US Secretary of State Antony Blinken addressed NATO members in Brussels on Wednesday 24 March 2021 calling on them to work with the US to counter China. However in a shift of tone from that of recent weeks, he also said that the US “won’t force allies into an ‘us-or-them’ choice with China,” and acknowledged that the US knows “that our allies have complex relationships with China that won’t always align perfectly”.
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This Egmont Security Policy Brief notes that for many Western governments, there still is a lot of hesitation and bewilderment on how to deal with Russia. A first step in defining a coherent policy vis-a-vis Russia, is trying to understand the motivation and objectives of Russian foreign policy, as well as its weaknesses.
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A well-told lie is worth a thousand facts. And the debt-trap narrative is just that: a lie, and a powerful one. The Sri Lankan port of Hambantota is not an example of China’s strategic use of debt. With a new administration in Washington, the truth about the widely, perhaps willfully, misunderstood case of Hambantota Port is long overdue.
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In international affairs, words are bullets, according to an old diplomatic saying. If so, Australia in recent years has begun firing new ammunition. ‘Values’, a word seldom used in the past, has now assumed a central place in our foreign policy rhetoric. Speeches, press conferences and policy statements vibrate with the V-word. If values are now the coin of our foreign policy realm, we will have to start walking the talk.
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An impressive article by Michael Hirsh, which manages to be: a review of Barry Gewen’s “incisive new intellectual history of Kissinger and his times”, The Inevitability of Tragedy; an insightful enumeration of some key social, economic and strategic challenges the world currently faces; and a useful commentary on the US-China rivalry and the accompanying geostrategic shifts.
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Conceptual confusion in thinking about foreign policy is evident as the post World War II era’s structured international arrangements of durable institutions and agreed norms – designed to facilitate peaceful dispute resolution and cooperation on security, economic and social matters between nations – is challenged by the United States and others.
The indeterminacy over whether a gradual transition from the rules-based order to a degree of anarchy is taking place is generating a certain dissonance in the speechmaking of leading Australian political figures.
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One of the more disturbing tendencies of modern governments is ‘securitisation’ – transforming policy problems into threats, thereby elevating them into the national security domain. In many western democracies security is accorded pre-eminent status among the various domains of public policy, creating the preconditions for securitisation to elevate the levels of state intervention in a way that displays, emphasises and enhances the power of the state and its control over its citizens.
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Australia’s Prime Minister recently said that Australia always respects the sovereignty of other nations, and simply expects the same in return. But cases like Kosovo, Crimea, Jammu-Kashmir and Hong Kong illustrate the tension between sovereignty and self-determination – and the significance of precedent-setting. Recognising Israel’s sovereignty over the West Bank requires careful, nuanced consideration. What position will Australia take?
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Australia’s strategic quandary emerges from its status as an ally to a great power. If it abrogates its responsibility to set national policy aims by joining in a coalition in which one great power antagonist determines the goals of the war it cannot claim to have a strategy. It cannot claim to be linking Australia’s national priorities to the military actions. Its fate would be in the hands of its great power ally.
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Statements from NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg and President Trump reveal a divergence in the strategic interests of the Europeans and the US. If real alliances only work when there’s a clear alignment of strategic objectives, Stoltenberg’s comments are telling. Australia’s foreign and strategic policy needs to reflect a more sophisticated appreciation of the geopolitical shifts taking place.
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