Writing in the Lowry Institute’s online magazine ‘The Interpreter’, Hugh White, emeritus professor of strategic studies at the ANU, says that that there is a deep contradiction at the heart of the Albanese government’s foreign policy. This is between the government’s stated vision and its actions. Its vision favours of a multipolar Asian future. But its action signal complete alignment with the US policy of maintaining its strategic primacy.
In the vision Penny Wong has articulated she recognises that there should be a multi-lateral order in the region. China has increased its wealth and power and will play a larger role. But this should be balanced by the US’s indispensable continuing role and presence. The vision is one of co-equal powers that balance and constrain one another in the interests of peace and stability.
But White says the government’s actions- most recently its agreement to participate in AUKUS, and to purchase $368 billion nuclear powered submarines from the USA- signals “unconditional support for US policy” and sends the unmistakable message that Australia is perfectly happy as with US policy as it is.
The irreconcilable problem is that, according to White, US policy does not align with the Albanese government’s vision in favour of a multipolar Asian future.
“It is quite clear that the United States has no interest in joining China as a co-equal partner in a regional multipolar order. It seeks instead to perpetuate the role of Asia’s primary strategic power that it has enjoyed for so long,” says White.
White says that at her recent National Press Club address Penny Wong cautioned against “viewing the future of the region simply in terms of great powers competing for primacy”. But White says this is absurd. He says the contest between America and China for primacy in Asia is precisely what is driving the fundamental changes in the regional order and creating the risk of major war which Wong says we need to urgently to avert.
White says that Australia’s best chance of shaping the new order in Asia is to influence the USA’s approach to it. He says Wong must speak loudly to urge the US to aim for a balancing rather than leading role in Asia. He acknowledges that pessimists will argue that Australia has little to no capacity to affect US attitudes and actions.
Michael Keating is a former Secretary of the Departments of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Finance and Employment, and Industrial Relations. He is presently a visiting fellow at the Australian National University.
Initially a supporter of AUKUS, M. Keating, writing in ‘Pearls and Irritations’ Keating asks “if our key objective is to build a multipolar region where power is shared as a basis for future cooperation, does AUKUS damage the realisation of this objective?
He says the critical issue is the implications for Australia’s future sovereignty by tying ourselves to the US through AUKUS. The acid test would be how the US expects Australia to respond if it demanded that Australia join America in a war over Taiwan.
He says the answer to this (admittedly hypothetical) question needs to be mindful that for the last fifty years Australia (and the US) have recognised that there is only one China, and that Taiwan is part of it. Although Australia has maintained a policy of strategic ambiguity as to how it would respond to a forceful Chinese attempt to take over Taiwan, many Australians, including Keating himself, have argued that Australia should not join any war over Taiwan in future. Taiwan is not a strategic interest for Australia.
M. Keating then poses the question should Australia signal in advance to the US that they cannot count on Australia to join them in the defence of Taiwan’s independence? He says the government would be worried that if they did the US would cancel ANZUS. Keating doubts this would occur because the US derives substantial benefit from ANZUS, particularly in intelligence.
But M. Keating is not expecting the Albanese government to signal in advance to the US that it cannot count on Australian participation in a war over Taiwan. He says that “the fear of abandonment runs so deep, that no Australian government will run the risk of getting the wrong answer from the US, however damaging the future potential consequences. Thus, it is likely that the Albanese Government would instead prefer to take the risk of being involved in an unnecessary and likely disastrous war, and possibly before we get the first nuclear submarines.”
He concludes that improving our defence capability to make war less likely is, in principle, a worthy goal. But not if it comes at the cost of making war more likely. He now fears that AUKUS does it very difficult for Australia not to be dragged into an unnecessary and potentially catastrophic war at the behest of the US.
But as I have posted before I think the key role Pine Gap played during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in providing intelligence support to the United States military, including in the areas of surveillance, reconnaissance, and targeting, probably means the facility we would be dragged in any war between China and the US.
As early as 2012 Richard Tanter in a report to the Nautilus Institute for Security and sustainability stated that Pine Gap…remains a likely priority target for a Chinese missile strike in the event of a major China – United States conflict, both because of its role as a remote ground station for early warning satellites in the Defence Support Program (DSP) and Space Based Infra-Red Satellite (SBIRS) systems, and its larger role as a command, control, downlink, and processing facility for US signals intelligence satellites in geo-stationary orbit.
And if the Chinese attacked Pine Gap no Australian government could avoid involvement in the wider conflict between China and the USA.
Thus, AUKUS or no AUKUS, ANZUS or no ANZUS, if war breaks out between China and the US we are already “involved”. As john Menadue has written:
“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. Pine Gap would be the first Chinese target.”
It follows that presence of Pine Gap and other joint US-Australian military facilities in the country already narrow the scope of the Albanese government’s policy options. It must assume that if war breaks out between the US and China, AUKUS or no AUKUS, ANZUS or no ANZUS Australia is a likely target. Further, even if it wanted to (which it doesn’t), there would not sufficient electoral support for the Albanese government for closing or changing the role or accountability of the base at Pine Gap.
A 2022 Lowy Poll found that most Australians (52%) say AUKUS will make Australia safer. Around one in five (22%) say AUKUS will make no difference to Australia’s safety, and only 7% say the partnership will make Australia less safe. A substantial number of Australians are concerned about China becoming a military threat to Australia. Setting a record by some margin, three-quarters of Australians (75%) say it is very or somewhat likely that China will become a military threat to Australia in the next 20 years, an increase of 29 points since 2018. As Australians are increasingly concerned about potential conflict in the region, a bare majority (51%) say that Australia should remain neutral in the event of a military conflict between China and the United States. This figure has fallen six points since 2021. Almost half (46%) say Australia should support the United States in such a conflict, a five-point increase from last year.
While public opinion may well have been influenced by media reports such as “The Age’s’ Red Alert series it would require a very brave, some would say stupid, Labor government to raise start raising questions about whether, under current circumstances, Pine Gap or the US alliance make us safer or less safe. The Albanese government is neither very brave nor very stupid.
Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser both expressed concerns about Pine Gap’s secrecy and implications for Australian sovereignty. But the base was supported without qualification by both Bob Hawke and Paul Keating.
In a 1986 speech to the Australian-American Association, Hawke stated that the Pine Gap was essential to Australia’s national security and that it was operated in a manner consistent with Australia’s interests.
Similarly, in a 1994 interview with ‘The Bulletin’, Paul Keating stated that Pine Gap was a “crucial intelligence facility” and that it was in Australia’s interest to maintain its partnership with the United States in this area.