Australian Withdrawal From ANZUS

What if Australia had withdrawn from ANZUS in the 1980's?

Or rather, like OTL NZ adopted policies which made the US state that their ANZUS obligations were no longer operational.

For instance this could be an Australian refusal to have US nuclear-powered ship in Australian harbours or perhaps an Australian request for the US to withdraw their military bases from Aust territory.

In NZ part of the reason for the Lange govts policy was a desire of the Right of the NZ Labour Party (Lange, Douglas) to be given a free hand in neo-liberal economic reforms, if the Left's non-nuclear pacifist defence policies were also taken on board.

In Aust Hawke was more willing to negotiate economic reforms with the Left of Aust Labor, so such a trade-off was not as vital.

But it is still plausible.

What would the short-term and long-term consequences of such an Australian policy?
 
Well I don't know about the plauability of it, but if both NZ and Australia dropped out, ANZUS would be completely dismantled soon afterwards.
 
This was the time when Australia annunciated the Dibb doctrine of how to actually defend Australia without relying on the combat forces of other nations. Not long after Keating whipped out that treaty with Indonesia. So it might not be the blow that it could be perceived to be.
 
This was the time when Australia annunciated the Dibb doctrine of how to actually defend Australia without relying on the combat forces of other nations. Not long after Keating whipped out that treaty with Indonesia. So it might not be the blow that it could be perceived to be.


Is that the Defence of Australia doctrine? Yes I agree that it would be less of a blow to Aust than perceived.

How would the US react? Nothing much direct they can do but I suppose they could stop intelligence agreements with ASIO etc. They did this with NZ and I assume they would consider the loss of Aust to be more significant due to our greater strategic significance.
 
If Hawke had dared to do this, and given the popular support for ANZUS in the Australian electorate at the time (and even now), it would certainly have hurt his re-election chances in 1987.

Initially, it would have forced the resignation of the Assistant Defence Minister, David Simmons, whose margin in his seat of Calare would have required him to distance himself from this decision.

ELECTION FALLOUT:

Come the election, I suspect that the ALP would lose the seat of Barton (already on tenderhooks due to the third runway issue) and Hunter (ending the Fitzgibbon dynasty before it even started). It would be more likely for the Liberals to hold on to Lowe, despite their disorganisation. It is likely that the Liberal Party would have picked up at least six marginal seats in this state (Ballarat, Bendigo, Burke, Dunkley, McEwen, Streeton), but there would be no high-flying careers brought to an end in Victoria.

I doubt that Michael Lavarch would have won the seat of Fisher, meaning that he would not go on to become Attorney General. It was his personal drive that brought about the "Bringing Them Home" report. David Watson would have won Forde, so he would have stayed in Federal politics rather than moving on to become state Liberal leader of Queensland. Keating's industrial relations minister, Gary Johns, would never have won a seat.

In summary, my best guess is that an ANZUS withdrawal would have seen John Howard elected as Prime Minister in late 1987 with a ten-seat majority and he would have presided over the Bicentennial and World Expo. Andrew Peacock would be Foreign Minister to keep him out of the country. Howard also would have gloated over the NSW Liberal Party's victory under Nick Greiner, although the two men would never be close allies.

Other effects:

*APEC would be stillborn. Howard, at this time, was strongly xenophobic in his public discourse.
*Labor would seek to actively align itself with the growing Green movement at its political inception, to rebuild its support base, and this may have led to a long-term coalition relationship.
* Fees would have been restored for university education.
* Given scandals besetting the state governments of Victoria and WA, I suspect that Howard would have won re-election early in 1990, but would have lost government in 1993, bearing responsibility for the recession.
* Paul Keating would have become Prime Minister in 1993 and would be remembered for successfully reforming the Australian economy before the Liberals "stuffed it up".
 
For instance this could be an Australian refusal to have US nuclear-powered ship in Australian harbours or perhaps an Australian request for the US to withdraw their military bases from Aust territory.

was it nuclear powered ships that NZ objected to, or was it ships with nuclear weapons on board?
 
If Hawke had dared to do this, and given the popular support for ANZUS in the Australian electorate at the time (and even now), it would certainly have hurt his re-election chances in 1987.

Initially, it would have forced the resignation of the Assistant Defence Minister, David Simmons, whose margin in his seat of Calare would have required him to distance himself from this decision.

ELECTION FALLOUT:

Come the election, I suspect that the ALP would lose the seat of Barton (already on tenderhooks due to the third runway issue) and Hunter (ending the Fitzgibbon dynasty before it even started). It would be more likely for the Liberals to hold on to Lowe, despite their disorganisation. It is likely that the Liberal Party would have picked up at least six marginal seats in this state (Ballarat, Bendigo, Burke, Dunkley, McEwen, Streeton), but there would be no high-flying careers brought to an end in Victoria.

I doubt that Michael Lavarch would have won the seat of Fisher, meaning that he would not go on to become Attorney General. It was his personal drive that brought about the "Bringing Them Home" report. David Watson would have won Forde, so he would have stayed in Federal politics rather than moving on to become state Liberal leader of Queensland. Keating's industrial relations minister, Gary Johns, would never have won a seat.

In summary, my best guess is that an ANZUS withdrawal would have seen John Howard elected as Prime Minister in late 1987 with a ten-seat majority and he would have presided over the Bicentennial and World Expo. Andrew Peacock would be Foreign Minister to keep him out of the country. Howard also would have gloated over the NSW Liberal Party's victory under Nick Greiner, although the two men would never be close allies.

Other effects:

*APEC would be stillborn. Howard, at this time, was strongly xenophobic in his public discourse.
*Labor would seek to actively align itself with the growing Green movement at its political inception, to rebuild its support base, and this may have led to a long-term coalition relationship.
* Fees would have been restored for university education.
* Given scandals besetting the state governments of Victoria and WA, I suspect that Howard would have won re-election early in 1990, but would have lost government in 1993, bearing responsibility for the recession.
* Paul Keating would have become Prime Minister in 1993 and would be remembered for successfully reforming the Australian economy before the Liberals "stuffed it up".

Thanks for the very interesting reply. Do you or anyone else here on the forum know of anywhere I can find comparative statistics on Australian and New Zealand public support for the US alliance, etc?

It's just that I wonder how much different the levels of support for ANZUS between Australia and NZ. Of course Australia is at a far greater security risk than NZ, however a lot of support for the alliance is cultural as well. Considering Aust and NZ have similar cultural ties to the US, I wonder whether support for the alliance was really that much stronger in Aust? In NZ withdrawal was met with significant levels of support by major segments of society (and opposition in considerable segments too). But it didnt cause the fall of Lange. I wonder how many would be wiling to vote on defence policy alone?
 
Thanks for the very interesting reply. Do you or anyone else here on the forum know of anywhere I can find comparative statistics on Australian and New Zealand public support for the US alliance, etc?

It's just that I wonder how much different the levels of support for ANZUS between Australia and NZ. Of course Australia is at a far greater security risk than NZ, however a lot of support for the alliance is cultural as well. Considering Aust and NZ have similar cultural ties to the US, I wonder whether support for the alliance was really that much stronger in Aust? In NZ withdrawal was met with significant levels of support by major segments of society (and opposition in considerable segments too). But it didnt cause the fall of Lange. I wonder how many would be wiling to vote on defence policy alone?

While I agree that support is primarily cultural, I did get the Parliamentary Library to look into this for me about eight years ago. The average support level from a number of polls over the preceding ten years (1989-99) was 77%.

Hawke had already put the Reagan Administration offside by cancelling plans to be involved in MX. In addition, he would have faced a revolt from the right-wing on his own backbench. In fact, you would need to prevent the Labor lurch to the right in the late 70's and early 80's to create an ALP leadership who might be willing to carry through such a confrontation with the US on ideological grounds.

NZ does not have 200 million Muslims living on its doorstep. While I personally disagree with the fears of our politicians in Australia (strangely, most of them believe that Indonesia is a strategic threat), and the fears of our populace, they nonetheless exist.

Finally, in 1987, without the Joh for Canberra campaign, the ALP would not have survived the election anyway. If there had been this kind of controversial policy on the table, it would have unified the Coalition. My assessment of the 1987 election was based on only 2% of Australians changing their vote on this issue.
 
How would this affect Australia's military equipment purchases at the time and since? IIRC we were buying/building Hornets, Blackhawks and OHP FFGs.
 
I have to wonder though... if Australia did drop out of ANZUS, would it make much difference? Who's going to attack Australia? Even the notional Indonesian threat doesn't seem like much of one. And even without ANZUS, I don't think the US would let Australia fall to an invader...
 
How would this affect Australia's military equipment purchases at the time and since? IIRC we were buying/building Hornets, Blackhawks and OHP FFGs.

IIRC, the F/A-18's were being delivered about the time Hawke came to office and the frigates were arranged by the Fraser government. I can't recall when the Blackhawks were bought. Can someone confirm my recollections?
 
I have to wonder though... if Australia did drop out of ANZUS, would it make much difference? Who's going to attack Australia? Even the notional Indonesian threat doesn't seem like much of one. And even without ANZUS, I don't think the US would let Australia fall to an invader...

The constant refrain among hawks in Australia is that the reason Indonesia has not attacked us to date is because we retain technological superiority due to our "special partnership" with the US. Take away that technological superiority and, of course, the Indonesians are so aggressive they won't be able to help themselves. ;):D
 
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