CHECK ACATNST nELIVRY NMARMPED UNTIL D) ELIVERY
STATEMENT BY THE PRIME MINISTER
THE GULF
THURSDAY, 17 JANUARY 1991
Ladies and gentlemen, fellow Australians
You will recall1 that on 4 December last, I told Parliament
that Australia was prepared to make our Naval Task Force
available to serve with allied forces in operations
authorised by Resolution 678 of the United Nations Security
Council, should that become necessary.
You will also recall that Resolution 678 authorised member
states of the United Nations, from 15 January 1991, to use
all necessary means, including force, to uphold and
implement the Security Council's previous resolutions in
essence, the unconditional withdrawal by Iraq from Kuwait.
With profound regret, I must now inform you that the
necessity which I foreshadowed in the Parliament five weeks
ago has come about.
As a consequence, therefore, the Australian Naval Task Force
in the Gulf is now with other members of the United Nations
co-operating in armed action to fulfil the United Nations
resolutions to enforce the withdrawal of Iraq from Kuwait.
It has been my intention that Parliament, having endorsed
the position I put on 4 December, should be given the
earliest opportunity to receive a report from me should
action be taken in line with that position.
Accordingly, I have decided to recall the Parliament on
Monday 21 January for two days so that I can make, and allow
debate upon, such report.
Fellow Australians
I must emphasise from the outset and it cannot be repeated
too often or stressed too strongly that this tragic
necessity has one cause, and one cause only.
And that is the invasion and occupation of the nation of
Kuwait, a member-state of the United Nations, by Iraq on
2 August last year more than five months ago.
That was the act of war and since that time we have sought
by means of peace to reverse that act of war.
Since that time, the world community, working through the
United Nations, with a unanimity, a strength and unity of
purpose without precedent in history, has demanded that the
Government of Iraq withdraw unconditionally its armed forces
from Kuwait.
Twelve separate resolutions of the United Nations have been
aimed at achieving that result.
Since August, governments of the member-states of the United
Nations have worked unremittingly to persuade Saddam Hussein
to comply with the will of the world community and to end
the crisis he alone provoked.
Literally at the eleventh hour, with the positive support of
the allied nations and in particular the President of the
United States, the Secretary-General of the United Nations
went to Baghdad to make a last appeal for compliance, a last
plea for peace.
Like every other initiative undertaken within the framework
of the United Nations' resolutions, it was rejected with
contempt, and met the same uncompromising refusal to do the
one thing that the world community agrees he must do give
up the nation he has seized and crushed.
That is why Resolution 678 of the United Nations Security
Council has come into effect.
And that is why I have directed the Australian Naval Task
Force to participate in the operations authorised by that
resolution. Ladies and gentlemen, fellow Australians
So momentous a decision must be placed as it has indeed
been taken in the broad context of the future not only
the future of Kuwait, not only the future of the middle
East, but in the context of our future vision of a world
striving for peace and freedom.
And our decision is based on five grave considerations.
First, there is the fundamental principle, without which
there can be neither peace nor freedom the right of every
independent nation not to be invaded, not to be the victim
of aggression, not to be destroyed.
Second, we act with the commanding moral authority of the
United Nations. Never in its 45-year history has the United
Nations worked so effectively and unitedly to fulfil its
Charter and the principles of peace and security it
embodies.
Third, we have reached this decision only at the end of a
process without precedent in history. There is no parallel
for the restralint, the patience and the caution with which
the world alliance against Saddam Hussein has sought by
peaceful means to resolve this conflict.
Fourth, the decision has a clear and achievable goal to
end this aggression, as a necessary step towards
establishing the conditions for peace and stability in the
Middle East.
And finally, t: here is a wider purpose behind our decision.
It is a purpose implicit in everything that has been done by
the United Nations since last August.
That purpose is to further the great quest for a new world
order of peace, security and freedom to fulfil the hopes
and opportunities springing from the end of the
confrontation between the United States and the Soviet
Union. Indeed, I believe that, at the bar of history, there
will be no greater condemnation of Saddam Hussein, than that
his aggression has plunged the world into a terrible and
needless crisis which threatens the world stability on which
those splendid hopes depend.
My fellow Australians
I know that the overwhelming majority of Australians will
share my regret indeed much deeper than regret at the
need for this decision. We all of us wish for peace. But
we cannot have peace just by wishing for it or just by
talking about it; we have to work for it, and sometimes,
tragically, we have to fight for it. The great lesson of
this Century is that peace is bought at too high a price, if
that price is the appeasement of aggression.
I know that you all with me will feel that our first
thoughts today go to the 884 of our fellow Australian
serving men and women most directly affected by this
decision.
We have three ships of the Royal Australian Navy serving in
the Gulf; HMAS Sydney, Brisbane and Success.
Our thoughts go to these ships' crews, to the medical teams
serving on the hospital ships, to the logistic support team
in the region, and to the Australians serving on exchange
with other allied forces in the Gulf.
War is full of terrible uncertainty. We cannot foretell
what will be demanded of our serving men and women; but we
can foretell how they will meet those demands.
We are confident of their skills; we are grateful for their
devotion. We know they will serve bravely and well, and we
hope, above all, that they will return safely home.