January/February 2016 Vol 41, No 1 · New Zealand International Review 1 RInternationalNew Zealandeview January/February 2016 Vol 41, No 1 PIVOTAL+THAMES 1EOMRK XVERW 4EGM½G JVMIRHW

New Zealand

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TRANS-PACIFIC TRADE Jeremy Corbyn Chinese economy

NEW ZEALAND INSTITUTE OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

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Embassy of the Republic of KoreaEmbassy of the Republic of PolandEmbassy of the Republic of TurkeyEmbassy of the Russian FederationEmbassy of the United States of AmericaHigh Commission for MalaysiaHigh Commission for PakistanHigh Commission of IndiaNew Zealand Red Cross IncNZ China Friendship SocietyNZ Horticulture Export AuthorityNew Zealand Institute of Economic ResearchPapua New Guinea High CommissionPolitical Studies Department, University of AucklandSchool of Linguistics & Applied Language Studies, VUWSingapore High CommissionSoka Gakkai International of NZSouth African High Commission

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Stephen Jacobi comments on the implications for New Zealand’s relations with China and the United

States of the recent agreement on the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Terence O’Brien argues that good international citizenship not war involvement should underpin

New Zealand’s sense of place in the world.

Rita Ricketts reflects on the advent of Jeremy Corbyn as British Labour leader and compares him

with David Lange.

Ken Ross discusses the Labour prime minister’s contest with French President Mitterrand on a range

of difficult issues.

Fu Ying explains the many challenges facing China and predicts a successful outcome because of

strong fundamentals.

Balaji Chandramohan outlines Indonesia’s evolving maritime strategy in the Indo-Pacific

region.

Samuel Oyewole comments on Nigeria’s inability so far to free the abducted girls and its inadequate

crisis management strategy.

29 Books Anthony Giddens: Turbulent and Mighty Continent, What future for Europe? (Stuart McMillan).

George Friedman: Flashpoints, The Emerging Crisis in Europe (Stuart McMillan).

Masha Gessen: The Tsarnaev Brothers, The Road to a Modern Tragedy (Anthony Smith).

Gianni Vattimo and Michael Marder: Deconstructing Zionism: A Critique of Political Metaphysics (Nigel Parsons).

32 Institute Notes

33 Correspondence


2

In this article I will focus on three key issues:

how business in New Zealand sees the two critical relation-

ships with China and the United States in an economic

and commercial context;

what the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) has to do with all

this; and

how the TPP and, more importantly, what might flow from

it, could lead to a new framework for trade and investment

across the Pacific encompassing both these key partners for

New Zealand.

I am commenting from the vantage point of the New Zealand

International Business Forum, an organisation that brings to-

gether the leaders of New Zealand’s largest and most internation-

ally oriented companies and peak business associations.

Having spent the larger part of my professional life involved

in trade and trade negotiations, I still find it surprising that New

Zealand has for the last seven years enjoyed the benefits of a free

trade relationship with China while a similar set of arrangements

with the United States has continued to elude us. The situation

is all the more surprising if you think that New Zealand shares

fundamental values and principles with the United States as well

as shared history as an erstwhile ally and is still a ‘very, very, very’

good friend, to use the terminology of former Secretary of State

Colin Powell. As we know, the reason for this anomaly has to

do largely with factors in the political relationship between New

Zealand and the United States, which meant that we were un-

able, as had been the expectation at the time, to follow in the

footsteps of Australia in securing a free trade agreement in 2004.

In the period 2005–14 I personally led the work of the NZ

US Council, a non-partisan organisation funded by business and

government to strengthen the relationship with the United States

and prepare the way for a future free trade agreement negotiation.

I am delighted that those past political difficulties have now been

overcome, the political relationship is now in a better space than

it has ever been and the TPP appears poised to deliver the free

trade relationship we have sought for so long. None of this has

Stephen Jacobi comments on the implications for New Zealand’s relations with China and the United States of the recent agreement on

Stephen Jacobi is executive director of the New Zealand International Business

Contempoprary China Research Centre’s ‘China US Relations in a Global

both

stopped New Zealand from

actively pursuing a closer

economic relationship with

China — building on the

famous ‘four firsts’ and

culminating with the suc-

cessful conclusion of a free

trade agreement in 2008.

Much of the academic

discourse around these im-

portant relationships seems

to be focused on whether

New Zealand might one

day be forced to choose be-

tween one of these partners,

but this tends to overlook

the fact that an important

choice has already been

made. A generation ago

New Zealand faced some

difficult re-balancing of our

external economy as a result

of the consequences of Brit-

ain joining the European

Economic Community in

1973. At that time we made

the inevitable but nonethe-

less conscious choice to di-

versify our exports and seek

to align ourselves economi-

cally with the Asia–Pacific

region.

Changed natureToday that choice sees over

70 per cent of our exports

going to a region whose

economic pulse to a large

extent is determined by

both China and the United

Colin Powell

States. In the last decade also the nature of trade has changed

considerably. Models based on import and export are slowly be-

ing replaced by much more complex global value chains and net-

works. Trade in goods is being supplanted by trade in services

and by both inward and outward investment particularly as firms

seek to be closer to their customers and to benefit from innova-

Stephen Jacobi


3

tion on a global scale.

New Zealand is not immune from these

developments. We connect to global value

chains in different ways, we increasingly in-

corporate services into our trade in goods and

we actively seek new foreign investment and,

although in my view at too slow a pace, invest

ourselves in other economies.

Many of these value chains incorporate

both China and the United States — like, for

example, Pumpkin Patch designing clothes

in Auckland, manufacturing them in China

and selling them in New York. Or Fisher &

Paykel Appliances linking innovation teams

in Auckland and China to manufactur-

ing dishwashers in Mexico and selling them

throughout the United States. It should come

as no surprise, therefore, that to ask business

to make some sort of choice between China

and the United States is a question that simply

does not make sense in the light of the real-

ity of these global business networks. Rather,

business in New Zealand seeks the best pos-

one for Australia and will mount a challenge to New Zealand

over time as Australian exporters enjoy similar and in a few areas

better arrangements than New Zealand.

And what of the United States? As I mentioned above, Aus-

tralia has enjoyed a free trade agreement with the United States

since 2004 and has used this agreement to good advantage in

developing its commercial relationship, although primarily in ar-

eas that have not disadvantaged New Zealand. Meanwhile the

United States has clearly been disadvantaged in the New Zea-

land market as our arrangements with China have led to a loss

of market share. While this might not cause much lost sleep in

Washington it does reflect the impact free trade agreements can

have on trade flows.

The rise of China’s economic profile in New Zealand has also led

to calls for a new diversification of the economy, which would

allow the risks of dependence to be spread across a range of part-

ners. Somewhat ironically in the light of history since 1973, that

diversification needs to include the European Union, with which

we hope soon to start a new free trade agreement negotiation. The

fact of the matter is that both China and the United States matter

to New Zealand — as markets for goods as well as services, as

import sources, as partners for investment and as sources of in-

novation, entrepreneurship and business ideas. It follows also that

the relationship between them matters as well, particularly in the

new global economic context in which we now operate.

This is where the TPP comes in. The time taken to conclude

the TPP — not quite as bad as the WTO Doha Round — re-

flects the complexity of the issues under negotiation by the twelve

parties, including the United States and New Zealand. It is worth

remembering that the TPP was essentially a New Zealand idea

— a vision of a more seamless environment for trade and invest-

ment in the Asia–Pacific region — that was born in the early

1990s towards the end of the Uruguay Round and pursued with

resolve over the last twenty years.

Decisive steps forward were taken in the conclusion of the

sible environment for doing business with both partners. That is

unquestionably the sort of environment that a high quality free

trade agreement seeks to create.

New Zealand is fortunate to have enjoyed the benefits of its

free trade agreement with China for a number of years now. The

free trade agreement has given rise to an extraordinary increase

in two-way trade, due as much to what are called the ‘dynamic

gains of trade’ as to the progressive elimination of tariffs and

other trade barriers. Those ‘dynamic gains of trade’ have to do

with the increased commercial attention that a free trade agree-

ment tends to focus on the relationship as well as the framework

that a free trade agreement provides to improve the relationship

over time.

New Zealand has experienced these same dynamic gains arising

from the CER relationship with Australia over the last 25 years.

I fully expect to see these dynamic gains arising from the TPP

once it is signed and ratified and has entered into force.

In the case of China the two governments are about to embark

on an upgrade of the free trade agreement in an effort to continue

to sustain the momentum of trade growth in recent years. The

upgrade is of great interest to business because free trade agree-

ments always need continuous improvement and because trade

agreements are always lagging behind market realities. Some of

the elements of the China free trade agreement urgently require

updating. These include the safeguards applied to dairy exports,

which no longer reflect the growth of the market in recent years,

and the rather cumbersome bureaucratic arrangements around

the issuing of certificates of origin, which are out of step with the

direction of trade growth. There are likely to be a range of issues

on both sides that will be brought to the table to ensure that the

free trade agreement remains a driving force in the economic and

commercial relationship.

This is all the more necessary now that our other good friend

and competitor Australia has concluded a ground-breaking free

trade agreement with China — that agreement is a very good

The signing of the New Zealand–China free trade agreement


4

first TPP between New Zealand, Brunei, Chile and Singapore

in 2006 and when the United States joined the enlargement pro-

cess in 2008. New Zealand’s vision from the very beginning has

always been for open regionalism — the widest possible member-

ship of economies, the greatest possible coverage of issues and the

highest quality of agreement.

In its earliest stages the TPP was open for any economy within

APEC to join: at the APEC Summit in Peru in 2008 this brought

in Australia, Peru and Vietnam (at first in an observer capac-

ity). Later Malaysia joined and then very late Japan, Canada and

Mexico — by that stage the processes to join what was already an

advanced negotiation had become a lot more complicated.

I repeat this history to underline an important point — the idea

that the TPP has been devised to somehow contain China or that

China has been prevented from joining simply does not hold wa-

ter. It is completely understandable, of course, that the Chinese

government felt unable to commit to such an ambitious negotia-

tion at an early stage, but it has been very clear throughout the

TPP process that China has followed the negotiations closely and

no doubt has been kept informed by New Zealand.

At the TPP leaders’ meeting held on the margins of APEC in

Honolulu in 2011, it was agreed that the final agreement would

be ‘high quality, ambitious and comprehensive’. This wording

reflected the original vision of the negotiating parties and the op-

portunity to create a new framework for trade and investment

that would have a significant impact on sustainable growth and

job creation. Over time that vision appears to have been diluted

— to the point that what we saw coming out of the recent meet-

ing in Atlanta, while undoubtedly a major step forward, is some-

thing not quite as ambitious as the architects of the TPP had in

mind.

Perhaps we should not be so surprised about that. The forc-

es of protectionism and anti-competition are alive and well in

many economies, including our own. The Asia–Pacific region’s

economy has been subject both to rise and fall during this pe-

riod, affecting the willingness of politicians to embrace signifi-

cant reform — reforms are inevitably put off in the bad times

and seen as unnecessary in the good

times. And, it must be admitted, the

time taken with the TPP and the una-

voidable limits on transparency in the

negotiating process have given rise to

deep distrust on the part of civil soci-

ety, even here in free trade loving New

Zealand.

What we see coming out of At-

lanta is very positive indeed but still

something less than what was on of-

fer in Honolulu four years ago. It is

disappointing from a New Zealand

perspective that the final deal falls

short of the goal of comprehensive

tariff elimination — all duties on all

products — even if no sector is com-

pletely off the table. One might have

thought that a deal focused firmly on

the 21st century might have found a

way to deal with issues from the 20th

(or even 19th) centuries, but agricultural protectionism runs deep

in the United States, Japan and Canada, especially when it comes

to dairy products.

The TPP outcome on dairy marks the beginning of a further

process to address wrong-headed protectionism, but on other

agricultural products there are some very positive gains. On an-

other product of key interest to New Zealand — beef — the goal

of complete tariff elimination in Japan continues to elude us, but

there are very significant cuts to tariffs from 38.5 per cent to 9 per

cent, which should make a material difference to New Zealand

exports. In horticulture, wine, seafood, forestry and manufac-

tured products, there are also extremely useful advances which

can be welcomed.

Consistent approachBut the TPP was always meant to be about more than agriculture.

In that respect what the TPP does is set up a more contemporary

framework of rules for trade and investment that will lower costs,

reduce the time of doing business, provide greater certainty and

security for business and ensure that over time there is a more

consistent approach to setting regulations and standards across

the region.

That this has been achieved without the likelihood of signifi-

cant adjustment for New Zealand in areas like medicines, invest-

ment or intellectual property or the management of state owned

enterprises reflects both the skill of our negotiators and the fact

that New Zealand is already at the level of world’s best practice

in these areas. On medicines the TPP preserves the operations

of Pharmac, albeit with some modifications to the way Pharmac

interacts with industry. On investment the TPP retains the right

to regulate in areas such as public health, the environment and

the Treaty of Waitangi and provides an exemption for New Zea-

land’s existing approach to regulating investment through the

Overseas Investment Act.

The TPP also limits the scope of investor state dispute settle-

ment to measures affecting tobacco — an extraordinary facing

down of the powerful tobacco lobby in the United States. On

intellectual property the TPP upholds existing policy settings

except in relation to the copyright term — where in New Zea-


5

land the term will rise from 50 to 70 years — and the period of

data protection for biologic drugs, where we understand the term

will stay at five years as presently. On state owned enterprises the

TPP’s disciplines are likely to be close to what we already have

here and should not call into question government ownership of

entities in New Zealand. The government is on record as saying

that the costs and any risks arising from these changes can be

managed.

The final text of the TPP treaty was released to the public in

November and will undoubtedly be pored over by stakeholders of

all persuasions. This will hopefully enable a robust debate about

the implications for New Zealand on the basis of facts and should

enable conclusions to be drawn in the context of the parliamen-

tary select committee process that will precede ratification by the

government. Release of the text will also be useful for partners

like China and others not yet part of the TPP to enable them to

judge their ability to join the TPP at a later date.

This was always the strategy — build on each agreement in-

crementally to expand the vision of freer trade and investment

across the whole region: in that sense the TPP is not just about

the twelve but about the whole 21 members of APEC, eventually

including China.

When the earliest moves to expand the TPP got underway there

was a debate, particularly in the United States, about not wanting

to build a wall down the middle of the Pacific Ocean. The aim

of the TPP was, therefore, to link both sides of the Pacific and

also developed and developing economies. Thus the TPP today

includes dynamic economies in both Asia and Latin America.

The broader vision of which the TPP is a key part is for a

future Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific or FTAAP. In 1994 the

APEC economies proceeded to adopt the famous Bogor goals,

which committed them to achieving free trade and investment

in the region by 2010 for developed economies and 2020 for de-

veloping economies. It was envisaged that these goals would be

achieved through a mix of unilateral, bilateral and multilateral

efforts.

It took another ten years before the APEC Business Advisory

Council (ABAC) first started to think seriously about developing

a more ambitious proposal to achieve comprehensive free trade in

the region. Business leaders in ABAC were even then impatient at

the time being taken to make meaningful progress to achieving

the Bogor goals.

The FTAAP concept also arose due to the lack of progress in

the Doha Round of WTO negotiations, which has not improved

in the intervening period. By 2006 at the APEC Leaders’ Sum-

mit in Hanoi President Bush proposed that APEC adopt the vi-

sion of the FTAAP. After much debate leaders decided that the

FTAAP would be achieved through a range of practical and in-

cremental steps — something that trade negotiators will be quick

to recognise means no progress whatsoever.

Agreed actions In 2007, APEC Economic Leaders endorsed the report ‘Strength-

ening Regional Economic Integration’, which contained no less

than 53 agreed actions aimed at strengthening work among

APEC economies. These included reference to the FTAAP, but

as a ‘long-term’ prospect. In Japan’s year of APEC in 2010, it was

agreed that the FTAAP would be achieved through a series of ne-

gotiating pathways, including the TPP and the recently launched

Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), link-

ing sixteen Asian economies, including New Zealand and Aus-

tralia.

The achievement of the FTAAP remained hostage to the

conclusion of these negotiating pathways with all their attendant

difficulties. It was not until China’s leadership of APEC in 2014

that some real momentum was injected into the FTAAP with

strong Chinese advocacy of a work programme to complete the

broader vision. It was more than a little ironic that China’s ad-

vocacy received a lukewarm reception from the United States,

whose legislative processes remained fixed on securing the TPP

in the first instance.

Other economies, like New Zealand, were more appreciative,

suggesting it was possible to chew gum and walk at the same

time — that is, continue to work to conclude the TPP as a bot-

tom up approach while initiating work on the FTAAP from the

top down. This is essentially what is happening now as APEC

pursues a ‘collective strategic study’ to prepare the ground for the

FTAAP. The study is to be completed by the end of 2016 — by

then hopefully the TPP will be about to enter into force and the

RCEP hopefully, too, will have made significant progress.

Unconventional approachBoth agreements will contribute to achieving the FTAAP, bear-

ing in mind, of course, that the first A in FTAAP stands for Area

rather than Agreement. What that means in effect is that the

FTAAP may not take the form of a conventional free trade agree-

ment negotiation, but may be achieved by a merging and docking

of existing arrangements. In that way the FTAAP may serve to

bring together the two largest economies in the region — the

United States and China — building also on the progress made

between them in the interim, such as through the bilateral invest-

ment treaty currently under negotiation.

The point is that the launching of the APEC collective strate-

gic study process and the conclusion of the TPP in Atlanta bring

the prospects of a future arrangement between the United States

and China that much closer. What once seemed an impossible

dream now seems an achievable goal. Commitment, persever-

ance and a long-term vision are all indispensable elements in this

journey to unite both sides of the Pacific.

The US baseball player and part time philosopher Yogi Berra,

who died last September, once said ‘the future ain’t what it used

to be’. That observation is most certainly true when it comes to

the future architecture for trade and investment in the Asia–Pacific

region. It is also true in describing the way business is being done

today through complex global value chains and networks. New

Zealand has a major stake in the success of the region and in closer

economic relations with the region’s two major economic powers,

China and the United States. What we have achieved with China

through our free trade agreement we now — at last — have the

prospect of achieving with the United States through the TPP.

And the TPP together with the collective strategic study un-

derway within APEC provides a means to move forward with

the even broader vision of linking both sides of the Pacific in a

new area of economic opportunity. Making trans-Pacific friends

is something that comes naturally to New Zealanders. We hope

that this habit of expanding friendship across the region will be-

come a means of achieving economic and social progress right

across that great ocean that is our common home.


6

New Zealand’s worldview is shaped by geography, size, resourc-

es, colonial inheritance, external trade and intermittent experi-

ence of distant warfare. Each of those factors makes its own im-

pact upon our perceptions of New Zealand identity. What the

country is, and seeks to be, are central to its sense of place. New

Zealand’s originality resides largely with the Treaty of Waitangi

with a commitment to reconciliation at the core of its democ-

racy, which strives to blend Maori and European contributions

to cohesive nation-building — while adjusting to a multicultural

future. Those origins and that challenge ahead will define the

New Zealand world journey in the 21st century.

The task of reconciliation is complex, diversified and some-

times controversial and represents an enduring rite of passage for

the country and its nationhood. Other countries, particularly

those Anglo-Saxon democracies with which New Zealand likes

to compare itself, possess no equivalent. Some have a more cheq-

uered record in relation to indigenous people, and preservation of

harmonious racial order. In an era of international relations where

the idea of ‘soft power’, as distinct from the hard power of sheer

military and economic strength, is valued and promoted, New

Zealand has credentials. Soft power is not the monopoly of the

strong. It defines whatever contribution a small non-threatening

conscientious contributor to international relations can make.

The extent to which it nourishes evenhandedness and a potential

for impartiality is important for New Zealand soft power.

It is remarkable, nonetheless, the extent to which New Zea-

land’s sense of place in the world has for a century or more been

influenced through intermittent experiences of distant warfare.

For such a remote country with a traditionally low sense of threat

to its own physical existence, this is a curious birthmark. The ex-

planation derives, of course, from our colonial inheritance and a

sense of separation from pakeha cultural roots. This drove a psy-

chology of dependency and an enduring concern to demonstrate

that, despite geography, New Zealand remains a reliable, depend-

Terence O’Brien argues that good international citizenship not war involvement should underpin New Zealand’s sense of place

Terence O’Brien, a senior fellow at the Centre for Strategic Studies, Victoria

able partisan of Atlantic/European values and interests. The 21st

century is already, however, providing a test for this traditional

foundation beneath New Zealand external relations.

Two world wars, conflicts in Korea, Vietnam and Malaysia

and UN peace-making operations in sundry places add up to

a sturdy New Zealand record of burden sharing in the interna-

tional business of peace support. Membership variously in mili-

tary alliances (SEATO, ANZUS, the Canberra Pact) serves as

proof of New Zealand vigilance. Our prolonged four-year com-

memoration of New Zealand involvement in the First World

War (1914–18) represents an extensive tribute to the valour of

the New Zealand effort. It recalls that New Zealand pattern of

traditional dependency at the very moment when new dependen-

cies increasingly, however, shape New Zealand’s sense of place. It

recalls, too, severe blunders and mistaken ambitions on the part

of northern hemisphere politicians and commanders that cost

New Zealand dear. Has that lesson been retained?

That is a fair question at a time when, once again, New

Zealand has implicated defence forces in the Middle East. It is

remarkable, indeed, the extent to which the intermittent New

Zealand experience of distant warfare has centred around the

Middle East and its neighbourhood. There remains an embed-

ded conviction amongst New Zealand defence policy-makers,

reflected in government defence white papers, that this distant

region should be a focus for New Zealand military effort, al-

though there is no apparent disposition to deepen independent

understanding of the lessons or complexities which that region

now provides. The judgments and interests of others dictate New

Zealand’s decisions.

A small professional New Zealand Defence Force remains a real

national asset for the simple reason that it is itself a product of

In the Great War, as the First World War was known at the time, 5 per cent of New Zealand’s military-age men were killed


7

New Zealand society that traditionally embodies fair minded-

ness, evenhandedness, dependability and potential for impar-

tiality. For obvious reasons New Zealand defence planning is

predicated on an abiding assumption that only in the most ex-

ceptional circumstances would the force operate as a stand-alone

contingent.

Inter-operability with like-minded others is the presumed

rule of thumb reflected in the partnerships and coalitions New

Zealand seeks to join. These particularly involve NATO coun-

tries and especially the United States, but so far exclude inter-

operability exercising one-on-one with East Asian defence forces.

Successive New Zealand political leadership has commanded,

nonetheless, a ‘whole of government’ approach to Asian relation-

ship-building. It is not clear just how far the NZDF is actually on

board with that overall New Zealand blueprint for relationships

in important Asian countries — beyond occasional rhetoric and

some conventional defence diplomacy.

Official defence language about what drives New Zealand

coalition choices emphasises the importance of common values,

ideals and democracy when seeking partnerships. While at one

level this may be convincing, actual international experience

with conflict over the past 100 years points in a different direc-

tion. It proves clearly that common values or ideals do not ex-

plain alignments in times of need — communists and capitalists

fought fascists, dictatorships and democracies combined to con-

front communists, and right now human rights advocates join

with flagrant human rights abusers to defeat religious jihadists.

All this does not mean common values are not important, but

it does suggest that the government needs to task New Zealand

defence chiefs with developing closer operational ties with Asian

militaries, just as New Zealand private sector and other relation-

ships have evolved in such areas as trade, finance, education and

technology.

The new century so far yields conflict in the Middle East and

parts of Africa that is cruelly distinctive — involving ferocious

internally radicalised Islam together with intractable regional

separatism, tribalism and cultural antagonism. This resurgence

of religion as a vividly disruptive factor in international relations

was largely unforeseen by intelligence services. It affects the very

nature of diplomacy, peace-making and international security.

Expertise for handling those challenges no longer resides (if it

ever did) with governments, diplomats or military commanders

alone. Religion is now very obviously part of the problem, but

religion now also becomes part of the solution.

Military intervention by outsiders to take sides in such com-

bustible circumstances and to impose a victory for one religious

community over another is profoundly unwise. Inter-religious

dialogue between Muslims, between Muslims and Christians

and with other religions becomes an indispensable worldwide

priority. Domestic pressures upon individual governments by

religious leaders — including in New Zealand — to respond to

the barbarity of Middle Eastern conflict brings home forcibly the

new religious dimension to security in the modern secular age.

Yet it is important to be candid about underlying political

causes of the present tumult that touches nearly every single coun-

try in the Middle East. The region is historically much scarred by

violence — between empires, civilisations, cultures and religions.

In the modern era a particular succession of powerful outside

governments have intruded into the region to impose their ver-

sions of order, and to tie the region’s fate and resources, especially

oil, to their own interests. No other region has suffered quite the

same prolonged intrusion or manipulation.

Longlasting repercussionsIt is sheer self-deception to believe there is no connection between

the present radicalisation of Islam and its collision with an intru-

sive West bent upon privileging interests and spreading its values.

The repercussions of today’s devastating internal violence will one

way or another likely persist for decades ahead. Well resourced,

media savvy Islamic extremists are determined to redraw the map

of the Middle East rather in the same way imperialists did one

hundred years ago — with devastating consequences that persist.

New Zealand’s self-view in the future is perhaps less likely

to be influenced by war as such than by perceived threat of inse-

curity (perceived by others perhaps more than by New Zealand

itself) and by fundamental shifts to the tectonic plates below the

international landscape. The two factors are related but differ-

ent. The scourge of terrorism is not new. As a tactic it is as old

as warfare itself. In the modern era of accelerated movement by

people, weapons, technology, money and dissidence across na-

tional boundaries, it assumes ever greater foreboding. It deepens

the threat mentality amongst those who fear to be targets.

One danger is exaggeration, even fabrication, of intelligence

so that it becomes self-fulfilling prophecy. Look at Iraq and the

2003 invasion based upon doctored intelligence that was a mon-

umental blunder, whose disastrous consequences endure with the

rise of ISIS. In addition, earlier, the United States in particular

suffered a deep shock as the century began following spectacular

unprecedented attacks upon its homeland. Washington launched


8

a ‘war on terror’, which it has leveraged into an organising princi-

ple for American global leadership and which involves massively

enhanced intelligence gathering that surpasses in scale and pur-

pose anything known previously in order to confront threat.

The vehicle chosen by Washington and London to anchor

and co-ordinate the enhanced intelligence system internationally

directly involves New Zealand — through the so-called ‘Five

Eyes’ intelligence sharing arrangement between the five Anglo-

Saxon democracies. New Zealand is by far the junior participant

and, uniquely, the only one effectively with no hard power.

New Zealand perceptions about threat will obviously be influ-

enced through and by the consequential reorganisation within

Wellington of the management of both New Zealand interna-

tional security responses and the revitalised relationship with the

United States (after a 25-year standoff following US disapproval

of New Zealand’s non-nuclear policy). An expanded Prime

Minister’s Office with enhanced intelligence and national secu-

rity management responsibilities becomes a small cameo of the

American national security state system, where the White House

with the National Security Council and Pentagon holds sway

over external relations policy, including even the geo-politics of

trade policy, while diplomacy (the US State Department) endures

diminished standing. The system combines a staunch threat

mentality with firm conviction about the utility of hard power.

Given New Zealand possesses no effective hard power, it

seems counter-intuitive to tilt its own institutional arrangements

for policy-making now in the direction of such hard power cal-

culations, associated normally with the national security system

— exemplified in Washington or Canberra. It is a sign, however,

of how strongly the United States prefers to conform the practices

of smaller partners to its own matrix.

Mistrust elsewhere in the rest of the world about massive US

surveillance, and the notion of a five-nation stockade behind

which the English-speakers shelter in a hermetically sealed cabal,

can hardly be ignored in this country. In an era where New Zea-

land is crucially striving to widen and deepen global connections

(most notably in Asia) and where cultivation of trust with other

governments is an absolute premium for our diplomacy, the Five

Eyes arrangement risks some harm to New Zealand soft power

reputation. It is pretty obtuse to imagine otherwise.

The New Zealand requirement to strike the right balance be-

tween threat assessment and external opportunity — between

security policy and foreign policy — manifests itself particularly

in our neighbourhood policies with respect to the Pacific Islands

region and to Australia. The two relationships capture the es-

sential realities for New Zealand external policy and there is an

intrinsic connection for New Zealand between them.

The cultivation of stable, friendly, prosperous, well-disposed re-

lationships with the Pacific Islands region, where New Zealand

has extensive traditional ties together with constitutional obli-

gations and responsibilities, is an important New Zealand na-

tional interest in its own right. Although it is important always

to respect the diversity within the Pacific Islands region, New

Zealand policy should not be driven by calculations of threat to

our own well-being emanating from within the region. We need

to work co-operatively with others, notably of course Australia,

when pursuing our objectives, but, and this is important, New

Zealand must not conceive its role as acting as a proxy manager

of Pacific Islands region security on behalf of large powers (the

United States), thus sparing them the burdens of stewardship.

That point deserves to be registered because Australia, with

its larger baggage train of international interests, its middle-level

power ambition and its close security treaty relationship with

the United States, does conceive its own role as the metropolitan

power with regional security supervision responsibility. Its highly

developed sense of security vigilance nourishes interventionist in-

stincts in the Pacific Islands region, which some Australian pun-

dits have identified as Australia’s ‘arc of instability’. For New Zea-

land Australia remains, of course, its most important relationship

centred around the Canberra Pact as well as a Closer Economic

Relationship (CER) which is one of the world’s most comprehen-

sive, effective and compatible (with international trade rules) eco-

nomic agreements. It offers a platform for successful joint trade

relations with South-east Asia.

While New Zealand and Australia share much modern his-

tory, culture and attitude, neither envisages political federation

even while a network of agreements underpin unique political,

economic, security, social and cultural relationships, where New

Zealand occupies the classic situation of the junior partner; and

where the senior partner understandably pursues interests with

often little obvious concern for the junior bedfellow. In the past

Australia has identified the mutual security effort as the touch-

stone for the entire trans-Tasman relationship, whereas New Zea-

land emphasises rather the relationship’s multiple strands with-

out privileging one above others. New Zealand is motivated by

a practical realisation that its capacity to spend more on defence

is circumscribed, whilst Australia, because of its close American


9

security ties, confronts pressures to remain in step with its power-

ful patron when equipping its defence force.

In the Pacific Islands region, however, where the forces of glo-

balisation have debilitated traditional hierarchies and disturbed

small fragile economies, and where greater outside interest is evi-

dent particularly in regional maritime resources, there is emerg-

ing resistance amongst some governments to Australian and New

Zealand metropolitan supervision. Ideas for new regional insti-

tutions that would exclude the two metropolitans are surfacing.

Resistance remains also in negotiations over a revised reciprocal

regional trade agreement to replace an earlier non-reciprocal ar-

rangement.

Achilles heelIt is reasonably clear, moreover, that some Pacific Islands region

governments do not relish definition as an Achilles heel for Aus-

tralian and New Zealand security. Indeed, the shoe for some is

on the other foot. Those governments whose countries confront

real physical danger from sea-level rise as a consequence of cli-

mate change are disappointed at New Zealand and Australian

hesitance to commit to more ambitious carbon reduction targets.

Some are frustrated, too, by the way in which Australian and

New Zealand priorities (such as security harmonisation, money

laundering, tax havens, drugs and free market liberalisation) now

dominate agenda setting for the Pacific Islands Forum.

Greater attention from China and Japan has extended Pacific

Islands region diplomatic horizons and economic development

opportunities. This does not, in the New Zealand mind, indicate

sinister intent. New Zealand’s ability to ‘think small’ inside the

region has always previously counted as an asset. But the extent

to which New Zealand’s external political self-view now shifts

away from being a country both ‘in’ and ‘of’ the Pacific Islands

region towards a more detached metropolitan stance driven, for

example, by threat-dominated policy judgments because of Five

Eyes loyalties and/or Australia’s wider interests will obviate that

perceived New Zealand comparative advantage in neighbour-

hood dealings. The argument that New Zealand has no choice in

the matter is not compelling.

It is important at the same time to recognise that shifts in

the international political and economic landscape are changing

substantially New Zealand’s particular ‘comfort zone’ in external

relations, where for decades New Zealand looked principally to

Atlantic powers for reassurance to ensure its prosperity and secu-

rity. Over the last 30 years of the old century a group of larger de-

veloping economies, especially in Asia led first by Japan, and then

by China, seized upon the advantages of globalisation to register

economic and social progress that is transforming the centre of

the world’s political and economic gravity.

Great opportunityFor New Zealand the ‘potential of proximity’ to this transforming

gravitational pull replaces the old ‘tyranny of distance’ from its Eu-

ropean antecedents and, indeed, it must influence the New Zea-

land sense of place in the world. The newly emerging East Asian

powers who owe their success to their own industry and effort, not

to foreign magnanimity, are demonstrating that to be modern and

successful in today’s world does not necessarily require a country

first to become Western or democratic. One abiding lesson then

is that a world of diversity, involving a more hybrid international

order, remains the ultimate destiny for the age of globalisation.

The emergence of China in the 21st century with its economy

as a transforming influence in a world of established American

primacy will set the tenor of modern international relations. This

indomitable fact presents New Zealand with a challenge to its

foreign policy unequalled by any of its 20th century experience,

and one where New Zealand needs a clear sense of place in which

it accordingly promotes and protects its interests and values.

Like most small countries New Zealand does not want to

have to choose between the two powerful partners, China and

the United States. In this it shares an interest with most of the

rest of governments in East Asia. New Zealand needs a quality of

relationship in Washington and in Beijing that can survive those

occasions whenever choice becomes unavoidable. That requires

first and foremost independence in New Zealand foreign policy

thinking about those issues that shape the regional and global fu-

ture. Both China and the United States possess legitimate security

interests. One set of those interests does not automatically trump

the other, if a real basis for stable relations, regionally and glob-

ally, is to be established and sustained. Inside the United States

there is some reputable opinion that already describes America’s

strategic rebalancing towards Asia (the so-called ‘pivot’) as an ef-

fort to initiate Cold War style containment of China.

Globally, New Zealand multilateral diplomacy needs to keep

clearly in view the equivalence of responsibilities and of obligations

of all member states — the heavyweights and the featherweights

— inside the international system. As things stand the UN sys-

tem is experiencing a crisis of relevance. Inefficiencies, lack of co-

ordination, overlapping mandates and diminished member state

allegiances combine to undermine its standing. It stands in dire

need of reform — and so do attitudes of member states.

The UN system has, nonetheless, a sufficiently reputable list

of accomplishment in respect to economic and social develop-

ment in member states, to assisting countries to nationhood, to

protecting refugees and the rights of the child, to securing dis-

armament agreements and to the linking of major international

challenges of climate and environment with both security and

prosperity. Above all membership in the system ‘socialises’ mem-

ber governments to the business of dealing with others and im-

proving overall understanding of prevailing challenges. The sys-

tem is dismissed as a mere ‘talk shop’ by firm-eyed realists, but in

an era where religious and cultural antagonisms show every sign

of being very divisive it would be foolhardy indeed to dispense

with the ‘socialisation’ potential of the UN system; quite apart

from discounting the vast network of rules and principles devised

under its auspices to underpin the essential inter-dependence of


10

the international community.

The New Zealand sense of place internationally is, more-

over, reinforced by the effectiveness of a widely mandated system

grounded in open liberal order, in the sovereign equality between

nations and in principled negotiation open to all, as well as the

novel provision of permanent conference diplomacy which ben-

efits smaller countries with limited diplomatic reach. New Zea-

land has deep vested interest in an effective rules-based interna-

tional system that it specifically identifies as a vital New Zealand

security interest.

In the 21st century three inter-related changes are, howev-

er, vital. First, the successful large emerging economies (among

them China, Brazil, India and Indonesia) must commit to full

support of the international rules-based system from which they

have so conspicuously benefitted in ways that are commensurate

now with their increased capacities, interests and responsibilities.

That will entitle them to a greater say in the management of and,

indeed, future agenda setting in the system.

Second, the necessary space for this change to occur requires

that important Western governments, founders of the system and

New Zealand’s traditional mainstays, should now share their

monopoly over management and command inside the system

with the entitled newcomers. Those governments must move to

create the necessary space.

Third, and more specifically, China and the United States must

commit to equality of responsibility and obligation inside the

system. For the United States this will inevitably require that it

dispense with ‘exceptionalism’ according to which it self exempts

from international rules that are perceived (in Washington) to

infringe US sovereignty or interests. Without such a conversion it

will be very difficult to persuade China (and others) not to assert

similar immunities. It is wrong to under-estimate how difficult

this will be for Washington to set the example whereby the Unit-

ed States will share power with others and not impose its power

upon others through the international system. Yet if Washington

is concerned to ensure that its supreme legacy to the world of an

open, liberal, equitable international system from which others

like New Zealand have so manifestly benefitted endures, then

such adjustment is unavoidable.

Efforts to refashion the international system to reflect chang-

ing reality have been made. The formation of the G20, involving

the world’s top twenty economies, is a recognition that success-

ful large emerging countries must be enrolled in the business of

guiding the global economy. The G20 is not intended to take

charge of existing trade, economic and financial international in-

stitutions but rather to improve and reform their operations on

the basis of G20 members’ collective undertaking to sustain an

open world economy.

This resolve sounds encouraging but results are uncertain.

American trade policy, for example, involves three major ini-

tiatives — the Trans-Pacific Partnership, where New Zealand

is closely implicated, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment

Partnership (TTIP) with the European Union and a Trade in

Services Agreement (TISA) involving a selected group of coun-

tries (New Zealand included). These are ambitious proposals that

extend well beyond traditional free trade agreements and aim at

significant economic policy integration between participants.

What is common to all three is that they specifically exclude any

of the fast growth newly emergent economies (such as China,

India and Brazil).

If consummated, such agreements would segregate the world

trade economy and, of course, in the case of the TPP (where only

five Asian countries of differing size are involved) the Asia–Pacif-

ic regional economy. TPP proponents, including New Zealand,

emphasise that future membership will be open to all and the

TPP is thus a stepping stone to an eventual comprehensive in-

tegrated Asia–Pacific wide trade/economic area. The majority of

East Asian governments (including China) prefers an alternative

stepping stone and are negotiating a Regional Comprehensive

Economic Partnership, where New Zealand is adroitly involved

but not the United States. The ultimate outcome for this compet-

ing miscellany of economic negotiation is difficult to foretell. The

notion that in order to integrate the region it must first be segre-

gated represents curious logic. Globally the tripod of US initia-

tives seem also to diverge from the stated aims of the G20 about

an open world economy.

Good citizenship Finally, for many New Zealanders the country’s identity is best

defined not by war but by its exercise of good global citizenship.

The New Zealand role in the UN system provides a snapshot.

Every once in a while the New Zealand place within the sys-

tem is illuminated by a seat around the table at the UN Secu-

rity Council. This is the case right now. It is a rare experience.

In 70 years New Zealand has served the regulation two-year

term just three times (it also served one half-term). Success in

the face of tough competition for a seat is understandably ex-

tolled by New Zealand governments as recognition of New

Zealand’s merit.

As a non-permanent council member New Zealand has only

two years to make a mark. That is not very long in Security Coun-

cil terms. The influence New Zealand is able to exercise over that

time depends upon the skill and foresight of its diplomacy, al-

though this is likely to be exceeded ultimately by the influence

that the Security Council experience itself has on New Zealand

foreign policy — both during and after its tenure. While some

depletion of New Zealand foreign policy capability occurred be-

cause of some government directed internal MFAT reforms, a

deft and conscientious two-year performance remains very fea-

sible. Decisions at the political level in Wellington will always

of course, finally determine New Zealand alignments in various

negotiations over key UN Security Council issues in New York.

The hard bargaining at the Security Council occurs behind

closed doors. A reputation for good global citizenship continues

to depend rather more on New Zealand’s contribution across the

more transparent activities and wider horizons of the UN sys-

tem — affecting contributions to peacekeeping, the generosity of

refugee quota, the levels of aid (overseas development assistance)

for poverty reduction and contributions to the climate change

negotiations and those for environmental protections. The list

is longer than that. Any sense amongst other governments that

New Zealand is slipping off the pace (and there is, indeed, some

decline discernible in some areas, such as UN peacekeeping) sub-

tracts from perceptions by others of New Zealand’s good global

citizenship credentials. New Zealand campaigned successfully

for a council seat on the promise of independent foreign policy

and the merits of sound small country judgment. It needs to de-

liver on that testimony.


11

On first examination, David Lange and Jeremy Corbyn seem to

have little in common. David Lange was hailed as a saviour after

being elected as a member of Parliament, deputy leader (1979),

leader (1983) and then prime minister (1984). He went on to win

a second term — till then Labour’s only since 1938. But look

again, at policy and role rather than style and personality, and

Corbyn’s election feels like déjà vu for anyone who remembers

the 1980s. Lange’s elevation, like Corbyn’s, precipitated a seismic

shift in the political climate. Both were popularly elected — not

pushing but pushed into the forefront — with a passionate desire

to be inclusive in policy formation and to balance the interests of

labour and capital. Jeremy Corbyn has a record of Robin Hood-

like support for his constituents just as Lange had, albeit the lat-

ter’s tenure in Mangere was considerably shorter than Corbyn’s

is in London’s Islington North. It is, of course, Corbyn’s fierce

determination to oppose a new generation of nuclear missiles that

suggests an immediate comparison with David Lange. Corbyn,

as Lange did, will have to face down the military industrial elite.

This will be trial enough. But, like Lange, Corbyn’s Achilles heel

threatens to be ‘the economy, stupid’.1

Revolutions, wrote Gerald Hensley, are famously touched off

by the unexpected.2 Could the unexpected election of Jeremy

Corbyn be the trigger for an English equivalent of a Boston tea

party? The day after his success, both the broad sheets and the

red tops were already dismissing him. Yet even the most wither-

ing commentators admitted a grudging admiration for someone

who had the brass neck to think he could change anything at all.

But despite themselves, they were touched by Corbyn’s message

of hope for a new, gentler, style of politics. And as a leader elected

with almost 60 per cent of the vote, he just might usher in a new

era of greater democracy when those who did not usually vote,

would vote. Even so, commentators predicted that the parliamen-

tary party would dump Corbyn, just as soon as it recovered from

the shock. These pundits of gloom were confounded when Cor-

byn received two standing ovations at the Labour Party Confer-

ence. He affirmed that his populist election was revolutionary.

What happened this summer with the leadership election was a

Jeremy Corbyn as British Labour leader and

most recent book, Scholars, Poets and Radicals, was published by the Bodleian in

political earthquake… According to the script, socialist and

social democratic parties were in decline. Social democracy

itself was exhausted. Dead on its feet. Yet something new and

invigorating, popular and authentic, has exploded.

This could have been a speech made by David Lange. Yet on the

face of things Corbyn and Lange have little in common. Da-

vid Lange’s election as leader, and as prime minister seventeen

months later was greeted with euphoria. Lange was at the time

almost twenty years younger than Corbyn is now, and their per-

sonalities are as different as chalk and cheese. Corbyn is watch-

ful, patient, restrained and reticent. Lange was often reckless.

Jeremy Corbyn

A powerful orator with

an acerbic wit, often

directed against him-

self, his quips brought

gusts of laughter and his

gnomic thrusts winded

his critics. Corbyn has

none of Lange’s ebul-

lience. In Parliament, he

comes across as a world-

weary schoolteacher

facing a rebellious class

of teenagers. Yet, he

has the power to tame

them. Turning prime

minister’s question time

into ‘a people’s question

time’, Corbyn regaled

his smirking audience

with the story of home-

less Mathew. The class,

of MPs, tittered. David

Cameron appeared ‘not

to care’, but Corbyn

came back with ‘but

Matthew does’. Cam-

eron, chastened, shot his

supporters a withering

look upon which they

immediately assumed

compassionate masks.3

Lange, no doubt, would

have had something

contemptuous on the tip

of his tongue in such a

situation.


12

Wide appealThere are several reasons for comparing Lange and Corbyn. Both

leaders had wide appeal, as attractive to baby boomers as to the

internet generation; like Lange, Corbyn had set up close, per-

sonal, communication with his electorate, except the latter has

the advantage of the internet and smart phones. Their agendas,

too, are remarkably similar: addressing poverty and exclusion,

facing up to the establishment on tax and welfare reform and no

more corporate backing in return for jobs for the boys, either in

Parliament or government, for example. Corbyn’s anti-austerity

case rests on investment in people and enterprise, rather than par-

simony.4

Lange had his hands tied by his finance minister, Roger

Douglas, whose astringent policies came to be admired by Ron-

ald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. Douglas introduced de-reg-

ulation of the economy, and cuts left workers and government

officials without jobs. The unions were in uproar. Lange, with

Mike Moore at his side, had to come up with a compromise,

which he dubbed ‘a manifesto which appealed to the right, the

left, the centre and the totally bewildered’. Lange sought to weak-

en the influence of the Douglasites by reshuffling his Cabinet,

but this did little to prevent guerrilla warfare breaking out. Early

in 1988, while Douglas was overseas, Lange shelved the right-

wingers’ new flat tax plans. The rift between Lange and Douglas

was now public, and there was no compromise. When Labour’s

caucus re-elected Douglas to the Cabinet in 1989, Lange picked

up his bat and walked.

Hot water Corbyn may have studied Lange’s demise, and he certainly had a

bird’s eye view of the Blair–Brown power struggle. Consequent-

ly, he appointed an ally, John McDonnell, as shadow chancellor.

But this has not pleased his critics in the parliamentary party.

After only a few weeks in post, he is already in hot water over his

chancellor’s U-turn on fiscal management. Twenty Labour MPs,

forbearing to toe the party line, abstained in the vote. Perhaps,

too, there are shades of President Obama. When elected, he called

for growth through investment in jobs with a decent wage, care

families can afford, extension of free health care, dignified retire-

ment, and scrutiny of public accounts — the equivalent of David

Lange’s ‘open the books’.5 ‘Only then’, Obama expounded, ‘can

we restore the vital trust between a people and a government… a

nation cannot prosper long when it favours only the prosperous’.

In response, the wrath of the American Right was unleashed.

In opposing the austerity measures, including the much-de-

spised cuts in welfare payments, Corbyn, too, will have to face

the hubris of what C. Wright Mills called the ‘military industrial

complex’. More immediately, Corbyn must contain disagreement

in his shadow Cabinet. If not, say the gossips, the voters will run

scared. The jury is out, but Martin Wolf, writing in the usually

redneck Financial Times, gave two cheers for Corbyn’s ‘chal-

lenges to economic convention… challenges he will make demo-

cratically’.6 Corbyn, it seems, is not so green. He, unlike some of

his predecessors, knows intuitively the value of what Joseph Nye

terms ‘soft power’.7

The use of ‘soft power’ will be a useful tool in the forthcom-

ing negotiations between the European Union and the present

British government. David Cameron, more dove than hawk,

will come up against formidable opposition from his own party.

Corbyn, too, is in for a storm. There were no mutineers when

New Zealand took on the Common Market. Sir John Marshall,

a past master in the wielding of soft power, led the charge. While

everyone was behind Marshall, there are splits in Corbyn’s back

yard. When Corbyn came out against a Brexit, the unions and

other dissenters harked back to the old days when socialists saw

the Common Market as a ‘rich man’s club’. Corbyn sees oth-

erwise: the size of the market there with opportunities for job

creation, inwards investment and higher returns through provi-

sion of services — education, for example. He would do well to

remind all parties in the escalating battle that the original Treaty

of Rome called for a balancing of the interests of labour and capi-

tal, coming at a time of austerity after the Second World War.

EU legislation has benefitted the individual too. It has help bring

about unprecedented improvements in human rights, work place

rights and equality. But as most observers know, the debate will

be fiercely subjective, each side having its own barrow to push.

Historians may recall that the most significant challenge to New

Zealand’s export markets came not from Britain, or Europe, but

from America. In 1933 one of the major goals of American trade

policy had been to ‘smash Ottawa utterly’ — to be rid of Com-

monwealth Preference — a sentiment reiterated by President

Kennedy in 1962 when it was included in instructions to State

Department officials serving in Brussels. And New Zealand took

heed. It set out to locate itself in its own (Asia–Pacific) back-

yard, enabling it to box above weight. The British government,

also hedging its bets, is looking elsewhere to shore up its trade.

It is giving China the red carpet treatment, even though China’s

steel subsidies have contributed to liquidations, layoffs and de-

skilling in the United Kingdom’s industry; in any case, British

trade with China is less than half of its trade with France. India

and Africa, too, are in its sights, and, as ever, North America.

Yet America has shown itself to be as perfidious as Albion where

its own trading interests are concerned. When British steel came

under threat from America during the Gulf War, the government

had to call on the European Union for help. There is a lesson to

be learnt from this, one advocated by former European Trade

Commissioner Lord Patten.8 Corbyn draws strength from Lord

Palmerston’s words:

it is a narrow policy to suppose that this country or that is to

be marked out as the eternal ally or the perpetual enemy of

England. We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual

enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and those

interests it is our duty to follow.9

Small wonder then that there are as many concerns about the

TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) in the

United Kingdom and Europe as there are in New Zealand over

the TPP.

Corbyn has already sought advice on the TTIP. Is he mindful

of the furore that faced Lange when he held the foreign policy

brief, in addition to the premiership? Both leaders, of course,

committed themselves to a moral foreign and defence policy.

Corbyn is known to have influenced David Cameron’s decision

to pull the plug on a prison project in Saudi Arabia, and is set

to remind Chinese President Xi Jinping of human rights abuses,

politely and in private, if he gets a chance. But it is Corbyn’s op-

position to the forthcoming renewal of Trident that puts one

immediately in mind of David Lange. Both Lange and Corbyn

broke their political teeth in grass roots activism, nurturing a


13

longstanding repugnance for the gung-ho reliance on the threat

of mass destruction. For both, all nuclear weapons are morally

indefensible.

Will Corbyn be able to take public opinion with him? It was

easier for Lange. He knew that most New Zealanders had a deep-

seated resentment towards nuclear testing in the Pacific, perpe-

trated, in the past, by the British, Americans and, particularly,

the French in Moruroa Atoll. Opposition to nuclear testing had

been a plank of Norman Kirk’s success in 1972. As prime min-

ister, he sent a frigate to the French test area to protest. It caused

a fray in the ANZUS alliance, as he made it known that New

Zealand did not want to be dragged into foreign wars and be-

come a Russian target. Closer to home, there had been evidence

of radioactive strontium 90 in milk samples.

As prime minister, Lange took New Zealand’s anti-nuclear

stance as his own. And he travelled to the United States and

United Kingdom to explain why. Within months, Lange had

more power to his elbow after French agents, sanctioned by their

government, bombed the Rainbow Warrior to prevent it travel-

ling to Moruroa in protest at the nuclear testing. Hardly surpris-

ing then that he carried the majority of the population with him

when he sought to exclude American surface vessels from New

Zealand’s territorial waters, lest they should be nuclear-armed.

Lange argued, as Corbyn must, that if the role of the state is to

protect its peoples, then how can they be protected with weapons

of mass destruction? Such ‘finality’, he asserted, ‘guarantees only

insecurity’ — a ‘policy of mutually assured destruction… we will

all be in the throes of nuclear winter… enemy or friend… nuclear

weapons create terror’.10 His appearance in debate at the Oxford

Union, arguing against the moral majority leader Jerry Falwell,

earned him an international reputation for his oratory skills. But

Lange’s policy unleashed uproar in America, Britain and France,

and the hostility of the Australian government. As a result of the

1987 legislation, ANZUS unravelled. ‘We part as friends, but we

part… We have lost New Zealand’s address’, George Shultz told

the world’s press. Margaret Thatcher was irate. It was the ‘first

blot’ on the historic relationship between Britain and New Zea-

land.11

British Foreign Secretary Geoffrey Howe, usually such a

gentle man, told New Zealand of-

ficials in London that their country

was behaving like a small country

in the Eastern Bloc. By how much

more will Corbyn’s policy upset the

West’s defence establishment? How

will he find a way out of this one,

should he become prime minister?

At the moment he is implacable in

his opposition to Trident’s renewal,

which he deems ‘a great hunk of use-

less weaponry’, as he told the BBC.

These missiles will ‘not deter modern

terrorists… and cannot be just a job

creation scheme for Scotland’. The

defence establishments, in London

and Washington, will hover over

Corbyn like a sword of Damocles.

Will he be up for the fight, asks Si-

mon Jenkins, and ‘break the craven

The Trident rocket replace-

appeasement of the industrial lobbies and log-rollers’?12

Unlike Lange, Corbyn has not, as yet, taken the majority of his

party, or the country, with him on this issue. The parliamentary

party, with an eye on electability, wants to be seen as tough on

defence and is unwilling, or unable, to differentiate between nu-

clear and conventional arms. At the party conference in Septem-

ber 2015, Corbyn made no diatribe. Like a senior member of the

family, he cautioned that it was ‘wrong to fund a replacement for

Trident… I don’t believe that £100bn spent on a new generation

of nuclear weapons taking up a quarter of our defence budget

is the right way forward’. However, he warned delegates that he

was ‘gearing up and prepared for a fight over Britain’s independ-

ent nuclear deterrent’. And he would use his huge mandate to

persuade people over to his view.

If necessary, Corbyn told the conference, he would eventu-

ally force his will on areas such as Trident that have defined his

political worldview over three decades. Failing in his attempt to

hold a conference vote on the issue, he displayed his conciliatory

credentials, announcing that Maria Eagle, the shadow defence

secretary, would lead a review into Trident. But he warned Eagle,

and any other dissenting members in the shadow defence team,

that he was ready for a fight if they continued to support Trident.

Softening the situation, as is his way, he said: ‘I believe Britain

should honour our obligations under the non-proliferation treaty,

and lead in making progress on international nuclear disarma-

ment.’

The Labour Party has, of course, been here before. Go back

to the successful motion calling for unilateral disarmament at La-

bour’s Scarborough Conference in October 1960; future Prime

Minister Harold Wilson was a prime mover. Hugh Gaitskell, in

answer, was passionate and defiant. He would, he said, ‘fight,

fight and fight again to save the Party we love’. As Nye Bevin had

famously said, without the nuclear deterrent Britain would face

going ‘naked into the conference chamber’. Within a year the

conference motion was reversed.

Sharp divisionPragmatism may be informing the New Zealand government’s


14

desire to find a way through the nuclear ships impasse. During

her tenure, Helen Clark remained faithful to the spirit of Lange’s

stand. She was not ‘in thrall to the great powers’ and continued

to work for an independent ‘Pacific’ foreign policy. Nowadays,

John Key sits uneasily with the policy and is mindful of pressure

from his own (defence) officials as well as from the United States;

in any case, the United States has taken all nuclear weapons off

its surface vessels. But views in New Zealand are still sharply di-

vided.13

This is as nothing to the divisions that will spring up in the

United Kingdom, Europe and America if Corbyn pushes ahead

with his policy. Could this trigger a bonfire of alliances? Will

Germany or France inherit Britain’s so-called special relationship

with the United States? Will Britain be downgraded as New Zea-

land was in 1987? But Corbyn has proffered an olive branch. He

insists that he

understands the argument put forward by supporters of

Trident, which includes many of his trade union backers…

but in developing our policy through the [Eagle] review, we

must make sure all the jobs and skills of everyone in every

aspect of the defence industry are fully protected and fully

utilised so that we gain from this, we don’t lose from this. To

me, that is very important.

Like Lange and Obama, Corbyn has no intention of disman-

tling Britain’s conventional defences, or of cocking a snook at

allies. As leader, rather than activist and bad boy of the back-

benches, and should he become prime minister, he insists that

he will play his part if required. But he has vowed never to

press the nuclear button. Provocatively, a senior serving general

responded by threatening mutiny should Corbyn ever become

premier. Guardian journalist Seumus Milne retaliated, asking

‘what if a Muslim’ had made such a threat? Security, as Lange

had argued, is only safeguarded when proportionality is exer-

cised, and on behalf of a just cause and planning for a just out-

come. Corbyn may well be rehearsing these arguments when

he is faced with the very real possibility of airstrikes on Syria.

But, in his view, this is a problem that ‘won’t be settled by a few

more bombs’ — and it seems he has found an ally in the newly

elected Justin Trudeau in Canada.

Although such issues must weigh heavily on Corbyn, he reacts to

criticism in a mild mannered way. This is often misinterpreted.

The press portray him as not being serious, less politely as ‘a rank

amateur’ and, dismissively, as ‘incompetent’.14 Britain’s manda-

rins, we can hazard a guess, will have much the same attitude

to Corbyn as senior officials in New Zealand’s Treasury, Min-

istry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Defence had to Lange.

Jerry Falwell told the world that Lange’s action (proposing the

nuclear free legislation) was ‘juvenile’.15 Writing in the Guardian,

Poly Toynbee accused Corbyn of ‘a lack of professionalism’.16 She

should perhaps look back at the writing of her illustrious ances-

tor, the classicist Gilbert Murray, who made dire warnings about

the consequences of war (the First World War), as, of course, fa-

mously, did John Maynard Keynes.17

Corbyn is essentially an autodidact, who has earned his

laurels, not in Oxbridge but on a back-bench apprenticeship as

lengthy as Jacob’s was to Laban; he was first elected as an MP in

1983 and was active in the peace movement when still in short

trousers. The sun shone on him in Brighton at the party confer-

ence, where he made his debut speech. Although, unlike Lange

and Obama, he is no orator, and is no ‘cult personality’, he was

‘an anchor’.18 His authenticity and courtesy have dampened the

ire of even his bitterest critics.19 With these attributes he would

be a welcome guest at any genteel tea party. But his intention

to ‘stir up Britain… to challenge the financial and defence es-

tablishments’ is revolutionary. It is a ‘call to action for the sans-

culottes’.20 A genie has been unleashed’, added Gaby Hinsliff in

the Guardian.21 David Lange, for one, would be cheering from

the treetops in Elysium’s fields.

But tougher and more uncompromising tests are around the

corner.22 At the moment, the nucleus of Corbyn’s support lies

outside the House of Commons. Inside, he has to face down

members of the new Momentum group, who want what they

call ‘progressive change’, code for going along with Chancellor

Osborne’s austerity programme. But in his quiet way, with ‘the

greatest democratic mandate of any British party leader in his-

tory’, he may well have triggered a revolution, one that renews

the electorate’s enthusiasm for the ballot box.23 In an era where

the electorate in the United Kingdom, as in New Zealand, has

been switched-off, we may, in future, be raising three cheers for

greater democracy!

NOTES1. Coined by James Carville, campaign strategist for Bill

Clinton’s successful 1992 presidential campaign. See also

Andrew Grice, Guardian, 17 Oct 2015.

2. Gerald Hensley, Friendly Fire (Auckland, 2013), p.24.

3. Prime Minister’s Questions, UK Parliament, 14 Oct 2015.

4. Seumus Milne: ‘It’s the establishment that has a problem with

democracy’. Guardian, 24 Sep 2015.

5. President Obama’s acceptance speech, Nov 2008.

6. Martin Wolf, Financial Times, 2 Oct 2015, p.11.

7. See Rita Ricketts, ‘Match point’, NZ International Review, vol

33, no 6 (2008).

8. Rita Ricketts, ‘Post-modern states’, ibid., vol 30, no 1

(2005).

9. Third Viscount Palmerston, House of Commons, 7 Aug

1844.

10. Oxford Union debate, 1 Mar 1985.

11. There could have been an earlier one, if, when the United

Nations sought to condemn the British invasion of Suez, the

Anglophile Walter Nash had not, reluctantly, sided with the

British against the advice of his officials. For a moment, New

Zealand lost face as an honest broker. Rita Ricketts, oral

interview with Tom Larkin, 2013.

12. Simon Jenkins, Guardian, 1 Oct 2015.

13. Hensley, p.296.

14. Grice, Guardian, 17 Oct 2015.

15. Oxford Union debate.

16. Poly Toynbee, Guardian, 30 Sep 2105.

17. Rita Ricketts, Scholars, Poets and Radicals (Oxford, 2015),

p.64.

18. Gary Younger, Guardian, 30 Sep 2015.

19. See, for example, Andrew Grice’s recantation. Guardian, 17

Oct 2015.

20. Matthew d’Ancona, ibid., 30 Sep 2015.

21. Ibid., 30 Sep 2015.

22. Ibid., leader, 30 Sep 2015.

23. Owen Jones, ibid., 30 Sep 2015.


15

‘Let’s hear it for the French. Not only did the Rainbow Warrior sinking remind us how arrogantly larger powers may

disregard the integrity of small states, it was also a below-the-

belt lesson about the reality of international incidents; this

one hit home out of the blue from an unanticipated quarter.

Neither ANZUS nor strategies of forward defence were

relevant.’ (Pauline Swain, 1985)1

David Lange’s Parisian entanglements prompted contemporary

global leaders to nod that he was a serious player on the interna-

tional landscape. It was a suite of three initiatives that had him

(and New Zealand) on collision courses with French President

Francois Mitterrand and his lieutenants. Lange’s exposure of

French culpability in the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior, his

firm advocacy for the French South Pacific territory of New Cal-

edonia to become the independent Kanaky and his being at the

forefront of international opposition to French nuclear testing at

Moruroa together present a major portfolio of global diplomacy

by a New Zealand prime minister.

Lange’s global diplomacy with Washington has been so well

raked over that that literature fills a library shelf. But his Mitter-

rand global diplomacy lacks any substantial assessment.

Lange’s was a high wire act, with no safety net, as he went

head-to-head with Mitterrand. He never lost his footing. Twice,

scorpion-like, Lange stung the president — when he showed

Mitterrand’s culpability for the Rainbow Warrior’s bombing and

when his interventions secured New Caledonia’s reinscription on

the United Nations List of Non-Self-Governing Territories. Each

is among the handful of most serious setbacks for Mitterrand

during his fourteen years as president.

Lange and Mitterrand never met. Nor did Lange encounter

any of Mitterrand’s four prime ministers — Pierre Mauroy, Lau-

rent Fabius, Jacques Chirac or Michel Rocard. Lange missed out

completely on one of his own predecessor’s most favoured locales

Ken Ross discusses the Labour prime minister’s contest with French President

Ken Ross was an analyst with the External Assessments Bureau, Department

associate at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, London and the

— Parisian nightclubs. Mul-

doon was in Paris eight times

during his prime minister-

ship and met Mitterrand.

Lange never got there. He

met Claude Cheysson, the

first of France’s three foreign

ministers during Lange’s

prime ministership, but only

once, at the United Nations

in New York in September

1984. Cheysson lost his job

two months later — his two

successors, Roland Dumas

(1984–86, 1988–93) and Francois Mitterrand

Jean-Bernard Raimond (1986–88), steered clear of Lange.

His sharp relationship with Mitterrand was extraordinary. Lange,

who relied heavily on establishing personal rapport with other

leaders, had to do mind games with Mitterrand. His early pitch


16

lomatic weaving and threading of the high politics of the affair

remains locked away, seemingly for a long time yet. Thus, Lange’s

pivotal interventions are little known publicly.

By contrast, we can pry closely into Lange’s New Caledo-

nia initiative. We have a magnificent resource for the first four

months, from when the South Pacific Forum concluded in late

August 1984, which opens up a rare view of New Zealand’s

most talented diplomats at work. Four foreign ministry files,

R20766230 to R20766233, at Archives New Zealand detail

the progress until 31 December 1984 of the Forum Ministerial

Group on New Caledonia. (Later files in this series will not be

available until 2020.)

By the year’s end Lange had made his mark with the ini-

tiative, which developed a life of its own as 1985 began. From

then, he intervened just at critical moments. However, it is evi-

dent that things slowed down during 1985 as the succeeding file,

R20766234, which is not publicly accessible, covers the whole of

that year — a sharp contrast to the four substantial files needed

for the final four months of 1984.

New Caledonia5 was Lange’s principal ‘captain’s call’ in his glob-

al diplomacy. In this he was superbly backed by his senior foreign

ministry officials — Merv Norrish, Tim Francis and Chris Beeby

— as well as key working level ones, such as Dick Grant (the

consul-general in Noumea), John McArthur (the ambassador in

Paris) and Diane Wilderspin (in Wellington).

Lange had become absorbed in the cause of the Kanak inde-

pendentists before he became prime minister on 26 July 1984.

New Caledonia was the foremost topic for Lange on his first two

overseas trips as prime minister — to a Commonwealth regional

leaders (CHOGRM) meeting in Papua New Guinea on 8 Au-

gust and then the annual South Pacific Forum on 27 and 28

August.

Lange’s grasp of the New Caledonia topic is clear from the

summary records of the two meetings’ discussions. (The official

records of both meetings are at Archives New Zealand.6) On

each occasion Lange was to the fore in the discussion of New

Caledonia, which was the lead topic at both meetings. The forum

record of that discussion is 3300 words long and leaves no doubt

of Lange’s urgency. He emerges from the two meetings with a

clear mandate (despite a couple of Bob Hawke hissy fits) to push

the region’s concern.

that as fellow progressives they should

have the same perspective was breath-

taking in its gaucheness. This was over

New Caledonia — Mitterrand as lead-

er of the French Socialist Party in 1979

had signed off his party’s support for

the Kanak independentists. But, when

president, he never delivered.

Lange foiled Mitterrand. His

strength — his public wit — out-

pointed the Frenchman, whose tactic

as a master of elusiveness and devi-

ousness did not play well vis-à-vis the

New Zealander. Nor, importantly,

did it with other world leaders as they

watched the pair jostle.

The outstanding portrait of Mit-

terrand came early in his presidency

— Christine Nay’s The Black and the Red: Francois Mitterrand The Story of an Ambition (1984, Eng trans 1987).

She focused on ‘what events had

shaped Mitterrand before he, in turn,

shaped events’.

My Mitterrand is drawn predomi-

nantly through the contemporary

lens of the writings of British journal-

ists who throughout his presidency

camped outside the Elysee Palace

crafting their prose — in particular the BBC’s Philip Short, the

Guardian’s Paul Webster, and Jonathan Fenby. Each has subse-

quently written a major book reflecting on his Mitterrand ex-

perience. Short packaged Mitterrand as ‘intimidating… subtle,

stealthy, artful and determined’.2 The quintessential one-liner

summing up Mitterrand is that the phonetic translation of his

name in Chinese is ‘a perfectly clear enigma’.3

For Mitterrand, his French nationalism was foremost. He

performed poorly as an international progressive. Lange learned

that, finally. Norman Kirk could have warned Lange. Kirk saw

first-hand how the French Socialists under Mitterrand’s leader-

ship mingled at the Socialist International — but at the most

pertinent moment for Kirk, speaking out against nuclear testing,

the French stood aside from the body’s willingness to meet Kirk’s

push for condemnation of nuclear tests.

Much of what happened when French agents sank the Rainbow Warrior on 10 July 1985 is known. Michael King’s The Death of the Rainbow Warrior is easily the most authoritative account

from the New Zealand perspective of the bombing itself and the

early aftermath — but King published on the first anniversary

of the bombing and never returned to the subject. His book has

short-comings, particularly his late addition (on page 188) of a

‘second male and female couple’ of agents.

Media reporting, both New Zealand and foreign, enables a

good enough appreciation of the comings and goings between

Wellington and Paris, sometimes via the United Nations (in

New York), as the diplomacy of the aftermath played out during

Lange’s prime ministership. Sir Kenneth Keith has now given us

his insights as a key participant.4 But the fine detail of the dip-

The Rainbow Warrior


17

Ahead of the forum meeting, Lange had ensured that New

Zealand took charge by circulating a discussion paper. The fo-

rum set up a ministerial action group. Lange got himself on the

team and immediately took the lead. The forum wanted their

team to go see for themselves what the conditions in New Cal-

edonia were. The French said ‘Non’ to the group; but would allow

individual foreign ministers to visit.

Lange had his next move in play immediately. A month on, he

was in New York for the UN General Assembly to megaphone to

the world leaders that ‘it will be clear in many parts of the world

that a new Government is at work in New Zealand, with a new

spirit and a new approach to world affairs’.7 He had already in-

formed his Cabinet, after the forum meeting: ‘The message I shall

put across is that the Forum has now acknowledged that it has a

major interest in securing a peaceful transfer to independence in

New Caledonia. In the past it has barked only at the French: now

we seek to keep both sides herded in the dialogue pen.’8

Added visitIn New York, Lange met Cheysson. Diplomatically, he told his

French counterpart that he was going to add Noumea to this

trip, so would arrive in ten day’s time. Paris was back-footed.

Lange was thorough in arranging, with their assistance, his visit

on 6 October. He spent a day in non-stop talks. The next day

he flew to Vanuatu to lunch with Prime Minister Walter Lini

and his ministers to report on these talks. It was a manoeuvre

which broke open the issue. The following day Lange informed

his Cabinet of the progress.9

From then Lange did not let off the pace, continuing to nudge

the forum, particularly as serious political disturbances erupted

in New Caledonia in November 1984, continuing through 1985

and deepening when Jacques Chirac’s conservatives won control

of the National Assembly in France in March 1986 and formed

a ‘cohabitation’ government. Mitterrand continued as president.

The 1986 forum committed to ‘battle’ for the Kanak independ-

entists, who wanted New Caledonia to be reinscribed on the

United Nations List of Non-Self-Governing Territories — Paris

having unilaterally taken it off the list in 1947. A battle royal

developed at the General Assembly as the vote approached in

December 1986. Paris was defeated heavily — 89 to 24 (with 34

abstentions).

A year later the battle was as fierce. Paris managed to reduce

support by twenty votes so only 69 countries voted for the con-

tinued reinscription, but the ‘no’ vote crept up by just three to

27. Abstentions jumped to 47 and there were other countries not

willing to be present, even to record an abstention.10

The following year, 1988, when the Socialists had regained

control of the government (and Mitterrand had defeated Chirac

for the presidency), Paris accepted the status quo without a fight.

Today, New Caledonia continues to be listed.

Lange’s leadership is not forgotten in New Caledonia, France,

and many other places, even if few New Zealanders have this

awareness. New Caledonia’s reinscription ranks as one of the worst

defeats ever for France at the United Nations. Yet, at the time, it

was barely known in New Zealand how engaged Lange was or

how prominent New Zealand was in the forum effort — the first

time the forum had put a regional issue on the world stage.

Fascinating chapterThe bombing of the Rainbow Warrior is the most fascinat-

ing chapter in Lange’s global diplomacy — more so than the

ANZUS/nuclear free New Zealand saga. This affair still lacks an

accomplished story-teller of the political diplomacy dimension.

Lange’s leadership of the New Zealand cause following the

bombing of the Rainbow Warrior humiliated Mitterrand when

his government was exposed as being culpable. Paris took a seri-

ous beating in the court of world opinion. It was New Zealand’s

efforts that turned around the Mitterrand government’s initial

‘non-ownership’ of the bombing. Merv Norrish, one of Lange’s

key officials, has the perspective spot-on: ‘New Zealand did well

to catch two of the agents involved and to sheet home responsibil-

ity to the Government of France.’11 And then to secure a fulsome

apology, substantial compensation, avert trade repercussions, and

garner access to the European Union of $200 million of addi-

tional agricultural exports was simply impressive.

New Zealand’s police and diplomats deserve much kudos.

Over and above them Lange’s contribution was integral — his

wit, already heard globally at the Oxford Union four months

previously, came into play to shine Wellington’s perspective so

forcefully that the Mitterrand government was back-footed,

prompting its defences to stumble. Lange’s most effective foray

was his quip to a BBC reporter on 27 August, just hours after

the Tricot Report became public, declaring it ‘too transparent to

be even a whitewash’. That one-liner flashed around the world.

Within an hour it was rattling through the corridors of power

in Paris like a diplomatic Exocet missile.12 Seemingly, Lange had

New Caledonia

Zealand for the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior


18

lit the fuse prompting revelations that dramatically shredded the

Mitterrand government’s credibility — Le Monde’s story on 17

September detailed for the first time a third team of agents, a trio

that reportedly New Zealand police had not already conclusively

fingered. Edwy Plenel’s La troisieme Equipe: Souvenirs de l’affaire Greenpeace (2015) has just now appeared — he was the Le Monde reporter who broke the story.

Everybody, including Lange’s most stringent critic, Michael

Bassett, praised his performance. There were only plaudits; not a

brickbat was pitched up. There were some surprising silences in

several Western capitals.

Lange stayed with the case, even after stepping down as prime

minister. As attorney-general he led the New Zealand team for

the arbitration in New York in October 1989. His colleagues

were apprehensive, but he turned in a professional performance

to New Zealand’s credit.

Lange was at the forefront of his government’s determination to

U-turn Muldoon’s infamous U-turn, when one of his first acts as

prime minister in December 1975 was to instruct the New Zea-

land permanent representative at the United Nations to disown

the General Assembly resolution, which New Zealand had co-

sponsored with Fiji and Papua New Guinea, that promoted the

South Pacific as a nuclear weapons free zone. The resolution had

been adopted by the General Assembly as the Muldoon govern-

ment was taking the oath of office at Government House.

Muldoon’s eight years as prime minister had seen New Zea-

land, a once leading opponent of French nuclear testing, go quiet.

Muldoon’s credentials were thoroughly discredited when he was

stood down as prime minister — most spectacularly his claim,

which he repeated in his fourth memoir, Number 38 (1986), that

President Mitterrand had assured him French nuclear testing

would end in two years’ time. Lange speedily ensured that the

world knew Muldoon was history.

Lange’s foreign ministry moved expeditiously. On 8 October

1984 it delivered him a substantial memorandum that canvassed

the record of New Zealand’s official protests and the current pro-

test activity as Labour took office; it then set out for him ‘what

more, if anything, could be done by the Government to protest

against continued French nuclear testing and bring it to an end’.13

Malcolm Templeton, in Standing Upright Here: New Zealand in the nuclear age 1945–1990 (2006), gives us a fine account of

subsequent developments. Beyond New Zealand Lange was not

impressed with the proposed nuclear free zone for the South Pa-

cific that Bob Hawke was shepherding through the South Pacific

Forum. Lange and Walter Lini tried to beef up the proposal, but

most of the other forum leaders were disinclined to go that far.

Lange still considered the Treaty of Rarotonga, which declared

the South Pacific a nuclear weapons free zone, that the forum

adopted in 1985 was worthwhile, and backed its passage and im-

plementation. Lange envisaged that the treaty’s ‘zone will con-

tribute a new and powerful means of exerting pressure on France

to change a policy which has become intolerable to the whole

region’.14

Lange’s great success in establishing personal rapport with

another world leader was Margaret Thatcher. Bob Hawke was

his big failure. Mitterrand stands out as the masterful adversary,

the one leader Lange had to rely wholly on his mind-games skills,

garnered from his law days at the old Auckland Magistrates

Court, to engage.

NOTES1. Pauline Swain, ‘Who defends New Zealand?’, NZ Listener, 16

Nov 1985, p.33.

2. Philip Short, Mitterrand: a Study in Ambiguity (London,

2013), p.x.

3. Wayne Northcutt, Mitterrand: A Political Biography (New

York, 1992), p.2.

4. Kenneth Keith, ‘The Peaceful Settlement of International

Disputes: The Rainbow Warrior Affair — Experiences of a

Small State’, in Charles Chernor Jalloh and Olufemi Elias

(eds), Shielding Humanity: Essays in International Law in Honour of Judge Abdul G. Koroma (Leiden/Boston, 2015),

pp.21–34.

5. See Ken Ross, Regional Security in the South Pacific: the Quarter-century 1970–95 (Canberra, 1993), pp.133–47;

Helen Fraser, Your Flag’s Blocking Our Sun (Sydney, 1990);

and David Robie, Blood on their Banner: Nationalist Struggles in the South Pacific (Sydney, 1989), pp.82–141.

6. The Commonwealth Secretariat document is in R17586044.

The Forum Secretariat document, ‘The 15th South Pacific

Forum: Summary Record’, is in R17725398. Discussion on

New Caledonia is paras 9 to 34, pp.4–18.

7. ‘Memorandum for Cabinet from Prime Minister and Minister

of Foreign Affairs reporting his visit to the United States,

Britain, India, Singapore, New Caledonia and Vanuatu from

23 September to 7 October 1984’, 8 Oct 1984, para 3. Copy

is at Archives New Zealand, R20766232. The report was

before Cabinet less than 24 hours after the prime minister

returned to New Zealand. Merv Norrish and Michael Green

had both travelled with Lange. Green was an extraordinarily

talented wordsmith. An even more breath-taking account of

the trip is on the same file. It is the 13-page record of Lange’s

meeting with Vanuatu Prime Minister Walter Lini. Lange’s

insights to Lini on Gromyko, the British Labour Party, Indira

Gandhi and Lee Kuan Yew are riveting. Lange also tells Lini

of Lee’s exquisite put downs of Lange as being no Norman

Kirk. The report opens up the portrait of the Lange his close

staff dealt with everyday as his wit ran riot!

8. ‘Memorandum for Cabinet from Prime Minister and

Minister of Foreign Affairs reporting his visit to Tuvalu for

the 1984 South Pacific Forum on 27–28 August 1984’, 31

Aug 1984, p.2. The document is in R17728203.

9. Ibid.

10. The fullest account of the episode is by Richard Woolcott,

Australia’s representative at the United Nations in New

York, in his The Hot Seat: Reflections on Diplomacy from Stalin’s Death to the Bali Bombings (Sydney, 2003), pp.196–

8. Extraordinarily, he fails to mention New Zealand’s

engagement!

11. Merwyn Norrish, in Malcolm Templeton (ed), An eye, an ear and a voice: 50 years in New Zealand’s external relations 1943–1993 (Wellington, 1993), p.143.

12. Michael Dobbs, ‘French Secret Service Hit’, Washington Post,

28 Aug 1985.

13. The memorandum is at Archives New Zealand, in

R22499599.

14. New Zealand Parliamentary Debates (Hansard), 9 Oct 1984,

p.927.


19

New Zealand is a popular tourist destination for the Chinese.

It is adored for its fresh air and mind-blowing scenery, not to

mention the Hobbits. And especially for Chinese mothers, New

Zealand makes high quality baby formula!

When preparing this presentation, I was told that China’s

economic slowdown is what people are concerned about. Indeed,

the many comments about Chinese economic volatility contrast

sharply with those of the years of bullish outlook. China’s econ-

omy is facing very sophisticated challenges, but the prospects

remain good because the fundamentals of the economy are re-

silient.

When I left China the Standing Committee of the National

People’s Congress of China, of which I am a member, had just

had its August session. One of the important duties of the Na-

tional People’s Congress and its Standing Committee is to super-

vise the work of the government. Ministers are required to report

their work regularly and sometimes to face questions.

During the August session Xu Shaoshi, the minister of the

National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), re-

ported to us about China’s current economic performance. He

assured us that China’s economy remains generally stable, but

noted some deep-seated difficulties and problems.

All three drivers of China’s growth — investment, export,

and consumption — are slowing in various degrees. And new

sources of growth are not strong enough to replace the traditional

ones, which are declining; that is, the labour intensive export sec-

tors are facing difficulties caused by the rising cost of labour and

resources and a sluggish export market.

There is also the problem of capital flowing more into the

virtual economy than the real economy, which increases financial

risks. The uncertainties of the global economy are also having an

impact on China’s economy.

So, generally speaking, the downward pressure is growing.

China’s growth rate in the first half of 2015 was 7 per cent, a 0.4

per cent drop. China’s trade growth had already been shrinking

for a few years. In the first half of 2015, it came down by 6.9 per

cent, with imports dropping more, including with New Zealand.

Fu Ying explains the many challenges facing China and predicts a successful outcome

Fu Ying is chairperson of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National

of the address she gave at a meeting co-hosted by the NZIIA and the Chinese

All this is part of China’s economic readjustment. After 30 and

more years of high-speed development, China now has the sec-

ond largest economy of the world. However, as the economic

rules showed, we could not grow at a high rate forever. Trees

cannot grow all the way into the sky unless there are magic beans

involved (as in Jack and the Beanstalk)!

The Chinese government is making adjustments in its policy.

When the premier reported to the National People’s Congress

early in 2015, he proposed a growth target for 2015 lower than

before, to about 7 per cent. And the Congress adopted the report.

With the new emphasis on sustainable and healthy growth,

China is making enormous efforts to shift from traditional to

high technology; from labour-intensive to capital intensive; from

low-value added to high-value added industries, and from rely-

ing mainly on export to more on domestic consumption. I trust

these structural changes will eventually pay off. And now we

have already seen some results. The services industry has climbed

to half of GDP; consumption is contributing to 60 per cent of

GDP growth; household income growth is 7.6 per cent, higher

than that of GDP growth.

Despite the lower growth rate, the size of China’s growth re-

mains substantial. If this year’s target can be achieved, the incre-

ment of growth will be about US$7 trillion, about the total GDP

of Switzerland. But, of course, it must be borne in mind that

China’s per capita GDP is only about 19 per cent of that of New

Zealand. And it is not very likely that the Chinese will catch up

in the foreseeable future.

To look at it from another angle, the huge challenges China

faces are exactly the areas where there is potential for growth. For

example, one major challenge is the disparity in the development

between the east and the west, between the urban and rural areas

Xi Jinping


20

and between the rich and the poor.

In 2014 China’s urbanisation level was 54.77 per cent. In

terms of human urbanisation, the rate was under 40 per cent

because many migrant workers and their children who live in

the big cities are not yet enjoying urban healthcare and educa-

tion services. Looking ahead, continuous urbanisation will bring

more people into the cities and it will generate huge new demand

for services and facilities.

That is why we say the Chinese economy has tremendous po-

tential for long-term growth. Also, we have many unique ad-

vantages, including a very stable society. There are more than 7

million new college graduates every year, and there is world-class

infrastructure.

China is a complex and diversified country. To understand it,

one needs to have patience and view it from different dimensions,

instead of trying to put it in this or that box. China is a coun-

try that has been persistently undergoing reforms for almost 40

years. Very few countries in the world could do that. It shows that

we are never satisfied with ourselves and that we are determined

to change and improve.

Deng Xiaoping, the architect of China’s reform and opening

up, famously said that reform is akin to ‘crossing the river by feel-

ing the stones’. However, now, having waded so far into the river,

we sometimes find the water too deep to feel the stones.

The third plenary session of the 18th Communist Party Cen-

tral Committee unveiled a whole package of new reform meas-

ures, which will give guidance in the coming years. The 12th

National People’s Congress and its Standing Committee have

also speeded up legislation to provide major reforms with a sound

legal base.

Obviously it is not going to be easy, and further reforms face

far more complex challenges, many of which involve interest ad-

justments and are hard to address. Therefore, it takes time. But

we are confident that we will get to the other side of the river.

The opening-up measures are also continuing. For example,

foreign investors have greater access as a result of the slashing

by half of the category of sectors previously restricted to foreign

investment. It will make China more attractive to investment. In

the meantime, China’s investment overseas is growing rapidly,

rising to over US$100 billion annually.

Great progressNew Zealand is an early-bird in the Chinese market. In 2008 it

became the first developed country to sign a free trade agreement

with China, catching the tide of China’s fast growth. Since then,

our bilateral trade has achieved great progress, growing by 320 per

cent.

Another angle about China is that it is transforming from a

very poor country that had long suffered from shortages of food

and basic needs to one of relative sufficiency. It was not until

the year 1993 that we stopped printing food coupons. Such a

transformation is inevitably accompanied by fast social changes,

which have brought about new challenges.

The British writer Charles Dickens gave harrowing descrip-

tions of the social upheaval created by industrial development,

which Britain struggled with for more than 200 years. I remem-

ber visiting Port Arthur in Tasmania, where one could see the

footprints of how Britain tried to manage sharp social conflicts

by transporting people.

China is many times bigger than Britain, and has industrial-

ised a lot faster. Now China is confronted with the huge task of

ensuring that its growth benefits are shared in an equitable and

fair manner. The building and improving of laws and rules must

catch up with the changes.

The environmental cost for China’s growth is also a big con-

cern. When I was young, there were 6 million bicycles in Beijing,

and blue sky and white clouds were the normal scene. Now Bei-

jing’s automobile count is about to reach 6 million. China be-

came the world’s largest automobile market six years ago and the

whole country already has 264 million vehicles, about 150 times

the number in 1980.

We now are keenly aware of the importance of environmental

protection. The newly amended Law on Environmental Protec-

tion, which went into effect on 1 January 2015, is regarded as ‘the

strictest law with teeth’. It also entitles social organisations to file

environmental lawsuits for public interest. We would like to see

the law fully implemented.

China’s relationship with the world is also undergoing major

changes. There is greater inter-dependence. China is committed

to the policy of peaceful development and is taking more and

more regional and global responsibilities. Chinese president Xi

Jinping, in his speech at the 70th anniversary of the victory of

the Second World War, placed very strong emphasis on peace.

The general public in China, who watched the military parade

on 3 September, shared one common happy feeling: that is, we

are finally safe, and there is a strong army to protect the country.

There will not be another Opium War or Japanese military ag-

gression against us.

For a country the size of China, peace needs to be defended

with strength. China’s development and people’s prosperity need

a long-term peaceful environment.

Of course, as China grows stronger, it needs to develop a wid-

er vision for the world, including world peace and security. And

that will come through co-operation and consultations among

countries of the world.

China is a tale with many dimensions. With 1.3 billion peo-

ple trying so hard, it has got to be a tale with a happy ending for

China and the world. As a New Zealand proverb goes, ‘a house

full of people is a house full of different points of view’. Let both

our common understandings and different points of view enrich

us and the world.


21

With the emergence of the Indo-Pacific region as a key geo-stra-

tegic entity Indonesia, at the confluence of both Indian and Pa-

cific segments, is becoming more important. Its profile in the in-

ternational arena is growing. It has expanded the range and scope

of its diplomatic initiatives, while converting from primarily a

continental inward-looking strategic orientation to an expand-

ing maritime outlook. Along with its enhanced presence in the

Indo-Pacific region, it has sought to formulate a grand strategy.

Furthermore, Indonesia has become important in the United

States’ forward policy or pivot in the Indo-Pacific region. The

archipelago is a ‘gateway zone’ for the Eurasian rim land and the

offshore continent of Australia.1

The growing importance of Indonesia’s geo-political posi-

tion has given a fillip to its maritime strategy. Further impetus

was provided by Joko (‘Jokowi’) Widodo’s election as president

in 2014. One of the key steps he took after coming to power in

Indonesia was to release a maritime doctrine in November 2014.

The five main principles of this doctrine are

rebuild Indonesia’s maritime culture, for, as a country that

is made up of 18,000 islands, it must realise that its future is

largely determined by how it manages the oceans

maintain and manage sea resources with a focus on

establishing sovereignty over sea-based food products

prioritise infrastructure and maritime connectivity develop-

ment by building deep sea ports while also improving the

shipping industry, logistics and maritime tourism

through maritime diplomacy, end the sources of conflict at

sea, such as fish thefts, violation of sovereignty, territorial

disputes, piracy and pollution

as a country that is the bridge between two oceans, build its

maritime defence power.2

Geo-strategic position Indonesia is the largest archipelagic state in the world. It has

within its waters some of the most strategic sea lanes in the world,

connecting the Indian and Pacific oceans. Furthermore, of the

three areas identified as being the key to power projection in

the Indo-Pacific region — the Indian sub-continent, the South

Balaji Chandramohan outlines Indonesia’s

Based in New Delhi, Balaji Chandramohan is a member of the Institute of Defence and Strategic Analysis, and a visiting fellow with Future Directions

China Sea and the South-west Pacific — Indonesia, as a resident

power, has a military presence in two of them, the South China

Sea and the South-west Pacific. This ensures that Indonesia will

be an important geo-political player in the 21st century. Jakarta

has accordingly begun evolving a grand strategy of its own. It

also occupies an important place in the strategic outlook of pow-

ers like India, Indonesia and the United States that are seeking

to contain China’s increased maritime expansion in the Indo-

Pacific region. Australia’s 2013 Defence white paper mentioned

that ‘Indonesia’s importance to Australia will grow as its signifi-

cant regional influence becomes global. Indonesia’s success as a

democracy and its economic growth will see it emerge as one of

the world’s major economies’.

An aggressive reform agenda enacted during former Indone-

sian President Yudhoyono’s first term (2004–09) provided the

impetus for economic growth. This included significant reforms

in the finance sector, and tax and customs regimes, along with

enhanced capital market development and supervision. These

changes are generally credited with setting the stage for growth.

The administration also won plaudits from multilateral agencies

for its stringent fiscal management, resulting in a debt to gross

domestic product ratio of less than 25 per cent, and a fiscal deficit

of less than 3 per cent.

Propelled by prudent macro-economic management, strong

domestic consumption and investment and rising prices for its

commodity exports such as palm oil, copper, and rubber, Indo-

nesia’s growth rates have been exceptionally strong over the past

decade — generally in the 5–6.5 per cent range, except during

the global financial crisis. This economic growth means that, like

China, India and Australia in the Indo-Pacific region, Indonesia

will invest in its strategic priorities, increase its defence budget

and expand its reach both militarily and diplomatically.

Jokowi Widodo


22

At present, the Indonesian armed forces’ basic doctrine places

primary emphasis on the army, the dominant service in the In-

donesian military. Both the air force and the navy are charged

with providing direct support to the army, with their individual

service missions secondary in importance. The army prides itself

on its historic role as a revolutionary people’s army and as the

prime mover in the achievement of Indonesia’s independence. As

with other praetorian revolutionary armies graduating into being

under civilian leadership, the military, especially the land force,

still plays a major role in deciding the national security strategy

of Indonesia.

Right from Indonesia’s independence, the military came to

view itself as the guardian of national unity and cohesiveness. It

is co-equal with the civilian political leadership (some Indonesian

military advocates note that the establishment of the army pre-

dated that of the republic). In contrast to armies in other South-

east Asian states, such as Thailand and the Philippines, the In-

donesian Army developed an ideological and legal framework to

support a formal role in both governance and expansion of the

legitimate authority of the Indonesia within its territory.

Furthermore, with civilian control over it the military, which

has had an indifferent past through having an internal orienta-

tion for most of its independent history, can now look to play a

primary role in Indonesia’s external orientation as an extension of

having a veto in strategic affairs concerning Indonesia.

The Indonesian Army’s Strategic Reserve Command (Ko-

strad) is a corps-level command that has up to 35,000 troops. It

also supervises operational readiness among all commands and

conducts defence and security operations at the strategic level in

accordance with the policies of the Indonesian national armed

forces (Tentara Nasional Indonesia) commander. The reserve

command, which has a commander-in-chief (panglima), usually

a lieutenant-general, falls under the army chief of staff for train-

ing, personnel and administration. However, it comes under the

commander-in-chief of the Indonesian national armed forces for

operational command and deployment.

While the command structure is oriented towards land op-

erations, this is set to change with the Indonesian Army getting

the logistical lift capacity to carry out long-range operations with

the help of the other two services, the navy and air force.

The expanding economy means that navy has received increased

attention in Indonesian strategic thinking. In terms of active

personnel and ships, the Indonesian Navy is the largest navy in

South-east Asia. At present, it has about 74,963 active personnel

and more than 150 marine vessels in active service. It is also one

of only a few navies in the region that is substantially supported

by domestic military industries as well having a marine corps,

supersonic missiles and attack submarines.

Indonesia has two fleet commands. The Eastern Fleet Com-

mand based in Surabaya is conterminous with four of the army’s

area commands (Kodams V and VII through IX) and the Indo-

nesian Air Force’s Operation Command II. The Western Fleet

Command, based in Jakarta, is conterminous with five of the

army’s area commands (Kodams I through IV and VI) and the

air force’s Operation Command I. Apart from this, Indonesia has

many existing naval bases, including the major bases at Surabaya

and Jakarta. Forward operating bases exist at Kupang in West

Timor and Tahuna in Sulawesi.

With the above logistics and a formidable army, Indonesia

wants to expand its reach by developing amphibious capabilities.

It is ready for active co-operation with other nations both on the

high seas and in hosting warships of allied countries and partici-

pating in reciprocal visits.

Part of the navy’s capability expansion is its modernisation pro-

gramme, which is an effort to develop the minimum essential

force of the Indonesian national armed forces. Although the

minimum essential force is depicted as a means of ensuring that

the Indonesian Navy is able to anticipate traditional and non-

Indonesian frontline troops


23

traditional security threats, it is undoubtedly aimed at putting

Indonesia in a position to project its power. This requires the de-

velopment of amphibious capacity.

Jakarta’s strategic approach in the 21st century involves mod-

ernising the armed forces over the next ten to fifteen years, in-

cluding through investment in anti-ship missiles, new warships,

submarines and combat aircraft. Indonesia’s 2010 Strategic De-

fence Plan formulated the goal of developing a minimum essen-

tial force by 2024. Key elements of this force include the devel-

opment of a ‘green-water’ navy, major upgrades of air combat

capability, development of a more mobile and agile land force and

the development of a viable domestic military industrial base.

As a result of the expansion, the minimum essential force will

comprise a 274-ship navy, ten fighter squadrons and twelve new

diesel–electric submarines. While Indonesia has had similar am-

bitions in the past, this time the match between resources and

ambitions seems closer. This translates into a situation in which

Indonesia graduates as a major maritime power, which can ex-

pand the range and scope of its operations and can become an

asset in various contingencies, including assisting in Australia’s

security.

According to Jane’s 2014 military forecasts, Indonesia’s mili-

tary spending from 2011 to 2015 is set to rise by 46 per cent

to US$9.29 billion, with a 71 per cent increase in procurement

alone. This bulkier purse could lead to Indonesia embarking on

the largest naval shopping spree in 40 years.

Therefore, apart from existing work to ensure adequate pa-

trolling of the vast swathes of Indonesian waters, the Indonesian

Navy will expand its role in several areas. One such was high-

lighted by the response to the Aceh tsunami in 2004. Using its

amphibious assets, the Indonesian Navy played a major role in

transporting relief workers and humanitarian aid — a vital con-

tribution given that land infrastructures, such as roads and air-

fields, were too severely damaged for military transport trucks

and aircraft.3

Urgent callsMaritime boundary disputes, too, have prompted urgent calls for

the government to revamp Indonesia’s naval defence. At present,

Indonesia still has more than ten unresolved maritime boundary

disputes with neighbouring states. Some of them, like those in

Ambalat and the Natuna Sea, have resulted in naval skirmishes

among the disputants. Indonesia and Malaysia are currently in

dispute over the Ambalat waters off East Kalimantan and Sabah,

which are known to contain huge hydrocarbon reserves. In May

2009, an Indonesian naval vessel almost fired on a Malaysian

patrol boat.

Similarly, China’s ‘cow’s tongue’ claim in the South China

Sea, which overlaps Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone in the

Natuna Sea, is a brewing storm in Sino-Indonesian relations.

This could become more serious if China increases its maritime

capabilities in the Indo-Pacific region in an effort to assert its

claims in the South China Sea.

Of major concern to Jakarta is the security of Indonesia’s

expansive exclusive economic zone. Indonesia’s vast archipelago

includes about 18,000 islands stretching over nearly 2 million

square kilometres. It has a coastline of 54,716 kilometres to pro-

tect and three land borders (East Timor 228 kilometres, Ma-

laysia 1782 kilometres and Papua New Guinea 820 kilometres).

Moreover, it sits right at South-east Asia’s maritime chokepoints,

such as the Strait of Malacca.

Green-water blueprint As part of its effort to expand Indonesia’s maritime profile, the

Indonesian Navy announced in 2005 its ‘green-water navy’ blue-

print to achieve a 274-ship force structure by 2024. This will be

divided into a striking force (110 ships), patrolling force (66 ships)

and supporting force (98 ships). In addition, the navy is upgrad-

ing its existing assets by installing new systems and armaments.

This is Indonesia’s largest naval modernisation plan in more than

40 years. The last major effort in this direction was in 1959–61,

when Indonesia purchased a substantial number of Soviet-made

naval vessels.

The blueprint is now being gradually realised with some new

platforms having already joined the fleet. All four Sigma-class

corvettes built in the Netherlands have been in service with the

Indonesian Navy since 2009. In 2011, Indonesia’s amphibious

capabilities were also boosted with the commissioning of its

fourth Makassar-class landing platform dock vessel. One of these

even participated in a hostage rescue operation in the Gulf of

Aden in March 2010.

For its patrol muscle, Indonesia’s naval shipyard, PT PAL, has

been able to manufacture fast attack craft and arm them with

Chinese C-802 anti-ship missiles. PT PAL is also keen to inte-

grate various naval weapon systems into different platforms. In


24

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April 2011, a Russian Yakhont missile mounted aboard an ex-

Dutch Van Speijk-class frigate was successfully test-fired. Such

integration of ‘hybrid’ systems will most likely characterise Indo-

nesia’s naval shipbuilding capacity in the near term, rather than

the more ambitious whole-platform construction of submarines

or frigates.

The Indonesian national armed forces also have plans for a

major procurement for this decade. PT PAL is about to jointly

construct frigates and submarines with foreign naval shipbuild-

ing companies. In August 2010, a project was agreed to locally

construct four to sixteen guided missile escorts in co-operation

with the Dutch company Damen Schelde. This 2400-tonne

105-metre multi-purpose frigate will be fitted with an array of

anti-submarine, anti-surface, anti-air and electronic warfare sys-

tems. Three Type-209 Chang Bogo submarines procured from

South Korea will complement the Indonesian Navy’s two exist-

ing Cakra-class (Type-209/1300) submarines. The procurement

budget increased from the equivalent of US$5.28 billion in 2011

to $7.15 billion in 2012.

As with all emerging great powers, Indonesia faces numerous

challenges. As an archipelago country, it needs to expand its na-

val reach if it is to be a credible naval power. Second, despite the

formulation of the maritime doctrine, Indonesia’s total defence

strategy still puts heavy emphasis on the land-air combination.

Recent budgetary allocations reinforce such a strategic orienta-

tion. For the navy to be operationally effective, it needs an overall

maritime defence strategic orientation, which at present is want-

ing. As the senior service, the army can be expected strenuously

to resist the shift from the existing overall continental strategic

arc to a maritime one. Given that these obstacles remain, Indone-

sia’s naval modernisation is not something other countries need

to get nervous about.

Indonesia has expanded its maritime intelligence by join-

ing the Intelligence Exchange Group under the Malacca Strait

Sea Patrol, which involves four littoral states along the Strait of

Malacca. The fruitful co-operation in this framework and closer

relations with Singapore’s Information Fusion Center have also

supported the Indonesian efforts. Countries in the region share a

common interest in the security of the Strait of Malacca and that

has been the key to communication and co-ordination. As for fu-

ture efforts, the success of the Malacca Strait Sea Patrol could be-

come a role model for an ASEAN maritime patrol, which would

focus on not only the Strait of Malacca but also the wider waters

of South-east Asia.

The Indonesian Navy has started to co-operate with the Roy-

al Australian Navy in combating non-traditional security threats

such as piracy. This co-operation has extended to joint patrolling

against traditional threats and regular exchanges of military of-

ficers and port visits.

The Indonesian and Australian navies increased their mari-

time strategic co-operation through the Multilateral Exercise Ko-

modo 2014, which was held under the framework of the ASEAN

Defence Ministers’ Meeting Plus (ADMM Plus) and the ASEAN

Navy Chiefs’ Meeting. Indonesia invited ADMM Plus countries

to join the exercise in order to embrace all countries and promote

co-operation for regional maritime security stability.

With the release of its maritime doctrine in 2014, Indonesia

signaled its intention to graduate from being an inward-looking

continental orientated power to being one with enhanced mari-

time capability. Indonesia seeks to co-operate with maritime

powers such as India, the United States and Japan, though such

co-operation will test its relations with Beijing.

NOTES 1. An Indonesian perspective on the Indo-Pacific’, Jakarta

Times, 28 May 2013.

2. ‘The Indonesian Maritime Doctrine: Realizing the Potential

of the Ocean Future’, Dictions International, 22 Jan 2015

(www.futuredirections.org.au/publications/indian-

ocean/2087-the-indonesian-maritime-doctrine-realising-the-

potential-of-the-ocean.html).

3. ‘Moving beyond ambitions Indonesia’s military modern-

izations’, Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Nov 2013

(www.aspi.org.au/publications/moving-beyond-ambitions

-indonesias-military-modernisation/Strategy_Moving_

beyond_ambitions.pdf).


25

The fate of the 276 students abducted by Boko Haram from the

government secondary school in Chibok, north-eastern Nigeria,

on 14 April 2014 has generated worldwide attention over the last

18 months. The Nigerian government has responded to this chal-

lenge with a military offensive against the insurgents in the hope

of rescuing the girls. Negotiations have taken place with the in-

surgents in an attempt to secure release of the hostages. Several

actors in the international community have supported these ini-

tiatives. But despite all efforts, 219 of the Chibok schoolgirls are

yet to be recovered from Boko Haram.

Boko Haram is estimated to have killed more than 20,000

people since 2009 and to have abducted no fewer than 2000 peo-

ple since 2011. More than 1.5 million people have been displaced

in north-eastern Nigeria, while hundreds of thousands of Nigeri-

ans are refugees across the Lake Chad region. Several infrastruc-

tures and private properties have been destroyed. These crises

have brought the education system in the region virtually to a

halt. As of 2013, Boko Haram was estimated to have done $15.6

million-worth of damage in destroying more than 200 schools in

Yobe state alone.

The United States has labelled the Boko Haram leadership

as international terrorists, while Spain has commenced an inves-

tigation into crimes against humanity committed by the group.

Following the lead of the Nigerian government in 2013, Aus-

tralia, Britain, Canada, Turkey, the European Union, the UN

Security Council and the United States have proscribed Boko

Haram and Ansaru (its breakaway faction) as international ter-

rorist organisations.

The term Boko Haram is translated as ‘Western education is

forbidden’. The official name of the movement is Jama’atu Ahlis Suna Lidda’awati Wal Jihad (People Committed to the Propaga-

tion of the Prophet’s Teachings and Jihad). Boko Haram emerged

in Nigeria in 2002 under the leadership of Sheik Yusuf Moham-

med, who died in police custody in 2009. The group adopted a

terroristic strategy from 2010 under the leadership of Abubakar

Shekau, who declared his commitment to a global jihad and loy-

Samuel Oyewole comments on Nigeria’s inability so far to free the abducted girls and

Samuel Oyewole is a post-graduate student with the Department of

alty to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

The objective of the Boko Haram insurgency is to create an

Islamic state in Nigeria and beyond. Prominent in the insurgent

group’s tactical array are assaults, assassinations, bombings, hos-

tage-takings and attacks against infrastructure facilities. Primary

targets are security agencies, government offices, schools, media

houses, places of worship (churches and mosques) and religious

figures, foreign nationals and the border communities. This cam-

paign of terror has spread across the Lake Chad region, from Ni-

geria to Cameroon, Chad and Niger.

From 2013 Boko Haram has seized a swathe of territory in

north-eastern Nigeria, amounting to about 52,000 square kilo-

metres by February 2015, in which it operates a self-proclaimed

Islamic caliphate. In March 2015 Boko Haram declared its loy-

alty to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and renamed its

caliphate in Nigeria as the Islamic State in West Africa. Between

February and May 2015 the insurgents lost the territory under

their control to a sweeping campaign mounted by Nigerian

troops and the combined forces of Lake Chad region states.1

Boko Haram is committed to discouraging enrolment in

Western education in northern Nigeria, on the ideological

grounds that it socialises people against the will of God at the ex-

pense of Islamic revivalism. Between 2009 and 2013 Boko Har-

am was responsible for the death of about 275 people in 63 terror-

ist attacks against education targets in Nigeria.2 As the situation

deteriorated further in early 2014, the Nigerian federal ministry

of education ordered the closure of some of the secondary schools

in the vulnerable parts of Borno and Yobe states.


26

The senior school certificate examinations are normally con-

ducted in all secondary schools. But owing to the security situ-

ation in north-eastern Nigeria, the West African Examination

Council proposed that in the volatile north-eastern states of Ad-

amawa, Borno and Yobe exam centres should be located only in

their capitals. However, Borno and other affected state govern-

ments created additional centres outside the state capitals, prom-

ising to provide sufficient security for the students. Among the

locations of the centres in Borno state were Askira, Biu, Chibok,

Gworza, Maiduguri and Uba.

The 2014 West Africa examination was scheduled for 24

March–15 May. The council’s records show that 530 students —

135 males and 395 females — registered at the Chibok centre.

However, the boarding house at the centre was only available to

female students, because the school was originally a girl’s school.

To improve the security around the Chibok centre, nineteen

soldiers were deployed to the town to reinforce the police post.

Although Chibok experienced no Boko Haram attacks in 2013,

the insurgents had earlier invaded the community on 30 Octo-

ber 2012, burning a primary school, a bible college, a divisional

police station and multiple telecommunication masts, though

without inflicting any human casualties.

At around 11.45 pm on 14 April 2014 about 200 armed

Boko Haram fighters arrived in Chibok — on motorbikes and

in trucks — and overran the town following a gunfight with the

police and soldiers stationed there. Despite a series of alerts re-

ceived by the military commands in Damboa and Maiduguri,

36.5 and 130 kilometres away from Chibok respectively, and

by the office of the governor and other relevant authorities in

Borno state, between 7 pm on 14 April and 2 am on 15 April,

there was no prompt response to the plea for reinforcement.3 The

outnumbered and outgunned officers eventual fled after a more

than hour-long gunfight with the insurgents. By then, Chibok

was nearly deserted.

Some of the invaders, who were dressed in military uniform,

proceeded to the school. Their arrival scared many of the stu-

dents. Some went into hiding, while a few staff and guards fled.

However, the militants calmed the remaining students with the

lie that they were in fact troops deployed to protect them. After

virtually all the students were assembled, the invaders unleashed

a violent attack on the school, looting the warehouse, burning the

buildings and abducting 276 students. However, 57 of the 276

managed to escape. Some got away during the school siege, many

jumped from the abductors’ vehicles, while others escaped from

the insurgents’ camps after a few days.

The Chibok siege and the abduction of the schoolgirls generated

confusion and suspicion within and against the Nigerian political

class. Many questions about the incident are as yet unanswered.

Worse still, the Nigerian government was indifferent for weeks.

But this changed when, on 5 May, the insurgents announced

that the schoolgirls would be married off. This sparked a series

of protests across the federation and demands for the rescue of

the girls.

The chain of events generated global attention. Prominent Is-

lamic clerics and organisations across the world criticised Boko

Haram’s action. So, too, did al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb’s

leadership. Furthermore, the African Union, the Economic

Community of West Africa (ECOWAS), the European Union

and the United Nations all condemned Boko Haram terrorism


27

and urged the Nigerian government to rescue the girls. A series

of solidarity campaigns for the Chibok schoolgirls also emerged

across the world, including in Bangladesh, Britain, Canada,

France, Ghana, Germany, India, Pakistan, Portugal, South Af-

rica, Togo and the United States.

The campaign extended to the social media. The hashtag

‘#BringBackOurGirls’ was tweeted more than 1.3 million times

within two weeks of its creation by Nigerian lawyer Ibrahim Ab-

dullahi. No fewer than 60,000 people joined the campaign on

the Facebook page created by Ramaa Mosley. Such high-profile

personalities as Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, the youngest

ever Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai, Hollywood ac-

tor Forest Whitaker and US musician Chris Brown joined the

campaign. Amidst this, a BringBackOurGirls (BBOG) group

emerged in Nigeria with Hosea Abana as chairman and the for-

mer minister of education Oby Ezekwesili as co-ordinator.

Against this background, the Nigerian government, the Bor-

no state government, the Nigerian military and other security

agencies in the country were put under pressure to rescue the

schoolgirls. The internationalisation of this campaign extended

this pressure to Nigeria’s counter-insurgency partners, including

member states of the Lake Chad region, Britain, Canada, Israel

and the United States and various international organisations.

Amidst confusion and suspicion on the details of the 14 April

incident, the Nigerian government had two options: mount a res-

cue mission or negotiate the girls’ release. The Nigerian security

agencies responded to the challenge by deploying various search

parties, including a special forces team, the air force and local

vigilant groups. However, the search was put at a disadvantage

by a shortage of relevant assets for the mission. Orbiting 37,000

metres above sea level, Nigeria’s satellite (NigComSat1R) is un-

suitable for close observation of the ground. Only a few of the

Nigerian Air Force’s planes have surveillance capabilities, while

its drones’ availability is limited by lack of maintenance.

In May 2014, the Nigerian police and the Borno state gov-

ernment announced a substantial reward for credible informa-

tion that might lead to the rescue of the girls. When these efforts

failed to bring any promising results, about 500 relatives of the

abducted girls, armed with local weapons, including bows and

arrows, embarked on a rescue mission, but were advised to turn

back by the concerned community near the Sambisa forest. The

intelligence gathered soon after this incident indicated that some

of the Chibok girls at least were being held in the forest, while

others had been taken to Chad, Cameroon and Niger. Conse-

quently, Nigeria has involved its neighbours in the search for the

girls.

To search for the missing girls, the United States deployed

MC-12W Liberty and unmanned RQ-4 Global Hawk aircraft to

Chad in May 2014. At the same time, it sent a team of 30 offic-

ers, including five State Department officials, two strategic com-

munications experts, a civilian security expert, a medical support

officer, ten Defense Department planners, seven extra military

advisors from the US Africa Command and four Federal Bureau

of Investigation officials and experts in hostage negotiations, to

assist the Nigerian security agencies.

The British Royal Air Force also deployed Sentinel R1 sur-

veillance aircraft to Accra, Ghana, on 18 May and three Tornado

GR.4 combat aircraft to Chad in August 2014, so as to assist

with the search for the girls. The surveillance planes deployed

for the search could not be based in Nigeria itself because of the

country’s long-held policy of not allowing any foreign military

presence. Britain and Israel also deployed technical teams to Ni-

geria, while Canada sent a team to Niger. French teams are based

in Chad, Cameroon and Niger. France further encouraged more

collaboration among frontline states and partners by convening

the Paris Security Summit on Nigeria on 17 May 2014.

In mid-May 2014, the Nigerian military announced that the

abducted girls had been traced to three different Boko Haram

camps. The insurgents, however, threatened to kill the hos-

tages in the event of any attempt to rescue them. Such a threat

cannot be ignored in Nigeria. On 8 March 2012 Briton Chris

McManus’s and Italian Franco Lamolinara’s captors (Ansaru)

summarily executed them when a rescue team (a joint British

Special Forces–Nigerian State Security Service force) attempted

to free them. Similarly, on 31 May 2012 al-Qaeda in the Islamic

Maghreb killed a German, Edgar Raupach, when the Nigerian

Joint Task Force tried to rescue him. Likewise, Ansaru killed sev-

en expatriates abducted in February 2012 because they suspected

Britain and Nigeria were planning a rescue attempt.4

Although the location of the abducted schoolgirls was identi-

fied for more than a year, the Nigerian security agencies were

reluctant to carry out any rescue mission because of this danger

of the insurgents killing the hostages in the process. This drew

mixed reactions both among the Nigerian public, which largely

viewed the government as a failure, and among international

partners, some of whom viewed the country’s security agencies as

under-motivated, under-equipped and inefficient.

The role of dialogue in Nigeria’s engagement with Boko

Haram has remained controversial. Many Nigerians and interna-

tional partners are against negotiating with the terrorists. More-

over, the government is strongly committed to its no-ransom-nor-

concession policy in the northern region.5 Nonetheless, several

dialogues have taken place with Boko Haram, including about

the Chibok girls. This option received more attention when it

appeared that no rescue mission was underway.

On 17 October 2014 the Nigerian government confirmed a

ceasefire deal with Boko Haram and scheduled a ceremonial re-

lease of the Chibok girls. The deal emerged from a month-long

negotiation by the representatives of the government and the

insurgents’ Secretary-General Mallam Danladi Ahmadu, me-

diated by Chad’s President Idris Derby. However, the ceasefire


28

fell apart because of distrust on both sides. Different factions in

Boko Haram were unable to agree on the release of the girls. Also

terrorist attacks continued unabated, despite the ceasefire deal.

On the other hand, various security agencies were reluctant to

release the prisoners in their custodies who were to be exchanged.

Amidst these difficulties, Abubakar Shekau released a video that

denied the ceasefire and its negotiators altogether.

The Nigerian government and the Borno state government

have made several contacts, while many individuals and organi-

sations have appealed to Boko Haram to release the girls. Earlier,

before October, the Nigerian government recruited Australian

negotiator Stephen Davies, who has years of experience in the

Niger Delta region of the country. In June 2014 Davies declared

that an agreement had been reached with the insurgents to re-

lease the schoolgirls. But there was no result from his efforts be-

yond a series of promises, continuing a hope raised, hope dashed

trend. In a similar way, the military announced the release of the

hostages in both April and September 2014, but in both cases

soon after withdrew the statements.

The fate of the 219 Chibok schoolgirls that are still missing re-

mains a matter of debate. Pessimists maintain that the insurgents

will never free all the girls. Several sources, including the testi-

mony of survivors, indicate that the remaining Chibok girls have

been married, radicalised and conscripted by the insurgents, and

many of them are now committed to the campaign against the

state. More alarming, the girls have become an instrument of sui-

cide warfare. Survivors’ testimonies have also revealed that some

of them have terrorised other hostages. More than 180 Christians

among them have been forced to embrace Islam.

In June 2014 Davies disclosed that many of the girls were sick,

but were without proper medical treatment. This, among other

things, has fanned speculation that some of the girls have died in

captivity. By February 2015, thirteen parents of the girls had died

of stress-related illnesses. However, some residents of Gwoza, un-

der Boko Haram rule, were reported to have seen about 50 of the

abducted girls in March 2015. This testimony and that of many

survivors of captivity indicate that the schoolgirls have received

preferential treatment from their captors.

Some optimists maintain that a better commitment to dia-

logue on both sides could actually yield better results in the near

future. Others put their faith in a military offensive against Boko

Haram. In April 2015 Chad rescued 43 Chadian children who

had been abducted and conscripted by Boko Haram to fight in

Nigeria. In January 2015 Cameroon rescued 24 out of 80 villag-

ers abducted in that country by Boko Haram.

The reasons why Nigeria cannot rescue the girls from Boko

Haram are still controversial. Technically, rescuing the girls from

insurgent camps is more demanding than rescuing them from

insurgents on the run, as in the case of the Chad and Cameroon

rescues. This makes the Nigerian security agencies’ late response

to the abduction of the schoolgirls all the more agonising. How-

ever, a recent offensive that forced Boko Haram to be once again

on the run is a hopeful sign. Between March and May 2015 the

Nigerian Army rescued more than 700 hostages. The Chibok

schoolgirls could have been rescued at the same time had not the

insurgents previously evacuated them from the Sambisa forest

and the other territories recovered by the military.

The motivation to rescue the girls remains high, and the

military is now well-equipped thanks to a large defence procure-

ment programme. Moreover, the political game is over. In March

2015, Goodluck Jonathan became Nigeria’s first sitting president

to lose power in a presidential election because of his inadequate

response to this challenge and the country’s security crises in gen-

eral.

NOTES1. Samuel Oyewole, ‘Boko Haram: Insurgency and the War

against Terrorism in the Lake Chad Region,’ Strategic Analysis, vol 39, no 4 (2015), pp.428–32.

2. START, Global Terrorism Database (GTD), 1970–2013.

3. Amnesty International, ‘Nigerian authorities failed to act on

warnings about Boko Haram raid on school,’ 9 May 2014.

4. Samuel Oyewole, ‘When the Safe Return of Hostages is no

Longer Taken for Granted: Terrorism and Atrocities against

Hostages in Nigeria,’ The Counter Terrorist (Asia–Pacific

edition), vol 8, no 2 (2015), pp.57–61.

5. Samuel Oyewole, ‘The Quality of Hostage Fate in Armed

Conflict: Nigeria’s Conflict Theatres in Comparative Pers-

pective,’ African Security Review (forthcoming).


29

Stuart McMillan is a senior fellow in the Centre for Stra-

tegic Studies at Victoria University of Wellington and

a life member of the NZIIA. In 2003 he did a study

for the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and

the National Centre for Research on Europe at the

University of Canterbury on the possible effects of the

enlargement of the European Union to 25 members.

Dr Anthony Smith is in the Department of Prime Minister

and Cabinet. The views expressed here are those of the

author alone and do not represent the DPMC or the

New Zealand government.

Dr Nigel Parsons is a senior lecturer in the School of People,

Environment and Planning, Massey University.

Although Robert Schumann, one of the founders of what evolved

into the European Union, envisaged a supranational entity, the no-

tion of a looser collection of states with economic and trade links

rather than a conventional federation persisted, testing in some

cases the basic principle of an organisation that brought peace to a

continent frequently engulfed in wars.

The migration crisis, straining a host of countries within the

European Union, is now straining the union itself to its limit. The

earlier crisis in the eurozone, the monetary union formed by nine-

teen of the union’s 28 states, also brought to the fore that now

ancient dilemma and is testing the whole of the union’s structure.

Anthony Giddens discusses migration into Europe but well be-

fore the present tragedy and numbers migrating. He sees dilemmas

being resolved by an ever closer integration of Europe’s states. He

also sees this as a necessary part of Europe remaining a significant

force in the world, a player with some claim to equality with the

United States. He is undoubtedly a believer in the value of the Eu-

ropean Union, is intimately knowledgeable about its workings and

a doughty defender of it as a Labour peer in the House of Lords.

An influential sociologist with a formidable list of publications, he

is also a social democrat theorist, being credited with coining the

phrase ‘the third way’ and doing some of the thinking behind that

approach. One of the accomplishments of his book is that he does

Author: Anthony Giddens

Published by: Polity Press, Cambridge, 2014, 237pp, $25.99(pb).

Author: George Friedman

Published by: Scribe, Melbourne, 2015, 288pp, $37(pb).

not let his detailed grasp of Europe’s problems dominate the clarity

of his writing. Instead, one is treated to an insider’s view expressed

clearly and compellingly.

Three concepts illuminate his exposition: EU1, EU2 and what

he calls paper Europe. EU1 consists of the organisation’s institu-

tions, the parliament, the European Commission and so on; EU2,

made up of Germany, usually France and maybe other countries,

the European Central Bank and the International Monetary

Fund, really makes the major decisions affecting the union; paper

Europe, in Giddens’s words ‘consists of a host of future plans, road-

maps, regional strategies and so forth, drawn up by the Commis-

sion and other EU agencies’.

Giddens believes that the European Union has exhausted its

capacity to put off decision-making. He thinks the European Un-

ion needs more dynamic leadership and greater political legitimacy

as well as greater macro-economic stability.

George Friedman’s response to the dilemma is to remain con-

vinced that Europe’s ancient enmities and differences will not be

sublimated by Europe’s connectedness. He sees Europe divided in-

to ‘borderlands’ where, as he puts it, ‘nations, religions and cultures

meet and mix’. His borderlands may or may not have political bor-

ders but are the flashpoints for conflicts. The main borderland is

that between Russia, which he considers to be the European main-

land, and the peninsula containing Western Europe. The border-

land thus includes the Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania. Others

he lists are between the French and German worlds, the Balkans

between central Europe and Turkey and the Pyrenees between the

Iberians and the rest of Europe.

Friedman’s is the more personal book. He comes from a family

of Hungarian Jews who survived the Holocaust but escaped from

Hungary to the United States to avoid Soviet rule. He was only a

baby at the time, but his family’s experience shaped his views and

were a main reason for writing the book. The book is interlaced

with his observations during travel and study in Europe, never los-

ing sight of illustrating his arguments. He was an academic and

later chairman and founder of Stratfor, a private intelligence agen-

cy concentrating on geo-political and geo-strategic analysis. The

analyses, insights and predictions of Stratfor are highly regarded

internationally.

His book in some ways resembles the Stratfor analyses. It is

like a collection of essays, though addressing his central themes.


30

Author: Masha Gessen

Published by: Scribe, Melbourne, 2015, 273pp, A$29.99.

On 15 April 2013, Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev bombed

the Boston Marathon, killing three people and injuring 264 oth-

ers. Much of what was reported at the time turned out to be

incorrect.

The question of what the brothers were trying to achieve

looms large in this particular case, but, as this book explains, an-

swering it is not an easy assignment. Tamerlan was killed during

the manhunt, and Dzhokhar has not made a full public confes-

sion beyond an attempted apology to his victims during his trial.

Dzhokhar was also sentenced to death in a federal trial. There

may be a lot that is never known about this case, probably partly

dependent on whether Dzhokhar can successfully appeal and/or

delay his execution.

Perhaps the most terrifying part of the Tsarnaev story, aside

from the obvious devastation caused during the Boston Mara-

thon, is how ordinary the perpetrators were. Tamerlan’s ‘Ameri-

can Dream’ had not panned out in the way that he expected —

although that must be true for many others — while Dzhokhar

had quite promising academic prospects. What is quite unusual

in this case is that Chechen separatists and militants have not

had a history of attacking Western targets. In fact the brothers’

connection to Chechnya was not that strong; their father was

a Chechen, while their mother was an ethnic Avar — a mixed

marriage that appears to have put up some barriers in the con-

fusing patchwork of north Cau-

casus. The family was not in

Chechnya during the periods

of conflict there. The Tsarnaev

family had in fact bounced be-

tween Kyrgyzstan (the family’s

point of origin as many Chech-

ens were moved there during

Stalin’s mass evacuation of the

population), Dagestan and the

United States. A formative ex-

perience for Tamerlan had been

a stint as an adult in Dagestan

(but not Chechnya), where he

It is not footnoted or indexed. It is his interpretation of events and

history that gives the book its distinction. There is a very interest-

ing chapter about the American influence on the origins of the

forerunners to the European Union and he concluded that this

was more important in the formation than the visions generated

in Europe.

Neither book should be regarded as the work of a eurosceptic

though eurosceptics might find fodder for their cause in both of

them. The doubts Giddens entertains spur him to think of bet-

ter ways for the European Union to function and to warn of the

loss to the world if the union fails. Friedman seeks answers to the

question of whether war has been banished and is driven by a pro-

found pessimism. In his last chapter he observes ‘that the idea that

Europe has moved beyond using armed conflict to settle its issues

is a fantasy’.

Both books make the case strongly that Germany, because of

its exports to other EU countries, is a major benefactor from the

eurozone.

To Giddens the eurozone is part of the completion of the po-

litical process towards greater integration that he wants to see oc-

cur. To Friedman the fact that the use of the euro spread to poor

countries as well as richer can only be explained in terms of reckless

optimism and the European dream.

The books could hardly be more timely. Each encapsulates

critical aspects of Europe and says it well.

STUART McMILLAN

encountered Islamist elements. They may have radicalised him in

a political and religious sense, although there is not yet any evi-

dence he received any military-type training. On what is known

to date, Tamerlan and Dzhokhar appear to have been lone ac-

tors. Furthermore, Gessen, who has interviewed as many contacts

as she can find, notes that those she spoke to in Dagestan were

struck by the superficiality with which Tamerlan understood Is-

lam. But Tamerlan’s growing Muslim consciousness was married

with some pre-existing political notions that ranged from liber-

tarianism to a growing cynicism about US domestic and foreign

policy. His negative views on the United States hardened in Dag-

estan, and Gessen (herself a Russian by birth) speculates that this

is probably in part because of a diet of anti-Americanism peddled

by Russia’s media. Tamerlan subscribed to the theory that 9/11

was a hoax, although the irony should not be missed that this is

part of the milieu that lies behind the Tsarnaev brothers’ decision

to commit their own act of violence against civilians — and in

the state of Massachusetts, which most Americans would regard

as the epitome of liberalism.

Gessen’s book is, however, only partly about the Tsarnaevs

themselves. A substantive part of this book is about the reaction of

the authorities. Initially members of the crowd with connections

to the Middle East fell under suspicion; one injured Saudi nation-

al had the police join him on his ambulance ride. Once the Tsar-

naevs were identified, many in the Chechen and Central Asian

émigré community with connections to the brothers came under

very close scrutiny. Some were involved in drugs — Dzhokhar

was selling pot on campus — and they had a lot to hide from the

police. One individual caught in the dragnet, Ibragin Todashev,

died in unclear circumstances during questioning. Police claim

Todashev tried to get a knife out of the kitchen. Gessen, who be-

lieves that the Tsarnaevs are guilty of the Boston bombing, notes

that some of these events explain why Dzhokhar has attracted so

many supporters who believe he is not guilty after a series of ap-

parent inconsistencies in the police record.

This book throws up a lot of important questions, and some

answers, while making it clear that the full facts of the case have

yet to be revealed. But this careful scrutiny of the circumstances

surrounding the Boston bombing is an important antidote to the

breathless 24/7 news coverage that recycles rumour as fact.

And whatever it was that the Tsarnaev brothers thought they

were achieving by attacking Boston, the city itself refused to be

cowed. At least a million people lined the streets of the following

year’s marathon. Tamerlan and Dzhokhar achieved nothing.

ANTHONY SMITH


31

Deconstructing Zionism is dedicated to Jacques Derrida. This

might seem intimidating and ironic. The famous French phi-

losopher was not only recondite; Jewish, he was also pro-Israel.

Christopher Wise duly observes that ‘Derrida’s views on Zion-

ism did not represent what is most exemplary in his thought’.

To be fair, Wise does acknowledge that Derrida advocated with-

drawal from the occupied Palestinian territories. Derrida also

contributed greatly to the toolkit used here to deconstruct Zion-

ism. This act of deconstruction permits the analyst to ‘open, to

disassemble, to examine of what the assemblage is made’ (Jean-

Luc Nancy, cover).

The Zionist assemblage holds that Jews are not just a religious

group but a nation possessed of the right to self-determination

and a state. This state ought to be in Palestine. It is called Israel.

The distortion of human life inherent in pursuit of this project

is massive. Hence editors Vattimo and Marder assert that to de-

construct Zionism is to

demand justice for its victims — not only for the Palestinians,

who are suffering from it, but also for the anti-Zionist Jews,

‘erased’ from the officially consecrated account of Zionist

history. By deconstructing this ideology, we shed light on the

context it strives to repress and on the violence it legitimizes

with a mix of theological–metaphysical reasoning and

affective appeals to historical guilt.

The metaphysics in Zionism underpin its claims on Palestine.

In all its forms it takes the concept of the Jewish people and

its connection to the ‘Land of Israel’ to be transhistorical

and unitary, temporary exiles notwithstanding. Proclaiming

Jerusalem to be the ‘eternal and indivisible’ capital of the State

of Israel, it wilfully neglects the city’s historicity, its changing

architectural, demographic, and political realities along the

centuries.

Enter deconstruction, the power of which inheres in its readiness

to reject ‘the assumptions Zionism takes to be untouchable.’ For

example, ‘Just as deconstruction is the possibility of justice, so

it is the necessity of a diaspora, without return to the fictitious

sameness of the origin’.

Eleven uneven essays follow. Amongst the highlights, Vatti-

mo relates a personal account of becoming anti-Zionist by grasp-

ing the weight of al-Nakba, the Palestinian catastrophe of 1948.

We started with a ‘Zionist’ mythology — the right of Israel

to have its own state, legitimized by the horror of the Shoah

and by the apparent lack of democracy in the entire Middle

East — and we have over time abandoned it precisely when

we discovered the Nakba; that is, when we opened our eyes,

or when they were opened, to the colonialist and nationalist

(even racist) sin that remains like an original sin upon the

foundation of the State of Israel.

Vattimo speaks of progressive Italian families sending children

to work on a kibbutz ‘so that they might learn what democratic

Editors: Gianni Vattimo and Michael Marder

Published by: Bloomsbury, New York and London, 2014, 180pp,

US$29.95.

socialism is’. He makes a confes-

sion (this reviewer makes the

same): ‘What did we know or

think then of the Palestinians

who were driven from their

homes and their land?’

Slovene celebrity philoso-

pher Slavoj Žižek sees Israel

with gimlet-eyed clarity. On

Jerusalem, and in particular the

biblical Disneyland that is the

‘holy basin’ redevelopment pro-

ject, Žižek cites Tel Aviv Uni-

versity’s Raphael Greenberg:

‘The sanctity of the City of David is newly manufactured and is

a crude amalgam of history, nationalism and quasi-religious pil-

grimage… the past is used to disenfranchise and displace people

in the present’. Žižek also sees through the Zionist legal system:

‘By way of occasionally passing a judgment in favor of the dis-

possessed Palestinians, proclaiming their eviction illegal, it guar-

antees the legality of the remaining majority of cases’.

Artemy Magun’s contribution brings to mind the re-election

of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. Magun revisits

Hannah Arendt’s critique of Israel in light of her severed bonds

to Zionism and observations on the 1961 Eichmann trial. The

Nazi criminal was understood by Zionist prosecutors as an-

chored in a timeless anti-Semitism. For Arendt, this made for

‘bad history and cheap rhetoric’ captured in the metaphor of

the ‘bloodstained road traveled by this people’ in pursuit of its

destiny. That destiny was, of course, fulfilment of the Zionist

project in Palestine. Arendt finds this to be a dark celebration of

‘nationalist egocentrism and the confidence of one’s righteous-

ness’. It echoes clearly in the Israeli government today.

Prospects for resistance advance in a rewarding chapter by

Santiago Zabala. He advocates a ‘hermeneutical stance in favor

of Palestinians and Jews in their existential conflict against po-

litical Zionism’. What does this mean? As a ‘philosophy of inter-

pretation… hermeneutics is not concerned with facts, but rather

with those beings who must submit to them’. Zionism constructs

a framework underpinned by metaphysics and demands that

Palestinians submit to it; ‘political Zionism claims to represent

the rightful owners of the Land of Israel regardless of the differ-

ences that exist on the ground’. There are profound problems

with this configuration; ‘truth becomes a violent imposition that

will inevitably discard, marginalize, and ignore anyone who does

not belong, accept, or believe in its necessity’. This is daily lived

experience in Palestine/Israel and beyond.

Deconstructing Zionism is published in Bloomsbury’s Political

Theory and Contemporary Philosophy series and is consequently

a rather specialised work. It is by turn spectacular, compelling,

difficult and tangential. For a practical-minded reader of politics,

the contributions discussed here count amongst the best. To them

should be added that of Mark Ellis, to whom is reserved the last

word. Ellis presents a bold deconstruction of ‘Holocaust theology’

in which ‘Israel is a self-understood need… transcending politics’.

Ellis recalls that the ‘phrase “after Auschwitz” has almost become

a cliché’ and goes on to note that ‘Indeed, Jews do come after the

Holocaust’. He adds, ‘They also come after Israel’.

NIGEL PARSONS


32

A panel discussion was held at Parliament on 16 September on ‘The Potential Pitfalls and Windfalls of the Nuclear Deal with Iran’. Chaired by Don MacKay, the panel comprised Dr Rouz-beh Parsi (senior lecturer, Department of History, Lund Univer-sity, Department of History), Profs Robert Patman and Bill Harris (both Otago University), Dr Negar Partow (Massey University), and new NZIIA executive director Maty Nikkhou-O’Brien. La-bour MP David Shearer hosted the event.

On 22 September, in conjunction with the New Zealand Con-temporary China Research Centre, the NZIIA convened a meet-ing to hear Fu Ying, the chairperson of the Foreign Affairs Com-mittee of the Chinese National People’s Congress, give a lecture on ‘China’s Development and its Implications’. The edited text of her address is to found elsewhere in this issue.

On 5 November a panel discussion on ‘Sports Diplomacy: New Zealand’s Hardest Soft Power?’ was held in the Backbencher Pub, Wellington. Chaired by Patrick Gower, political editor of TV3 News, the panelists were Hon Sir Jim McLay, New Zealand’s permanent representative to the UN (2009–15) and former deputy prime minister; HE Mark Gilbert, US ambassador to New Zea-land and Samoa and former major league baseball player; Chris Laidlaw, broadcaster, author, sports commentator and former high commissioner, All Black and member of Parliament; Prof Steve Jackson of Otago University’s School of Physical Education; and Michalis Rokas, chargé d’affaires of the embassy of the European Union Delegation to New Zealand, former diplomat and profes-sional basketball player. Between 190 and 200 people attended this event, including 25 diplomats and 50 students.

On 20 November the National Office co-hosted with the Wellington branch a seminar ‘New Zealand and the United Na-tions’ to mark the 70th anniversary of the United Nations found-ing conference in San Francisco, with a view to reflecting the organisation’s achievements, the challenges it faces to remain rel-evant in today’s world and its place in New Zealand’s network of international engagements. The occasion recognised the contri-butions of three former New Zealand diplomats, Merv Norrish, Tom Larkin and Malcolm Templeton, all of whom had close United Nations involvement at times in their distinguished ca-reers. The seminar was conducted in association with the United Nations Association of New Zealand, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the New Zealand Defence Force, Victoria University of Wellington and the United Nations Information Centre (Canberra). AucklandThe following meetings were held:28 Aug Prof Jörn Leonhard (professor of modern European his-

tory, Freiburg University, Germany), ‘The End of Em-pires and the Triumph of the Nation State? 1918 and the New International Order’. This meeting was held in co-operation with Auckland University’s Europe Institute.

24 Sep Prof Sahar Amer (University of Sydney), ‘Muslim Wom-en’s Rights in Post-Colonial Europe’.

30 Sep Prof Jane Kelsey (Faculty of Law, Auckland University), ‘What’s at Stake with the TPP’.

14 Oct Hon Sir Jim McLay KNZM, QSO (special envoy to the prime minister and former deputy prime minister),

‘Some Thoughts on the United Nations’.21 Oct Dr Babcock-Lumish (entrepreneur, academic, and

policy-maker), ‘All Politics is Local?: The 2016 US Presidential Election and its Implications for the In-ternational Community’.

ChristchurchThe following meetings were held:23 Sep Prof Sahar Amer (chair, Department of Arabic Language

and Cultures, University of Sydney), ‘Muslim Women’s Rights in Post-Colonial Europe’. This meeting was co-hosted with the pro vice-chancellor arts, University of Canterbury and jointly sponsored by the National Centre for Research on Europe.

20 Oct Col Colin Richardson (New Zealand Defence Force), ‘The Continuing Relevance of the Classics and Historical Study to Military and Strategic Thinking’.

The British high commissioner in New Zealand, HE Jonathan Sinclair, addressed the branch on 22 October.

WaikatoOn 28 October Dr Masood Masoodian, an associate professor of computer science at Waikato University, addressed the branch on ‘The Persecution of the Bahá’ís of Iran’.

WairarapaThe following meetings were held:26 Aug Prof Roger Stewart Morris CNZM (retired professor

of animal health, Massey University), ‘From Influenza and SARS to Ebola and Foot and Mouth: New Zea-land’s Contribution to Controlling the International Spread of Infectious Diseases’.

23 Sep Anthony Haas (veteran journalist and Pacific specialist), ‘Is New Zealand Really a Pacific Nation?’

14 Oct Dr Joe Burton (Victoria University), ‘Cyber Attack: How Serious is the Threat?’

WellingtonThe following meetings were held:2 Sep Stephen Jacobi (executive director of the NZ Inter- national Business Forum), ‘TPP— Where to From Here

(and How Did We Get Here Anyway?)’ 10 Sep Elliott Abrams (senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies,

Council on Foreign Relations, Washington), ‘US Middle East Foreign Policy: Obama and Beyond’.

21 Sep Prof Sahar Amer (chair, Department of Arabic Language and Cultures at the University of Sydney), ‘Moslem Women and the Politics of the Veil’.

12 Oct Col Colin Richardson (New Zealand Defence Force), ‘The Continuing Relevance of the Classics and Historical Study to Military and Strategic Thinking’.

5 Nov Andrew Hyde (director of the International Org-anizations Office of Regional Policy and Coordination, US Department of State), ‘Multilateral Co-operation with New Zealand’.


33

Sir,

In ‘Together in struggle’ (vol 40, no 5), Yosef Livne outlines in

a very brief paragraph New Zealand’s role in the First World

War in Palestine. Ten years ago I was working in Jerusalem and

I asked a taxi driver what I should see on a day off. He directed

me to a hillside in East Jerusalem — to the ‘Kiwi’ graves. What

I found was a meticulously kept Commonwealth War Graves

Commission cemetery containing largely Anzac graves with

some British. Almost all had died between May and November

1918, often in clusters on the same day. The Australians included

members of the Australian Camel Corps and New Zealand had

some Mounted Rifles. On enquiry I was told that they had freed

Jerusalem from the Ottoman Turks and some had died crossing

the Jordan with General Allenby. Most surprisingly, on reach-

ing the top of the hill I was confronted with a beautiful small

chapel donated by ‘The People of New Zealand’. It had tukutuku

panelling and a greenstone cross. Since then I have looked for

some memorial to this action each Anzac Day without finding

out anything more. The Sir Peter Jackson exhibition at the for-

mer Dominion Museum includes about one line ‘including some

action in the Middle East’. Perhaps some reader has an intern or

student who could expand on this story for all of us, including

Yosef Livne.

PAMELA A. JEFFRIES

Wellington

Auckland: Treasurer, Auckland Branch NZIIA, Dept of Politics, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland

Christchurch: Treasurer, Christchurch Branch NZIIA, Margaret Sweet, 29B Hamilton Avenue, Fendalton, Christch-

Treasurer, Hamilton Branch NZIIA, c/- Politics Department, University of Waikato, Private Bag 3105,

Nelson:

Tauranga:

Wairarapa:

Wellington:

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