All nations in the world maintain armed forces, mainly for the purpose of defence. This may be defence against internal or external threats, but in the developed world it is the external threats (present or potential) that are most important, The nature of a nation's armed forces, therefore, should square with the type of external defence policy existing in that nation: the roles, organization and equipment of the forces should fit closely the specifics of the policy. This applies even more to small countries than to large, as the former with only limited resources cannot maintain forces of a multifarious nature. Because of this a small country must be more rigorous in its choice from the many different types of roles, organization and equipment available. Even in large countries, however, it is necessary to concentrate on certain kinds of forces. We can, therefore, assess the nature of the armed services of a nation by examining how closely they fit the national defence policy. Defence policies of course are not static; they change in response to changes in governments and in the international situation. Another criterion then for evaluating a state's armed forces is to consider how far and how fast they have adapted to changes in defence policy. This study is concerned with the forces of one small state, New Zealand, in the years since the end of the Second World War. No claim is made that the factors analyzed have any broader application to small states in general, for the forces New Zealand has developed and the problems it has faced in doing so have been distinctly its own. The period the study covers - 1946 to the middle of May 1972 - is significant because major changes occurred in the country's defence policy, to which the forces had to respond. The present structure of the New Zealand Armed Services is largely a result of these responses.