 (File 69) - Box 13
Includes Malcolm Templeton (official historian), Bruce Brown, Sir Frank Corner, Dennis Maclean, Jack Shepherd, Hunter Wade, Bryce Harland (& cassette), etc, an Australian perspective from Alex Borthwick , NZ archival material with Australian connection.
Series 15. Burma
Active in supporting the democracy movement in Burma (Myanmar) and Aung San Suu Kyi from 1988, was co-patron of the Australia-Burma Council with Sir William Keys from 1989, and spoke, wrote and conducted an active international correspondence, including with Aung San Suu Kyi's husband Prof Michael Aris and her "Western mother", Lady Patricia Gore-Booth, a fellow South Australian: except for their correspondence, which is closed, the filed correspondence is selective only, as indicative of its domestic and international range.