Current Affairs

This is an article written in 2021, it explores the reasons behind Australia, United Kingdom and the United States reasoning for coming to a strategic partnership.

AUKUS is probably one of the biggest gambles the US and UK have made, it is an argument to challenge and influence the politics in Asia, the Indo-Pacific, and Oceania. It is a move towards creating arguments last seen in the Cold War, which is a movement by the military to challenge the regional super-powers: China and the less influential Russia. Though the nuclear submarines that Australia buy and develop will have conventional weapons, the reality is that the Australians have moved their thinking away from ASEAN and towards bridging the technological divide with Europe and North America to counter China’s aggressive posturing.

China has only itself to blame, it unleashed a cyber war, a war of words, economic sanctions and peddled it’s arguments among those who could be bothered to listen. It destabilised Burma, empowered the military junta to continue with its ethnic conquest of those challenging the regime, reignited a war and destroyed the democratically elected parliament. China has also challenged the sovereignty of countries such as Vietnam and the Philippines and encroached on the sovereign territory and resources of almost all the Asian nations. China argues that it is reclaiming territory and resources. It has exploited loopholes to instil its arguments, but ultimately it has demonstrated its disdain for equitable governance and challenged the fundamental movement across Asia for universal suffrage.

But it is the way that the AUKUS agreement was announced that challenges Asia, it moves the West into a sphere of influence in Asia, and challenges the ASEAN nations to begin looking toward the West rather than an empowered China that has tried to dictate arguments within the region. The absolute monopoly that China held as a super power in the region has been challenged, but it brings to the forefront an argument how the seas will be policed and in what way the sovereignty of the Asian nations will be further tested and if the industrial and financial centres will accept the movements that are going to be pushed into arguments dependent on resources. The resource poor will be pushed into a compromise of who they look to -to lead their economic outlook, and how they will be militarily affected by the argument that AUKUS puts forward in response to Chinese aggression.

The danger lies in how these moves will be interpreted in the future, which are arguments the Chinese government have begun and that is the West is pushing a colonialist argument and is enforcing its will through gun boat diplomacy by enforcing its arguments through military power. But the colonialist argument also belongs to China, which has been forcing its arguments on Asia, and challenges the sovereign borders of nations such as India and the Philippines and threatens nations beyond their sphere of socio-economic arguments, such as Taiwan, South Korea and Japan.

Initially, China cannot gain a moral foothold in this argument because of their behaviour in Hong Kong, Vietnam, India, Taiwan and the Philippines. China is trying to enforce the narrative and clumsily imprisons the Hong Kong protesters arguing for universal suffrage and takes sovereign land, such as in the Philippines, Vietnam and India, and has enforced its arguments to control resources in the region. Furthermore, China is also trying to impose its will on Taiwan and challenges the sovereignty of Taiwan’s borders, it has continually pushed the boundaries of acceptable behaviour and used its air force to probe the Taiwanese defences and aggressively moved military forces on mainland China threateningly. But most of all it is China’s determination to push their arguments within Asia that has mostly affected their influence within the capitals and among the politicians in Asia.

The danger is if the Chinese economy slows and President Xi moves his arguments away from the economic success China has experienced and suffocates the free reigning business’ in China with the reforms he has placed on those that have come to his notice. A fall in property prices or a slowdown in the industrial sector will challenge his Presidency and may lead to the regime focussing militarily on the region.

The arguments that China has pushed to extend its influence in the region has led to charges of bullying and forcing the ASEAN block and parts of Oceania to find alternative regional partners, rather than facing the enforced arguments China is trying to instil on the region. India is being squashed by two spheres of concern and does not have the luxury of buffer zones on its borders. The northern Indian border is being directly challenged by China, which has led to physical conflict between the two armies, and on the western border of India, the rearming of Pakistan by China’s armaments industry is a concern for the Indian government. With Pakistan’s government becoming more influenced by China and dependent on the Belt and Road initiative of President Xi for internal investment and armament of the Pakistani army, it has also led to Pakistan offering China influence in the investment and industrial sectors and the strategic renewal of Pakistan’s lines of communication.  

The war of words that has escalated Australia’s concerns with China, and turned a good relationship into a crisis, has included cyber warfare and an economic blockade of Australian agricultural exports into China. The movement of industry away from China and to other regions in Asia, has to a point alleviated the damage that China is able to impose on Australia, but China’s behaviour has been seen as a warning to other Asian nations and moved Asia, Oceania and the Indo-Pacific to look for other partners to form strategic alliances.

The danger for the West lies in whether the military movement will inflame Xi Jinping into becoming more aggressive with AUKUS and begin acting in such a way that it forces conflict in the region. China has already moved toward undermining the movement of Asia towards the West by applying to join CPTPP, but the amount of harm China has done to itself by its previous behaviour has moved the narrative away from their sphere of influence and placed questionable arguments against the Belt and Road initiative that to date has been China’s attempts to influence Asia, and the Pacific and Indo-Pacific nations which has led to it being seen as expanding its influence across this region. But there is support, but there is also a lot of opposition coming from countries such as Japan, Australia, Canada and Mexico.

Arguments aside, China is on a charm offensive, and is shoring up its expansionist arguments by declaring that it will no longer be building coal fired power stations. But there are still concerns about its environmental position in the region. It is by far the largest polluter and is slowly moving towards recognising that there is a long way to go before the region will trust China to meet environmental concerns. The teak forests in eastern Burma have gone, the forestry and environment in Indonesia is on the edge of disaster and the resources China is chasing to continue its dominance in manufacturing means that they need to control the resources found in the region. However, there will be pressure put on China to not only clean up its militarily aggressive stance in the ASEAN block, but they will also be questioned about the industrial pollutants that have had a huge environmental impact on the region.

China will also be questioned about the 100 nuclear silos that they have built and further questioned why they have brought this type of technology to the forefront of their military argument. There are serious questions that ASEAN will put to China, and whether they will pull back from their aggressive stance with Oceania and ASEAN members, which is now challenging them diplomatically, is yet to be heard. If China can roll back its conflicting ideological stance, which needs containing in the region, and produce cohesive arguments why they have moved the narrative to a military rather than industrial argument, then they will place AUKUS in a position that compromises AUKUS own arguments.

Whatever happens AUKUS cannot be seen as the aggressor in the region, other than being a force that contains China’s military machine, and act as a protector of Asian financial, industrial, agricultural and military industrial interests. But AUKUS must not be seen as a former colonial power trying to impose its will on its pre-colonial allies. There will be pressure placed on AUKUS by those closest to the arguments that have destabilised the region and there will be surprising alliances made to contain China’s arguments, but most of all there is the possibility, or imposition that the West has acted to late to change the arguments China has made and is making in its domination of Asia.

The rearming of Australia, and building up its ability to rearm not only itself but nations that are threatened by China, is a tall order. The movement of technology into Australia will move the threats that China poses to the nations borders, but most of all it will bring about an entrenchment of arguments of how Australia, UK and America will impose strategic arguments to balance China’s influence in the Indo-Pacific, Asian maritime and the Pacific Ocean, which to date has not challenged China’s growing militarisation and alliances in these areas.

The Belt and Road initiative is China’s attempt to dominate the cultures and nations that have accepted Chinese investment. The investment or loans are being integrated into the countries that have accepted this initiative, but in reality it has led to nations mortgaging themselves to the hilt and in exchange for the investment, ports have come into the hands of China, such as in Sri Lanka and Pakistan. Resources are being exploited in Africa and are being used to pay off the development debts that the initiative is exploiting, such as mining and fishing in exchange for development of the nations infrastructure. The loans to African nations come without stipulations to them and circumvent at times the stipulations placed on these nations by western bankers or the IMF, but in reality the Belt and Roads initiative is exploitative and enables China to expand its influence throughout Africa, Asia, the Pacific and Eurasia.

More worrying for the American’s is that China is introducing the Belt and Road initiative to South American countries that are hungry for internal investment and development, when sanctions or the IMF are refusing to extend loans, which in itself discourages investment from the banks. Strategically, this will enable the Chinese to influence and shore up nations that have conflicting arguments with the United States. In many respects the United States is taking the argument back to the Asian region through its partnership with Australia and the United Kingdom. It is exploiting the real fear among the ASEAN nations that China is dominating the political landscape and militarising its forces and is hostile to the arguments of these nations, who are at the forefront of the aggression that has emanated from China.

The geopolitical landscape is changing through the Chinese attempt to impose its arguments on Asia, Oceania and the Indo-Pacific, through the extension of Chinese influence. But the argument is wider and the influence of China and its behaviour has challenged the West to react to its expansionist arguments. Though the Belt and Road initiative has enabled nations to develop their infrastructure, there has been a realisation that China has plunged some of these nations into a position of not being able to repay the loans made to these nations. There is payback and through these nations reliance on the development of their infrastructure, they are being forced to release their resources to China, and as such, it is changing the geopolitical landscape of the world.

The movement by AUKUS, is a move that realises that the Belt and Road initiative, China’s posturing and its aggressive stance in Asia, has led to a rethinking of the geopolitical make-up of the world, and this in itself has led to the empowerment of arguments for new alliances to be made and a realisation that containment through rearmament of the region is necessary to contain any future conflicts and the ambitions of President Xi .

The resolve of AUKUS to act is dependent on their willingness to confront the strategic arguments of China, and whether they have the ability to challenge the expansionist arguments that to date has led to China gaining the upper hand in its continual expansion of its assets militarily. If the pact does not challenge the growth of the Chinese military machine, it will have to contain the aspirations of China’s ambitions through shoring up its interests in the region and forming diplomatic axis’ that can form a progressive and unified front that argues against the expansionism of China’s interests, its industrial power and military growth…  

Bibliography

China Has Lost the Philippines Despite Duterte’s Best Efforts

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an article written in 2021, it is a exploration of what the Australia, United Kingdom and the United States agreement would mean in Asia. If you would like to understand how significant AUKUS is, then review what you have seen over the past couple of weeks in Taiwan.