Piers Akerman: Disappointing number of young people would choose ‘flight’ over ‘fight’

A clear majority of Australians under 35 would flee the country than stay and defend it in the face of a foreign aggressor. I only wish they would leave now, writes Piers Akerman.

With Russian President Putin waging a merciless barbaric war in Ukraine and the development of a Chinese military and naval base in the Solomon Islands, Australians must consider what is worth fighting for.

Disappointingly but perhaps not altogether unsurprisingly a slab of young Australians would rather flee their nation and abandon it to a foreign aggressor than stay and fight.

A survey commissioned by the IPA published last week asked 1000 people “if Australia was in the same position as Ukraine is now would you stay and fight or leave the country?”

Forty six per cent said they would stay and fight, 28 per cent said they would leave the country and 26 per cent were unsure. Just 32 per cent of those aged 18-24 said they would stay and fight and 40 per cent said they would leave the country, 28 per cent said they were unsure.

Ukrainian soldier Andriy carries the baby of a displaced family to help to cross a river, on the outskirts of Kyiv. Few young Australians say they would defend their country, as Ukrainians have. Picture: Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP

Slightly more (35 per cent) of those aged 25-34 said they would stay and fight while 38 per cent said they would leave the country, 27 per cent were unsure. A clear majority in those age groups therefore indicated they would either run or were undecided about defending Australia. I only wish they would leave now.

Daniel Wild, director of research at the think tank, blamed the “years of relentless attack on our values by the cultural and media elites” for this disheartening showing.

I would go further whilst acknowledging the Fifth Column that exists within academia actively working to undermine the Australian way of life and add woke business leaders, the ABC, the ALP and, of course, the Greens. Wild noted that the “negative self-hate view of Australian history and culture being forced onto students at schools and universities means that now barely a third of young Australians believe Australia is even worth fighting for”.

“Since World War II millions have fled racial division, sectarian conflict, and abject poverty for a better life in a tolerant and free society that Australia offers yet young Australians are denied the opportunity to be taught about this inspiring optimistic and hopeful reality of Australia’s history.”

Undermining the ethos of the nation goes beyond the classroom though. Our so-called business leaders and Opposition leader Anthony Albanese have signalled their impotent virtue by embracing the global warming cult and ensuring that Australia is no longer able to access cheap and reliable sources of energy while the two largest autocratic nations in the world, Russia and China, reap billions manufacturing goods using our coal and sending vast magnitudes more emissions that we do into the atmosphere.

A large proportion of our coal is exported to China, where its use in manufacturing contributes far more to greenhouse gas emissions than Australia does.

The ABC relentlessly promotes this money-wasting unscientific cult relying on dubious claims from Tim Flannery and the IPCC, both with a history of unreliable forecasts and doomsday predictions invariably proven wrong and based on flawed or deceptively manipulated data.

The taxpayer-funded megaphone joins the ALP in the attempt to wedge the Coalition over China’s interference in our domestic politics with its suggestion that Prime Minister Morrison break all precedent and meet the current Chinese ambassador at a time when our diplomatic representatives are not only denied all contact with Chinese officials but barred from the courtroom where an Australian citizen is being held hostage and tried on trumped up charges of espionage.

President Zelensky pointed out to a joint sitting of Parliament that Australia shared history with Ukraine over the 2014 Russian missile attack on Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, which killed 298 civilians, 38 of them Australian. Then Prime Minister Tony Abbott did shirt-front Russia’s President Putin at the first opportunity and the little tyrant shouted Russian nationalist nonsense in response.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy received a standing ovation from Australian parliamentarians after addressing the House of Representatives on Thursday. Picture: STRINGER / AFP

As Zelensky said, eight years later, justice hasn’t been achieved.

Showing a surprising knowledge of our hardware, he asked that we send armoured cars “you have very good armoured vehicles, Bushmasters”, designed and built by ADI in Bendigo.

Some of the $500,000 vehicles will be flown to Ukraine, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has confirmed.

Asking how many more tragedies there would be before the West stood up to Putin, Zelensky warned: “The unpunished evil comes back and, I would say, unpunished evil comes back with inspiration, with the feeling of almightiness. If the world had punished Russia in 2014 for what it did, there wouldn’t be any of this terror of invasion in Ukraine in 2022.”