Life on the West Island - Still going all the way

Just over three years ago, Life on the West Island commented on a visit to the United States by our then Prime Minister Scott Morrison. It concluded:

Given the current political and economic turmoil in the US and Britain, the Prime Minister’s gormless toadying to President Trump reflects badly on the West Island and has done nothing to lessen global tensions. ‘All the way with USA’ will anger our major trading partners and lock us in to even more military contributions to America’s colonial wars and aspirations.

Since that was written, it appears that the West Island has slumped into an even more subservient relationship with the United States, which remains in political turmoil as it is consumed by baseless conspiracy theories and a level of belief in its own exceptional virtue bordering on delusional.

This week, John Menadue, former head of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet and West Island Ambassador to Japan, raised a red flag about our slavish attachment to a decaying world superpower. Writing in Pearls and Irritations, he said (in part):

As China grows and prospers many in the US want us to believe that China will follow the same path that the US itself pursued - global military aggression, the overthrow of numerous governments around the world and persecution of minorities at home.

But the record so far suggests that China is different. They do not want to take on the US global dominion and hegemony role. America posits that China thinks and behaves like itself: ‘We had Manifest Destiny and it took us across the Pacific to the Philippines. Therefore, China must have a Monroe Doctrine and Manifest Destiny in mind.’

Our dangerous ally has been addicted to war and violence at home and abroad for centuries. It sees war as a means of holding and if possible enhancing its power and authority. War and the threat of war have been continuing features of US policy. Apart from brief isolationist periods, the US has been almost always at war. For over two centuries, the US has subverted and overthrown numerous governments. It has a military and business complex – a state within a state – that depends on war for influence and enrichment.

The US assumes a moral superiority it denies to others. It is blinded by its own self-righteousness. It believes in its ‘exceptionalism’ – the ‘chosen people’ with a ‘manifest destiny’. Often the US leadership looks quite unhinged.

I have drawn attention repeatedly to the risks we run in being ‘joined at the hip’ to a country that is almost always at war. The facts are clear. The US has never had a decade without war. Since its founding in 1776, the US has been at war 93 per cent of the time. These wars have extended from its own hemisphere to the Pacific, to Europe and most recently to the Middle East. The US has launched 201 out of 248 armed conflicts since the end of World War II. In recent decades most of these wars have been unsuccessful. The US maintains 800 military bases or sites around the world, including in Australia. The US has in our region a massive deployment of hardware and troops in Japan, the Republic of Korea and Guam.

By contrast, China has not engaged in military activity outside its borders for 40 years. It does not project military power around the globe like the US. It does not have a history of military aggression beyond the defence of its own borders. It has only one foreign base in Djibouti, mainly for anti-piracy purposes. Not surprisingly, China is determined that it must have the military capability to defend its homeland against the US and its allies. The US would have hysterics if Chinese vessels patrolled off the Californian coast and the Florida Keys. Or if China had B-52 type aircraft based in Mexico!

The US has been responsible for the death and dislocation of tens of millions of people in the Middle East. But we look away from US aggression and violence and incessantly find fault with China in every possible way. Anti-China racism runs deep.

China has a large and diverse population in areas such as Xinjiang, Tibet, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. It has land borders with fourteen other countries. Not surprisingly, China focuses on domestic issues and the protection of its borders. If China was an imperial power, it would have swallowed up defenceless Mongolia long ago, a democratic, mineral rich state on its border which is more than twice the size of Ukraine.

The US believes that China will act aggressively around the world as it has itself over centuries. It parrots on about a Rules Based International Order but breaks or ignores the rules when it suits like the Law of the Sea, the invasion of Iraq and the occupation of Diego Garcia. To avoid facing up to its failing society and economy the US wants to attack and cripple its competitor by goading China into war over Taiwan, a province of China. In WW1, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan we tagged along as loyal colonials. It was almost risk free. There was no real threat to our homeland. That has now changed as we have progressively ceded our sovereignty to the US.

Defence Minister Marles is out of his depth in talking about safeguarding our sovereignty. He lacks any sense of curiosity. He has been on the Washington drip feed for too long. He says that AUKUS ‘would boost Australia’s sovereignty’. Is he serious? Both Albanese and Marles are following in the footsteps of Morrison and Dutton with it all choreographed by Washington.

Menadue makes many telling points and raises serious questions about the West Island’s independence and sovereignty. Is “All the way with the USA” our best defence and national security strategy? Or could we be putting all of our eggs into one fraying US basket?