Stopwatches at the ready. How much face-time will Anthony Albanese be granted by Donald Trump? And how will his long-awaited visit to Washington compare with those of previous prime ministers? When John Howard met Bill Clinton in 1999, he endured the indignity of being left waiting in his limousine because the president was running late. Their discussion barely lasted 30 minutes. When, on the other hand, Howard sat down with George W. Bush for the first time on September 10, 2001 – the day before the world changed – their talks, which included a convivial lunch attended by the 41st president, George Herbert Walker Bush, lasted three hours.
Howard had flown to Washington to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the ANZUS military alliance, a pact that meant a lot to the Bush family. As a naval pilot, Bush Sr. had flown 58 combat missions in the Pacific theatre. This kind of shared history – and crucially the shared values it embodies – means little, if anything, to Donald Trump. Besides, now the focus is AUKUS, which will hang over Australian prime ministers like the sword of Damocles, rather than ANZUS, which served more like a comfort blanket.
Australia is arguably more plugged in geopolitically than its one-time colonial overlord.
Before venturing on, I realise I am adding to the voluminous column inches already devoted to the episodic saga of Albanese’s troubled pilgrimage to Washington, which has been almost John Bunyan-like in intensity. In so doing, I also recognise the danger of falling into the trap of viewing Australia’s global status solely through the relationship with one individual, the US president. Often it feels as if minutes in the Oval Office have become the foremost barometer of Australian power. As a Briton, though, this is a familiar mentality.
Anthony Albanese last visited the Oval Office two years ago and was given a warm welcome by then-president Joe Biden.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
Westminster is obsessed with the UK-US “special relationship”. So much so that when the then presidential candidate Joe Biden playfully turned down my request early in 2020 for an interview with the BBC, saying “I’m Irish”, with a leprechaun twinkle, Whitehall went into near-freefall. Installed on the roof of the Foreign Office, I have long suspected, are finely calibrated antennae attuned to detect any deviation in the bilateral relationship. When the BBC rebroadcast that brief exchange, on the weekend Biden celebrated victory over Trump in the 2020 election, it felt like they had been wrenched from their moorings before splashing down somewhere in the Baltic Sea.
Post-Brexit, Britain has needed more diplomatic friends, which partly explained the appeal of AUKUS. It gave the UK a chance to re-establish a foothold in the Indo-Pacific.
Australia is arguably more plugged in geopolitically than its one-time colonial overlord. The fixation with the US alliance detracts from how its influence has grown over the course of the 21st century as a result of a diplomatic flirtatiousness bordering on the downright promiscuous.
Australia belongs to a screenful of geopolitical dating apps: ANZUS, AUKUS, APEC, the G20. The “Quad” security dialogue with India, Japan and the United States, “The Squad”, a grouping of Japan, the US and the Philippines, the Pacific Islands Forum and the Commonwealth. With ASEAN, it now has comprehensive strategic partner status.
John Howard and then-president George W. Bush in the Oval Office in 2003.Credit: Getty Images
