November 2021

By Gary Lefley

AUKUS is the acronym for the new military alliance of Australia, the UK and the United States. It will seek to marshal the Asia-Indo-Pacific region in the interests of US imperialism, with Britain as an established nuclear lieutenant. Australia will be the second country in history, after Britain, to be given nuclear technology by the US, and only the 6th in the world to possess nuclear submarine capability. AUKUS is the latest evidence of US imperialism pivoting towards China as its primary enemy. To most observers, arming Australia with nuclear powered submarines is a worrying breach of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. AUKUS pleads not guilty, based on the dubious loophole that the submarines will, for now, not carry nuclear weapons, even though they will be powered by weapons-grade enriched uranium. And in any case, with these vessels patrolling undetected through the East and South China seas, where is the verification by independent inspections? And why should China believe them?

MILITARY ALLIANCES 

AUKUS is not the only US sponsored military alliance operating in the region. The so-called QUAD - the quadrilateral military pact in the Pacific area of the US, India, Australia, Japan - was set up in 2007, and re-launched in 2017, with China as the target.

“The UK Integrated Review 2021: The defence tilt to the Indo-Pacific” published on 11th October this year, undertook to “make a bigger and more consistent contribution to the Five Power Defence Arrangements (FPDA)”, which comprises the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, and Singapore.  This was set up in 1971 to “pursue closer defence cooperation with the 10 nations of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member states.” (1) While the FPDA and ASEAN may not have originally been set up with China as the first consideration, the ‘bigger… more consistent contribution’ and ‘closer defence cooperation’ now being flagged up in the Government review lend themselves to the strategy of a multilateral encirclement of China, with military deployments, while significantly enhancing British imperial clout in the region.

Britain’s Indo-Pacific strategy, with integrated naval security arrangements including India, Singapore, South Korea and more, is at the core of the HMS Queen Elizabeth carrier strike group voyage to the region.  HMS Queen Elizabeth aircraft carrier is the largest and most powerful surface vessel in the Royal Navy’s history. The strike group consists of 9 ships, 32 aircraft, and 3700 personnel. The carrier will lead several NATO exercises, with US and Netherlands forces fully integrated into the deployment. The major planned stops for the QE carrier are South Korea, Japan, India and Singapore, while its escort ships will “engage with regional and ASEAN partners as part of the United Kingdom’s commitment to be a persistent, credible and reliable presence in the Indo-Pacific”. (ibid)

The 60-year-old ‘Five Eyes’ intelligence gathering and sharing network of the US, Canada, U.K., Australia and New Zealand has shifted its focus toward China. While this has troubled New Zealand, reluctant precisely because it wants to maintain peaceful cooperation with China, Japan is now hankering to join the spy club.

These Indo-Asiatic-Pacific alliances and deployments represent a clear and present threat not only to the people of China but also to Russia and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea).  Furthermore, the militarisation of the South China Sea is a concern for a host of other Southeast Asia states. The escalating threat of a nuclear conflagration is a threat to the entire region.

DEATH OF NATO?

The original purpose of NATO remains, and it continues to present a material threat to (capitalist) Russia. This has manifested itself in various ways, including support for the reactionary regime in Ukraine and hostility toward Belarus. Nevertheless, AUKUS and the invigoration of other alliances around the Indo-Pacific, indicate a tilt toward China as the primary focus of US imperialism. This is reflected in the escalated propaganda war against China, initiated by Trump and continued by Biden. These developments are best understood, not as replacing NATO, but rather as supplementing it as a multilateral strategy for isolating and choking the primary post-Soviet threat to US global domination, China. The raison d’etre for NATO has continued, while its strategic direction has pivoted towards China. NATO’s existential purpose remains:

(1) Securing the interests of US capital through force projection

(2) Uniting European capitalist states under US hegemony to sustain the interests of imperialism

(3) Securing the interests of European capital where these coincide with US capital

(4) Thwarting the re-emergence of socialist and anti-imperialist forces globally

(5) Containing contradictions and conflict between allied capitalist powers

But there has been a shift in NATO’s strategic focus. From its inception in 1949 NATO’s key objective was to defeat the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact socialist countries as the systemic threat to the continuation of capitalism, and the source of material support for anti-colonial and anti-imperial resistance. That objective was achieved 3 decades ago.

Since then we have seen the US take advantage of its lone superpower status with a consequential demise in peaceful coexistence and the right of nations to self-determination. The so-called ‘war on terror’ heralded three decades of US imperialism on the rampage, advancing its interests globally, most especially in the Middle East, through unbridled interventionism. The US positioned itself as the world’s indisputable, swaggering hegemon. That is now under threat. Throughout this period China was slowly emerging as a serious economic competitor. The US had been the world’s top manufacturer for over a century. Between 2010-2012, it was superseded by China. NATO’s response, under US direction, was to orientate toward containing and overcoming China.

The US certainly does not want to see the break-up of NATO. As has always been the case, it is looking to secure - and subordinate - additional regional allies. With the rise of China and the exponential growth of trade in and around the Pacific, what we are witnessing with AUKUS and the orientation of other alliances, is a predictable shift in regional priorities.

CHINA'S MILITARY THREAT?

The ‘Soviet military threat’ was fabricated to justify: the Cold War; the massive US nuclear weapons build up; the multi-trillion dollar transfer of public money to the military-industrial complex; the imperial wars against Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos; endless attempts at regime change in Cuba; the projection of a nuclear first-strike strategy; covert operations funded through the CIA; and the anti-communist McCarthy witch hunt. Similarly, the justification for the ‘tilt to the Indo-Pacific’ is now the manufactured ‘threat of China’. China is an economic threat. In terms of manufacturing, trade and the export of capital it now represents a serious challenge to US global dominance. But in terms of being a military rival and threat, there is no comparison.

The establishment media routinely reports that China has the biggest navy in the world, without mentioning that these forces consist largely of coastguard vessels and small corvettes. It has hardly any ocean-going capacity with just two aircraft carriers and a third being built, none of which are anywhere near the state-of the-art standard of the US, which has 11 carriers as well as inter-operability arrangements with the two recently built UK carriers, the HMS Prince of Wales and the HMS Queen Elizabeth.  Of China’s 56 submarines, only six are nuclear-powered with reach across the Pacific.  All of the 72 US submarines are nuclear-powered and can threaten China’s coast.

So where is the China threat? The Queen Elizabeth carrier strike group has recently been criss-crossing the East and South China Seas. When has any Chinese fleet sailed close to the Pacific or Atlantic coasts of the USA? Or conceived a military alliance with Latin American states to run nuclear submarines in the Caribbean Sea? When has it conducted the equivalent of US/UK and NATO war games in seas around the USA? The answer is, of course, never, and we can be pretty certain how Biden would react if it did. If China were now to respond to recent provocations in a manner comparable to Kennedy during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, we would be on the brink of global nuclear war. China has, in fact, shown great restraint.

While several nations have claims on islands in the South China Sea, including Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, and China, among others, none of the AUKUS parties has any claim or any basis for naval activity in the area. That detail has not prevented the Australian Prime Minister from talking about ‘preparing to send warriors overseas’ in case of a conflict over Taiwan. The internationally agreed One China policy recognises that Taiwan is part of China, whereas Australia, the UK and US have no locus whatsoever regarding its status. Any dispute over Taiwan must be resolved diplomatically and not be used as an excuse for ramping up war with China. It is hard to see any legitimate role for the AUKUS states in such negotiations.

Alongside the propaganda about China’s alleged military threat there are also sustained campaigns by the capitalist media round issues like human rights and climate change. Given the origins of these claims and the purposes to which they are being put we should treat them with an appropriate level of scepticism. Nor should they be allowed to be a smokescreen for the build up of hostilities against China.

The people of China can but view these developments and war-games off their coastline with trepidation and they are also a concern for smaller South East Asian countries. It matters not whether you believe China is a socialist country, or transforming towards a socialist country, or simply the USA’s biggest rival in manufacturing, trade and capital exports. AUKUS and other military developments targeting China are a significant escalation of the arms race, destabilising the Indo-Pacific region and posing a very real threat to world peace. China will inevitably make a considered military and diplomatic response. That will not be to reduce its military capability. Indeed, if the anti-Soviet cold war was anything to go by, then a key component of US strategy will be to redirect and drain China’s economic and social resources by sucking it into a multi-trillion dollar arms race. When Biden euphemistically refers to “multilateralism” he is, amongst other things, leaning on US allies to help drive and fund this project. AUKUS, as a nuclear alliance, is a key development.

BIG POWERS FALL OUT 

The USA’s pivot towards China is not without difficulties, in particular for NATO unity.  First and foremost, France is furious over AUKUS. France had a confirmed deal with Australia to provide a fleet of diesel-engine submarines, at an estimated cost of $40-50 billion.  That deal has been ditched in favour of the nuclear-powered submarines, with technologies provided by the US and Britain, and with the boats to be built in Adelaide.

France has been snubbed and is not dressing up its anger in diplomatic language. French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian described the AUKUS deal as “a stab in the back” by Australia. Referring to Biden and the US, Le Drian remarked, “This brutal, unilateral, and unpredictable decision reminds me a lot of what Mr. Trump used to do.” France has not only lost a deal worth in excess of $40 billion. It considers itself to be a Pacific power, with New Caledonia as a colony, and was integral to the G7 states and NATO adopting the ‘Indo-Pacific Tilt’ strategy. Having found itself excluded it took the extraordinary step of withdrawing its ambassadors from both Australia and the US. For NATO this is further complicated by France looking to increase the military projection of the EU and, as the EU’s only nuclear weapons power, exercise military leadership.

Membership of AUKUS by the UK is risking its economic relationship with China, a relationship that former Prime Minister David Cameron and Chancellor George Osborne had sought to cultivate. In doing so, Johnson has prioritised the arms industry over all other UK economic sectors.

Australia is taking a huge gamble with its economy, given that 40% of its exports are to China and only 11% to the US.  Former Australian Labour Party Prime Minister Paul Keating slammed the AUKUS deal. He said, “Material dependency on the United States has robbed Australia of any freedom or choice.” In 2019, he accused Morrison’s government of letting “the phobias of security agencies” dominate Australia’s foreign policy and said that the “whispered word Communism of old is now being replaced with the word China.”

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern commented that New Zealand wasn’t invited to join the pact and would have said no anyway. It should “be very clear to all New Zealanders, and to Australia,” Ardern said, “why New Zealand would not wish to be a part of that project.”

PEACEFUL SOLUTIONS 

With virtually all western allies questioning the hegemonic role of the US after its unilateral withdrawal from Afghanistan, the US, and in particular the AUKUS military alliance, is facing anything but untroubled waters. There is good cause for the British peace and labour movements to come up with their own ‘multilateralism’ and unite with other peace and progressive movements globally to ensure that AUKUS is dead in the water - demilitarisation and denuclearisation of the seas is vital. Forging an independent or non-aligned British foreign policy, along with countries like New Zealand, is central to defusing the US-led war drive. The bedrock of a peaceful independent British foreign policy are the principles of peaceful coexistence and a commitment to the right of all nations to self-determination. That includes the People’s Republic of China. The interests of US or UK capital do not define an exception.

 

(1) https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-carrier-strike-group-in-the-indo-pacific

 

USS America (foreground) HMS Queen Elizabeth (centre) and the Japanese JS lse undertaking exercises in the Philippine Sea August 2021 pic MoD

The establishment media routinely reports that China has the biggest navy in the world, without mentioning that these forces largely consist of coastguard vessels and small corvettes.