Keating’s timewarp

Former prime minister Paul Keating has launched another extraordinary spray at the Australian government’s foreign policies.

In an apparently unsolicited written statement, Mr Keating lambasted the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and its Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg while supporting Emmanuel Macron’s opposition to the organisation expanding into Asia. President Macron is incapable of delivering peace and security to his own country, but that is another story.

Condemning the “militarism of Europe” Mr Keating stated that “exporting that malicious poison to Asia would be akin to Asia welcoming the plague upon itself.”

“Of all the people on the international stage the supreme fool among them is Jens Stoltenberg, the current Secretary-General of NATO”, added Keating. “Stoltenberg by instinct and by policy, is simply an accident on its way to happen.”

Mr Stoltenberg, the former Labour prime minister of Norway, has served in his current role since 2014. 

His crime in the eyes of Mr Keating is to draw parallels between Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s behaviour in Asia.

Coinciding with the visit by prime minister Anthony Albanese to Europe for a meeting of NATO in Lithuania, Keating’s statement was a direct assault on NATO and the foreign policies of the Australian government.

This is not the first outburst by Mr Keating about relations with China. It is no wonder that the CCP mouthpiece the Global Times praised Keating.

Last year, he proposed that Australia ditch its involvement in the QUAD and AUKUS arrangements.

Mr Keating nurses a deep grievance towards the United States which he attacked again in his recent statement. The US had not been ‘grateful’ enough for Australia’s contributions to global affairs, including the creation of the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation group (APEC), he claimed last year.

“This (APEC) came out of the Australian foreign policy – this is my personal gift to the United States. They will give you no thanks and gratitude,” Mr ­Keating said. “The US is exceptionally ­ungrateful for people who have (supported it) for a lifetime. I am one of them. For two decades within the Labor Party … I supported the United States against what was then the pro-communist left.” 

Indeed the idea of APEC was first publicly broached by Prime Minister Hawke during a speech in Seoul, Korea, on January 31, 1989. Ten months later, 12 Asia-Pacific nations met in Canberra to establish the organisation.

Mr Keating has a misguided view of the Chinese communist regime. “The Chinese are not trying to overturn the existing system. Let’s get this clear: China is not the old Soviet Union. It’s not exporting ideology,” he said. This view stands in stark contrast to most observers of China, including another former Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd who claims that Xi Jinping has brought communist ideology back to the core of the country’ decision-making. 

“The West ignores Xi’s ideological messaging at its own peril. No matter how abstract and unfamiliar his ideas might be, they are having profound effects on the real-world content of Chinese politics and foreign policy—and thus, as China’s rise continues, on the rest of the world,” Mr Rudd wrote in an essay published last year. “Xi’s ideological beliefs have committed China to the goal of building what Xi describes as a ‘fairer and more just’ international system—one anchored in Chinese power rather than American power and one that reflects norms more consistent with Marxist-Leninist values.”

It would appear that Mr Keating is blind what Mr Rudd describes as “the truth about China that is hiding in plain sight.”

Paul Keating was a member of parliament and prime minister of Australia until 1996. Much of his 27 years in political life coincided with the reign of Deng Xiaoping and his successors such as Jiang Zemin as leaders of the Chinese Communist Party. It was the period of Deng’s opening-up of the Chinese economy, of which Australia was a beneficiary.

Mr Keating’s views of China were formed during that era, and in his subsequent involvement with the Chinese Development Bank. It is a quarter of a century since Mr Keating sat in the National Security Committee, let alone received a briefing from the national security agencies. His political involvement was nearly 30 years ago and during a far different era to the one of Xi Jinping. Mr Keating’s views about China seem to be stuck in a time warp.

Mr Keating would have China dominate the Indo-Pacific. “The US could run the world co-operatively with China. In other words, the US consolidates the Atlantic, which includes bringing Russia into Europe, and in the east, the stability is provided by the Chinese,” he said.

According to Keating, the world would acquiesce to a Chinese take-over of Taiwan. “Taiwan, I repeat, is not of vital Australian interest,” he said last year. “If I’ve got any advice for them (the US) it’s to stick to strategic ambiguity like glue.”

The idea that Taiwan is not vital to Australia is misguided. A successful Chinese invasion of Taiwan would have one of two economic consequences; either the destruction of the island’s semi-conductor production; or the domination of the industry, if it survived invasion, by China. Either way, Australia – along with most of the world - would face disastrous economic consequences running to hundreds of billions of dollars a year.

Mr Keating envisages a benevolent Chinese Communist Party ruling the Indo-Pacific. He is particularly sensitive to any challenge to this utopian dream, including by NATO setting up an office in Japan.

Sensibly the Australian government has ignored his advice. Prime Minister Albanese encouraged the Germans for example to have a greater naval presence in the Pacific.

Contrary to Mr Keating’s naivety, an emboldened China would not stop at Taiwan. China’s so-called first island line – its projected primary line of defence - extends to South Korea, Japan and the Philippines. It is already seeking to extend its influence throughout the Indo-Pacific, including to islands on our doorstep. Just this week, China and the Solomons Island entered a comprehensive partnership which extends the CCP’s influence over the Pacific nation.

Under Keating’s scenario, the Indo-Pacific would become a vassal for Xi’s regime. A resource-rich Australia would be at the mercy of the CCP if Mr Keating’s scenario ever became a reality.

 First published in the Epoch Times Australia.