The politics of standing up to Xi’s China

The new Defence Minister, Peter Dutton, has been criticised for warmongering this week, and the government stands accused of trying to set up a China panic to boost its re-election chances. The toughest critic probably was Kevin Rudd. The former prime minister told the ABC’s Leigh Sales that the government was seeking “the khaki terrain of a national security agenda”.

Rudd told me that “Morrison and company are addicted to the drug of ‘standing up to China’ every day of the week” because it helps the government politically. National security was “old faithful for the next election” while other issues weren’t running in the government’s favour. “And that is what the agenda shift to China is all about.”

Illustration: John ShakespeareCredit: The Sydney Morning Herald

So what did Dutton say? In an interview on the ABC’s Insiders show on Sunday, host David Speers asked Dutton: “Two of your former colleagues, Tony Abbott and Christopher Pyne, now believe the prospects of a battle over Taiwan are growing, could happen quite soon. Do you share that view?”

Dutton: “I don’t think it should be discounted. I think China has been very clear about the reunification and that’s been a long-held objective of theirs and if you look at any of the rhetoric that is coming out of China from spokesmen, particularly in recent weeks and months in response to different suggestions that have been made, they have been very clear about that goal.”

Speers: “How do you view that. We have seen a lot of aggression from China with incursions into Taiwan’s air space, live-fire navy drills off the coast of Taiwan. How do you view all that?”

Dutton: “I think people need to be realistic about the activity. There is militarisation of bases across the region. Obviously there is a significant amount of activity and there is an animosity between Taiwan and China. For us, we want to make sure we continue to be a good neighbour in the region, that we work with our partners and with our allies and nobody wants to see conflict between China and Taiwan or anywhere else.”

The news reporting of these comments, reasonably enough, homed in on the phrase “I don’t think it should be discounted”.

In response, there were two notable responses from Beijing, one formal and careful and the other emotive and inflammatory. China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Wang Wenbin, said: “China must and will be reunified. We are willing to do our best to strive for the prospect of peaceful reunification, but we will never leave any space for ‘Taiwan independence’ separatist activities in any form.

“It is hoped that the Australian side will fully recognise that the Taiwan question is highly sensitive, abide by the one-China principle, be prudent in its words and deeds, avoid sending any wrong signals to the ‘Taiwan independence’ separatist forces.”

The other response came from a Chinese general who works as a professor at the People’s Liberation Army National Defence University, Major-General Jin Yinan: “We don’t need to take it seriously. [Australia] is not that strong, it’s not that powerful … Australia wants to rush to the front line of the conflict … then let it come, let it walk on the forefront of the conflict ... then we can have a good fight. If it insists on intervening, it will only cause greater damage to Australia itself.” Australia’s warlike impulse came from its commitment to “white supremacy”, he said.

Rudd doesn’t dispute that China is deadly serious about its intent to “reunify” with the self-governing, democratic island of 25 million people. And that it will use force if necessary. He just thinks that there’s nothing imminent about it to justify comments like Dutton’s.

“The starkest danger zone for Taiwan,” says Rudd, “is at the end of this decade and into the 2030s when, in the absence of significant US and Taiwanese military advances in the meantime, China will move from strategic parity to decisive advantage.

“That is when Beijing would be more inclined to move to deliberate action in the expectation that the US would not then fight in a war they believed they could not win.”

Does Dutton think he was exaggerating the danger, warmongering?

“The statement I made was factually based and indisputable,” he tells me. “The conversation is important for the Australian public to have. For those who may not have awareness, who don’t follow day to day, my view is it’s best to be honest and frank about the situation in relation to Taiwan. The only question in my mind is around timing, and the approach of Taiwan or the Chinese Communist Party.”

Timing, says Dutton, is “the $64 million question – there’s a lot of speculation and informed judgment and in the end nobody except China could know”.

In other words, Rudd and Dutton agree that a “reunification” of China with Taiwan is inevitable, and only the exact timing and terms are in question. So is it valid and reasonable for Dutton to be openly countenancing war now?

Taiwan’s Foreign Affairs Minister, Joseph Wu, seems to think so. Wu said this week that Beijing had been “conducting misinformation campaigns, hybrid warfare, and recently they have increased their grey zone activities against Taiwan. And all these seem to be preparing for their final military assault against Taiwan. This is our country, this is our people and this is our way of life. We will defend ourselves to the very end.”

“Taiwan,” Wu told Sky UK on Wednesday, “happens to be on the frontline of China’s expansion of its authoritarian order. And if Taiwan is taken by China, I think the consequences will be global.”

Beijing has been sending its fighters and bombers into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone more frequently, almost daily, and in bigger numbers, since September. This week a mainland air force reconnaissance plane skimmed the surface of the Taiwan Strait, flying just 30 metres above sea level, in an apparent effort to see if it could fly under Taiwan’s radar systems. It was part of the constant mainland program of probing, pressuring and intimidating Taiwan.

The US President, Joe Biden, and Japan’s Prime Minister, Yoshihide Suga, also seem to be taking Taiwan pretty seriously. They issued a joint statement two weeks ago committing to the “importance of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait”. It was the first time Tokyo had made any such reference to Taiwan since 1969, which was before it gave diplomatic recognition to Beijing.

A retired US admiral, Jim Stavridis, former supreme commander of NATO, wrote this week: “Of the four potential maritime flashpoints in East Asia, Taiwan is the most dangerous – and the most likely to explode.” He envisaged a “lightning strike” by Beijing to take Taiwan, and said that working with US allies, especially Japan, would be “critical”. He didn’t claim to know the timing.

But after Beijing’s swift and sudden move against Hong Kong last year, it seems prudent to be vigilant. It had promised to preserve Hong Kong’s liberties till 2049.

If push comes to shove, Washington will have to decide very quickly whether it is prepared to go to war against China to defend Taiwan. It has no treaty commitment to do so. If it does, Canberra will need to decide very quickly whether to it will join the US effort. It would have no treaty commitment to do so.

Dutton, asked whether there’s a scenario where Australia would become involved in the military defence of Taiwan, tells me: “I just think there are hypotheticals that make it impossible to answer.” The government will be turning its mind to exactly these hypotheticals, and, in the meantime, Dutton is wise not to speculate.

Rudd’s criticism looks more valid if you put Dutton’s comments together with two other events this week. After he spoke, the secretary of the Department of Home Affairs, Mike Pezzullo, circulated a message he gave his staff about the “drums of war” beating more loudly in the region. And Scott Morrison visited the Northern Territory and announced $747 million worth of upgrades to training bases, to be shared with US forces, in the territory.

Dutton didn’t know Pezzullo was planning his remarks, but he was pivotal to Morrison’s spending decision.

Taken separately, each development is reasonable enough. “War may be folly,” said Pezzullo, formerly a senior defence planner, “but the greater folly is to refuse to give it a thought”. And he’s surely right. And Morrison’s announcement was merely belated fulfilment of Australia’s decade-old promises to upgrade the training areas.

But just as the government is quite right to warn of the risks of war, Rudd is right to warn of the risks of domestic political overindulgence. The three government pronouncements this week, taken together, do start to look like a trend. And as next year’s election draws nearer, the Coalition inevitably will be tempted to turn the trend into theme. Election campaigns are not ideal showcases for subtlety and restraint.

Standing up to China’s Xi Jinping is a sobering necessity and the government is doing a serious job of it; it will have to fight the urge to pursue it as an intoxicating drug of political powerseeking.