Joe Hildebrand: Ugly truth is America may be Australia’s ally but it is no longer our friend
America may be an ally but it is no longer our friend, and Australian flag-bearers for Trumpism might want to ask themselves where their national loyalties really lie, writes Joe Hildebrand.
Opinion
Don't miss out on the headlines from Opinion. Followed categories will be added to My News.
In politics the truth is rarely clear unless it is ugly, and a very ugly truth has now become clear: America may be Australia’s ally but it is no longer our friend.
The two are not the same. Alliances between nations are formed out of mutual self-interest. National friendships rely on shared history, shared cultural values and strong interpersonal connections at the apex of power.
But, most importantly, they rest upon an even more critical and intangible quality: Goodwill.
The US under Trump 2.0 has shown precisely zero goodwill towards Australia – nor any other of its supposed allies, so at least we are not alone.
This is both sad and bad but it is also something that we simply have to deal with. And how we deal with it will be the difference between a stronger and more enduring friendship on the other side of it or no friendship at all.
Some of this is just Trump being Trump but the scary part is Trump being more Trump than he has ever been, and with no one around him able to rein in his crazier impulses.
Of course the lion’s share of the blame for this – arguably the total blame for this – lies at the feet of the hapless and hopeless Democrats.
A largely shambolic presidency, occasionally occupied by the somnambulant Joe Biden, was for a time the Democrats’ most embarrassing low water mark since they were the party of slavery and segregation.
Then Kamala Harris came along and laughed and nodded and condescended her way to an electoral wipe-out for the ages. The fact that Trump is president is far more their fault than his doing.
But as my mum’s special friend Don said when he took my dog Barney to the vet’s for the last time, “Well, we’re here now.”
So what do we do?
There was hope early on that Australia – as staunch an ally as America could ever hope to have in both war and peace – would receive some degree of clemency in Trump’s tariff war.
Australia fought with the US in Vietnam when even the British would not and fought in Iraq when even the French would not.
Modern America’s founder and its oldest ally both abandoned it in these two dubious wars. Australia, ever loyal, was with it to the end.
But Trump’s America has no loyalty except to itself, and its latest war, a war of trade, has no friends outside its borders.
Of course the US has every right to pursue naked self-interest and has done so before. There were powerful America First movements before both WWI and WWII which demanded the US not get involved.
Had they succeeded, Hitler may well have ended up running Europe and Australia may well have ended up a Japanese colony.
Happily, America overcame its isolationist tendencies and we remain a free democracy to this day.
And the reasons for American hesitancy in both global conflicts were as parochial and petty as they are today. While the studious veteran presidents Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D Roosevelt were deeply sympathetic to the Allied cause, they worried about the political blowback from German-Americans in the Midwest. Yes, all those troublesome swing states again.
As it turned out, they did rise up. My grandfather, Fritz “Freddy” Hildebrand, served with the US Army in both these wars, in which civilisation itself hung in the balance. Americans were not as insular and selfish as their leaders had feared.
A century later the world is still suffering no shortage of tyrants, but America seems confused about which side it is supposed to be on. (SPOILER: It is not the same side as Vladimir Putin.)
Incredibly, Trump seems to be captive to elements of the lunar right who are so far off the grid they have ended up championing a dictator who wants to re-establish the USSR.
There is no amount of bonkers to describe this.
But we are where we are. One day, God willing, America will come good again. And perhaps even Trump will see the error of his ways once his tariffs wreak havoc on the US economy or Putin doublecrosses him yet again.
But it must surely be clear to all those who saw Trump as the second coming that he is not the Messiah, nor is he a true friend to Australia.
Australians on the right who are still flag-bearers for Trumpism might want to ask themselves where their national loyalties really lie.
Get The Real Story with Joe Hildebrand wherever you get your podcasts
More Coverage
Originally published as Joe Hildebrand: Ugly truth is America may be Australia’s ally but it is no longer our friend
A shout-out to undervalued, invisible, awesome carers
Husbands with cancer, mums with dementia, neurodivergent kids. An army of carers — so often overlooked — are the hidden glue that keeps our communities soldered with their quiet love.
Editor’s view: Brisbane has waited long enough for inner-city arena
Queenslanders will know within days the full plan for Brisbane 2032 venues. If an inner-city arena is not included, the state government must have a plan to ensure one gets built anyway.