Paul Keating fires potshots in the battle of ideas
Paul Keating’s views on security are heard widely. But it’s only reasonable to expect he will be challenged on them.
On Thursday The Australian ran an article by Paul Keating titled “Marles’s ceding of power to US a dark day in history”. The reference was to the Defence Minister Richard Marles’s address to The Australian’s Defending Australia 2025 summit held on Monday.
The Marles address was a considered analysis of Australia’s strategic situation. He defended the Albanese government’s defence policy and made some criticisms of what Labor had inherited from its Coalition predecessor.
Marles made this point, which is a reflection of Australia’s foreign affairs and defence policy since Federation in 1901: “In terms of our own defence capability needs, our risk is not so much the invasion of the continent. We are fortunate that we are an island nation surrounded by oceans, but on the other hand we are deeply reliant on our sea lines of communication. The supply of the country – almost all of our liquid fuels are imported by sea, but also through export revenues. And so that is our strategic risk. It’s the disruption of those sea lines. It’s the coercion that could result because of the disruption of such sea routes, it is that, and the stability of the region in which we live.”
There is nothing exceptional in this. In 1914, Labor leader Andrew Fisher declared that Australia would support Britain in its war against Germany to the last man and the last shilling. Fisher and his successor Billy Hughes understood that, as an island continent with a small population, Australia could be conquered through an interdiction of its sea lanes. Sure, in 1916, Labor divided over conscription for overseas service and Hughes split from/was expelled by Labor. He continued as prime minister leading the Nationalist Party. But Labor continued to support the war effort even though it opposed conscription. After all, Imperial Germany was a Pacific force at the time.
In 1939 Robert Menzies, then United Australia Party prime minister, declared war on Germany and dispatched Australian forces to the northern hemisphere. Labor, led by John Curtin, was not in favour of forces being sent overseas to fight with the Allied forces. But Curtin supported the Allied cause.
When Japan attacked the US at Pearl Harbor in December 1941, which started the Pacific War, Curtin, who became PM earlier that year, worked hard to develop a military relationship with the US. It became a formal alliance under the Liberal Party government led by Menzies in 1951.
Australia joined the UN force, led by the US, in 1950 to protect South Korea from attack by communist North Korea. Australia’s commitment was motivated, in part at least, by a wish that US forces would remain active in the Pacific. This mission was broadly successful. A similar motivation underpinned the Menzies government’s decision in 1965 to send military forces to support the US in its defence of South Vietnam against communist North Vietnam. Menzies believed if Australia supported the US in Vietnam, the US would be more inclined to support Australia if there were hostilities between Australia and Indonesia, led by ultra-nationalist president Sukarno.
The decision of the Howard government to support the US in Afghanistan in 2001 and in the Second Gulf War in 2003 had a similar motivation. As to the First Gulf War in 1991, I remember Keating phoning me to advise he had supported in cabinet the Hawke Labor government’s decision to send a naval taskforce to the Persian Gulf. He added that he had opposed the dispatch of the army or air force.
Of the military engagements mentioned above, Labor opposed only Australia’s commitment in Vietnam and the Second Gulf War. In view of this, Marles’s speech in Canberra was consistent with Labor’s policy for most of the past century and a bit. Yet, in his response, Keating described the conference as “sleazy”. Apparently he was concerned “the guests invited to the conference were chosen and assembled according to the paper’s view of their collective propensity to subjugate Australia’s interests to those of the United States”.
Yet South Australian Labor Premier Peter Malinauskas also spoke at the conference.
But there were other targets. Keating attacked former Labor PM Julia Gillard and defence minister Stephen Smith along with the Liberal Party’s Julie Bishop and Tony Abbott for agreeing to host US military forces in Australia.
After his speech, Marles responded to a question from Chris Uhlmann as to what would be Australia’s response “if China takes Taiwan by force”. Marles referred back to his speech, adding “our continent is more relevant to great power contest now than it’s ever been before”. He then referred to Australia building up “our defence capability”. That was all.
Keating responded to Marles’s remarks, stating: “Monday’s statement by Defence Minister Richard Marles that Australia’s geography and continent would be crucial to any United States prosecution of a war against China will go down as a dark moment in Australia’s history.” But Marles did not quite say this. Keating went on: “Labor and its grassroots will not support Australia being dragged into a war with and by the United States over Taiwan.” Yet no one in Labor or the Coalition is advocating a war between the US and its allies and China.
However, historically, both sides of mainstream politics have supported governments intent on ensuring that Australia’s sea lanes and now, flight paths, remain open.
Keating’s views on security are heard widely. But it’s only reasonable to expect he will be challenged in the battle of policy ideas.
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