Vulnerable Pacific Island states should have the freedom to keep their options open rather than being locked into collective defence alliances that are erroneously based on containing China.
Prime Minister Albanese and Foreign Minister Wong have been making well publicised trips to Pacific Island neighbours. Humming Rodgers and Hammerstein’s captivating hit, Some Enchanting Evening, they “promise to listen”, disavow any ulterior leadership motive and celebrate Australia’s “Pacific family”. They say they very much respect the sovereign independence of all Pacific states.
Does a less inspired strategic motive lurk here? Albanese and Wong are bundling “comprehensive” agreements and promoting new alliance commitments that require the Pacific Islands to accept exclusive, if not compromising, consultation and security and policing guarantees, while emphasising Australia’s pressing “material security interests”.
Meanwhile, the media gets hysterical about the single test launch of a Chinese ballistic missile in the Pacific. The US has 3,700 nuclear warheads, China 600 to 620, only 34 of which are deployed. Who has the overwhelming margin of force? How many tests has the US carried out near the Marshall Islands? On 10 July, senior ABC political presenter Patricia Karvelas highlighted Australia’s new Fiji treaty as a “landmark treaty” in light of “China’s militarisation” and Australia’s urgent need “to muscle up” against China.
Labor disappeared “Morrison’s arc of alliances”, but retained the AUKUS, the QUAD and the number one priority to contain China. It is now nursing containment 2.0 – the US has been growing the “three island chains” against China since 1951. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi has responded by insisting on “no alliance, no confrontation and no targeting of any third country”, as consistent with Article 51, Chapter 7 of the UN Charter that formally requires alliances to act only with UNSC authorisation. Article 103 requires that UNSC decisions take precedence over all other treaties.
Is Albanese’s Pacific strategy essentially a Cold-War inspired attempt to create a new Pacific mini arc that connects to a US-led region-wide security network? Labor told Scott Morrison to take his ukulele and go home. Now it is touting its own variation on Morrison’s arc as “new architecture” that respects national independence in the Pacific. Would it not be preferable to include China in wider regional security and economic structures, based on sovereign equality, which transcends the exclusivity of alliance politics?
Public debate in Australia needs to better explore the view from Beijing, before making any sweeping judgements. There is more than one model for achieving Australia’s national security and economic priorities in the island Pacific.
Prime Minister Bob Hawke led APEC’s founding and helped ensure APEC included China. The grouping created new opportunities for ministerial-level consultation. This example is worth emulating in both the economic and security space. APEC was designed as an inclusive problem-solving agency that builds on consensus. It was not intended as yet another US security bloc. But is Albanese building on Hawke’s legacy? Presently, China is not included in the Pacific Island Forum or Pacific Community. Nor has Australia yet to endorse an ascension working group to review China’s application in 2021 for CPTPP membership.
When thinking about security, “International Relations 101” relies on the key difference between “collective defence” and “collective security”. “Collective defence” (alliances) is an exclusive, binding set of closed state relations that binds states together against either a specifically named or well understood apprehended threat. “Collective security” is a universal security system that responds to any aggression in the international system of states, including that of its own membership.
The Chinese have reason to be suspicious of the efficacy and fairness of alternative great power alliance politics and adhere to a strict interpretation of the UN Charter – unlike the US, which “preemptively” invaded Iraq in 2003 without the benefit of proper UN authorisation. (In 1999, Australia acted without UN authorisation in East Timor.)
Alliances may serve as a cozy security blanket, but they are structurally flawed in their exclusive decision-making that dictates to weaker member states. NATO is a full “alliance”, predicated in “all for one, one for all”. The latter assumption is now under scrutiny.
Entering into an alliance requires states to sign the future away on a dotted line. The famous US expert on the Soviet Union, George Keenan once advised, “…wise statesmen usually shy away from commitments [constituting] limitations on government’s behaviour at unknown dates in the future in the face of unpredictable situations”.
ANZUS is not a full-blown treaty of alliance. Having underwritten NATO, the US in 1951 was not that keen on being tied down by ANZUS. The treaty calls for “consultation” in the case of “common danger”. It is left to each country to decide at the time what action to take.
The creation now of an interlocking security systems across the Pacific should not be a matter of crowing, but rather of deep regret. To enhance peace against the instability and inequities of great power rivalry, the experience of APEC plus ANZUS would more properly inform policy adaptation in the contemporary context of global disorder.
NATO’s example should not be applied in the Pacific. “Consultation” can cross over into political coercion. The PNG-Australia Security Agreement Treaty assumes PNG is Australia’s primary security partner. This means PNG faces serious security restraint, even strategic denial. PNG decisions must come with advanced consultation in all matters that “materially impact” Australia’s security, for example PNG’s acceptance of any foreign military access. Vanuatu cannot allow foreign bases on its territory. The Tuvalu-Australia Falepil Union 2023 agreement required Tuvalu to consult Australia on “all security and defence partnerships with third states”. The Australia-Fiji Veitacini Treaty, or “Ocean of Peace Alliance” extols a new accession strategy enlisting other Pacific Island countries to sign on to the new treaty’s security provisions. All of this is erroneously predicated on distorted strategic priorities regarding China’s exclusion rather than inclusion in the Pacific.
On the eve of geopolitical tumult and shrinking US leadership of the “Free World”, exaggerated Cold war disenchantment still fosters ever-expanding, increasingly costly national security structures. The brittle nature of exclusive alliance relationships is a drag on national economies. Security trumps economy to contain China. Rather than expanding anti-China alliances, it would be rational to cooperate rather than compete with China.
Ronald C. Keith received his PhD in Politics at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. He retired as Head and Professor of Political Science in 2006 at the University Calgary where had taught courses on China and international relations for more than 25 years. He retired a second time as Professor of China Studies at the Department of International Business and Asian Studies, Griffith University, 2015. He has published 17 books and 48 articles in major refereed journals, focusing on China. The present article especially draws on his books, The Diplomacy of Zhou Enlai, The Foreign Policy of Deng Xiaopingand China Change and Confucian Benevolence.