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China-Australia relations
OpinionLetters

Letters | Australia must cease beating war drums over Taiwan for regional peace’s sake

  • Whether or not Canberra’s bellicose rhetoric is a distraction from its pandemic failures, it must not risk dragging the entire Asia-Pacific region into war

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A view of two Australian Collins class submarines at HMAS Stirling Royal Australian Navy base in Perth, Western Australia, on October 29. Photo: EPA-EFE
Letters
In recent months, Australia’s officials and its media outlets have been talking about the possibility of a war with China over Taiwan. This rhetoric is accompanied by a rise in Australian military spending this year, as well as plans to spend more than US$500 million on military upgrades.
This approach has been explained as the souring of China-Australia relations since the beginning of the pandemic, with Australia calling for scrutiny over allegations of China’s human rights abuses as well as an international investigation into the origins of Covid-19. In response, China restricted the import of Australian products including wine, coal and wheat.

Foreign policy experts can speculate about whether this rhetoric is a consequence of Australia’s internal politics: creating a common enemy to divert attention from how poorly its vaccination roll-out has been handled. Nonetheless, Australia’s rhetoric is contributing to the spread of a Cold War mentality in the West’s relations with China.

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How would this hypothetical war play out? Australia has a population of around 25 million people, similar to that of Taiwan but in no way comparable with China’s 1.4 billion people. Meanwhile, China has the world’s largest land army and the second largest military expenditure. Australia does not represent much of a military foe to China, but its security pact with the United States and New Zealand does somewhat address the difference in any potential military confrontation.

Australia’s rhetoric over the Taiwan issue is usually presented in the context of a possible war in conjunction with its major military partners, and that is where the danger lies. A direct confrontation between the world’s superpowers is a recipe for disaster on a global scale. Dancing around the possibility of war over what Beijing sees as an internal affair and a matter of national sovereignty should not serve as a casus belli of a major war that could involve the entirety of the Asia-Pacific region.
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Relations between China and the US are already at their lowest point in years. It is imperative that the other US-allied countries in the region – particularly New Zealand, Japan, South Korea and the Philippines – do not join in Australia’s enthusiasm for war games.

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