My Take | ‘Wolf warrior’ misfires over war crimes meme
- The longer Beijing drags out the controversy, the sooner people forget about Australia’s killings in Afghanistan
Scott Morrison has demanded an official apology from China, but what the Australian prime minister should really do is say thank you to the Chinese.
Last week, Canberra was still in crisis management mode after its military admitted its soldiers had committed war crimes in Afghanistan, a shocking revelation that has generated news headlines around the world.
Then, being ever so helpful, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian sent an inflammatory tweet showing a meme of an Australian soldier apparently trying to kill a child.
That was the godsend Morrison needed to jump on his high horse as he denounced the tweet as “falsified”, “repugnant” and “utterly outrageous”.
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Australia ditched diplomacy for ‘adversarial approach’ to China and ‘a pat on the head’ from US
Suddenly, the whole focus of the story and the conversation shifted. It’s no longer about Australian soldiers killing civilians and prisoners, but Chinese state propaganda and the larger diplomatic meltdown.
Beijing could have just sat tight and let the Australians stew. However, the new “wolf warrior” protocol demands not only that something be said, but also the more inflammatory the better.
