"Reflections on The Triumph of Howard’s Way" – end-of-year newsletter by James Dunn (author, former DFAT career officer, and persistent East Timor activist)

Editor’s note: While I wrestle with an appropriate pre-Christmas end-of-year message to my www.tonykevin.com readers , here meanwhile is a good and thoughtful message to reflect on from my former DFAT colleague and continuing friend Jim Dunn. It is the best wrap-up of 2004 I have seen. This message is copied from Jim Dunn’s weekly email newsletter. For anyone who wants to get onto Jim’s circulation list it, his email is

jasdunn@bigpond.com

Jim spent many long years pressing patiently for the truth to come out and justice be done to the people of East Timor. In the end – after many years of being ignored and marginalised by people who lacked his courage and stubborn streak - he was proved right. An inspiring example for the cause of SIEV X justice, and also for the oppressed and suffering people of Iraq.

Tony Kevin, 21 December 2004

 

With Christmas and 2005 almost upon us, it is time to look back and take stock of how Australia's fortunes have fared in the past twelve months. In this column I shall focus on the domestic context of foreign affairs, especially on the consolidation of Howard’s conservatism, and take a look at the global scene next week.

This past weekend most columnists have been generous in their praise of a Prime Minister who has often been an object of criticism in the previous twelve months. Leading articles in The Sydney Morning Herald, for example, were surprisingly fulsome in their praise of John Howard and Alexander Downer, the main players in our foreign policy. As I have also been a critic of the conduct and drift of our foreign policy, I too must pay tribute to John Howard for his tenacity, his determination and, in particular, his adroitness as our national leader. It is these qualities, rather than the policies he has expounded, that have kept the Coalition in office for nearly nine years. Foreign policy is not really John Howard's strong point, though he set out to create a statesman image, and, in so doing, he has improved over the years, though he is still prone to blunder from time to time. The problem is that Howard is no visionary, and he has little sense of history. Issues like international human rights, how to strengthen the United Nations system, and upholding the sanctity of international law, lie buried or obscured beneath the political instincts that motivate most of his responses to international issues. It has made him over-confident in the rectitude of his views and policies.

By weaving a powerful mix of patriotism ignited by the glorification of our role in wars past and present, by extolling pride in our great sporting triumphs, and lauding the economic prosperity his government has achieved, Mr. Howard has managed to promote a new nationalism in this country. This nationalism has made Australia a meaner and more inward-looking country, and it has helped him retain office. But we need to be very cautious about this nationalist trend, with its extolling the virtues of strong and unbending leadership, especially when right wing governments are in power. Hitler and Mussolini exploited such a trend, to foster the fascist concept of the master race, at the expense of those considered inferior. Australia, for a host of reasons, is unlikely to go down that track but we must be alert for attempts to take us in that direction, not least the exploiting of national pride for political ends.

Mr. Howard’s handling of our relationship with the US has been particularly skilful. Americans have not really been walking tall in Australian eyes during a year in which the Iraq situation worsened. This, together with attempts to undermine the UN, has deeply divided Australians, as it has Europeans, and Americans themselves. Some argue that the greatest threat to peace right now is not Iran or North Korea, but this US administration. Most disagreed strongly with American moves to invade Iraq in the first place, our fears justified by the outcome, so far - up to 100,000 Iraqi civilians killed, and no end in sight to the violence. John Howard managed to make Australia a part of the Bush-led Coalition from the very outset, despite popular opposition. It is a tribute to his political skills that he escaped unscathed on this count at the election. He has been able to dismiss, mostly with one-liner responses, charges that would have ended the career of lesser politicians. As it turned out our minor role in Iraq served to shield the Government from any responsibility for mistakes and abuses.

What most Australians did support was that once involved in this operation we had to see it through. We should not cut and run, to use that simplistic jargon. Mark Latham's pledge to bring our troops home before Christmas was effectively turned against him. The Prime Minister skilfully moved to ensure that, unlike Vietnam 32 years earlier, Iraq was virtually sidelined, in the end well down on the agenda of the long election campaign. The attention of our mortgage-burdened electorate became riveted on interest rates and related economic issues, at a time when the Australian economy was strong. Attacks on his controversial policies on issues like Kyoto, Iraq and asylum seekers, were skilfully disposed of by Mr. Howard, his brief responses cloaked meaninglessly in that great political escape - the national interest.

Mr. Howard’s claim to a mandate in relation to these issues is at best misleading. The only way to claim one would be to follow the Swiss and put such issues to referenda. Another contentious issue that Mr. Howard managed to use to his advantage was the Australian-US relationship, now decorated with a freshly-negotiated free trade agreement.

It is fair to say that George W Bush is not a popular figure with most Australians, any more than he is in the Western world as a whole. Opinion polls by the BBC and others showed that more than 70% of Europeans wanted him defeated at the November presidential election. Bush would get more support here, but less than a majority. In our election campaign, Mr. Howard cleverly navigated the issue of the alliance to his advantage, by focusing simplistically on the importance of our link with the US, which most of us accept. The real issue, which escaped debate, was whether Mr. Howard's dedicated support for this very unpopular US administration has harmed Australia's international image, especially in the region.

Thanks to his political skills Mr. Howard’s political stocks in Australia are higher than ever, but the same cannot be said for his image beyond Australia’s shores, perhaps with the exception of the Solomon Islands and PNG. In Europe, Asia and the Third World in general, Howard’s Australia is seen as a mean, rich country, a people exhibiting a revived level of racism, jealously guarding their privileged life-style, and exhibiting a new arrogance in relation to security issues. In the past we were respected for our thirst for knowledge of the peoples and cultures to our north. Our interest in Asia may not have slackened, but our thirst today is more about how to exploit the upward surge of Asian economies to our advantage.

Maybe we are in for some surprising changes in Howard’s current term. As a Christmas thought, let’s hope for a new creative vision in 2005 - for John Howard to follow the experience of Martin Luther King and have a dream.......

Best wishes for a Joyous and Peaceful Christmas!

James Dunn, 21 December 2004