Hastie’s warning reveals deep divisions over China
Does the Australian Government see China as an existential threat or a friendly trading partner? After Andrew Hastie’s warning this week, it’s clear there is no consensus about how to handle Beijing, writes David Speers.
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Andrew Hastie hit the nail on the head in at least one respect this week.
In a punchy opinion piece about the threat posed by China, he wrote that “right now our greatest vulnerability lies not in our infrastructure, but in our thinking.”
Just what is Australia thinking when it comes to China? It’s a good question. At times Australia appears to be all over the shop.
Hastie, an influential backbencher and chair of Parliament’s intelligence and security committee, takes a particularly hawkish view of China. In his piece this week for Nine Newspapers, he suggested Chinese President Xi Jinping’s “view of the future is one where capitalism will be eclipsed”. He likened the West’s failure to defend itself against China to France’s failure to defend itself against Nazi Germany in 1940.
In other words, we’re failing to see what is an existential threat to our very democracy. Serious stuff.
The Chinese Embassy reacted strongly, labelling the comments “detrimental” to the China-Australia relationship.
This was a clear, predictable response from Beijing.
The reaction from Andrew Hastie’s senior colleagues was anything but.
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Attorney-General Christian Porter said Hastie was factually wrong, taking issue with his colleague’s “radical oversimplification” of the relationship with China.
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton, by contrast, powerfully endorsed Hastie. He pointed to the fact Hastie is privy to intelligence information others can’t see (Dutton of course can). “There’s no sense pretending that there’s nothing to see here”, he told Sky News. “As China will stand up for its national interest, so will we.”
Finance Minister Mathias Cormann took a middle road. While not disputing Hastie’s broad arguments, he told Sky News the reference to Nazi Germany was “a clumsy and inappropriate analogy”.
The Prime Minister tried to dodge the grenade lobbed by Hastie, a former SAS Commander. He refused to endorse or criticise Hastie in any way, simply pointing out he’s not a Minister.
Good luck to any casual observer in Beijing trying to work out whether the Australian Government sees China as an existential threat or a friendly trading partner.
Consistency matters in politics. It matters even more in diplomacy. And it matters most in dealing with China.
Australia needs to be clear where it stands on this crucial relationship. This week it was unsure and confused.
Andrew Hastie may have gone too far with some of his language, but he raised some important points.
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China should be called out over its mistreatment of the Uighur population in Xinjiang, the intimidation of pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong, its lack of free speech and a free press, its disregard of international law in the South China Sea, its influence peddling in the Pacific and through Australian universities and other institutions here.
Hastie is right to say Australia must “accept the reality of the geopolitical struggle before us”. The problem was the confused reaction of Cabinet Ministers to his comments.
That’s not to say it’s easy for the Government to find the right line on China. In fact it’s becoming exponentially more difficult.
Every day comes a new test, with another example of China’s regional assertiveness. And every day the temperature rises in the tense relationship between China and the United States.
The trade war deepens, the language hardens, the military posturing intensifies.
Two months ago, before heading to the G20 summit, the Prime Minister laid out his position. He gave a nuanced and balanced speech, trying to maintain Australia’s delicate balance between its great security ally and its great trading partner.
Australia, he said, would not “sit back” when its interests were threatened. Nor would it be bullied into choosing sides. “As independent sovereign nations in the Indo-Pacific, we don’t see our options as binary and nor do we wish them to become so.”
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The US, however, wants Australia to take a binary view of the world. It wants Canberra to speak up more loudly and more often about Beijing’s bad behaviour. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was blunt when he visited this week for the AUSMIN talks in Sydney. “You can sell your soul for a pile of soybeans, or you can protect your people,” he said.
The problem is that pile of soybeans has become a mountain.
Official figures this week showed Australia has just posted a record trade surplus, thanks to (you guessed it) China. Nearly a third of all Australian exports, by value, go to China. It buys twice as much as the next country, Japan and about nine times as much as the US.
China could easily tip Australia into recession by turning off the tap. It can and does use its economic muscle to further its strategic goals.
Morrison may well have a clear line of “thinking” on how to call out China’s bad behaviour, while protecting Australian jobs. There’s little evidence, however, that the rest of his Cabinet does.
David Speers is Sky News political editor.
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