With Donald Trump and Joe Biden still neck and neck in national polling, and Trump leading in key states like Arizona, Michigan and Georgia, the return of Trump to the presidency continues to be a substantial possibility, even probability.
While disastrous for American progressives, Trump’s return to the White House would represent the greatest opportunity in generations for those who want to see greater distance between Australia and the United States — whether of the anti-American left, advocates for a more independent Australian foreign policy or those opposed to specific elements of the US-Australia relationship, such as AUKUS.
A second Trump presidency would harm America’s international image in ways comparable to the presidency of George W. Bush. Bush accomplished the improbable alchemy of transforming the global sentiment in US favour in the wake of 9/11 into global notoriety via the historic disaster of the Iraq invasion, which cost hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives, and the lies about weapons of mass destruction — along with minor issues like widespread use of torture and repeated killings of civilians via drone strikes. They led to a massive collapse in favourable views of the United States in Europe and Australia.
But Trump will go far beyond Bush in other areas. If Bush was seen as tainted by the stolen 2000 election in Florida, Trump’s treachery, authoritarianism, encouragement of insurrection, criminality and peddling of hate place him in a unique category of posing a direct threat to US democracy, especially given his commitment to acting as a dictator, taking revenge on perceived enemies from his first presidency and jailing political opponents.
Trump is also unique among post-war American presidents in his attitude toward allies. Not only does he seem to view dictators more favourably than allies, but he has openly stated he is prepared to break alliance commitments, particularly in relation to NATO — complementing his pro-Russian stance.
For the anti-American left, the return of Trump will confirm many of the tropes of its portrayal of the US: a dysfunctional country run by and for corporate elites and a crazed fundamentalist minority. They will point to a deeply corrupt political system and media that has smoothed the way for the return to power of a man not merely unfit to govern but anti-democratic and dangerous to his own country and the world. Trump will represent not a deviation from the American norm, they will argue, but its unmasking — the revelation of its true form.
While Trump may be distasteful to those who want to see a more independent Australian foreign policy, the kind pursued by Paul Keating or advocated by Malcolm Fraser, his greater significance for them lies in his hostility towards allies and his eagerness to disrupt global norms. With his commitment to launching a far bigger trade war than the one he waged against China and Europe between 2017 and 2021 — one the Biden administration has in many areas carried on — Trump represents a serious threat to the interests of any medium-sized trading power like Australia that relies on relative international order and global economic growth.
Worse, as a US ally, Australia is potentially in the firing line of Trump’s foreign policy and can have no certainty that his administration will meet its commitments or obligations to us. Advocates for greater independence can argue that it is not Australia that is moving away from the US, but the latter which has turned its back on Australia through Trump’s truculence and antipathy toward allies.
That applies doubly so in relation to AUKUS. There is already considerable risk that the US will not be able to fulfil its commitments regarding the provision of nuclear-powered submarines due to workforce and budget constraints. Trump is less likely to feel impeded by agreements, especially with a rusted-on ally like Australia, than traditional or mainstream presidents, if he decides the US can’t afford AUKUS.
But the greater threat from Trump to AUKUS lies in his possible embrace of it, and if he clearly states what AUKUS is really about, which is the subordination of Australian sovereignty to the American strategy to militarily contain China. Our government is naturally reluctant to say this aloud, as its predecessor was. That accounts for the almost bizarre silence from Labor, especially gormless Defence Minister Richard Marles, about the entire point of AUKUS versus either the original conventional submarine deal, which had been underway for several years before being scrapped, or the cheaper and more sovereignty-friendly option of French nuclear submarines.
Once Trump brings AUKUS into his more bluntly Sinophobic worldview, there’s a clear risk that AUKUS will become associated with him, undermining it in the eyes of Australians. To this end, it’s been interesting to watch the reaction to US Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell saying the quiet bit loud about AUKUS last week — that its purpose was to bring Australian submarines into a war with China, something the astute Financial Review international editor James Curran nailed on the weekend.
The response from the US lobby has been amusing: Richard Fontaine of the defence contractor, Democrat-aligned defence think tank Center for a New American Security — whose interview with Campbell prompted the remarks — was quickly corraled by the Sinophobes of the Fairfax media to correct the record and tell us that Campbell hadn’t actually said what we’d heard him say. Dubbing Fontaine “one of America’s leading foreign policy thinkers”, Fairfax told us he thinks there’d been a “naive reaction” (the words of the journalist concerned) to Campbell letting the cat out of the bag, and that Campbell was merely saying “submarines could be relevant in a variety of contingencies”.
In fact, Campbell explicitly said AUKUS would mean submarines “from a number of countries operating in close coordination” could attack (“deliver conventional ordnance from long distances … including in cross-strait circumstances”).
Now, imagine Trump delivering the same message, but in his own particular way. How long will Australian support for the extravagant and implausible AUKUS project last under Trump? It’s enough to give the armchair admirals at Fairfax, and the AUKUS cheer squad, nightmares.
