Book Reviews

Potted imponderables of Australia's defence

Until 1942 Australia had no foreign policy worth calling a foreign policy. Australia was part of the British Empire and Britannia ruled her waves. If Britain fought, Australia fought alongside her, believing that Britain’s interests were her own.

When the mother lion went into battle she was followed by her loyal cub.

Then came World War 11, and, i 1942, the fall of Singapore— nd everything changed. Suddenly ritannia no longer ruled the waves -not in Australian waters anyway -and the Japanese were on Aus alia’s doorstep.

It was at that time that Prime linister Curtin turned to the US Tee of any pangs as to our aditional links with the United ingdom”, and asked for help.

And the Americans sent help— icn, money and machines. It was profound reversal of ties for Aus alia, this new alliance with America, id it was one that affected Aus alia and Australians strongly.

Singapore started it

From the fall of Singapore on ards Australia was forced to depend creasingly on the US. It was in ustralia’s interests to support the S and she has done so pretty insistently in postwar years (with ie exception, of course, of Suez, hen Menzies was every inch a ueen’s man). In particular Aus alia, unlike Britain, has supported merica by refusing to recognise Red hina.

Now with Americans and Aus alians fighting side by side in ietnam, and with British troops aving their bases East of Suez, ustralia and America are closer lan ever.

These developments are underlined Australia Faces Southeast Asia: he emergence of a foreign policy, brief (168 pages) report on and lalysis of Australia’s foreign policy nee the war. It is written by an merican husband and wife team, mry and Mary Belle Vandenbosch le’s Professor Emeritus of Political cie n c e at the University of entucky).

The book, which is divided into eight chapters (each of which can be read as a separate essay), places particular emphasis on recent events —such as the confrontations in West New Guinea and in Malaysia, and the war in Vietnam. The authors don’t make many strong judgments, but those that they do make are sound.

As far as Vietnam is concerned, the Vandenboschs seem to be mild mannered hawks. Describing Aus

tralia’s involvement in the war, they give the opposition a fair go—but are critical of confused thinking in the Australian Labour Party.

For instance, an ALP resolution in 1965 recognised that the presence of American forces in Vietnam was “necessary”. The resolution called on western nations to withdraw support “from the forces of reaction, oppression and tyranny” (i.e., the government) in South Vietnam and urged that “a programme of full scale economic and social assistance” should be implemented.

But, as the Vandenboschs point out: “To whom this assistance should be given after support of the existing government had been withdrawn was not indicated by the resolution”.

New Guinea

Coming nearer home, this book has some commonsense things to say about New Guinea. To quote: “The territory’s sparse population is divided into numerous primitive ethnological groups with hundreds of different languages, living in mountain pockets with great distances between them.

To build a nation, much less a strong society, out of such groups and under such geographic conditions is a slow process. To grant self government prematurely would be

iwise and would not benefit the habitants”.

Although this book places a lot : importance on the American liance, this alliance is not the be-all id end-all of Australian foreign >licy—as the Vandenboschs recog se.

Speaking of the possibility of a lion between New Zealand and ustralia, they write: “If threats to e security of the two states con me, and especially if Australia and ew Zealand should fear that the nited States might withdraw from e area, or that disagreement might ;velop between them and America, ncerted action would be highly sirable”. ‘7/ Australia and New Zealand

should fear that the United States might withdraw from the area. . . ”

Well, many people in Australia and New Zealand do fear that the United States might withdraw. And surely the crux of the matter is that Australia must not become so dependent on America that she is unable to develop her own defence policies.

Pessimistic now

The authors appear to avoid this issue, and don’t make enough of Australia’s fear of an American withdrawal. Certainly their book was written before the de-escalation of the Vietnam war, before the Vietnam peace talks, before the assassination of Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King. It does not, therefore, reflect the pessimism of many Aus tralians, who feel that America may be tempted, because of her internal strife and because of anti-US feeling in Europe, to withdraw into isola tionism.

But their book is good, potted politics, which will make Australians

at least ponder on the defence problems of their own area, if it will not supply any answers. And it comes at a time when in Canberra there is being mounted a thorough review of Australia’s defence and foreign policy, likely to determine Australia’s direction for the next decade.—Sß.

(Australia Faces Southeast

ASIA. University of Kentucky Press, distributed in Australia by Tudor Distri butors Pty. Ltd. $7.00.)