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2 Australia's warped war
visions By Minh Bui Jones
achieved and signaled an end to its
commitment.
In 1969, with anti-war
protests gathering momentum, a public opinion poll
indicated that 55% of Australians wanted their
troops brought home. In May 1970, anti-Vietnam War
protesters staged the first of three moratorium
marches in Australian cities. The Australian Labor
Party, which had campaigned against the war, was
elected to office in December 1972. Within days,
the curtain was brought down on the country's
military involvement in
Vietnam, in defeat and
dishonor.
The war polarized Australia,
split the Labor Party, and started the culture war
that is simmering to this day. Which brings us
back to November 2006 and the conclusion that's
increasingly hard to avoid: that is, if Howard
supports the original decision to go to war in
Vietnam, he must therefore support the premises on
which that decision was based.
Then, those
premises were: that China was intent on regional
conquest; that Hanoi was Beijing's puppet; that
the Vietnam War was not a civil war; and that the
Vietcong were made up of communist infiltrators
from the north. Even at the time, it was known by
sections of the political class that these
premises were false, but they were nevertheless
sold as facts to the Australian public. Like the
US over Iraq, Australia wanted war, and every
argument in favor of war was employed.
Australia invited itself to the
technological slaughterhouse of Vietnam to realize
its strategic objective of placing the United
States' military might between it and communist
China. And by supporting the US in Vietnam,
Australia was purchasing security insurance from
its powerful ally. This has been the sole
strategic aim of Australia's defense policy since
the end of World War II.
It was widely
believed at the time that the US forced Australia
into the war. The reverse was closer to the truth,
however. As journalist Evan Whitton reported in
1975, "Indeed, documents in the US archives
confirm that, when America appeared to be wavering
... on whether to commit ground troops, Australia
applied pressure to involve the US more heavily in
the war."
Former Australian diplomat
Gregory Clark underlined the significant role of
Australia as warmonger during the Vietnam War: "On
China/Vietnam, Australia actually stood to the
right of the US. We skillfully lobbied the US
right wing to encourage the greatest and firmest
commitment possible in Vietnam. Australia was
terrified that the US might one day go soft on
China."
Four decades later, Australia is
similarly terrified that the US might go soft on
Iraq and leave Australia exposed to the supposed
new global threat of Islamic terrorism. That
analysis goes a long way in explaining Howard's
recent revisionist rants about the Vietnam War,
and why Australia is doomed to repeat its mistakes
alongside the US in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Minh Bui Jones is Asia Times
Online's former news editor. He is currently a
writer based in Sydney, Australia.
(Copyright 2006 Asia Times Online Ltd.
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