Declining empires never decline gracefully. And neither will the US empire – addicted as it is to a belief in its ‘exceptionalism’ and its grounding in aggression both at home and abroad. Add to the mix that 70 million people voted for Donald Trump and 70% of Republican supporters believe that the election was stolen by the Democrats. A sick country! Joe Biden will smooth a few rough edges but won’t do much more.
Yesterday I discussed US ‘exceptionalism’ and that the US is almost always at war. Today I discuss the US domestic sickness- a failing democracy,inequality, racism and violence.
It is a myth that democracies like America will behave internationally at a higher level of morality. Countries act in their own interests as they perceive them. We need to discount the noble ideas espoused by Americans on how they run their own country on the domestic front and look instead at how they consistently treat other countries. Consider how the Kurds are being treated. They led the fight against ISIS but are now largely abandoned by the US and other ‘allies’. The scrapping of the alliance with them is made the more dishonourable by the US/Saudi alliance with the resulting tragedy in Yemen.
The US claims about how well they run their own country are challenged on so many fronts. Alongside great wealth and privilege, 43 million US citizens live in poverty, they have a massive prison population with its indelible racist connotations, guns are ubiquitous and they refuse to address the issue. Violence is as American as cherry pie. It is embedded in US behaviour both at home and abroad.
The founding documents of the US inspire Americans and many people throughout the world. “The land of the free and the home of the brave” still has a clarion call. Unfortunately, those core values have often been denied to others. For example, when the Philippines sought US support it was invaded instead. Ho Chi Minh wanted US support for independence but Vietnam was invaded.
Like many democracies, including our own, money and vested interests are corrupting public life. As some have described it, ‘Democracy’ in the US has been replaced by ‘Donocracy’, with practically no restrictions on funding of elections and political lobbying for decades. House of Representatives electorates are gerrymandered and poor and minority group voters are often excluded from the rolls. The powerful Jewish lobby, supported by fundamentalist Christians, has run US policy off the rails on Israel and the Middle East. The powerful private health insurance industry has mired the US in the most expensive and inefficient health services in the world
The US has slipped to number 21 as a ‘flawed democracy’ in the Economist’s Intelligence 2016 Democracy Index. (NZ was ranked 4 and Australia 10). It noted that ‘public confidence in government has slumped to historic lows in the US.’ Trump is pushing the US into becoming a failed state. His executive power is largely unchecked by a crippled Congress. The Supreme Court is stacked
Many democracies are in trouble. US democracy is in more trouble than most. With over 40% of Americans still prepared to vote for Donald Trump it tells us a great deal about the pervasive sickness.
But our risky dependence on the US cannot be avoided or excused by laying problems at the door of Donald Trump alone. Malcolm Fraser warned us about a dangerous ally long before Donald Trump came on the scene. US obsession with war and with overthrowing or undermining foreign governments goes back over a century. So does domestic gun violence,inequality and racism.
Donald Trump excesses are not likely to significantly move American policies from what has become the norm over two centuries.
Hugh White has pointed out, the US has in effect now given up looking after anyone but itself – “America first” – which makes it very dangerous for a country to be joined at the hip with the US, with or without Donald Trump. It could, of course, be argued that Trump is just being honest and saying what US presidents have always done, looking after their own interests even if they refuse to admit it.
A major voice in articulating American extremism and the American Imperium is Fox News and Rupert Murdoch who exert their influence not just in America but also in the UK and Australia. Fox News supported the invasion of Iraq and is mindless of the terrible consequences. Rupert Murdoch applauded the invasion of Iraq because it would reduce oil prices. Fox and News Corp are leading sceptics on climate change which threatens our planet. News Corp underpins American imperialist intentions. The New York Times tells us that outside the White House, Rupert Murdoch is Trump’s chief adviser. God help us!
In the past as in the Vietnam war, the good sense of the American people turned the tide. It is now a moot point whether the US can turn the tide again. The sickness is now more entrenched by Fox News and other moneyed extremists.
But it is not just the destructive role of News Corp in the US, UK and Australia. Our media, including the ABC and even SBS, is so derivative. Our media seems to regard Australia as an island parked off New York. We are saturated with news, views, entertainment and sit-coms from the US. It is so pervasive and extensive, we don’t recognize it for its very nature. The last thing a fish recognizes is water. We really do have a ‘white man’ media’. We see it most obviously today in its paranoia over China.
One outcome of the declining comparative US economic power is that the US will ask its allies to do more. We saw the influence of US budgetary pressures in its launch of the pivot to the Pacific. It was designed in part to help the US extricate itself from the Middle East, but also to reduce defence expenses in the budget.
Despite continual wars, often unsuccessful, the overthrow or subversion of foreign governments and declining US economic influence, US hegemony and domination of Australian thinking continues. Despite all the evidence, why do we continue in denial?
One reason is that as a small, isolated and white community in Asia we have historically sought an outside protector, first the UK and when that failed, the US.
We are often told that we have shared values and common institutions first with the UK and now with the US. But counties will always act first in their own interests as Australian farmers are finding as a result of Trump’s dealing with China.
We continue to seek security from our region through a US protector rather than, as Paul Keating put it, security within our own region. Our long-term future depends on relations in our region and not reliance on a dangerous and distant ally.
Another reason why we are in denial about the American Imperium, is, as I have described, the saturation of our media with US news, views and entertainment. We do not have an independent media. Whatever the US media says about tax cuts for the wealthy, defence or climate change it inevitably gets a good run in our derivative media.
A further reason for the continuing US hegemony in Australian attitudes is the seduction of Australian opinion leaders over decades who have benefitted from American largesse and support – in the media, politics, bureaucracy, business, trade unions, universities and think-tanks. Thousands of influential Australians have been co-opted by US money and support in travel, ‘dialogues’, study centres and think tanks. That is real ‘foreign influence’.
China is a beginner in this soft power game.
How long will Australian denial of US policies continue? When will some of us stand up? Are our political leaders right in their assessment that any questioning of the threats posed by our interpretation of the benefits and obligations of the US alliance will lose them an election?
In so far as China is any sort of distant threat it would be much less so if we were not so subservient to the US. The great risk of war with China is if we continue to act as a proxy for the US.
What will we do if the US decides to follow the advice of some of its senior generals and use tactical nuclear weapons in North Korea? Their use would engage the US/Australian facilities in Central Australia a fact that would not escape the notice of China
There is also a great risk that we could be drawn into a US-led attack on China without our knowledge or agreement.
We are a nation in denial that we are ‘joined at the hip’ to a dangerous ,erratic and risky ally. Apart from brief isolationist periods, the US has been almost perpetually at war. The greatest military risk we run is being led by the nose into a US war with China.
Our record is clear. We have allowed ourselves to be drawn into the futile wars of the UK and the US time and time again. We are used to acting at the direction of our imperial masters. We have become culturally addicted to being told what to think and do. We have forfeited our strategic autonomy while parroting on about our sovereignty
John Menadue is the Founder and Editor in Chief of Pearls and Irritations. He was formerly Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet under Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser, Ambassador to Japan, Secretary of the Department of Immigration and CEO of Qantas.
Comments
30 responses to “Our aggressive and violent ally. An updated repost. Part 2 of 2”
There is truth in the statement “We have become culturally addicted to being told what to think and do.” The good news is that it has worked for us when it comes to COVID unlike has been the experience in much of the rest of the world.
As to our supine allegiance to our Great Protector, it may suit current politicians to push this line beyond breaking point. But after the Trump experience, is this the view of the generation coming to the ballot box now? Are they imprinted with the gratitude which gave rise to the public subscription for funds for the American War Memorial on Russell Hill?
THanks again.
1. the kurds NEVER lead the fight against daesh, that was Syria, Iran, Hezbollah and Russia.
2. “Trump is pushing the US into becoming a failed state. His executive power is largely unchecked by a crippled Congress.” Are you serious? Did history start 20Jan 2017 when the orange golem of greatness won?
Your logical fallacies and cognitive dissonans is baffeling, obama was a peaceful loving hippy as was the last u.s 10 prez in your eyes i guess, IT CERTAINLY looks that way in your writing.
You are either shilling for u.s/nato terrorists or you are so caught up in western propaganda and your programming that you do not see the forrest bc of the trees.
Whatever point you are trying to make is destroyed by stupid nato buzzwords and tds.
John, what you say tells me that nothing has changed since a terrified young research assistant (me) stood up at a political science conference in 1959 or thereabouts to say that China was not interested in invading Australia. My four years study of Chinese at Sydney University, fruitless in most ways, at least compelled me to do that.
Perhaps it is time for proactive measures; for example, the formation of an ‘Asia-Pacific Foreign Policy Electoral Lobby’ based on the Women’s Electoral Lobby model (or the model they used). A questionnaire could be devised to be sent to all candidates in the next federal election for their response. Local networks in each electorate to be informed by the well informed members.
It’s insanity and delusional to believe China would waste resources on military aggression against any foreign state when honest trade and investment is so much more profitable.
…or even dishonest trade and investment as practiced by most industrialised countries.
Look where the government is now taking us with China, they are utter fools. Note Morrison says nothing but once again uses his war crazy attack dogs.
“Liberal Senator Jim Molan fears Australia is on brink of military conflict with China”.
https://7news.com.au/sunrise/on-the-show/liberal-senator-jim-molan-fears-australia-is-on-brink-of-military-conflict-with-china-c-1851733
Kerry stokes is Chairman of the 7 Network. He also sits on the board of the AWM. It was he who came to the rescue lately offering legal help and financial assistance when some of our SAS soldiers were accused in the Brereton Report of war crimes.
Molan is spruiking an imminent war with China while the government he is a part of is spruiking the wonderful rise in GDP because of increased iron ore sales to China.
I wonder if they have ever heard of ‘Pig Iron Bob’.
JM states that “countries will always act first in their own interests.” MH17 provides a good example of where the US has acted in its own interests at the expense of Australia’s interests.
John Kerry, the then US Secretary of State, stated in a media interview the day after MH17 was shot down that the US had surveillance footage of the shoot down. This footage, which would seem to confirm conclusively whether it was the Ukrainian’s or separatists who shot down MH17, has never been provided to the investigation.
The failure to provide this evidence suggests that the footage indicates Ukrainian culpability which would undermine the US’ objectives in Ukraine and the narrative of Russian culpability. Clearly the US chose in this instance that its interests in Ukraine/Russia are more important than Australia’s interests to determine who shot down MH17.
This example is just one more reason why it is foolhardy to base our defence policy on an alliance with US.
Around the time Kerry did the media interview, or maybe even a few hours earlier, Tony Abbot declared that it was the Russians! WMD all over again. Tony Abbot did exactly what was expected of Australia.
The inquiry that was done also excluded the participation of the Malaysians who owned the plane. The Malaysians were trusting enough (or dumb enough…) to hand over the black boxes to the UK. So in the end, it was the Ukrainians, the Dutch, and you can bet your bottom dollar, MI6 which decided who was guilty.
Simple logic informs us of 2 arguments a) Why in the world would the Russians want to shoot down an airliner? It just makes no sense. b) It was a war zone; the less well-disciplined Ukrainians had the Buk missile system… but we can only speculate whether it was they who did it.
Unfortunately for the families of the Aussies who died, they will never have the truth as to what really happened.
Cameron: Its one thing for the US to act in its own interests re Ukraine and the shooting down of MH17 but quite another thing for the Australian government to parrot the US line. As I recall both Abbott and Bishop were quick to blame Russia and repeat the US narrative without regard for the loss of Australian lives.
No wonder the younger demographic of voters in Australia has lost faith in democracy. It’ s been reduced to a permanent election campaign and the equivalent of a well scripted side show on the part of the government and media to distract from the real purpose: the government implementing its secretive ideological agenda. The only ‘demos’ this government supports are its crony mates. Same for the Republicans in the US.
With Morrison in control it has become all about photo shoots and tailored performances that paint him in good light, while he gets his attack dogs to do the dirty work. Tudge, Robert, Porter, Dutton, Tehan, and now the elevation of one of the anti-China pro-US Wolverines in the form of Hastie for assistant minister of defence. (Perhaps that should be ‘defense’ in line with US spelling). It is Orwellian given most of these ministers do the opposite of what they are supposed to be there for in the most doublespeak manner possible.
Bipartisanship has almost disappeared unless it is Labor capitulating to the Liberal’s demands. All that matters is that a party wins, it seems to be the only objective, and many voters see politics like a game of sport. They always barrack for the same team irrespective of how it performs because the other side is like the enemy, the ‘loser’ in US speak. From day one after an election, the next election campaign starts all over again. What the government actually delivers is not important to the media, they’ll just massage anything they do into the minds of readers. Politicians now act with total impunity because former codes of conduct are never acted on.
Democracy has been robbed from the people, they only get to vote every now and then, and even when that happens their voting choices are informed on the basis of a bunch of lies. Throw them money and they’ll respond, voting is only about what “you’ll get” in the media, the larger issue of what is best for Australia goes unnoticed, its just about ‘me’.
So well put. Western “democracy” is such an obvious sham yet most are still drunk on it’s propaganda. I find it so infuriating.
The meme-term ‘robust democracy’, frequently used, is the one that makes me puke.
Thanks
Like another article here on Brexit, it is related, US radical right libertarian ideology and hefty Anglo exceptionalism revolving rounf white nationalism; now it seems Australia is being compelled to have a ‘Brexit’ with China in supporting US foreign policy but severely damaging our own trade relationship?
The intended result all along is to bill the Oz masses for the economic losses and keeping them emotionally invested into worthless feel-good Anglocentric ideologies and sinophobia, while the ruling class manically laughs at the stupidity of their voter base as they keep collecting their fat paychecks from the US State Dept.
First we must wipe our hands clean of the orthodox Western approach to relations with nations, which means in part to desist from referring to these relations as “strategic”, “power”, “soft power”, “foreign policy” etc. It also means identifying specifically those who are the foundation of the orthodoxy and calling them out for their antagonism. The many and varied university faculties such as ANUs Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, and the privately financed research institutes such as the Australian Institute of International Affairs are good examples.
As I said yesterday upon reading Part I of this analysis of our dangerous and close and not otherwise properly analysed relationship with the US – this needs study in all our schools – by all teachers and students. It would be so good to see a bipartisan national parliament standing up in a truth-and-reconciliation process explaining how they have been suborned by US largesse into their essentially treasonous acts against our national sovereignty and interest! Surely enough is enough! Thanks for the mention of the warnings sounded by Malcolm Fraser, too. No wonder his erstwhile US-serving party rejected him – no wonder he and Gough Whitlam found a kind of rapprochement in their latter years.
The issue is we don’t really live in a democracy. The USA is clearly not a democracy in any real sense of the word, but rather more accurately described as a corporatised fascist state ruled by an oligarchy of elite interests fronted by a facade of democratic institutions and “elected” (more selected) corrupt puppet leaders. While Australia may be considered not so bad, the two party system is clearly a charade where half the time the “opposition” votes with the government, especially on “national security” matters and on trade deals.
The Australian electoral system (much like most of the west) effective operates as a series of three year dictatorships where the people are sold on and vote for one set of policies only to be delivered whatever the party bosses and their sponsors (together with the unelected complex of state bureaucrats and special interest think-tanks) see fit immediately after the election and over the ensuing three year period. The ordinary people (citizens) are only ever given a say in specific policies through referenda which are usually aligned with the elections and for largely inconsequential issues like the flag or gay rights (the rigged Australian referendum question on becoming a republic notwithstanding). The voting public (citizens) are never asked about really important questions like: who the nation should be allied with, whether the nation should go to war, what the defense budget should be, what trade deals and treaties should contain and whether whatever has been negotiated should be ratified.
So, are we at all surprised that young people and increasingly many others have no faith in “democracy” as it has been delivered to us?
In this context the alliance with “our aggressive and violent ally” is not a project of the people of Australia, but rather of the nation’s political and bureaucratic elites — people who deign to represent Australia but really represent their own interests and in gathering power and wealth for themselves.
A great contribution John. I suggest Democracy and American democracy are treated as homologous terms . We need to stop and take note of this. American democracy ascribes (politically and economically) to the liberal light on the hill of individualism, libertarianism and neoliberal economics. What about the collective/ social ideal– for me it sheds a brighter light. Australians need to look closer. Even our Parliament does NOT have a Constitutional mandate on Foreign Policy– maybe why ignorance prevails.
As you say we are a small, isloated white [supremacist] community. I would add that we are fearful, cowardly and not prepared to stand up for ourselves.
Seems like we are hell bent on turning Asia into a subservient colony of the West instead of accepting our geographical reality. This is insanity.
I can’t agree, George. We were once hell-bent on Asian subservience, perhaps. But Asia has definitely emerged from that position. I suppose the question is, what does accepting our geographical reality involve?
Hey Barney can you first tell me when we were subservient to Asia?
You’ve misunderstood me; perhaps I was ambiguous. I mean, in agreement with you, that we in the West wanted Asia subservient to us. But those days are over, and it is not just the rise of China that made it so.
It is the US that tells us what to do and dominates our country with foreign investment, military bases, and political interference. It is clearly trying to control China’s economy and woo the rest of Asia to follow the US agenda. They just sent Pompeo on a tour and his main motivation was to turn south east Asians towards the US’s anti-China view. It was an utter failure. India, under fascist Modi is the only country that is complying.
The same countries that made Asia subservient before, are now back on the job, don’t you notice that? Australia leads the pack once again being the willing lacky that it always there for these older Western powers. As Jack Waterford once wrote in one of his articles, in Washington they consider Australia an “easy lay”.
The US has demonstrated two ways it is attempting to inhibit China’s growth. One is with quieter less public ‘containment of China’ policy exampled by Obama’s (euphemistic) Pivot to Asia (replete with a rejuvenation of US military bases pointed at the Sino region), the second is the uncontrolled public method which has been employed by Trump in a range of denigrating, abusive, and racist tweets, and a plethora of dubious US officials travelling around the world, including Australia, promulgating neo-McCarthyist fear over China. It has mainly been based on lies and fake information as was done with the case for the war in Iraq and Vietnam.
The US will never give up its ‘exceptionalism’ and its belief it should be the most powerful country in the world, evidenced with the kind of military domination it displays and the enormous military budgets it constructs.
It was clearly the last large scale Western country to adopt imperialism, roughly starting around the time of president McKinley. When he was elected, Americans had a clear choice as to whether they should turn into an imperialist country or not. They chose the first option. That set the pace for the entire 20th Century up until today.
While England receded, the US took its place.
McKinley led the US into the The Spanish American war using a fake news “yellow journalism” campaign run by William Randolf Hearst. They claimed the USS Maine had been sunk by Cuban terrorists in Havana Harbour. It was never proven, but became the convenient fake-meme cause for invasion of Cuba mainly for the sake of wealthy US robber barons. Other plausible causes for the explosions that sunk the ship were cited, but they were swept away in the press by the nationalist-patriotic spin of bigots.
The US has not stopped using fake news to start wars since that time, and continues to push its world dominance as self-appointed international policeman, and even that is a euphemism. It’s more like the world’s self-appointed warmonger interfering with geopolitics everywhere it decides to go uniquely for its own self-interests.
China’s mistake as far as the US is concerned is that its economy got too big. And the scale of an economy is related to world power (especially according to Western thought). The US is also concerned that China’s electronic technology, and thus hybrid war technology, may have surpassed their own level of knowledge, so that’s another reason to smash the country.
Australia is not even worth mentioning really, because we are no longer independent, both sides of politics have given America full control. They give the orders, we jump.
The reality is that Australia is a vassal state of the Western block empire. To assume that its political leaders have any real scope to change the nature of the nation’s position in this respect is to deny geopolitical reality and history. “Fearful” and “cowardly” are emotive terms that are inappropriate to a cold hard assessment of power relations.
Australia is trapped within a powerful web of controls involving military and intelligence linkages, economic dependence on the USD and US controlled institutions like the IMF, World Bank and SWIFT network, and US banks and others that own much of Australia (accounting for the bulk of foreign investment vs China at 5% or less). All of the nation’s defence infrastructure is predicated on being a part of the US military alliance (a good question is whether some of might even work if used in defence against the US?).
For Australia to go its own way would require a suicidal bent on behalf of the political leadership. As pointed out in the article above, the US is an “aggressive and violent ally” — a characteristic that would not bode well in the face of losing one of its most loyal (craven) supporters. History shows the US leadership to be vengeful brutal oppressors of wayward or target nations with little tolerance for dissent and signs of independence.
There’s no denying the central thrust of your argument John, that America is “..a dangerous, erratic and risky ally.” So the next question is: what’s the alternative? Since WW2, Australian governments have not been game (with one exception) to pursue that question and instead have believed that compromises were necessary in order to uphold the US political order throughout the world; in essence a permissive environment for international financial institutions and business corporations. This partly explains why Australia has subordinated its foreign policy to the wishes of the US and is the real reason Australian troops were in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan – it was considered important to show our relevance to the US as a competent ally. This ‘assistance’ has been considered necessary and part of the price to be paid for the alleged promise of US assistance in the defence of Australia.
Perhaps you are correct John, “..that any questioning of the threats posed by our interpretation of the benefits and obligations of the US alliance will lose them an election..”. But even so, Australians have never been told the bald truth; in fact when it comes to committing Australian troops, we have been told anything but, and a compliant media ensures this continues.
Do we deserve better? My oath we do.
We might deserve better, but it seems unlikely we will get it any time soon. Maybe after the US economy finally collapses and it breaks up into a series of different nations.
Nothing will change at best, until the treasonous ruling elites on American payroll is put to the guillotine.