What's at Stake in Albanese-Trump Meeting

Bloomberg

Watch What's at Stake in Albanese-Trump Meeting - Bloomberg on Dailymotion

Transcript

00:00Just ahead of this Albanese Trump meeting, been a long time coming, you might want to comment on

00:04that. But in terms of the tone, is it going to be a reality check, a reset or just a reassurance?

00:11Actually, that's pretty hard to read. I mean, the centerpiece here, I think,

00:17from the Australian perspective will be the AUKUS agreement and the Pentagon review that's

00:23been announced. There is speculation that the results of that review are going to be made known

00:27to us in the lead up to the visit. But actually, even that is speculative. There's been very few

00:32leaks about the content of that review and where it's going to come down. Interestingly,

00:38the American Secretary of State, Marco Rebio, made a statement to the media a little while ago saying

00:45that this all looks positive for Australia and that the review is going to endorse the basic outline

00:50of the AUKUS agreement that was struck under the Biden administration. I'd say back here amongst

00:56defence observers, there is some scepticism about that in the sense that even if rhetorically the

01:01Americans say, yes, we're going to deliver those submarines, whether they can actually make good

01:06on that promise is really open to question. I'd say the overwhelming sentiment among defence

01:11observers here is that the American defence industrial capacity is simply not strong enough

01:17to deliver what they are promising and also to deliver the submarines that they promised to their

01:22own navy. Yeah, well, the UK Prime Minister Sikir Starmer has been optimistic about the future of

01:27AUKUS as well. But more broadly, based on the past few months, this review as well, do you feel the

01:33Trump administration's second go around has its approach to alliance has been different from the

01:38first term? Certainly Trump's own instincts are no different. So he's carried around a few sort of core

01:47beliefs throughout his public life. One of those is that allies are essentially exploiting the United

01:54States. He voiced that sentiment multiple times in his first term. In the second term, he's done it

02:00again. The difference is that there are fewer institutional barriers to that sentiment within

02:05the US system. He has packed his administration with like-minded people. And so the barriers to him

02:12making good on those kind of beliefs are fewer. The interesting thing from Australia's point of

02:18view is that we have kind of been exempted from that. In the first term, we never got, we were never

02:22on the receiving end of some of his verbal barbs about alliances. And so far, so good in the second

02:28term as well. Things, of course, could go desperately off the rails in this upcoming meeting. I mean,

02:36it's a high stakes environment if ever there was one. It could be on the one hand, a Zelensky type

02:41situation that he faced in the Oval Office with that very public disagreement and meltdown even,

02:48you could call it. Or it could be a perfectly cordial meeting where, you know, the two sides agree

02:55warmly with each other. And the terms of the AUKUS agreement are fully reinforced. It's a measure of

03:03how unpredictable the environment is in Washington that both of those possibilities

03:08seem likely and cannot be in any way ruled out. Yeah, because of course, beyond AUKUS, there are a

03:14few other interesting things to discuss as well, not the least of which the trade relationship. I mean,

03:19there is an element of surprise here in Australia that the country got hit with tariffs despite the

03:23US running a rare trade surplus. But also this notion of rare earth, we've seen reported in local

03:29media, the possibility of a deal here between the US and Australia. How significant would that be?

03:35Yeah, I mean, the reporting is very preliminary. So it's very difficult to make judgments on exactly

03:40what Australia is proposing. Nothing that Australia can do, it seems to me, from my understanding of

03:48the industry is going to break that stranglehold that China has on the on the production of these

03:53materials and its control of the market. So at the moment, this feels slightly marginal to the main game

04:03here. What I'm also a little wary of is the sense in Australian policy that we are really at the, under the

04:14leadership of the United States, backing away slightly from the open economic principles that have served Australia

04:22so well since the 1980s, really. And included in that, of course, is strong advocacy and strong

04:28support for open trading and open borders to trade. That has been incredibly beneficial to Australia.

04:35Specific deals we do with the United States on rare earths, I think, are an indicator that our allegiance

04:43to those kind of principles is starting to erode. I think that's altogether a bad sign for Australia.

04:47Of course, Australia's biggest trading partner is China. So Anthony Albanese, he's got the same

04:52balancing actors as predecessors in terms of balancing the relationship with China with the

04:57US. What's the report card so far and what are the risks ahead?

05:01Well, I think the really good news for Australia is that that relationship since the change of government

05:07in Australia in 2022 has improved markedly. And the reason that's good news, I don't

05:13give overwhelming credit to the Albanese government for that change, but I would give credit to

05:20Australian governments of both persuasions because we went, we underwent a three year campaign of

05:26economic coercion from China that ended in 2022. And I think it ended because both sides of politics

05:32stood firm. We didn't retaliate against China, but we stood firm and said we are not changing our policy

05:38because of because of this economic coercion campaign. And I think after a time, China basically

05:45realised it wasn't going to get Australia to make major policy changes under duress. And so we set an

05:52important precedent and established an important principle in our relations with China that we are

05:58still benefiting from today.

06:00Well, we had an example of that just recently as well, with Australia signing a security deal with

06:04Papua New Guinea. What message is Canberra sending here to China about regional partnerships and influence?

06:10Look, I think it's very difficult for Australian governments to talk openly about pure power politics in

06:18the Pacific Islands, because that does offend regional sensibilities in the Pacific. But I think that's what this

06:24is at the core of it, is power politics. Australia wants to establish itself as the leading power in our

06:31region and the Pacific Islands region. And this is an attempt, and I think a very important signal

06:38to China that Australia is the leading regional security partner, not just for PNG, but for other

06:44Pacific Island countries as well. And that if China wants to establish itself as a major alternative to

06:51Australia in the region, it's going to have to work much harder. So I think an important statement by

06:57Australia, and by PNG as well, that Australia is the leading power in this part of the world,

07:04and that China's attempts to change that balance of power, which really began, you know, probably in

07:10the sort of mid-teens period, where they rapidly upped their aid budget in the Pacific Islands region,

07:17that Australia has stepped up, again, under both governments, Liberal and Labor,

07:23and that China's going to need to do more if it wants to wrest control of the region and of the

07:27regional security environment away from Australia and its part.

Category

Transcript

Be the first to comment

Recommended