Rupert Murdoch says Australia and US must work to strengthen ties

Australia and the US must work harder to strengthen ties in a tumultuous era of rapid change, Rupert Murdoch says.

Executive chairman of News Corp Rupert Murdoch.

Australia and the US must work harder to strengthen their alliance in a tumultuous era of rapid change, Rupert Murdoch said yesterday.

Mr Murdoch, executive chairman of News Corp, publisher of The Australian, told a gala dinner in New York that the US-Australia relationship was growing but needed to be ­improved by a new generation to protect its legacy.

“Economic ties are profoundly important, with more than a quarter of international investment in Australia coming from the US, and around 28 per cent of Australian external investment heading to the US,” Mr Murdoch said during a speech to mark the 70th ­anniversary of the founding of the American Australian Association in New York.

“But those metrics do not measure the real depth of a dynamic relationship, one that is growing and of which we, in our modest way, are custodians. “And so it is up to us to ­improve, to enhance what we have been bequeathed.

“The year 2018 is vastly different from 1948, but we still live in a world and at a time when we’re being challenged by rapid change. In this tumultuous era, it is comforting to know that the economic mateship between Australia and America remains robust.”

Mr Murdoch spoke after being awarded the AAA’s “legends award” for his lifetime of support for the Australia-US alliance. The AAA, the premier business, cultural and education forum ­between Australia and the US, was founded in 1948 by Mr Murdoch’s father, Sir Keith Murdoch, to promote co-operation and understanding between the countries. Mr Murdoch said the rise of China required Australia and the US to think carefully about how they dealt with what he called “the new superpower”. “If China is influential now, how much more powerful will it be in 10 or 20 years?” he said.

“Consider the words of Sun Tzu: ‘Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory — tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat’. We need to think long and hard about our relationship with the new superpower.”

The dinner for about 600 people included business leaders such as the Australian head of The Dow Chemical Company, Andrew Liveris, the chairman and CEO of JPMorgan, Jamie Dimon, and the CEO of Morgan Stanley, James Gorman.

The dinner honoured the CEO of American defence company Lockheed Martin, Marillyn Hewson, who credited Australia for being one of the original partners with the US in the development of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter.

Mr Murdoch paid tribute to the vision of his father, who he said saw the need for an organisation that would help bind the two countries together in the uncertain years after World War II.

“In these changed and changing circumstances, Australia needed to strengthen ties with the US and could not rely on traditional relationships for its security,” he said. “Britain was broke.”

The AAA includes a business council of senior leaders and chief executives from both countries.