To the horror of the Australian defence and foreign policy establishment, Senator Jacqui Lambie had a characteristically sharp and to the point response to Donald Trump’s imposition of a 25% tariff on Australian steel exports to the United States.
Speaking to Nine Entertainment’s Karl Stefanovic, Senator Lambie reminded the audience that
“We’ve got this thing called Pine Gap.”
Lambie was referring to the nominally “joint” US-controlled giant intelligence facility outside Alice Springs.
“Pine Gap – they need it like no tomorrow. Just tell ‘em we’re going to switch it off in seven days.
“Obviously there’s no loyalty and mateship left here. He’s made that quite clear.
“Don’t play by their rules. They’re certainly not playing by ours. They’re showing that friendship doesn’t matter anymore.”
Lambie’s dismissal of the ritualistic mantra of “shared values” underlying the American alliance provoked cosplay shock horror amongst the usual suspects:
Stefanovic gasped: “Who’s going to come rescue us?”
Disgraced defence bureaucrat Mike Pezullo told Sky News that Lambie was “grossly irresponsible”, arguing,
- quite incorrectly – that “Pine Gap is as essential to Australia’s security as it is to American security”; and
- barely intelligibly – that “threatening to shut down Pine Gap would be grossly irresponsible in terms of our own security beliefs.”
The essence of Lambie’s argument was to take Trump’s transactional approach seriously as a threat to Australia’s sovereign decision-making capabilities:
“It’s time to let him know we’re not going to put up with this nonsense. If we’re so important to them, he better start showing it.
“It’s about time we start throwing something back.
“It’s a reality check for Australia. We need to stand on our own two feet.”
Lambie’s commendably strong and direct response to the Trump administration’s use of bullying as business as usual highlighted the issue of Australian sovereignty in graphic and understandable terms.
But there is a serious problem.
The threats posed to Australia by Pine Gap, a critical part of US nuclear command and control operations, are multiple and profound.
- is critical for US nuclear war-fighting plans and operations, as well as for conventional operations around the world;
- automatically pulls Australia into US planning for war with China;
- renders Australia complicit in gross violations of international law; and
- means that Alice Springs is a high priority nuclear target in the event of full-scale war.
A transactional approach to Pine Gap as Lambie suggests, however well intentioned, is not appropriate to the scale and nature of the threats to Australia posed by Pine Gap.
Senator Lambie’s positive suggestion is that Australia should think clearly about Australia’s interests without the guff of “shared values” – clearly not true now, if it ever was.
The problem is that adopting Trump’s brazen transactional approach suggests Australia would accept Alice Springs being a high priority nuclear target, if the price was right.
That was assuredly not Lambie’s intention, and could never be acceptable.
Lambie rightly pointed out that Australia should resist diplomatic bullying of all kinds – over economic policy and about defence policy.
The foundation of our thinking about relations with the United States should be Australian sovereignty, rooted in an institutional capability to work out when Australian interests and American interests align, and when they diverge.
For many years, this has been simply absent in Canberra.
There will be some policy issues where a transactional approach is appropriate – particularly where the issue comes down to money, which is always divisible, allowing a pathway to compromise.
But the threats posed by Pine Gap to Australia’s interests are different.
No price could ever be right.
The United States should be given notice that Pine Gap is to be closed, and Australian defence capabilities and budget should be developed for the actual defence of Australia.
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.
