CHECK AGATNST DELIVERY EMBARGOED UNTIL. DELIVERY
SPEECH BY THE PRIME MINISTER
FOREIGN CORRESPONDENTS' CLUB
SYDNEY 10 DECEMBER 1990
I very much welcome the opportunity to speak to you today.
From our different perspectives I, as the Prime Minister
of a country profoundly concerned with international
developments and you, as correspondents reporting on those
developments we share a deep interest in the fascinating
and crucial transition underway in international relations.
How that transition is managed and where it comes out will
provide the international backdrop for all the objectives
Australia must pursue in the 1990s economic, social, even
environmental and will have a major impact on our lives.
Now these issues have a very broad sweep. But there is no
more relevant starting point than the immediate crisis at
the top of the international agenda right now. For in the
crisis in the Gulf are encapsulated many of the more general
lessons and challenges crucial to international affairs in
the last decade of this century.
My friends
In my statement to the Parliament last week I listed a
number of reasons why Australia's interests warranted our
active involvement in efforts to resolve the Gulf crisis to
the point a most grave and serious point of military
involvement in a possible conflict. I said then that the
interest which stood higher than all others was the
establishment and maintenance of an international order
based on the principles enshrined in the Charter of the
United Nations: that international disputes must not be
settled by force; that national borders must be respected;
and that aggressors must not be permitted to prevail.
This was no effort to cloak in the language of principles
some other Australian motive in the Gulf. It was not a
rhetorical exercise in giving our involvement
respectability. Above all, it was not some abstract,
intangible and. obscure objective of which I was speaking. I
was talking here about concrete, vital Australian interests.
Of these Australian interests the more narrow and direct is
this that if this geographically vast country of only 17
million people were ever to be threatened we would certainly
want the international community, through the United
Nations, standing resolutely with us. And the same is true
of our friends in the region should any threat to them
emerge. If Iraq is expelled from Kuwait whether peacefully, as we
most earnestly hope, or otherwise through the resolve of
the United Nations to stand up for its principles, an
immensely important precedent will have been set. This
country all countries can feel more secure. Were the
outcome to go the other way, with the world acquiescing in
invasion, occupation and annexation of one country by a
powerful and brutal neighbour, then this country all
countries must feel less secure.
The broader but no less concrete reason for standing up in
this crisis for the principles of the United Nations is that
those are the principles which must govern the new
international order which is emerging. With international
relations in a state of tremendous flux with an imperative
need to mould and shape the outcome the United Nations
principles provide our guideropes for moving forward, the
sure footing for the steps we take.
Let me go further. Our guideropes are not just the
political principles enshrined in the United Nations
Charter. They are also the principles of fair and open
international trade which form the foundational objectives
of the GATT. They are the principles of economic
development and sound, market oriented economic management
which govern the World Bank and the IMF. They are the
principles of a better quality of life in so many fields
which provide the fundamental rationale for the United
Nations Specialised Agencies.
Ladies and gentlemen,
We will face in the 1990s both an immense opportunity and an
immense challenge to have those principles implemented in
practice. The opportunity arises because the many
beneficial changes in the world in the past couple of years
justifiably give us heart. The challenge arises because
very significant problems in the world remain to remind us
how difficult the task will be.
Despite the difficulties and dangers in the new world which
is emerging, and to which I shall refer in a moment, none of
us in our right minds would want to go back to the old one.
The journey the world is now making is not only one we
cannot avoid; it is one we should never want to avoid.
The transformation of East-West relations would be reason
enough not to go back.
It is now more than twelve months since we shared that
euphoric sense of satisfaction when the Berlin Wall came
tumbling down. In seeing those photographs and hearing
those news reports of the triumphant crowds of Germans
surging around and over the wall, many of them singlehandedly
starting to dismantle it with their own hammers and
picks in seeing those images of the tearful reunions of
East and West we became direct witnesses of history in the
most dramatic and moving way.
That single event encapsulates the whole drama of Eastern
Europe the popular demands for freedom and justice that
swept away the old regimes that had for decades oppressed
not just the people of East Germany but also the people of
Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland and Romania.
But this has not just been of immense humanitarian
importance for: the people of those nations. It has been of
fundamental geopolitical importance. The strategic fault
line in the Central European theatre has been bridged with
the reunificaltion of the two Germanies. And in Paris last
month leaders representing most of Europe met under the
auspices of the CSCE to sign what amounted to a formal end
to the Cold Weir.
The two superpowers for so long deeply antagonistic, armed
to the teeth, capable of global nuclear annihilation, and
engaged in competition and rivalry for the highest stakes on
a global chessboard have utterly transformed their
relationship. That the spectre of nuclear holocaust has
thus faded and that superpower tensions are no longer
engaged in virtually every regional trouble spot provide
ample reason for the rest of the world to applaud.
For us in Australia these events are important not just for
their effects far away in Europe they will increasingly
alter the strategic picture in the Asia-Pacific region. And
they occur against the background of profound and beneficial
change already underway.
We no longer live in a region characterised by underdevelopment,
instability and conflict, but overwhelmingly by
economic dynamism and political stability. The attitude of
Australians towards our region, twenty years ago
characterised by uncertainty, apprehension and even fear,
has changed fundamentally. Many Australians would once have
wished to keep the region at arms length. But today our
declared policy of enmeshment with the region is accepted
within the community.
But, my friends, despite all the initial euphoria about the
end of the Cold War, despite all the confident talk of the
Pacific Century, despite all the revitalisation of the UN,
we still face questions that are deeply troubling. They are
questions, in -their way, as profound and as challenging as
the ones that preceded them. Indeed some of the new
problems though not all have their seeds in the very
accomplishments to which I have already referred.
The disintegration of the Soviet economy, conceivably even
of the Soviet Union itself, places a very large question
mark over the direction of future events. And the ousted
Eastern European regimes have bequeathed to their democratic
successors huge problems of economic management and social
and political adjustment.
Developments in our own region have not been universally
benign. To take only one example, China's progress towards
modernisation and liberalisation came to a jarring halt in
Tienanmen Square. And five of the seven avowedly communist
countries left in the world are in our region.
Again, who can take as read an optimistic prognosis for the
world economy in circumstances of economic downturn in a
number of key countries? Who can be optimistic about the
economic structure itself given the crisis in the Uruguay
Round of trade negotiations? At worst but far from
fancifully we must fear the possibility of a global slide
into trading blocs with all the political as well as
economic tension which that implies; a new autarky of which
I have consistently warned.
And let me say here that the fact that blame for this crisis
lies directly with the European Community could put the
single European market planned for 1992 into a totally new
light. The process of European economic integration has been one of
the great and beneficial acts of statesmanship of our
century. I do not say this lightly. I mean that it has
been instrumental in breaking a pattern of conflict between
the nations of Western Europe which has lasted literally for
centuries. It has been integral to West European
prosperity. So I have no negative views about the European
Community as such; on the contrary.
But if European leaders were unable to show the political
courage to withstand their farm lobbies; if they were
unable to do this even though the interests of their
consumers and of their industries would so obviously be
enhanced by trade liberalisation; if they were unable to do
this where the insanity of protectionism was so forcefully
and logically argued by the international community, what
conclusion is the rest of the world meant to draw? If
Europe will sacrifice GATT to protect agriculture, how can
we fail to fear that Europe ' 92 will be Fortress ' 92 a
self-seeking and powerful trade bloc where it could and
should be an outward-looking and constructive world leader.
As well as these new problems, profound global problems of
long-standing remain. The problem of economic
under-development in much of the Third World is still with
us. We still have the tragedy of hunger in Africa, a
continent which has the capacity, with appropriate economic
policies, to be an exporter of food. Population pressures
increase. Global environmental degradation threatens
humankind in ways which are ultimately as significant as,
albeit more gradual and insidious than, the nuclear threat.
And last, of course, the crisis in the Gulf brings home to
us that the new world order will not necessarily be a
peaceful and safe world order.
Ladies and genrtlemen,
We must not, -therefore, be naively optimistic about future
international relations. My belief is rather that while the
challenges in a new, fluid, multipolar world are different,
they are no lesser challenges for our foreign policy than
those of managing the static certainties of the old bipolar
world order.
Now I do not wish to press this argument to the point of
saying that the decades of stability -albeit stability
founded to some extent on mutual fear -since the Second
World War will give way to fragmentation of the world order,
to political and economic chaos. A new order of some sort
will emerge. But we should worry about what the nature of
that new order will be. That it will be good for our
interests and good for the world is not pre-ordained we
must act to make it so.
I put it to you that the challenge of 1990 is analogous to
the challenge of 1945. Just as the generation of 1945
restructured the world after the devastation of war, so we
are faced today with the challenge of building a new
architecture in the aftermath of the Cold War.
The challenge this time is to ensure that peace will be
guaranteed not through a balance of power between East and
West but through international co-operation the
application of enlightened self interest in an
interconnected world.
The challenge this'time is to make sure that the eloquent
principles of the United Nations concerning respect for
sovereignty and peaceful dispute settlement are enshrined
not just in the Charter but in the real world by giving them
concrete backing.
The challenge this time is not to build new global
institutions for peace but to make a concentrated effort to
resolve the key regional conflicts.
The challenge this time is to ensure that vertical and
horizontal escalation in weapons of mass destruction gives
way to the most rapid possible de-escalation consistent with
stability.
The challenge this time is to ensure that peace is founded
on democratisation, political and social liberalisation and
a shift to the efficiencies of the market system in the
Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and even, in time, China once
again and throughout the world.
The challenge this time is to understand that it is not only
pointless, but massively hypocritical, to insist upon market
economics in the former command economies and the Third
World if we do not heed exactly the same injunction in the
international trading system.
And the challenge this time is to achieve a higher
collective global intelligence among nations in dealing with
new agenda problems such as the environment.
Ladies and gentlemen,
The key to translating this list of challenges into policies
for tackling them is to recognise the assets which we can
bring to bear.
The first, I suggest, is the international institutions
bequeathed to us at the end of the Second World War. The
United Nations, the Specialised Agencies and the
international institutions of Bretton Woods represent, at
their heart, the finest and most wise aspirations of those
who sought, when peace came in 1945, to rebuild a world
without war. Far from being redundant, they are now more
essential than ever as we try to structure a new and better
international environment.
But we cannot take these assets for granted we need to
make them work.
This is why more is involved in Security Council Resolution
678 than an effort to resolve today's crisis in the Persian
Gulf. It is exactly because we are on the edge of a new era
that the precedent of resolute, collective response to naked
aggression must be established.
It is why more is involved in the present crisis in the
trade negotiations than whether or not the Uruguay Round
fails or succeeds. It is exactly because we are on the edge
of a new era, in which prosperity will depend critically on
support for the GATT and its principles, that failure now
would constitute such a tremendous setback. It is not that
we are at some blockage along a road; we are at a crossroad,
and which way we turn will carry profound implications for
better or worse for the whole international economic system
of the future.
The second asset which I suggest we have is the habit of
co-operation and the common values and objectives of the
West. A grouping of nations formerly preoccupied with military
security now has the need to re-think its collective
priorities: to show that its members shared not just a
common fear of the Soviet bloc, but a positive set of
ideals. And to show that the West is not prepared just to
fight to preserve those values; it is prepared to work to
propagate them.
That would serve Australia's interests. It is in our
interest that the democratic system should expand throughout
the world the track record shows that democracies do not
wage war on one another. It is in our interest as well as
in line with our most deep-seated convictions that
concepts of individual liberty and human rights should take
hold in places where they have long been denied. And it is
in our interests as well as those of people who yearn for a
better life in many parts of the world, that market economic
systems should be adopted.
These are pre-eminently the values of the West and should, I
propose, unite the Western community in the new era, as the
fear of military threat fades. I would like, in short, to
see the collective sense of purpose which was earlier
directed to military security now be directed as well to the
challenges which I listed earlier.
It is pre-eminently the West which can assist change in the
Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. It is pre-eminently the
West which should show leadership on international trade
because the free market is a Western invention. It is the
West which can lead in giving effect to United Nations'
principles either through the United Nations itself or
outside it because these are essentially Western
principles. For example, the West ought to be able to make a greater
impact collectively than it has in the past in the search
for peace between Israel and its neighbours and in
facilitating the transition to a post-apartheid regime in
South Africa.
If this asset is to be effective, the role played in the
coming years by the three key components of the Western
community the United States, the European Community and
Japan will be of critical importance.
I do not say that United States foreign policy has always
been perfect but, on the whole, from the far-sighted and
enlightened example of United States policies in the
immediate post-war period up until the Persian Gulf today,
the international community owes much to America's
contribution.
We do not want that contribution to wane; but equally the
task of shaping a new world order cannot be left solely to
the United States. And because of the relative shift of
economic power, the scope for others to bear more of the
burden and the responsibility is clearly with Western Europe
and Japan.
This was the wider framework in which, on my recent visit to
Japan, I called for that country a country now committed
to democracy, the rule of law, market economics not to
hold back but to take on a more constructive international
role more commensurate with its economic power. And this is
the wider framework in which I call upon the countries of
the European Community to avoid every temptation of inwardlooking
complacency and narrow short term self-interest and
to stand for something in the world as the United States,
notwithstanding its imperfections, has so clearly done.
If the West Europeans would put into the quest for a better
global world order only one tenth of the extraordinary
vision and boldness they put into the development of their
own Community the cause would be greatly advanced. If the
Japanese would put into the global effort only one tenth of
the amazing determination and innovation they put into their
own economic reconstruction our confidence in the outcome
would grow.
Ladies and gentlemen,
A third asset which we have in facing the new challenges and
realising the new opportunities is regional confidence in
Asia and the Pacific.
Our region can, through its own internal behaviour, help set
an example in the world. If Germany and Japan were the
economic miracles of the 1950s and 1960s, countries
elsewhere in Asia were the economic miracles of the 1970s
and 1980s. And, from the outset, one of the objectives of
APEC has been the encouragement by the region of fair and
open international trade as a key to global prosperity.
But beyond that, our region is capable of demonstrating the
capacity of countries not so long ago torn by conflict,
countries with traditional rivalries, countries at different
stages of development, and countries of great cultural
diversity to cooperate together.
Now in all of these contexts the UN and other
international institutions, the Western community of
nations, the Asia-Pacific region Australia is well placed
to play a role. There are a myriad of specific interests
which Australia must pursue and protect in bilateral
dealings with other countries. And this will always be
vital in our foreign, defence, trade and international
economic policies. But in terms of contributing to the
larger reshaping of international relations it will be by
working with others that we will work most effectively.
This commitment to multilateralism must be a guiding
approach in our foreign policy in the decade ahead. At any
time that would make sense for a middle power. But at a
time of international flux and change unequalled since the
late 40s it is crucial.
And, ladies and gentlemen, this is exactly the course on
which we have embarked.
Our rapid and firm support for the United Nations' stand
against Iraq testifies to our commitment to multilateralism.
Our initiative in establishing the Cairns Group of likeminded
agricultural exporting nations, which has been
critical in having agriculture recognised as the lynch pin
of the Uruguay Round, testifies to that. So does APEC. So
does the effort with others to find a formula for peace in
Cambodia. So does our effort with France to persuade other
Antarctic Treaty countries to seek a permanent ban on mining
in Antarctica. So does our leading role in the campaign to
abolish chemical weapons, to achieve a comprehensive Test
Ban Treaty and, in our own region, to establish the South
Pacific Nuclear Free Zone. So does our work with our
neighbours in the South Pacific Forum on issues ranging from
economic development to environmental protection.
And in the Commonwealth we have led from the front in the
campaign for change in South Africa through strategies now
unambiguously vindicated by events.
Let me make this important observation. In facing a
situation of rapid and unpredictable change in the world,
one major advantage Australia has today not the case a
couple of decades ago is that foreign policy is no longer
perplexed by a national identity crisis.
Some issues then thought interesting, even important, are
seen as utterly anachronistic today: Is Australia part of
the developed country OECD " north" or do we in fact have
more in common with the developing country, commodity
exporting " south"? Are we part of Asia or an outrider of
Europe? Should we get closer to the Non-Aligned or place
ourselves squarely in the Western Alliance? Should we opt
for Forward Defence or Fortress Australia?
We have, as a country, fortunately put these issues behind
us. We know now that such choices were too simple. We are
a developed country but in no way precluded from working
with Third World commodity producers in pursuit of shared
interests. We are part of Asia and the Pacific and this is
certainly the region of our foreign policy priority but
Europe has given us much and we can gain much from it. We
can be unambiguously a part of the West, but still
collaborate with and respect countries whose posture is
non-aligned. We can have a defence policy geared to
protection of the Australian continent but still be involved
with the security of regional neighbours.
As Australians we are now comfortable with a greater
complexity in our view of the world and of ourselves.
Simplistic thinking which led us to terribly costly mistakes
in the past as in Vietnam will no longer plague us now
as we face the challenges of a world in flux. Our analysis
is far more sophisticated, our policy responses far more
mature. My friends,
I am deeply proud of this Government's foreign policy
record. It has been clear-sighted, ahead of the game in a
rapidly changing world, well-informed and creative. But
perhaps most importantly we are, under this Government, no
longer content passively to watch the world go by.
I do not proclaim on behalf of my Government that Australia
can deliver a new world order foreign policy without
realism is futile. But I do proclaim on behalf of my
Government that we shall contribute at this exciting,
challenging and vital time in world affairs for foreign
policy without activism is empty.
And we shall play our part not just because we seek a better
world order for its own sake. We are not embarked on some
merely idealistic crusade. We will as well play our part
for a much more direct reason that only if we succeed in
shaping a better world can we hope to achieve at home the
aspirations we have for the Australian people security, a
better quality of life, above all greater economic
opportunity as we approach the next century.