Abstract
Alliances require each party to constantly assess the benefits of maintaining the relationship. As the United States re-frames its defence posture and strategy to accommodate the new strategic environment, the utility of the ANZUS alliance, with its distinctly Cold War orientation, is under increasing scrutiny. Similarly, public opinion polls in Australia suggest that the ANZUS alliance, and US foreign policy generally, is viewed negatively. This article examines the several aspects of the Australia–US relationship, including: military and coalition operations, the rise of regional powers, the spread of weapons of mass destruction, and the increasingly interdependent economies of the Asia-Pacific region.
In 1962, at the height of the Cold War, John F. Kennedy observed that Australians were ‘very satisfactory friends in peace, and the best of friends in war.’1 More than four decades later, not much has changed. Australia, along with the United Kingdom (UK), remain the most loyal members of a United States (US)-led coalition. Australian Prime Minister John Howard remains steadfast in his support for the increasingly beleaguered administration of President George W. Bush. Although fiftyseven per cent of Australians polled for a recent Lowy Institute survey declared they were ‘very worried’ or ‘fairly worried’ about US foreign policy, well over seventy per cent still supported the US alliance as ‘important’ or ‘fairly important’ to their own country and seventy-two per cent evinced a ‘fair’ or ‘great deal’ of trust that the United States would defend Australia if the latter were threatened with invasion.2 No commensurate polling has recently been undertaken in the United States specifically on the Australian alliance. However, Australia consistently ranks at the top or near the top in the Gallup organisation’s annual survey of how Americans view foreign countries.3 It is thus hardly surprising that US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was able to observe on the eve of the 20th Australian–US Ministerial Meeting (AUSMIN) that ‘our two countries could not be closer ...’4
Yet platitudes about alliance unity cannot overcome lingering and obvious difficulties with US national security policy. Put simply, the United States is once more at odds with itself over what type of strategic commitments it can afford and can sustain at a time when it cannot meet recruitment goals for its armed forces, is unable to achieve decisive military victories in those limited conflicts in which it has engaged and has alienated many of its European allies. The value of future alliances will be measured by Washington, even more than previously, based on the level of defence burden-sharing they generate. This is particularly true at a time when America’s geopolitical posture shifts from one dominated by unilateralism to one in which the prospects of meeting threats through coalition warfare are relatively high. The executive summary of the March 2005 US National Defense Strategy clearly sets out Washington’s expectations: ‘We will help partners increase their capacity to defend themselves and collectively meet challenges to our common interests.’5 Some observers might find historical parallels between the deterioration of the US strategic position in South-East Asia during the late 1960s and current trends in Iraq. In reality, the geopolitical stakes in Iraq are far greater for Washington than the Vietnam War, with growing consequences for fundamental global security in the energy sector and, by default, in the international counter-terrorism campaign.6
Critics are now questioning the relevance of ANZUS at a time when American security planners are struggling to reconstitute a manageable global strategic posture. While still representing a minority view in the United States, Douglas Bandow of the CATO Institute has specifically targeted the Australian–American alliance and questions its ongoing utility to US national security. He predicates his argument on three key points: (1) that the defence capabilities of traditional US allies (including Australia) are sufficiently strong to warrant their increased defence self-reliance in a mostly ‘no threat’ Asia-Pacific regional security environment; (2) that the United States should move towards an ‘offshore balancing’ posture in the region, thereby ensuring that any future US military intervention there will be discriminate and short-term; and (3) that Australia and other traditional US regional allies might continue lower key defence ties with Washington without the United States formally underwriting their security by applying a China containment strategy or other approach that would commit US military power and forward deployed forces to the region indefinitely.7 Edward Olsen, a widely respected American analyst of Asian security politics, has also called for the termination of ANZUS, characterising that security agreement as ‘an irresolute alliance of marginal utility’ that would hardly be missed in regional security politics.8
In Australia, there has been a long-standing and visible opposition to the alliance, notwithstanding its general public support. Opponents to the US’ extended nuclear deterrence posture were highly vocal during Gough Whitlam’s Labor Government in the mid-1970s and again a decade later when the US nuclear policy dispute with New Zealand led to that country’s expulsion from the alliance.9 The Australian Labor Party’s (ALP’s) former leader, Mark Latham, has recently disclosed his own covert opposition to ANZUS during the Australian federal election in October 2004. Although his view has since been rejected by the current ALP leadership, a recent Australian National University/Queensland University of Technology poll has revealed that thirty-one per cent of ALP candidates in that election believed the United States would not come to Australia’s defence and a remarkable ninety-one per cent disliked President Bush (sixty-one per cent disliked him strongly). These percentages must be disturbing to alliance supporters, given that the ALP is one of two major political parties in a country that the United States views as one of its most stalwart allies.10
Shifting US global strategy in what the Bush Administration has termed the era of ‘the long war’ must be factored into the ANZUS equation. The Bush Administration’s implementation of the US Global Posture Review means that the significance of alliance dissent cannot be completely discounted. Those in the United States advocating continued alliance cooperation with Australia need to work harder to justify why ANZUS substantially contributes to US national security interests relative to more obvious American priorities: energy security in the Middle East and Central Asia, dealing with China as a rising power, and (re-) building obviously strained strategic relations with Europe and Russia. Washington’s failure to so justify plays into the hands of the persistent alliance critics in Australia who accuse it of taking their country for granted. It will also provide hard-liners in the United States a basis for demanding even more of Australia or reducing the alliance to a perfunctory entity. It will be argued here that alliance utility can be validly assessed from the US perspective by evaluating three basic criteria: (a) interests (allied contributions to US and Australian military objectives and capabilities); (b) influence (the use of an ally’s geopolitical position and standing by the other; and (c) legitimacy (the extent to which ANZUS engenders alliance credibility and consensus) versus risks and costs (the politico-strategic price the ANZUS allies pay for sustaining their alliance affiliation).11 All these provide a framework for measuring the continued value of the Australian–American alliance. The following subsections examine the benefits and costs of ANZUS.
Alliance Interests
ANZUS was formed during the middle of an Asian ground war (Korea) and justified on the basis of common ideological principles defined by the United Nations Charter. However, the treaty was largely predicated on a convergence of diverse interests. The United States needed its wartime allies to ratify a peace treaty with Japan. Australia and New Zealand wanted, as a quid pro quo for their signatures on any such document, entree into the West’s innermost global strategic planning circles.12 From the outset of the postwar era, Australian policy planners recognised the need to strike a balance between regional and global strategies to ensure their country’s survival.13 Their American counterparts were slower to realise the full value of ANZUS to Washington’s own international security interests. However, they more than compensated for this once the US’ global containment posture against the Soviet Union matured and Australia became a key geographic and technological component of US extended deterrence strategy in the Pacific.14
More than fifty years after the founding of ANZUS, the importance of Australia as a regional economic and security player is clear. Although its population numbers just over twenty million people, it sustains the world’s thirteenth-largest economy and the fourth-largest economy in the Asia-Pacific region. It is a major commodities exporter within the international community, ranking first in the world as an exporter of coal, wool, aluminum, and lead, and either second or third-biggest in iron ore, nickel, gold, meat, sugar and cotton.15 It has a formidable skills base and advanced research and development capabilities in such key areas as telecommunications, financial services and medical sciences. This allows Australia to provide valuable contributions within the context of joint defence burden-sharing, especially in intelligence collaboration, defence science and, to a more limited extent, weapons technology development. Its geographic location provides it with a substantial defence-in-depth, reinforced by a formidable air-sea gap between itself and its northern Asian neighbours. In terms of evolving US global strategic postures, Australia represents a friendly bastion: a ‘secure south’ for South-East Asia and a ‘secure west’ for the South Pacific.16 Its economic and technological infrastructure, along with its strategic geography, enhance Australia’s value to the United States as a strategic ally.
Strategic geography has been exploited by the creation and maintenance of critical joint intelligence installations in Australia. Special intelligence arrangements between these two ANZUS powers and US facilities in Australia have been monitoring global stability since the Cold War and constitute the heart of the alliance. 17 More recently they have been solidified by such initiatives as the ‘Technical Cooperation Program’ (which also includes research and development cooperation with Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom) and pending Australian access to the US Global Information Grid that will provide superiority for US and allied networkcentric warfare operations.18 With its privileged access to US technology, the Australian Defence Force (ADF) retains a sufficiently formidable technological edge over the military capabilities of its South-East Asian neighbours so that Canberra can claim with credibility ‘defence self-reliance’ for its substantial landmass, large coastline and adjacent sea lanes of communication. This makes Australia an ideal US ally—fulfilling US burdensharing expectations and ably supporting US coalition warfare operations in distant locales while maximising its linkage with US military technology.19 As the US Ambassador to Australia observed in testimony before Australia’s parliament in June 2004: ‘No-one could have foreseen [at the outset of ANZUS in 1951] that we would share the kind of intelligence we do today. Together we have a window to the world that would not exist if we were apart.’20
Against these strengths, however, some critical Australian weaknesses must be noted. Australia’s economic position in Asia is fragile over the longer term as modernising East Asian economies posit increasingly significant low-wage competitive challenges to its established medium technology industries. The clear exception is its continued ability to export minerals and commodities critical to the industrial modernisation of China, India and other regional powers. Australia’s choice to align itself with the United States so closely over the past ten years has also been resented by various ASEAN member-states, although this trend has recently softened.
This is particularly true with respect to Australia’s bilateral ties with the People’s Republic of China—a power with which Australia is intensifying economic and politico-diplomatic ties but which is potentially the US’ major geopolitical rival in the region. Australia is concerned over what it views as an excessively ideological American view regarding Taiwan and prefers to maintain a highly ‘pragmatic’ approach to China’s long-term strategic intentions.21 Conversely, Australian policy-makers are well aware that if Australia were seen to be caving in to Chinese pressure on the Taiwan issue, apprehensions entertained by some US observers over Australia’s becoming a ‘soft ally’ would be confirmed.22 In a visit to Beijing in August 2004, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer speculated that: ‘ANZUS obligations could be invoked only in the event of a direct attack on the United States or Australia. So some other activity elsewhere in the world ... doesn’t invoke it.’23 American officials immediately and forcefully rebuked Downer, noting that Articles IV and V of the ANZUS Treaty called for immediate response if either US or Australian forces were attacked anywhere in the Pacific.
In a Taiwan contingency, they insisted, a ‘straightforward’ interpretation of the Treaty commitment would mandate Australian military assistance. Prime Minister Howard publicly supported the American interpretation and Downer retreated to stipulating that a future Taiwan crisis would have to be treated ‘on the merits of the case’.24
The obvious Australian geopolitical interest is to balance its security relations with Washington with its growing economic ties with China. John Howard supported this policy approach in a definitive address to the Lowy Institute in early 2005:
Clearly, a large part of the burden of such restraint is borne by the relationship between China and the United States. It would in my strong view be a mistake to embrace an overly pessimistic view of this relationship, pointing to unavoidable conflict. Australia does not believe that there is anything inevitable about escalating strategic competition between China and the United States ... We see ourselves as having a role in continually identifying, and advocating to each, the shared strategic interests these great powers have in regional peace and prosperity.25
To what extent this posture can and will diverge from future US agenda in the East China Sea will be one of the central tests for the future of ANZUS.
Closer to home, Australia confronts an ‘arc of crisis’ of poverty-ridden and politically corrupt South Pacific states that will consume an increasing proportion of its strategic attention in the coming years. While Australia’s willingness to deal with these weak states alleviates what might otherwise be an additional security burden for US forces, the security assets it allocates to the South Pacific will vie with those earmarked for future US-led ‘coalitions of the willing’ further afield. In this context, Australia’s small military is arguably limited to ‘niche capability’ situations in which US resources can be supplemented: air refuelling tankers, Special Forces, conventional submarines and various types of maritime and tactical surveillance.26 An issue could arise over what constitutes the ‘fine line’ between Australia’s judicious exploitation of access to advanced American military technology and outright technological dependency. Australia’s latest Defence White Paper, released in 2000, anticipated this potential intra-alliance policy dichotomy: ‘a healthy alliance should not be a relationship of dependency but of mutual help ... [Australian] dependency would weaken the alliance in the eyes of Australians and in the eyes of Americans ...’27
Perhaps the most significant concern related to the ‘interest factor’ in future alliance relations is the danger that Australia’s legacy of relying on ‘great and powerful friends’, if not carefully managed, could result in future alliance division. Perceptions are already held among many in Australia that their country is excessively dependent on the United States (a recent poll by the Lowy Institute indicated that sixty-eight per cent of Australians questioned believed their country ‘took too much notice’ of US foreign policy). Equally risky are prospects that the Americans will expect unqualified alliance loyalty from Australia and overreact if differences emerge. As Paul Dibb has observed, current alliance relations are ‘heavily underpinned’ by close personal ties between Prime Minister John Howard and President George W. Bush. ‘Maintaining [future] support for the alliance is contingent upon Washington’s future success in convincing the Australian public of both the necessity and legitimacy of its policies.’28
A major challenge for sustaining mutual alliance interests will be how relevant Australia proves to be in the ongoing US Global Posture Review (GPR). The GPR is the most far-reaching reconstitution of US strategic planning since the onset of the Cold War. It is predicated on several key assumptions. First, today’s emerging adversaries are less ‘deterrable’ than was the USSR. Threats include international terrorists who are characterised by a willingness to die for their cause in the process of carrying out devastating attacks against US and allied targets. Increased force flexibility to pre-empt rapidly evolving or uncertain contingencies is thus required. Second, such force flexibility will need to be deployed in rapid and lethal ways to ensure threat neutralisation. Third, force capabilities other than manpower are increasingly central. Finally, allied force capabilities will be increasingly central to US strategic success in different regions; in particular, allied force modernisation and interoperability must be achieved in an Asia-Pacific environment where forward deployed US forces will be reduced as allied polities become more sensitive to their presence.29
Australian officials believe that the GPR fits well into the Australian ‘niche capability’ approach to alliance politics. Former Defence Minister Robert Hill argued that a ‘more global’ American posture strengthens opportunities for Australia to attach value-added dimensions to its defence relationship with the United States while simultaneously improving ‘the US capability to contribute to international efforts to defeat global threats such as terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.’30 His American counterparts have likewise anticipated a more critical Australian role under the revised strategy: ‘As the US begins to alter its military “footprint” in Asia, and as we seek to become more agile and deployable from home to confront today’s less predictable threats ... we will continue to rely on Australia’s advice—and abilities—in this region and beyond.’31
These factors were certainly in the minds of US and Australian defence officials when they convened AUSMIN in Adelaide during late 2005. Several key Australian alliance niches had already been identified and implemented, including the upgrading of cooperative science and technology experimentation (2002); substantially upgrading the operational tempo of joint military exercises involving US and ADF SAS force elements (2002–2003); entering into more extensive joint development of missile defence technology (2003); and upgrading Australia’s defence intelligence access to US intelligence data to a level commensurate with that of Great Britain (2004–2005).32
AUSMIN 2005 incorporated and expanded these precedents. A strategic bomber training program was announced whereby US B-52, B-1 and B-2 aircraft stationed in the US and/or Guam would conduct combined training with ADF air units at the Delamere Air Weapons Range in Australia’s Northern Territory. A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was also signed to further upgrade facilities at the Joint Combined Training Centre at Shoalwater Bay, Queensland, in preparation for extensive joint military exercises to be conducted throughout 2007. Discussions also focused on the future organisation of joint peacekeeping and peace-building operations in the Asia-Pacific region. The transformation of the US–Japan defence alliance into one in which Japan’s military would play an increased role was acknowledged and praised, while China and Taiwan were urged to settle their outstanding differences peacefully. All of these initiatives represented concrete steps for merging Australian–American defence cooperation initiatives into the larger US global posture framework.
Barring unexpected miscalculations, overall prospects for continued interest compatibility in Australian–American security relations remain strong. To the extent that any issue generates bipartisanship in the Australian body politic, the American alliance commands such support. Kim Beazley, leader of Australia’s major opposition party, is a robust advocate of US defence ties and most of the Labor Party’s key political figures also accept it as a cardinal axiom for Australian foreign policy. It is unlikely that any single issue, including Washington’s requesting Australian support for a US military intervention against a Chinese attack on Taiwan, would greatly alter the extent of alliance support in Australia, although such a development would cause short-term strains.
Fundamentally, there is no real viable alternative for Australia to ally outside the US-led ‘Anglophile’ family of states. Notwithstanding Australia’s understandable desire to cultivate it as an economic partner, China cannot provide the commensurate level of cultural affinity, technological assistance or geopolitical weight that currently allows Australia to play an important regional and international politico-security role with American political support and under US security guarantees.33 Some South-East Asians remain reluctant to accept Australia’s regional identity and credentials. By contrast, successive US governments have been consistently clear about the premium value they assign to Australia’s strategic contributions to US security objectives. One of the most recent confirmations of this was submitted by the US Government to the Australian Parliament’s Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade:
... For the United States, Australia is a durable and effective partner in the Asia-Pacific region, whose deep knowledge and influential role within the region, and the priority it attaches to its relations with the countries of the region, are of immense value to us. It is also, however, a global partner of the United States ... Australia’s contributions include tireless efforts to combat the spread of weapons of mass destruction, its strong support for multilateral measures to defeat terrorists ... and active diplomacy and assistance programs to advance human development and dignity ... Thus, our pledge to defend Australia in the context of the ANZUS Treaty is not only a solemn commitment, but also an integral part of the defense of our own vital interests, both regional and global.34
Alliance Influence
Alliance critics have argued that the Howard Government’s foreign policy behaviour has resembled that of a ‘deputy sheriff’ acting on behalf of US interests in South-East Asia. The Australian-led military intervention in East Timor during late 1999 engendered widespread suspicion throughout South-East Asia that Australia had little interest in becoming a part of the region. This impression has been reinforced by the Australian Prime Minister’s adherence to a pre-emption doctrine to combat regional terrorists, by Australia’s decision to buy 700-kilometre range missiles from the United States for extending its forward power projection capabilities, by its ongoing hard-line policy on refugee matters and, more recently, by its decision in December 2004 to declare a thousand-nautical-mile maritime safety zone. 35 However, the Australian–Indonesian security relationship strengthened again after the October 2002 Bali bombing, and Australian–Malaysian ties improved with Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir’s departure from office at the end of October 2003. Australia was successful in gaining entry to the inaugural East Asian Summit (EAS). Concerns are still evident throughout the region, nevertheless, that Australia’s unwavering support for the American occupation of Iraq and its participation with the United States and Japan in a bilateral alliance network that may develop into a containment system directed towards China will undermine regional stability.36
Despite these apprehensions, an equally strong case can be made for ANZUS and the Australian security tie as giving the Americans constructive access to the region. Australia has bridged ANZUS with various regional security arrangements, such as the Five Power Defence Arrangements (FPDA) with Malaysia and Singapore, and the Shoalwater Training Area Memorandum giving the Singapore Armed Forces access to large tracts (4500 kilometres) of Australian territory and opportunities to train with Australian force counterparts for approximately 45 days annually.37 The Howard Government has also upgraded its counter-terrorism cooperation with the Philippines, announcing in October 2005 that it would conduct joint maritime and aerial patrols with the Armed Forces of the Philippines and coordinate such efforts with the US Special Forces group at Headquarters Joint Special Operations Task Force operating in the southern Philippines sector.38
Indonesia is a particularly illuminating case of the way Australia’s relations with a key Asia-Pacific state underpin the influence of ANZUS in South-East Asia. Australia’s ties with Jakarta have oscillated over the years, with its spearheading of the INTERFET operation in East Timor reflecting a thirty-year low point in bilateral relations between the two states. Yet Australia and Indonesia’s proximity to each other means that their geopolitical fates are inevitably intertwined. Since the Bali bombing in October 2002, Australian and Indonesian law enforcement agencies have worked closely on counter-terrorism operations and related security issues. In April 2005, the two countries entered into a ‘comprehensive partnership’ designed to coordinate extensive Australian development assistance to Aceh in the aftermath of the December 2004 tsunami and to address people smuggling, narcotics, outbreaks of disease and money laundering. While hardly representing the comprehensive bilateral security arrangement in force between 1995 and 1999 (the Agreement on Maintaining Security), the new agreement posits a more realistic set of functional security tasks that require tangible cooperation between the two countries’ law enforcement agencies and the two countries’ military establishments (the ADF and the Indonesian TNI).39
The US Congress, until very recently, barred American military relations with South-East Asia’s largest country due to concerns over human rights violations. However, the George W. Bush Administration has regarded Indonesia as a key front line in its Global War on Terror and as a major determinant of ASEAN’s ultimate role as a stabilising influence in South-East Asia and the entire Asia-Pacific region. In November 2005, it restored full military ties with Indonesia that had been in abeyance since 1999. In a March 2006 visit to Jakarta, US Secretary of State Rice praised the Indonesians for making tangible progress towards democracy and for setting an example of ‘moderation, tolerance and inclusiveness’.40 By facilitating a stable socio-political environment in the world’s largest Muslim country, on Australia’s northern doorstep, the United States has contributed to the national security of both Australia and Indonesia’s ASEAN neighbours.
In a recent (mid-2005) visit to the US Pacific Command (PACOM), members of the Australian Parliament’s Joint Foreign Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade learned that US defence officials particularly valued the evolving Australian–Indonesian bilateral security relationship. This is based on what these officials asserted is a general lack of knowledge about Indonesia in US defence policy-making circles and ongoing legislative restrictions on developing US–Indonesian military ties. While some of these restrictions have since been lifted, the Committee reported that the value of Australian–Indonesian bilateral ties to regional security was well understood and appreciated in Washington: ‘... discussions with [US] defence officials made clear to the delegation how important Australia’s bilateral relations with its regional neighbours are to stability in the Asia-Pacific region, particularly as they can be used to increase the level of understanding of regional issues within America.’41
In a broader South-East Asian security context, recent progress by the ASEAN peninsular states (Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand) in coordinating maritime surveillance of the Malacca Strait—such as the ‘Eyes in the Sky’ initiative—has direct implications for ANZUS regional influence and objectives. Eyes in the Sky was a regionally indigenous alternative to the US-proposed Regional Maritime Security Initiative that was rejected by Indonesia and Malaysia as too intrusive in terms of their sovereign maritime prerogatives. Affiliates of this new arrangement are now reportedly ready to accept the assistance of the FPDA in coordinating Strait air patrolling, potentially giving Australia a more direct role in safeguarding Western maritime and commercial interests, although in a South-East Asian rather than ANZUS capacity.42 This is a clear instance in which Australia’s geographic position allows it to play a low-key but significant role in South-East Asian security which the United States cannot assume due to its superpower profile.
All of these networks and initiatives fulfill Australian national security objectives by allowing it to act as a meaningful participant in the building of a more stable region. They simultaneously reinforce the US strategic commitment to and involvement in the Asia-Pacific—the hallmark objective of overall Australian strategic policy. The latest challenge to this linkage is the convening of the EAS in Kuala Lumpur in December 2005. That Australia, New Zealand and India were even invited to attend this gathering was a triumph. ASEAN states such as Singapore and Indonesia, as well as Japan, wanted to circumvent the ‘exclusivist’ approach, championed predominantly by China, as to who makes up Asia. Beijing initially wished to restrict membership to the ‘ASEAN + 3’ grouping (that included Japan, South Korea and itself).
To gain entry into this new and potentially important regional club, Australia was required to accede to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC). It had previously declined to do so because of a perceived conflict of interest with ANZUS obligations, including future interventions against terrorist concentrations in South-East Asian territories. A breakthrough occurred in mid-2005 when South Korea and Japan reportedly convinced the Howard Government that it could—as they had done—circumvent this conflict of interest by agreeing to an exchange of written understandings between Australia and ASEAN that would guarantee that adherence to the TAC would not compromise alliance responsibilities. Australia subsequently indicated to ASEAN ministers that it would accede to the TAC in exchange for an EAS invitation.43 It remains unclear at the time of this writing what long-term impact the EAS will have on building a new regional security order in East Asia. More certain, however, is that Australia’s presence at its inaugural meeting should facilitate the summit’s sensitivity to US regional interests, notwithstanding the absence of American representation.
Alliance Legitimacy/Alliance Risks and Costs
Critics of the alliance have pointed to what they believe is a growing trend of Australian obsequiousness to US strategic objectives.44 Some believe that this continues a long pattern in Australian foreign policy of seeking out a ‘great and powerful friend’, but that at this historical point in time Australia’s chosen senior partner is a ‘revolutionary’ rather than stabilising hegemon.45 Others accuse Australian policy-makers of having fallen into a culturally misleading trap of pursuing an ill-fated ‘Anglophile’ version of geopolitics.46 Johns Hopkins University historian Stephen Morris (a native Australian) has countered such arguments. ‘The idea that Australia is looked down on in Washington as a lickspittle is wrong ... Australia is respected and its role in the alliance is appreciated. It has built up credit in the eyes of its friends, so it is listened to.’47
‘Alliance legitimacy’ can be viewed within the ANZUS framework as Australia’s succeeding in strengthening US credibility in strategic behaviour, sometimes by restraining that ally from pursuing policies that in hindsight would appear to have been shortsighted. If this is a legitimate view, then Australia’s track record of serving the United States in such a capacity over recent years has been decidedly mixed. In fairness, however, the Bush Administration’s first term was underscored by a proactive commitment to a neo-conservative-driven, unilateralist strategy that was to test even the most nuanced of alliance managers operating from Canberra and other Asia-Pacific capitals. As the noted Australian political commentator Paul Kelly has observed:
Australia prefers an America that values partnerships and coalitions, that utilises soft as well as hard power, that emphasises political methods as well as military ones. It is idle to suppose that any lurch to an American unilateralism would not erode the domestic political support within Australia for the alliance.48
Alliance legitimacy should therefore not be confused with unmitigated Australian alliance loyalty to the United States. Policy-makers can ill afford to entertain love affairs when core national security interests are at stake. The Howard Government committed itself to military action in East Timor despite the Prime Minister’s discomfort over his lack of personal chemistry with Bill Clinton and the obvious disappointment it felt over an American reluctance to commit ‘boots on the ground’ to that operation. Australia’s military commitment to the American intervention in Iraq during 2003 was visibly limited: around 2000 military personnel and a small number of Special Forces, F/A-18 aircraft and naval ships out of a total Australian force of around 50 000 regular service personnel and another 20 000 reserves.49 Australia was up front in applying conditions to its Iraq contribution: that its ability to deal with regional contingencies would not be undermined and that its military contribution would be withdrawn quickly after Saddam Hussein’s removal from power. During a July 2005 visit to Washington DC, moreover, Howard went out of his way to distinguish Australia’s posture of policy pragmatism directed toward China from the Bush Administration’s more ideological stance.50 He did so despite his obvious personal admiration of and cordial relationship with President Bush.
What Australia did not do very well was to treat US intelligence estimates of Iraq’s WMD program with appropriate scepticism prior to committing the ADF to the Iraq intervention campaign. Assessments of this episode commissioned by the Australian Government, such as the Flood Report, concluded that this policy failure, in part, could be attributed to a lack of ‘contestability’ in intelligence advice that the Government received from its own sources.51 Others have been more critical, asserting that Australia’s intelligence community was generally unwilling to provide alternative assessments to a Government that promotes a culture of tightly controlled foreign policy formulation from the Prime Minister and Cabinet downward.
Alliance legitimacy and alliance risks and costs dovetail in situations where an ally offers advice to its security partner that influences the latter to reach sober judgments about the risks and costs of military action relative to what perceived rectifications or benefits such action may generate. Legitimacy rests upon the action initiator’s ability to make a prima facie case to the international community that such action is justified and is limited in proportion to the initial threat. US and allied intervention in Afghanistan appeared to meet this test. The intervention of the US-led ‘coalition of the willing’ in Iraq did not because the rationale of WMD preemption failed to withstand the test of time and forcing a regime change in Iraq was, by itself, an inadequate basis for justifying war. Future historians will have a field day sifting through the operative policy documents in both the UK and Australia that led to those two countries’ participation in the 2003 Iraq conflict.52
However, governments do learn from past miscalculations. The Howard Government is no exception. Avoiding Australian involvement in a Sino-American conflict over Taiwan has now clearly become a key Australian foreign policy objective. Alliance legitimacy in any such conflict would be tested by how well Australia responded with a judicious combination of strategic restraint and alliance support. If China were to invade Taiwan without credible provocation, the United States would most likely apply the Taiwan Relations Act to such a contingency and intervene. Under such circumstances, Australia could extend low-key or tacit support for the Americans by offering to assume additional maritime or air surveillance responsibilities normally covered by PACOM. But it could refrain from directly involving Australian forces in or around Taiwan itself as any such conflict would not immediately entail a substantial requirement for Australian ‘niche capabilities’ (Australia’s Collins diesel submarines could be an exception to this, but recent operational difficulties with them puts their readiness in doubt).
Australian policy-makers and their American counterparts would prefer to work out any such Australian response in advance of a future crisis escalation in the East China Sea. What cannot be allowed to occur is the unfolding of a public drama reflecting alliance division: one in which US policy-makers demand that Australia support US objectives and actions or risk alliance dissolution, and in which Australia is faced with a New Zealand-type policy dilemma. Nor can China be encouraged to demand that Australia not apply ANZUS to any such contingency or face the consequences—a demand that at least some Chinese officials raised when China passed its Taiwan anti-seccession law in early 2005, which was strongly rebuffed by the Australian Government. In this context, Alexander Downer’s recent speculation offered in Beijing (during August 2004) that Australia may not necessarily invoke ANZUS in response to a renewed Taiwan crisis was unnecessary and unfortunate. It precipitated a strong American diplomatic rebuke and encouraged the Chinese to subsequently press Canberra on the issue. It appears that, for Australian policy spokespersons, the alliance legitimacy/risk and cost balance is still a learning process.
Conclusion
ANZUS is sufficiently beneficial to the United States to cast serious doubt over Douglas Bandow’s recommendations listed at the outset of this article. His assumption that Australia can defend itself in a no-threat environment does not take into sufficient account the rapid, de facto merging of contemporary regional and global security. Alliance strength means that Australia can and must relate to its American ally at different levels of strategic interaction because the regional and global dimensions of threat and response are becoming so integrated. International terrorism, energy security and other forms of ‘alternative security politics’ co-exist with WMD proliferation and power balancing to create a far more complex world than when ANZUS was initially created as a mere instrument of Cold War containment. Australia has committed its defence efforts and resources to realise niche and interoperable capabilities that can be employed selectively within future and mostly American-led military coalitions. The ANZUS imprimatur constitutes the heart of such initiatives. They are based on shared core and enduring values that underlie the politico-cultural dynamics of the alliance. It is unlikely that Australia will find better alternatives than the United States.
The sheer scope of and strategic transformation embedded within the US Global Posture Review precludes Washington’s adopting a constricted ‘offshore balancing’ approach for the Asia-Pacific region. In either case, however, Australia would have a key role to play in facilitating US strategic credibility. Under the Posture Review, joint intelligence facilities in Australia, the potential to deploy advanced networkcentric related systems at widely dispersed sites and the build-up of joint training facilities are vital to modern war. Realtime information and emphasis on long-range targeting and maximum lethality will increasingly prevail over manpower and vulnerable platforms, especially in scenarios dominated by asymmetrical conflict. Even a minimum US strategic presence in the Asia-Pacific would not change this reality: forward force presence may be reduced, but on the basis of force reconfiguration rather than strategic retrenchment. The extent to which Australia is contributing to the integration of US and allied assets is appreciated at the highest levels of US decision-making and reinforces alliance viability.
Australia is reaffirming alliance (ANZUS) access to the Asia-Pacific through its bilateral and multilateral regional security ties. It is building a modest but viable network of counter-terrorist operations with various ASEAN states and is a rising force in US–Japan deliberations about how security problems in North-East Asia affect the wider world. It is also a vigorous player in Asia-Pacific security dialogues, often providing both regional policy-makers and American counterparts a ‘second Western view’ on how preventative diplomacy and strategic reassurance can be more effective within such institutions as the ASEAN Regional Forum and the forthcoming EAS. This hardly resembles the containment strategy that Bandow believes is operative and directed against China. The Howard Government’s visible hedging strategy regarding Sino–American security relations undercuts those who would argue that containment is alive and well in an ANZUS context.
Even an alliance as close as ANZUS will confront Australia with formidable challenges over the near future as structural change affects regional and global power and stability. US foreign policy will need to be rationalised and explained more effectively if an inherently conservative Australian electorate is to remain comfortable with American leadership as a force for constructive rather than arbitrary change. The comparative rate of Australian economic growth will have much to do with how effectively the ADF can buy into and operate state-of-the-art defence systems in ways that add value to American coalition strategy. As a maritime trading state, Australia is required to assess the value of its ever-growing trade and investment volume in East Asia as a strategic factor. The extent to which the Australia–US Free Trade Agreement can balance such calculations will not be known for years to come. In the meantime, the China factor presents Australian officials with a highly complex myriad of geo-economic and geopolitical interplays that must be better understood and managed.
The testimony of ANZUS relevance and strength in the eyes of US policy-planners is the way that the alliance has endured for over half a century. As the US Government submission to the Australian Parliamentary hearing on the alliance observed, ANZUS provides a formal commitment ‘that buttresses a multi-dimensional alliance relationship’ and one that complements each ally’s strength with the other’s security in a variety of key sectors: strategic consultations and planning; intelligence sharing; joint military exercises; interoperability; and cooperative defence research and development. The United States is on record as wanting to sustain ‘both the habits and muscle of our cooperation’ because doing so constitutes ‘a vital interest for both of our countries.’53 This is one case where a historical legacy of cooperation in war and peace has evolved into a highly effective and appropriate relationship with which to face an uncertain future.
Endnotes
1 Cited in Rupert Darwell, ‘John Howard’s Australia’, Policy Review, No. 132, August–September 2005, at <http://www.policyreview.org/aug05/darwall.html>.
2 Tom Allard and Louise Williams, ‘Our New Nightmare: the United States of America’, Sydney Morning Herald, 29 March 2005, and a poll using data up to the year 2000 appearing in Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Attitude Matters: Public opinion in Australia towards defence and security, ASPI, Canberra, 2004.
3 In 2004, for example, nine out of ten Americans assigned a ‘favorable’ rating to Australia in this category with only about seven per cent saying they viewed that country ‘unfavorably’. See ‘Nine out of ten Americans like Australia best’, Sydney Morning Herald, 24 February 2004.
4 Rumsfeld, The Australian, 16 November 2005.
5 US Department of Defense, The National Defense Strategy of the United States of America, Washington DC, USGPO, March 2005, p. iv.
6 For a classical frame of reference regarding predictions of US strategic streamlining and retrenchment in Asia resulting from the Nixon Doctrine, see Earl C. Ravenal, ‘Consequences of the End Game for Vietnam’, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 53, No. 4, July 1975, pp. 651–67.
7 Analyst Says US–Australia alliance outdated’, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, ‘The World Today’, 17 August 2005, at <http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2005/s1439959.htm> and Bandow, et al. (eds), Alliance: the View from America, Centre for Independent Studies, Sydney, 2005.
8 Olsen, US National Defense for the 21st Century, Frank Cass, London and Portland, 2002, p. 122.
9 Numerous studies have covered the anti-nuclear position as it developed in Australia during this time. Among representative works are Coral Bell, Dependent Ally: a study in Australian foreign policy, Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1988; Jacob Bercovitch (ed.), ANZUS in Crisis: Alliance management in international affairs, Macmillan Press, London, 1988; Joseph A. Camilleri, ANZUS: Australia’s Predicament in the Nuclear Age, Macmillan, Melbourne, 1987; and Michael Pugh, The ANZUS Crisis, Nuclear Visiting and Deterrence, Cambridge University Press, Melbourne, 1989.
10 Dennis Shanahan, ‘Latham not alone on views on US’, The Australian, 23 September 2005.
11 These criteria are slight modifications of those applied by Michael Wesley, ‘The Australia–US Alliance under the Microscope’, On-line Opinion, 6 October 2004, at <http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=2619>.
12 Peter Edwards, Permanent Friends? Historical Reflections on the Australian–American Alliance, Lowy Institute, Sydney, 2005, p. 16.
13 See William Tow, ‘ANZUS: Regional versus Global Security in Asia?’ International Relations of the Asia-Pacific, Vol. 5, No. 2, 2005, pp. 197–216; and Robyn Lim, The Geopolitics of East Asia: The Search for Equilibrium, Routledge, London and New York, 2003, pp. 99–100.
14 Thomas-Durrell Young, Australia, New Zealand and United States Security Relations 1951–1986, Westview Press, Boulder, CO, 1992; and William T. Tow, Encountering the Dominant Player, Columbia University Press, New York, 1991.
15 Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, In the National Interest, chap. 3.
16 Ibid.
17 See Desmond Ball, The US–Australian Alliance: History and Prospects, Working Paper No. 330, Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Australian National University, Canberra, January 1999, especially pp. 6–9; and Young, ‘The nuanced Australian–US defense relationship’, pp. 3–6.
18 Gary Waters and Desmond Ball, ‘Transforming the Australian Defence Force (ADF) For Information Superiority, Canberra Papers on Strategy and Defence No. 159, Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, The Australian National University, Canberra, 2005, pp. 80–2.
19 Desmond Ball, ‘The Strategic Essence’, Australian Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 55, No. 2, April 2001, p. 237; and Gary Brown and Laura Rayner, Upside, Downside: ANZUS After Fifty Years, Current Issues Brief No. 3, 2001–02, Parliamentary Information and Research Services, Canberra, 28 August 2001, p. 9.
20 Testimony of US Ambassador Tom Schiffer before the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade, Australia’s Defence Relations With the United States: Issues Paper, March 2005, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra, March 2005, p. 8.
21 Stuart Harris, ‘China–US Relations: A Difficult Balancing Act for Australia?’ Global Change: Peace and Security 17, No. 3, October 2005, p. 235.
22 See former US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage’s warning to the 2005 Australian–American Dialogue session on this point cited in William T. Tow, ‘Sino-American relations and the “Australian Factor”: Inflated Expectations or Discriminate Engagement?’, The Australian Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 59, No. 4, December 2005, p. 459. See also Hugh White, ‘The limits to optimism: Australia and the rise of China’, Ibid., pp. 469–80.
23 Catherine Armitage, ‘Downer assures China on Taiwan,’ The Australian, 18 August 2004.
24 Mohan Malik, ‘The China factor in Australia–US Relations’, Jamestown Foundation China Brief at <http://www.asianresearch.org/articles/2601.html>.
25 Transcript of the Prime Minister, the Hon. John Howard MP, address to the Lowy Institute for International Policy, ‘Australia in the World’, 31 March 2005, at <http://www.pm.gov.au/news/speeches/speech1290.html>.
26 Paul Dibb, US—Australian Alliance Relations: An Australian View, Strategic Forum No. 216, National Defense University, Washington, DC, August 2005, p. 2.
27 Australian Department of Defence, Defence 2000 —Our Future Defence Force, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra, 2000. This point is developed further by Thomas S. Wilkins, ‘Coalition Formation and Management in the Asia–Pacific Region: The Case of an American–Japanese–Australian Combination’, Ritsumaikin Journal of Asia–Pacific, Vol. 14, July 2004, pp. 167–8.
28 Ibid, p. 5.
29 Jim Garamone, ‘Rumsfeld, Myers Discuss Military Global Posture’, Defense Link News, 23 September 2004, at <http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Sep2004/n09232004_2004092311.html>; and Garamone, ‘Fargo Details Pacific Command Posture Plan’, Ibid.
30 Defence Ministers and Parliamentary Secretary, Australia Welcomes Changes to US Global Force Posture’, 17 August 2004 at <http://www.minister.defence.gov.au/Hilltpl.cfm?CurrentId=4138>.
31 US Embassy, Canberra, ‘Inquiry into Australia’s Defence Relations with the United States’, submission to the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade, Defence Sub-Committee, 2004, at <http://www.aph.gov.au/house/committee/jfadt/usrelations/subs.htm>.
32 For background on the first three categories see Australia Department of Defence Submission, February 2004, at Ibid. For reports on the intelligence exchange upgrade, consult Greg Sheridan, ‘Bound by Intelligence’, The Australian, 3 September, 2005.
33 Cultural affinity is an important determinant of those ‘comfort zone’ factors that underpin alliance cohesion. Writing recently for the National Review Online, Michael Rubin has compared the informality of the Australian–American relationship with the ‘stiffness’ of Anglo–American ties: ‘The ease of interaction between Americans and their Australian counterparts is also one of culture: both countries have an immigrant culture; both eschew the class distinctions that so many Eton and Oxford-educated British officials embrace. While Britain perfects nanny-state political correctness and closed-circuit televisions on every street corner, Australians and Americans emphasise small government and liberty.’ Rubin, ‘Our Ally Down Under’ National Review Online, 7 July 2005, at <http://www.nationalreview.com/rubin/rubin200506070948.asp>.
34 US Embassy Canberra, ‘Inquiry into Australia’s Defence Relations with the United States...’
35 David Fickling, Australia seen as America’s deputy sheriff’, 10 September 2004; Richard Leaver, ‘The meanings, origins and implications of “the Howard Doctrine”‘, The Pacific Review, Vol. 14, 1999, pp. 15–34; and William T. Tow, ‘Deputy sheriff or independent ally? Evolving Australian–American ties in an ambiguous world order’, The Pacific Review, Vol. 17, No. 2, June 2004, pp. 271–90. On continuing Australian–Indonesian tensions, see Eric Teo Chu Cheow, ‘Work Cut Out for Australia and Indonesia’, The Japan Times, 15 November 2004; and Richard Wolcott, ‘Foreign policy priorities for the Howard government’s fourth term: Australia, Asia and America in the post-11th September world’ Australian Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 59, No. 2, June 2005, pp. 141–52.
36 Australia’s lead-up to signing the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation is a case in point of where such suspicions created a row over Australia’s commitment to the region relative to its traditional alliance commitments. See ‘Howard flies into storm over ASEAN treaty’, Sydney Morning Herald, 28 November 2004.
37 Ministry of Defence, Singapore, Defence Ministers of Australia and Singapore Sign Shoalwater Bay Training Area Memorandum of Agreement’, 23 August 2005 at <http://www.mindef.gov.sg/imindef/news_and_events/nr/2005/aug/23aug05_nr…;.
38 Australian Defence Ministers and Parliamentary Secretary, Counter-Terrorism Initiatives to Target Southern Philippines, 17 October 2005 at <http://www.minister.defence.gov.au/Hilltpl.cfm?CurrentId=5187>.
39 Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, ‘Joint Declaration on the Comprehensive Partnership between Australia and the Republic of Indonesia’, 4 April 2005 at <http://www.dfat.gov.au/geo/indonesia/comprehensive_partnership_1105.htm…;.
40 Ellen Nakashima, ‘Rice Praises Indonesia as “Model of Tolerance”, Washington Post, 15 March 2006.
41 Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade, Australian Parliament, Report of the Delegation to the United States, 28 June to 13 July 2005 at <http://www.aph.gov.au/house/committee/jfadt/usdelegation/report/chapter…;.
42 See P. S. Suryanarayana, ‘Security initiative for Malacca Straits launched, The Hindu, 25 September 2005; and David Boey, ‘More countries urged to join “Eyes in the Sky” patrols’, The Straits Times, 14 September 2005.
43 Paul Kelly, ‘The Day Foreign Policy Won Asia’, The Australian, 6 August 2005.
44 See, for example, Mark Beeson, ‘Australia’s Relationship with the United States: The Case for Greater Independence’, Australian Journal of Political Science, Vol. 38, No. 3, November 2003, pp. 387–405.
45 Owen Harries, Benign or Imperial?, ABC Books, Sydney, 2003.
46 Michael Fullilove, ‘Whither the Anglosphere?’, Lowy Institute, 23 April 2004 at <http://www.lowyinstitute.org/Publication.asp?pid=122>.
47 Cited by Elizabeth Feikhah, ‘Brothers in Arms, Time (Pacific Edition), 11 October 2004, at <http://www.time.com/time/pacific/magazine/article/0,13673,503041011-711…;.
48 Paul Kelly, ‘Australian for Alliance’, National Interest, No. 71, Spring 2003, pp. 92–3. Also see Hugh White, ‘Australian Strategic Policy’, in Ashley Tellis and Michael Wills, Strategic Asia 2005–2006: Military Modernization in an Era of Uncertainty, The National Bureau of Asian Research, Seattle and Washington, DC, 2005, especially pp. 318–20.
49 White, ‘Australian Strategic Policy’.
50 See Howard’s press conference remarks at ‘President Welcomes Prime Minister of Australia to the White House’, 19 July 2005, at <http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/07/20050719.html>.
51 Australian Government, Report of the Inquiry into Australian Intelligence Agencies, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra, 2004, at <http://www.pmc.gov.au/publications/intelligence_inquiry/>.
52 These views were recently summarised by Tony Walker, ‘Getting too close for comfort’, The Australian Financial Review, 18 November 2005. This article attacks former US Ambassador Michael Thawley’s contention that Australian war critics should exhibit more confidence in the independent judgment of their government in matters of war and peace. It observes that this ‘is an odd proposition since it is now clear that whatever the original pretext for the decision to go to war, it has not survived the war itself.’
53 United States Embassy, Canberra, ‘Inquiry into...’
