China’s Port of Darwin deal always an unmoored strategy
As I sat down to write this column I glanced at the television and saw the headline on SKY News: “Port of Darwin lease could be torn up.” This immediately brightened my day.
I have never been able to work out why the lease was approved. Strategically it looks like a really stupid decision. If we have an enemy it would have to be China and if, God forgive, we ever got into a conflict with them, northern Australia would be where our forces would need to be based.
There would be a snowflake’s hope in hell of Beijing allowing the purchase by a foreign power of any port in China.
The Chinese are still dredging the ocean floor so they can construct new islands in the South China Sea. They will then be in a position where cutting off a vital supply route to Japan will be a fairly simple matter.
China always looks and sounds threatening. The heavies in Beijing have no time for subtlety. Most bullies don’t. Their focus is always on fuelling the fears most nations have of them. They prefer “grey zone” warfare through cyber attacks on Western nations, which can have a devastating effect on the victims. They have developed an expertise in this field, leaving countries like Australia awfully vulnerable.
Western nations see themselves as the good guys and are reluctant to retaliate in kind. This strikes me as an absurd response. If the Chinese, or the Russians, believe they can make bastards of themselves and suffer little or no penalty, they have no incentive to stop.
Even the North Koreans are getting in on the act. Whenever there is any opportunity for bastardry you can bet Kim Jong-un and his mates will be in on it.
If this band of bullies are all allowed to continue this appalling behaviour, who knows when it will end and how far they will go?
This situation is just a continuance of the timid reaction of the West to challenges from Russia, China or North Korea. The usual suspects are usually guilty but there is no point in taking judicial action.
You can appeal to international justice as expressed by the court in The Hague, but that is a toothless tiger if there ever were one. The guilty are certain they will suffer no detriment if they are found guilty or liable for a fine. They won’t pay, in any case, and chasing them would be a forlorn and futile exercise.
We are yet to see exactly how President Joe Biden will conduct US foreign policy but already it is clear he will not go down the isolationist road of Donald Trump.
Biden has had almost 50 years in politics to acquire his skills and knowledge of how the world works. He will have a steady hand on the rudder — and that is precisely what the world needs right now. He will not embarrass his country in the way only Trump could manage.
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