Labor elders now just weak-kneed ‘appeasers’ on AUKUS

Paul Keating and Gareth Evans in their attacks on AUKUS demonstrate they have learned nothing from history, writes Alexander Downer.

Paul Keating and Gareth Evans in their attacks on AUKUS demonstrate they have learned nothing from history. One lesson is that to keep the peace it’s necessary to maintain a balance between major powers and their allies.

That was the key to peace in Europe for nearly a century after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. It’s the key to peace in the Indo-Pacific region today. We have to maintain a balance of power with an aggressive China. Both Pillar 1 and Pillar 2 of AUKUS will help to do that.

If we don’t, China will dominate the region, reducing neighbouring countries to the traditional status of mere tributes to China. The South China Sea would be turned into a Chinese lake, giving China complete command of sea and air traffic through that vital waterway. And Taiwan would of course be incorporated into the People’s Republic of China. To stop this, there is a coalition of nations that balances the power of China and deters Chinese adventurism.

That coalition is led by the US and its allies. It’s also includes countries such India and, for that matter, Indonesia, which while cautious not to become allies of any nation nevertheless want a balance of power in the Indo-Pacific region. This seems to me to be a straightforward proposition for anyone who is concerned about Australia’s security.

There is an alternate strategy, which is to leave the cost and diplomacy involved in balancing power in the Indo-Pacific region to others. There’s precedent for that strategy – Eamon de Valera, who was prime minister of Ireland in the lead-up to and during WWII.

Then prime minister Paul Keating with then Senator Gareth Evans in 1995.

In 1938, de Valera made an agreement with Neville Chamberlain, of Munich fame, to exclude the British from the use of Irish ports in the event of war. When war came, de Valera proclaimed Ireland’s neutrality, banned the British from protecting their convoys from Irish ports and made it a criminal offence for Irish citizens to join the British forces.

So de Valera essentially left the cause of liberal democracy, freedom and the preservation of our way of life to others. It was a selfish and immoral policy. After all, to be neutral between Churchill and Roosevelt on the one hand and Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo on the other was a pretty tall moral order!

Neville Chamberlain and Adolf Hitler

It is clear from their recent pronouncements denouncing AUKUS that Keating and Evans are inspired by the de Valera approach to geopolitics. They attack AUKUS because they say it draws us too closely to the Americans, thereby compromising our sovereignty. Well, we sacrifice some of our sovereignty in the interests of guaranteeing our security.

We can’t balance power in the Indo-Pacific alone and nor do we have the capacity to provide the effective deterrence that makes that possible. What is more, you would think anybody who had been the prime minister or foreign minister of Australia would understand the huge diplomatic and force multiplier Australia gets out of its intimate intelligence relationships with both the US and UK. Our alliances with these countries are with countries we deeply trust.

The reservations the likes of Paul Keating and Gareth Evans have about consolidating the Western alliance don’t particularly matter but when governments take this position that is dangerous. As I have argued in these pages before, the Western world is facing something of an existential threat from the alliance of Russia, Iran and China.

The way to deal with that threat is to work hand in glove with each other, showing a fierce determination and unhesitating will to defend our liberal democratic systems and way of life. That means being prepared together to meet head-on the threats that we face not standing out alone in the name of sovereignty.

The West has been right to support Ukraine against Russia but it has been hesitant in doing so. President Joe Biden still doesn’t want to give the Ukrainians all of the weapons they need to defeat Russia.

Eamon De Valera

The Germans are refusing to give the Ukrainians Taurus missiles because they think it might provoke the Russians. The same hesitancy is seen in the Middle East. The absurd idea of trying to appease Iran has led to increasingly aggressive Iranian adventurism. It is being left to Israel to fight the Iranians in Gaza, Lebanon and on the West Bank. It’s a tough call and Israel needs all the support it can get from the West. Does it get it?

As Israel faces this existential threat from Iran and its surrogates, the British government banned the sale of some weapons to Israel and the feckless Australian government abstained on a UN resolution that would make it impossible for Israel to defend itself. Although China is in no fit economic state to engage in foreign policy adventurism, it nevertheless is providing non-lethal support to the Russians and the Iranians, giving them diplomatic cover and adopting anti-Western positions in international forums. We have to have the courage to tell China that that behaviour is completely unacceptable.

But the likes of Keating and Evans seem to think a policy of appeasement will work. If deterrence and power balances are one of the lessons of history, then another is that appeasement does not work. In the 1930s it failed and it is not going to work today.

Joe Biden bids farewell to Anthony Albanese. Picture: AFP

Using language such as de-escalation when the Russians are pouring missiles and bombs into Ukraine, the Iranians through their surrogates are firing thousands of rockets and missiles into Israel, and the Chinese are threatening and harassing allies such as The Philippines is the language of weakness and fear. They need to understand that unless this behaviour stops they run the risk themselves of escalating to the point of war with the West.

If we stick with the appeasement strategy – the one favoured by Keating and Evans – that is the strategy that leads to war. For every inch we give these countries, they take a mile. If we give them no more inches they will understand the constraints within which they have to work.

The problem is, the West has lost so much confidence in itself that it is no longer prepared to unequivocally stand up for the moral superiority of its values. This is a time when we need the leadership of a Churchill not a de Valera or a Chamberlain. Unfortunately, we’re getting more of the latter than the former.

Alexander Downer was foreign affairs minister from 1996-2007, and high commissioner to the UK from 2014-18.