Trump’s stated positions on major international issues, e.g. climate change and the value and importance of multilateral institutions, both political and economic, and on particular issues such as Ukraine, the Middle East and relations with China, give grounds for plenty of concern when compared with Australian interests and policies.
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Geoff Miller
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Can Trump make the Planet Safe, as well as America Great?
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Avoiding an ‘exclusion’ disaster in the Pacific – a different lesson from Ukraine
The most senior US officials, including President Joe Biden himself, refer to US alliances with individual or groups of countries in the Indo-Pacific as benign and defensive in nature. These references contrast with warnings about the possible “knock-on” effect of a Russian victory in Ukraine which, it is said, could encourage China to seek to incorporate Taiwan by force. However, an examination of the situation in Europe provides a different lesson for our part of the world; that is that building an alliance system which excludes the most important country in a region can have disastrous effects. (more…)
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AUKUS: Submarines afloat in — and perhaps causing — a sea of troubles
In the wording of the Ministerial Statement after the recent AUSMIN meeting between Australian and US Ministers of Defence and Foreign Affairs, and in a subsequent on-the-record conversation, Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles strongly endorsed both AUKUS and a greater US defence presence in Australia. Unfortunately there are questions about AUKUS which the Government has never answered, and about how the US Government sees itself possibly using the stronger military presence which it is establishing in Australia and elsewhere in the Asia-Pacific. (more…)
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Shangri-la Security Dialogue heralds important shift in Australia’s language on China
The 21st Shangri-la Security Dialogue, held in Singapore between 31 May and 2 June, saw the United States’ Secretary of Defence unveil a new way to describe his country’s Asia-Pacific policy, and hold a bilateral meeting with his Chinese counterpart. China was unyielding on its “core interests”. Australian Defence Minister Marles embraced the “global rules-based order” and drew a sharp distinction between Russia and China, which he invited to abide by “the order’s” rules. (more…)
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North Asian Summit: hedging against the United States?
The Prime Ministers of China, Japan and South Korea met in Seoul on 27 May to resume regular annual meetings which began in 2008 and were held annually until 2019, when they were interrupted by COVID and “aspects of the international situation”. (more…)
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Another road for “Made in Australia”
In spruiking their coming “Future Made in Australia” policies PM Albanese and Treasurer Chalmers have singled out for a possible government “helping hand” projects designed to promote our role in their hoped-for future renewable, green economy. But if government “helping hands” are thinkable they could be applied in other areas as well. One area crying out for attention is in establishing and supporting employment-creating projects and businesses in the Northern Territory. (more…)
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‘To Boldly Go’—but not so far as to replace the private sector
The Government’s foreshadowed bill for a “Future Made in Australia” has been met with two very different kinds of response, one positive, welcoming the prospect of initiatives from the Government to support and promote investment in forward-leaning projects and the “industries of the future”, the other negative, saying that governments should stay out of private sectors’ business, risk creating distortions if they don’t, and in Australia’s case that we shouldn’t try to compete with much bigger countries like the US and China, able to swamp any subsidies we might give our industries. (more…)
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ASEAN Summit a timely background for this week’s talks with China
The recent ASEAN-Australia Summit in Melbourne was widely well received. Leaders of all member countries, except Myanmar, attended. Some—President Marcos of the Philippines and Prime Minister Anwar of Malaysia—also carried out quite extensive individual programs. Speeches and comments reflected general agreement, and there was an impressive list of follow-up practical actions, many of them with a substantial Australian financial contribution. (more…)
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The Wily Occidentals
Can Australia reconcile the American and Chinese strands of its foreign policy? (more…)
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The US in Australia—and in China!
The coming week will see an enormous festival of US alliances with and in Australia, with the biggest “Talisman Sabre” exercise ever, and a visit to Australia by the US Secretaries of State and Defence for the annual “AUSMIN” talks. All of this has been made more glamorous by the arrival of a new US warship, commissioned as “USS Canberra” while here. (more…)
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Shangri-la Dialogue: some Americans just don’t get China
Prime Minister Albanese spoke moderately and positively at the Shangri-la Dialogue in Singapore last weekend, although his address didn’t really live up to its prior publicity. However the main impression from the exchanges at the Dialogue was of the differences between the US and China. Amazingly, the American Secretary of Defence didn’t seem to realise that the US continuing to keep the Chinese Defence Minister on some kind of sanctions black-list would affect the latter’s willingness to engage in bilateral talks. (more…)
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North Korea: same old, or another ticking bomb?
Continued missile testing by North Korea invites the question, why do they do it? It’s tempting to regard it as “just what they do”, but is that all there is to it? Is it “urgent but not important”? What about the response? (more…)
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The Asia-Pacific: strategic equilibrium, not primacy
When there has been so much loose talk about what would be a catastrophic war between the world’s two major powers, it is both significant and welcome that Foreign Minister Penny Wong has authoritatively stated her position that the Asia-Pacific is a multipolar region, and that this is Australia’s national policy at this time. (more…)
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A long game—peace in the Asia-Pacific
Perhaps Australia should play the “long game”, and do everything we can to avoid a war in the Pacific, not just work out how we might take part in one.
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AUKUS: A greedy pup
It seems that poor old Albanese has been sold a very greedy—though only virtual—pup. Think of the comparison with another Labor PM, Ben Chifley. Albanese doesn’t come out of it very well. (more…)
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For Australia, horror of war over Taiwan is not inevitable
Contributors to the “War with China over Taiwan” horror show which began in the Nine newspapers this week assume that a war between China and the United States is likely, and some of them then explicitly say that Australia would be involved. Australia should instead regard the Taiwan issue as one for us to “sit out”. (more…)
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The Defence Strategic Review: We should regard the Taiwan issue as one for us to ‘sit out’
It is almost impossible to imagine any realistic circumstances, short of general war in the Asia-Pacific, under which China would launch a military attack on Australia. (more…)
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What Ministers in a new Government should do – climate change, China-US relations and our region
Foreign policy must be one of the areas where any government can find itself most constrained by the circumstances it has to deal with—“events, dear boy, events”, as former British Prime Minister Harold McMillan once said. But given that, even in the most pressing state of affairs a government can choose where it directs its discretionary resources. (more…)
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Australia is still in Fear of China
The former eminent Australian diplomat Sir James Plimsoll once described China as “a big fact”. It is big, and it is a fact, and we have to get used to it.
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Australia-China relations: will “face” trump trade?
China’s refusal to deal with Australia at Ministerial level is likely to frustrate its effort to join an important Pacific trade agreement. (more…)
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Ukraine, India, China and Australia: a Khaki election?
Prime Minister Morrison seems to want to fix in concrete what he says he and we should most fear—a Russia-China “alliance of autocracies”. He treats similar responses to the Ukraine crisis by China and by our fellow Quad member India very differently. Could the coming election be the reason? (more…)
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The Quad: it’s the US playing catch-up with China, but where does it lead?
For the emergence of a sustainable and mutually tolerable “Pacific strategic system” we should be aiming to make that system inclusive, not split down the middle with Quad. (more…)
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Now you see what it’s like in Ukraine
In massing large numbers of troops near the Ukraine Putin may have been aiming to show NATO and the West how Russia—and Putin himself in particular—has felt over the years as the Western alliance and NATO crept ever closer to Russia’s borders. (more…)
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China-Australia relations: A way out of the freeze?
China’s stated wish to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement on Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) could, if we are skilful, give us a path to promote the restoration of more normal diplomatic relations.
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The ‘forever submarines’ go nuclear
The nuclear submarine deal intensifies Australia’s military cooperation with the US. It will be up to our regional neighbours to decide whether, as Scott Morrison says, the deal will help and not hinder them. (more…)
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Strategic stances at an uncertain time
The unimpressive end to the United States’ commitment to Afghanistan emphasises the questions facing Australia in regard to the future security of the Asia-Pacific. Different approaches are being put forward, including greater self-reliance, and greater involvement with the US.
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Both Afghanistan and the US at an uncertain time
It’s possible, and much to be hoped, that some of the worst fears for the Afghan people under the Taliban will not be realised. But the United States’ standing in the world has been damaged.
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Defence cooperation with the US at an uncertain time
Only by acknowledging China’s importance in the region while working with others to influence, if we can, their approach and actions can we achieve the peaceful, prosperous and stable region that we want to live in. (more…)
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The world after 2020
What a year 2020 was for Australia, with first the fires and then the pandemic. Now at the end of it, we’re still confronted with the challenges of climate change in the shape of floods, not fires, and our Prime Minister unable to get a speaking slot at an international climate change conference.
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The main game must be to get US, China relations on a better footing
Whoever wins the imminent US Presidential election, US-China relations will continue to be the most important geo-political issue for the world, and for Australia. (more…)