ALBANESE HEADS OFF TO MEET HIS ‘DADDY’

By Cliff Reece

Anthony Albanese has talked up Australia's independence from the USA while paying tribute to wartime Labor leader John Curtin, in a speech that will surely cause concern within the leadership of our most important ally.

Critics have understandably taken the speech to imply a divide between Australia’s and USA’s strategy and interests in our region.

And many observers see this as a distinct shift in the Albanese government’s attitude towards the USA and Communist China; a shift very much in favour of the latter.

Hudson Institute senior fellow Dr John Lee said Albanese’s speech would be more credible if it was matched with greater investment in defence and national security.

“Calling for a more independent foreign policy would be understandable and credible if we are prepared to spend more to meet our defence needs rather than rely as much on American capacity, technology and presence as we currently do,’ he said.

“It does not appear that the Albanese government is prepared to do that.

‘Therefore, if Albanese is really serious about a strategic divergence away from the USA, this will leave Australia more isolated and vulnerable.”

He said the comments were unlikely to influence the outcome of the USA's AUKUS review but could shape how Washington responds to its findings.

The White House response, he said, would be swayed by their own assessments of Australian readiness to carry its own weight, which we clearly haven’t been doing for many years.

He said Australia has become an outlier internationally, with NATO countries and Asian allies all increasing their spending on defence and national security.

Peter Jennings and Michael Shoebridge from Strategic Analysis Australia have both similarly commented on the need for closer ties with the USA in these uncertain times and the urgent need for greater spending on national defence.

Jennings’ recent article in The Australian was headed “How to lose an alliance: PM’s shrinking ambition.” And Shoebridge’s article in the same publication was headed “Beijing’s man can rest assured our PM won’t rock the boat.”

Both articles spell out how the Albanese government is clearly taking us down a path we really should avoid – and one that voters have never said we wanted to go down!

Shadow defence spokesman Angus Taylor was similarly scathing, saying “It seems that this government and this Prime Minister are better able to, and more interested in, getting a meeting with the President of China than the President of the United States.”

Trump’s decision to leave the G7 meeting early last month - consequently missing a first-time meeting with Albanese - has compounded the problem.

Trump could easily have spent some time with Albanese either then or by inviting him as a guest on his plane back to the USA. He clearly chose not to – and who can blame him after all the adverse and sometimes abusive comments made by Albanese, Penny Wong and Ambassador Kevin Rudd against him?

It all points to our weak PM backing off meeting with Trump despite the importance of the AUKUS deal and U.S. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth’s requests for additional defence spending.

Our non-government experts on foreign affairs and defence & national security have nearly all criticised the Albanese government and Albanese himself for their negative stance against our most important ally, the USA, and the lack of urgent action on national defence given how vulnerable we are as a nation.

But they just don’t want to hear such criticism – and Albanese, Wong and others of the hard-left certainly don’t want to do anything that might upset comrade Xi Jinping.

Thanks to Kandy Wong writing for the South Morning China Post together with Daniel Flitton at the Lowy Institute and Johannes Leak for his very appropriate cartoons.