Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Phil, thank you so much for that kind introduction and Mel and Betty, thank you for sharing yet another evening with us. We’re delighted to be in your company.
You know, the other day I was reading the newspaper after I arrived on Sunday and I saw an infamous football player described as a man who quote, “shaves with a chainsaw and trims his nails with a jackhammer.” What occurred to me at the time was the suspicion that most Americans felt this described most Australians. This is a tough country, with tough people, who take to the tough tasks with alacrity. However one describes Australia, confident, clever, or simply sunburnt, it’s a very compelling place. And it’s increasingly an active player on the global stage, notwithstanding the fact that this is not comfortable for some Australians to be seen in such a light.
Now in that context, I’ve been honored and certainly always delighted to be able play a part in this Dialogue over the history of the convention. Of course, as has been mentioned by David, this came out of a conversation between President Bush 41 and Phil Scanlan. And it seemed like a perfectly good idea at the time. But I can’t say that I thought we’d still be coming together like this in the new millennium or that there would still be a President Bush in office. So I figure by the time the next generation of the Bush family is ready to run, I’ll be ready to take over for Jim Baker as the lead negotiator in the Western Sahara, proof yet again that old diplomats don’t die, they just get buried to their necks in sand.
You know, the Australian-American Leadership Dialogue is a rare format. This is after all not really track-two diplomacy. A number of us are serving as policymakers and we never truly leave our positions, even if we agree to do so in principle. Others of us are former policymakers who only think we never left. And of course we are blessed with a wide range of independent thinkers and oh, yeah, there are the journalists as well. Oh, yeah, I’m insulting the reporters, which is either a brave or foolish thing to do, depending on how you feel about reporters.
In any case, I would be tempted to call this track-three diplomacy. Track-one and track- two: one plus two. Except that over the past 10 years, I have found that this forum consistently exceeds the sum of its participants. Which is saying a great deal considering all the intellectual and the creative fire power in this room tonight. Truly, the AALD is an occasion where all participants come together to ask the right questions and come up with novel answers. In part I think this is a function of our gratitude for having the rare luxury of time to reflect and to relax and that has always been a part of the allure of this occasion. It is a trip away from that cruel dominatrix, the in-box, though these days she can still reach out and slap you with fax machines, emails and satellite phones. I can tell you that Melbourne may not seem far enough away from Canberra, but even 10,000 miles can be too close for comfort these days, unless of course you like that sort of thing.
Now truly, this meeting of minds has long served its participants and it is a quite rewarding exercise in foreign policy on the cutting edge. This meeting also serves as a reminder that regardless of divisions and opinion, including those that reflect domestic politics, certain continuities and priorities and in perspectives and certainly in personal relationships, endure over time and indeed return to us. I’m also talking here about the one-on-one friendships that we have all formed but indeed also about the relationship between our two nations. This Dialogue started from a single premise, that there is an enduring utility in the U.S.-Australian relationship. People of both our nations are better off for our partnership. Our fathers’ generation learned the lesson during battles of the Coral Sea. My generation learned it in the sad jungles in Vietnam and our new generation has had to learn it yet again in the ashy wreck of the World Trade Center and the firestorm ruin in Bali and in the devastated cities of Afghanistan and indeed in the corrupted heart of Iraq.
And yet this Dialogue also springs from a sense of pragmatism that such a partnership will not necessarily flourish if it is left untended. I think there is a temptation, there’s even a risk that we take the consanguinity of our interests and our history for granted and that we presume will always work together. The fact is that our national interests are often highly correlated, but they are by no means identical and they are certainly not causative. Both Australia and the United States want to do what is right in the world. But we also have to do the right thing for our people. This entails a certain degree of selectivity. We act in our own national interest. And just as with any other bilateral relationship, any kind of meaningful cooperation requires consultation, a regular menu and of course corrections from time to time. And indeed the parade of visitors, official American visitors that Australia will see in the next few months is not a sign of something new and different, so much as an indicator of the maturity of our ties and our respect for Australian views.
I believe we have reached a point where regular discussion of day-to-day matters is necessary, certainly for our ongoing military operations but also on a broader range of concerns. Indeed this kind of full scope engagement is all the more necessary when you consider what is at stake. This is not a partnership of equals in the sense that the U.S. is so much larger --- larger in population, in military might and indeed the size of our economy. But this is clearly a partnership of equals when we talk in terms of vision. We both want to see worlds where representative governments and human rights are the baseline reality, where free people enjoy the full benefit of free markets. We both want to see a world where HIV/AIDS is no longer a terrible scourge destabilizing entire continents and where no tyrant, whether freelance or holding a state hostage can threaten the safety of our citizens with reckless impunity. We both want to see a world where Australia is an Asian power, closely integrated in regional partnerships and where Asian powers are deeply invested in the health of the global system. We both want to see a world defined not by the predominance of American power, but rather the prevalence of liberty and the sort of dynamic prosperity that characterizes both our economies.
I think that this year we will spend some time focused on that latter issue. The strength of both the American and Australian economies and the ways we can better play to each others’ strengths. Indeed if you look at the composition of the U.S. delegation, you will notice that no small amount of our company and yours have a background in business and in agriculture – it’s hardly a coincidence. To be sure, our delegations reflect the priorities that Prime Minister Howard and President Bush discussed in Crawford back in May. And the public statement President Bush made about reaching a Free Trade Agreement by the end of this year, high hurdles and all. But the composition of this year’s group reflects not only where our interests lie over the next six months, but also I believe where they lie in the foreseeable future. Certainly our shared perception of the threats to our security will continue to drive our relationship. And I believe that our governments are in agreement about reinvigorating the tools we have for dealing with an array of transnational challenges as well as shaping some new tools such as the Proliferation Security Initiative. But increasingly, I believe it is our shared predilection for opportunity that will shape our future. And I mean not just the trade, commerce of goods and services, but also of innovation and of ideas.
You know, today is August 14. Tomorrow will be the 58th anniversary of the end of WWII and in that great destructive struggle was born the relationship between Australia–a special relationship–between Australia and the United States. Australian forces at that time were in the Middle East and in Europe protecting Allied interests and American forces came to the South Pacific to protect Australia. Fifty-eight years after that great destructive war–look at the irony that we’re about to witness. Next month, Australia and the United States will be training in Coral Sea. We’ll be training with the active participation of Italy and Germany and Japan. We’ll be training all over a great reef of memory made of the skeleton hulks of ships and planes lost in the Second World War. At the same time, Australian forces, along with South Pacific forces were in the Solomon’s keeping the peace in an area which some of the fiercest battles of WWII raged.
I believe that Australia and my nation have many shared common characteristics. History and culture, politics and demography, but I think nowhere do we have better ties that bind than in the twin pillars of perspective and action. And it’s because of that, that I unashamedly and unabashedly believe that there will be a great continuity in our cause. This cause which was forged out of the bones of our fathers and grandfathers and now of the blood of children, and because of that continuity of cause, I have no doubt that we can move forward in the new millennium without fear nor trepidation, but rather with optimism and hope and enthusiasm. And over the next few days we’ll be gathering and harvesting the insights of all participants in the Dialogue as we discuss the region and the globe and today’s realities and we renew the friendships we have formed with each other and as we inform the friendship yet again between our two nations.
So, ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of my American counterparts, I want to thank our Australian colleagues for playing host and look forward to a most productive Dialogue and more immediately to the continuation of an excellent dinner. Thank you all very much.
