The unity ticket achievement was given a tick in the column David Barnett wrote for the Canberra Times on 4 March (not online). Farmer David — ex-press sec for Malcolm Fraser and Howard biographer — can channel John Howard as well as anyone in the prints. The first par summarised the Rudd political strategy and pronounced it good. The White Paper, Barnett opined, 'is consistent with the security arrangements that Kevin Rudd inherited from John Howard.'

And the closing sentence reinforced the theme: '...the continuing readiness of the Government to maintain security measures is only what should be expected. But it is nice to know that what should be expected is what is happening.' Bingo for the unity ticket. Call it bipartisan. Or call it Rudd guarding his right wing.

The politics also comes up trumps when ignoring sceptical voices. Consider this from Chris Berg: 'The risk of terrorism is infinitesimally small.' And that leads to the second incontestable point: 'Human beings are terrible at assessing risk.' My favourite is Chris Michaelsen's observation that the chance of death by terrorist attacks is about equal to the chance of dying from severe allergic reaction to peanuts, lightning or bee stings.

Analysts can talk about bee stings. For a politician, that is the road to ridicule. The real challenge to the counter-terrorism edifice and the political strategy is the view that we are winning. Fareed Zakaria put the case enthusiastically in his cover piece for Newsweek on the victory of Muslim moderates over the extremists: '...the entire terrain of the war on terror has evolved dramatically. Put simply, the moderates are fighting back and the tide is turning. We no longer fear the possibility of a major country succumbing to jihadist ideology.'

The Zakaria summary, at the end of a fraught decade, is that the battle against jihadism has gone much better, much sooner, than anyone could have imagined: 'The enemy is not vast; the swamp is being drained. Al Qaeda has already lost in the realm of ideology. What remains is the battle to defeat it in the nooks, crannies, and crevices of the real world.'

Encouraging, really. It just doesn't fit the Canberra political narrative nor the bureaucratic interest.

Photo by Flickr user rhino neal, used under a Creative Commons license.

In my responses, I have suggested that Australia's Prime Minister may not have a strong view either way about whether Australia would win or lose an ICJ case. What he does have is a high profile promise to be assertive.

The use of the ICJ option was a promise given amid the 2007 election campaign. In this election year, it is not a promise that will be abandoned. Any leader has only a limited number of mea culpas and policy U-turns in his kitbag. The Prime Minister is not going to use up any of that precious ammunition backing away from the ICJ promise. Being seen to stand firm on whaling is a political necessity.

Australia and Japan are so used to being in total agreement on most things, having an actual policy difference is a shock. My assumption is that whaling will not have any real impact on the broader relationship. The Australia-Japan effort at low-level hedging against China is but one example of the vital interests the two share. To be wildly optimistic, having a fight might actually do some good, by reminding both sides of all the things that are important to them. And all the things they share.

The other perspective is offered by Greg Sheridan, who argues the Government has engendered a lot of ill will in Tokyo for no purpose at all:

Japan is our largest export market and we owe far more of our wealth to Japan than we do to China. It is also, second only to the US, the linchpin of the entire politico-military order in the Asia-Pacific. It is furthermore our most important and consistent diplomatic supporter in Asia. In other words, the Japan relationship embodies fundamental Australian national interests.

It's always necessary to be able to say 'No' to other nations. And the bigger the other player, the harder and more sensitive the formulation of the negative argument. The ability to disagree is as significant an element in close friendships as it is with more problematic relationships. Judging when to say 'No' to the US, for instance, involves some different calculations than when dealing with India or China. Japan sits in much the same place as the US. We are not used to having hard-charging-knock-em-down international confrontations with Tokyo.

For several decades, our biggest difference with Japan — its agricultural protectionism — has been dealt with in the most civilised terms. Australia has been consistent in its attacks but always polite. By contrast, the language and energy of our mud-slinging at the European Community for the same agricultural offence always had a more pungent farmyard vigour. And a much higher emotional content. Clearly the European and Japanese policies had vastly different impacts on world markets, but the difference in language was marked.

Canberra often raged at Europe; with Japan it was more a resigned sigh of understanding before repeating the same complaints about the lousy economics and rampant politics of coddling aging rice farmers. Australia seems to get much angrier about whales than the damage Japan does to our cow cockies.

Photo by Flickr user Roger Montserrat, used under a Creative Commons license.

Both the ASIO and AFP buildings pay homage to a central Canberra reality: if your department is a big beast in the jungle, its building sits within sight of the flagpole that flies over Parliament.

Australia is no longer as apoplectic or apocalyptic in the discussion of jihadist terrorism. The less colourful official language is more akin to the technospeak that comes naturally to Kevin Rudd. It is the patois of the substantial counter-terrorism machinery that now throbs in Canberra.

To get a brief glimpse of the official web, look at the glossary that accompanies the concluding chapter of the Paper. There you'll find 25 Australian institutions, departments or bodies that have some role in the effort to fight terrorism. The web stretches from ASIO to the Office of Transport Security. The count goes higher if you add in the off-shore efforts which have a distinct Australian flavour, such as the Jakarta Centre for Law Enforcement Cooperation.

The previous column noted the change in tone from the previous Terrorism White Paper in 2004. Note also the bureaucratic shift. Six years ago, Foreign Affairs produced the White Paper and the foreword was signed by the Foreign Minister. This time the report was produced by the Prime Minister's Department and the picture and signature are those of the PM.

The publication change follows the power shift that is already in place. Alexander Downer presented the paper last time. Now Rudd fronts the press conference flanked by his Foreign Minister and Attorney-General.

Australia's evolving counter-terrorism web, centred on the Prime Minister and his department, certainly looks 'real and enduring'. That phrase — used by the White Paper to describe the threat of jihadists — applies equally to the counter-terrorist edifice.

Photo by Flickr user PDR, used under a Creative Commons license.

The change is partly about expectation. Six years ago, Canberra judged that a terrorist attack on Australian soil was only a matter of time. That sense of looming, even inevitable violence has faded. America has not seen a repeat of the horrors of September 11, 2001. The first strike on Australia has not arrived.

The threat may be permanent, as claimed, but that can also mean it will be a long time getting here. So the discussion is no longer as apoplectic (or even apocalyptic). To see the shift, look at two speeches by Alexander Downer in 2004, in April and as he launched the White Paper in July.

Australia, Downer said, had entered 'a struggle to the death over values'. The enemy, al Qaeda, was primitive and triumphalist: 'Their precise goals and ideologies are so extreme — and their methods are so evil — that it is difficult for us to understand them.' The phrase that lingered was the Downer description of fundamentalist Islamic extremist terrorists as 'Islamo-fascists'.

The Rudd version has nothing that goes anywhere near 'Islamo-fascists'. The change in language is because the enemy no longer seems so unknowable. For Australia, the potential jihadist may live only a couple of suburbs away. Or, as the Rudd White Paper expresses the challenge, the terrorist threat could come 'from people born or raised in Australia, who have become influenced by the violent jihadist message'.

The best guide to why the tone had to change is not the Rudd White Paper, but a masterful analysis a couple of years ago from Waleed Aly on the rapid evolution of the terror threat, linking international policy to domestic radicalisation: 'More and more, terrorist are amateurs. They may be relatively incompetent, but they are also unlikely to be part of a network. Such people are not recruited — they recruit themselves.'

Railing against primitive Islamo-fascists is not much use if the dialogue that really matters has to take place within the Australian community. For that discussion, tone matters.

Photo by Flickr user cromacom, used under a Creative Commons license.

Track the growing warmth of this embrace over the decade by comparing the language in the Defence White Papers in 2000 and 2009. At the start of the decade, Australia had a long standing 'strategic dialogue' with Japan. By 2009, Japan was a 'critical strategic partner'. The shift in language described a shift in the facts. Australia and Japan now have a defence structure which has its own bilateral dynamics, as well as supporting the two alliances with the US.

In the 2000 White Paper, Australia and Japan shared a commitment to a strong an enduring US role in regional security. Each through its respective alliances would work hard to support US engagement. By 2009, this had become a more complex trilateral structure with several layers. Australia would work 'to develop practical defence cooperation with Japan', improving the interoperability of the defence forces both bilaterally and through the trilateral security dialogue with the US.

I've written before about the trilateral dialogue and its inadvertent christening by Australia as the Asian NATO. The importance of the trilateral process is not merely a more united approach to supporting the US. It tracks the growing strength of the Tokyo-Canberra element. That is signified by the Joint Declaration on Security Cooperation Australia signed with Japan in Tokyo in March 2007.

In Australia's view, the agreement signifies the establishment of a bilateral defence relationship which is the closest Japan has with any country other than the US.

By the time Japan and Australia signed the Declaration in 2007, the document was the expression of a defence structure that was already in place. The agreement stated an existing reality when its first paragraph affirmed 'the strategic partnership between Australia and Japan.'

At the time, the Opposition Leader, Kevin Rudd, worried that security cooperation with Japan should take no further steps towards a full defence pact, for fear of offending China. The momentum, though, continues. The low level hedge is being tended.

Photo by Flickr user ortizmj12, used under a Creative Commons license.

Mr He asked Andrew Forrest to allow China to take a majority holding in FMG. When refused, Mr He set out to attack FMG by leaking a story to the Australian Financial Review. The article suggested that Fortescue did not have firm contracts with China, contrary to statements given to the market.

Mr He did not win his main goal — majority Chinese control — but Fortescue and Forrest were put through legal agony for three years, courtesy of ASIC.

As the Federal Court judge, John Gilmour, makes plain in his decision, the story in the Fin Review...

...was engineered by Mr He of the NDRC as a blunt commercial tactic in an attempt to wrest majority control of the Project from FMG. This was quite contrary to the clear understanding which existed prior to the execution of the framework agreements that FMG would never agree to this but that a minority equity position would be given to a Chinese entity.

The Gilmour judgement is lengthy and dense, as is the way of the Federal Court. But search through it using 'Mr He' and you'll quickly get a sense of the games the Chinese bureaucrat was playing. The judge politely calls Mr He's actions 'unwarranted' and quotes the FMG submission that the bureaucrat 'provided an array of misinformation'.

At a meeting with Forrest in August 2004, Mr He told the Fortescue CEO that China wanted to invest not just in FMG's port and rail infrastructure but also in the mines. Forrest responded that only a minority interest in FMG or its mines was available and that no joint venture partner could ever challenge the sovereignty of Australia's interest in the mines. While Mr He twice acknowledged that the Chinese entities would not seek majority control of FMG, as negotiations developed he reneged and made clear that majority control was the aim.

The judge referred to evidence from Lawrence Xin, a businessman experienced with the Chinese Government, that Mr He was 'difficult to deal with', with a reputation in the Australian mining industry of 'being nasty'.

Evidence was given by Xin, who had had known Mr He for decades. As the judgement says, 'Xin explained in his statement that Mr He informed him in late February 2005 that: "the Chinese companies wanted control of FMG and as FMG was resisting, we would teach them a lesson."' The judge goes on to quote Xin's account of a statement by Mr He:

...He, at that time, when I talked with him he used the Chinese words called the “zhou han”, which is very unusual. He said Andrew “bu shi” - Forrest “shao han zhou han”. That means that's a semi-underground word. That means in my territory somebody try to challenge me...He used a word, very offensive, whatever, that means “zhou han” means, you know - normally it's a Mafia or underground word. So I thought he is very hostile. So I told Andrew [Forrest], I said, “You’re in trouble,” so he is so angry at you people.

None of this will help Stern Hu. But it points to the reality that the actual offence in the Rio Tinto case may not be spying or corruption. Rio Tinto walked away from the embrace of state-run Chinalco, a deal which would have given China an important presence in Australia's resources sector.

The business atmosphere in China at the moment is captured in this piece by the former chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in China, James McGregor, who says that in two decades in China he has seldom seen the foreign business community more angry and disillusioned:

Visiting CEOs' banquet-table chatter is now dominated by swapping tales of arrogant and insolent Chinese bureaucrats and business partners. The litany includes purposefully inconsistent and nontransparent enforcement of regulations, rampant intellectual-property theft, state penetration of multinationals through union and Communist Party organizations, blatant market impediments through rigged product standards and testing, politicized courts and agencies that almost always favor local companies, creative and selective enforcement of WTO requirements...The list goes on.

Australia is hoping for a speedy and transparent trial for Stern Hu. There's not much hope, though, for justice.

Photo by Flickr user Sheep"R"Us, used under a Creative Commons license.

One of the fascinating elements of the book is Wain's description of the secret defence pact Mahathir sealed in Washington in 1984, three years after becoming Prime Minister:

Dr Mahathir threw in his lot with the Americans, agreeing to naval ship visits, ship and aircraft repairs, joint military exercises in Malaysia and close cooperation between the two militaries. Thereafter, Dr Mahathir could launch regular rhetorical broadsides at the US, winning a name in Malaysia and the rest of the developing world for his courage in standing up to Washington, knowing his relations with the Americans rested on a secure footing.

The Bilateral Training and Consultation agreement established a series of working groups for exercises, intelligence sharing, logistic support and general security issues. The US 'vastly expanded military cooperation' while playing along with Mahathir's need to keep the deal secret so as not to damage Malaysia's non-aligned posturing.

The US used Malaysia's jungle warfare school in Johore, the US Navy built a small-ship repair facility at Lumut on Malaysia's west coast and the US Air Force established a facility to repair transport aircraft in Kuala Lumpur. In the early years of this century, US military ships docked at Malaysian ports an average of 30 times a year. In the mid 1990s, the Malaysian agreement became a template for the US in building military ties with other countries. Malaysia became a secret inspiration for the US 'places not bases' strategy.

Wain writes that while Mahathir noisily disagreed with Western fears that China might become a neighbourhood bully, 'in practice he indulged in classic hedging: He contributed to a balance of power arrangement and effectively paid insurance premiums to the US in case anything went wrong.'

Wain argues that Mahathir often stumbled in his ASEAN diplomacy: 'Despite his invocation of Asian values, his own failure to observe some of Southeast Asia's rituals and courtesies put him at loggerheads with neighbours.' The former Philippines Foreign Secretary and ASEAN secretary-general, Rodolfo Severino, said that Mahathir was more effective in the Non Aligned Movement and the Organisation of Islamic Countries than he was in ASEAN.

Mahathir was as vigorous in jostling his large neighbour, Indonesia, as in kicking his small neighbour, Singapore. Mahathir challenged Suharto for regional leadership and 'the depth of the antipathy between the two men imposed serious strains on ASEAN.'

I've written before about Mahathir's animosity bedeviling Australian diplomacy in ASEAN. Over two decades, Mahathir bamboozled Malcolm Fraser, proved immune to Bob Hawke's charm, infuriated Paul Keating and eventually caused John Howard to adopt a 'dead bat' stance which meant he never responded to anything said by the Malaysian leader.

Yet all the things Mahathir sought to deny Australia — a seat at the various Asian summits and an ASEAN free trade deal — quickly materialised after Mahathir left office in 2003. Mahathir's consistent rejection of any Australian involvement turned into an anomaly, even embarrassment, for the rest of ASEAN. The vetoes had become emblems of a personal vendetta rather than considered policy positions.

The Dr M experience shows the rhetoric doesn't always reflect reality. What is said for the benefit of the home audience is not always the policy pursued. And don't take at face value all that gloom-and-doom about the future role of the US in Asia.

Photo by Flickr user KamalSell, used under a Creative Commons license.

Dr Mahathir has also boosted interest by attacking the book several times on his personal blog. Dr M's blog is always lively (and notable for his habit of numbering his sentences).

Much of the controversy has been generated by Wain's estimate that Mahathir wasted or lost RM100 billion (US$40 billion at then exchange rates) pursuing his vision to modernise Malaysia. Wain writes that the spectacular financial scandals that exploded with startling regularity would have bankrupted most developing nations. Malaysia's natural resources and expanding economy 'absorbed the shock of much of the dissipated wealth' and the gaps were plugged by exports of oil and gas.

The common thread through all the scandals was that businessmen and officials were all tightly plugged into the ruling party, UMNO: 'Public funds were stolen in various ways, or simply poured into a big black hole in the name of ventures that bordered on the reckless, improbable or criminal.'

Mahathir waved away or hushed up the scandals as he 'sought change on an historical scale'. Mahathir is described as a 'forceful, quirky outsider' who captured the Malaysian political system by being 'harder, faster and smarter.' Unfortunately for Malaysia, Mahathir misused the institutions he captured.

As one example of the Mahathir method, the Prime Minister hushed up a disgraceful episode in 1987 when the then King, the Sultan of Johore, lost his temper on a golf course and attacked his caddy with a club, killing the caddy. The following year, the King had to do Mahathir's bidding when the Prime Minister emasculated Malaysia's judiciary. Mahathir attacked the Supreme Court because of the chance that it would uphold a legal challenge that threatened his control of UMNO.

Mahathir's reign was notable for how he weakened the independence of the judiciary, hit at the traditional rights of the Malay aristocracy and remade UMNO as a political institution. UMNO was transformed from the patriotic party that led the campaign for independence into a powerful patronage machine. Wain quotes the view that UMNO is 'morally exhausted' and 'ideologically hollow', concluding that it has lost its idealism and is rotting from within.

Just as Mahathir personalised control of the party, he sought the same influence over the police, courts and bureaucracy. Wain writes that Mahathir 'emasculated almost all institutions so he would meet no obstruction. He handed them to loyalists, shrank their authority or bypassed them altogether.' The Mahathir era created an official culture that 'rewarded obedience and short-changed integrity.'

One of the sharpest points Wain makes in his concluding pages is that Mahathir failed the goals that he had set himself as leader. 'Judged by is own high-minded rhetoric', Wain judges, 'Mahathir failed Malaysia.'

With Indonesia, Rudd has put a lot of effort into his personal ties with SBY, carrying on from John Howard. Boat people problems have to be factored in as an almost permanent part of the relationship, yet things have been much worse in times past.

Two decades ago, I did an interview in Jakarta with Indonesia's Co-Ordinating Minister for Security, who was happy to confirm that the crowded refugee camps meant there'd been a change in policy — Indonesia was giving fresh food and fuel to new boats from Indo-China and waving them off to Australia. So mark the Indonesia bilateral as ticking over relatively smoothly, particularly when set against the record of history.

The three bilats causing pain are with China, Japan and India.

China and India have one core element in common. In both cases, problems arose because Australia said 'No'. Saying 'No' can be a good and proper position to take in defence of national interest.  But it doesn't make for smooth motoring. Much of the heat from both Beijing and New Delhi can be waved aside as the anger of those who have rapidly inflating views of their rightful prerogatives.

Beijing last year decided to test Rudd and delivered a period of concerted pain. A diplomatic ceasefire was declared on 30 October, but the scars are fresh. China's mounting wave of investment will continue to ask questions of Australia and its leaders. Canberra's ability to say 'No' will be under constant test. It is not in Australia's interest to be as automatically acquiescent to China as has become the case in much of East Asia. Rudd has been at the wheel during a rough period but does not have to carry all the blame for the problem.

Much the same judgement can be made about India and its demand that Australia should sell uranium. Australia is maddening India by disproving one of New Delhi's old prejudices — we are not automatically following the lead of our ally, the US. I've argued before that to put the choice at its starkest, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty is more valuable to Australia than is our relationship with India.

Thankfully, we don't need to decide between those two points. The 'No' position on uranium sales seems to be quietly shifting inside the Labor Party, and the International Commission on Nuclear Nonproliferation and Disarmament will be an important stepping stone towards an eventual accommodation with India. But Canberra should be in no hurry.

The issue of the safety of Indian students in Australia is both a problem and an opportunity. The furore offers Australia a chance to tackle deep-seated Indian memories of the old White Australia policy. The diplomatic and media challenge is to tell the story of modern Australia as a rainbow nation – a dynamic multicultural success. Dealing with India's vibrant media (vibrant is a nicer word than raucous) is a challenge. But as Google is showing in China, the India challenge is far preferable to trying to get any sort of open debate on a tough issue in China.

Where Rudd gets a clear black mark is with Japan. Rather than saying 'No', he was guilty of not saying much at all. Granted, Japan was otherwise engaged, conducting its version of a political revolution. But in launching his crusade for an Asia Pacific community, Rudd didn't pay proper attention to our natural ally in Asia. Mark Japan as the bilateral failure where Rudd bears the most responsibility.

Photo by Flickr user Jim Grady, used under a Creative Commons license.

Rudd will get little electoral credit for the diligent argument and quiet passion (and constant phone diplomacy) he brought to promoting the G20. In the same way, Peter Costello will never get much glory for his similar nurturing and building work when the G20 was being created at Finance Minister level. For politicians, the creed that no good deed goes unpunished has the ring of historical fact.

Unfortunately for Rudd, when the voters think of his multilateral work, the first images to come to mind will probably include Copenhagen and snow. Global warming may trump the G20.

The G20, though, looks like a good approximation of a 21st century concert of powers. That doesn't mean Rudd gets to play Castlereagh or Metternich. But the Prime Minister achieves high marks for having made full use of a lovely crisis. He was one of the important handmaidens present at the creation. So the G20 success, on its own, ensures that Rudd is entitled to a healthy pass mark on his foreign policy report card.

Rudd has the vices of his virtues, so his personal effort on the G20 offers some insights into the ups and downs of his handling of the key bilaterals.

You'll notice that so far in this meditation, the name of the Foreign Minister has not been mentioned. The Cabinet engine has been running in a most unusual way, notably in foreign policy. Back in July, I wrote a three-part series arguing that Rudd runs a dysfunctional ministry because of the way the Prime Minister both commands and constrains his ministers.

Without going over all that ground, it is enough to make the obvious point that Rudd is the man driving the car, talking on the phone, issuing orders to the other passengers, reading the map, pointing out passing landmarks and arguing about the destination (plus trying to do the under-the-bonnet tinkering as well).

Having done the report card, I am now being nagged by a ghost from five decades ago. The ghost has grizzled wire-like hair and is waving his hands in manic fashion to match his rapid-fire delivery. I picture him in black-and-white, because that was the colour of TV pictures back then. The ghost is Professor Julius Sumner Miller, and the question he is shouting is the title of the wonderful science shows he did for the ABC: why is it so?

Why are only two of the key bilaterals running smoothly, but three running rough? What is wrong with The Kevin's driving? Or is it the fault of the other drivers on the road? These are intriguing questions. Or as the Professor would say: 'He who is not stirred by the beauty of it is already dead!'

Let us investigate. I will ponder the mixed state of the bilaterals and get back to you with more findings in the next column.

Photo by Flickr user London Summit, used under a Creative Commons license.

Libya's leader, Muammar al-Gaddafi, has probably qualified for a lifetime achievement award. His 2009 effort wasn't his best, but the Colonel enters the running with a stunt while visiting Rome: using an Italian hospitality agency to 'round up 500 attractive girls between 18 and 35 years of age' so he could lecture them on religion. Each woman was paid 50 euros and presented with a copies of the Koran and Gaddafi's 'Green Book', containing all his pearls of wisdom.

A more substantial effort was by the Prime Minister of Samoa, Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, who ordered his country to switch from driving on the right side of the road to the left. He said the switch meant Samoans would drive on the same side of the road as Australia and New Zealand. Thus, they will be able to get a better deal on second-hand cars from Australia and New Zealand.

It was a great effort by the Prime Minister to extend the steering-wheel of friendship to Wellington and Canberra. But by so changing the lives of more than 200,000 Samoans, he probably surpassed the narrow confines of a Madeleine, with its focus on mere gesture or symbolism.

To prove everyone has a chance, Barack Obama gets a nomination for bowing to Japan's emperor. Some US pundits called it a grovel. We prefer to see it as good manners, perhaps even old fashioned courtesy. And as the President already has a Nobel Prize just for being polite, we can't reward him with this award as well.

As 2009 was the year of the Copenhagen summit, the judges kept returning to the rich vein of climate-change stunts. The government of Nepal made a strong run by holding a cabinet meeting on Mt Everest to highlight the impact of climate change on the Himalayas. A gathering of 24 cabinet ministers wearing oxygen masks at 5,242 metres is truly in the spirit of the award.

But if global warming is about rising sea levels – pass the envelope please — then the winner has to be the world's first underwater cabinet meeting. Victory in the inaugural contest goes to the Government of the Maldives and the Ministers who donned scuba gear to conducted a 30-minute meeting at a depth of 20 feet.

Conducting cabinet business via white boards and hand signals – a true Madeleine-winning performance.

Photo by Flickr user 350.org, used under a Creative Commons license.

What I have found hardest to balance is the amount of travel that is expected today. One would think that in an era where communication is instantaneous, you would not have to get on an airplane and go sit in a meeting. But, in fact, it's almost as though people are more desirous of seeing someone in person...People sit around in capitals all over the world reading tea leaves, trying to make sense of what we're doing. We have to go and meet and talk and listen, and it is a challenge to manage all of the relationships you have to manage when you're on an airplane as much as I am these days.

The Secretary of State can get a lot done jetting around on the jumbo. But as Colin Powell found, one thing it is hard to do while airborne is protect your back from the other big beasts still sitting in Washington. That is part of the subtext to the Kissinger-Clinton discussion about dealing with the most important constituent of all – the occupant of the White House. Or to paraphrase Kissinger, if a secretary of state can't create an 'extraordinarily close' relationship with the president, then the SoS quickly becomes a burnt sausage.

Kissinger is probably as guilty as any holder of the office for the creation of the personal jet dilemma. His shuttle diplomacy in the Middle East set the model for the fly-in SoS. And, of course, his briefings to the accompanying US reporters while airborne created one of the great journalistic sourcing descriptions: 'sources at the front of the plane.'

The tensions confronting the travelling SoS is that between building diplomatic capital and getting a demonstrable outcome, as Kissinger noted: 'When you travel as secretary, one problem you have is that the press comes with you and wants an immediate result because it justifies their trip. And sometimes the best result is that you don't try to get a result but try to get an understanding for the next time you go to them.'

An interesting element of such an interview/conversation exercise is to see what gets a focus beyond the headlines and how they are ranked. To the usual tensions between what is urgent and what is important, Clinton added another category: the 'long-term trend lines'. The trend issues she listed were:

• Energy security and independence (and a common energy policy with Europe)
• Food security and food riots.
• Climate and migration patterns.
• Pandemics and global health.
• If the melting of the Arctic creates permanent rather than seasonal shipping, how will Russia and the other four countries ringing the 'Arctic Ocean' respond?

Photo courtesy of the US State Department.

1. Graham Freudenberg's 'Churchill and Australia' is a winner on many levels. The journo union rightly gave this the 2009 Walkley for a Non-Fiction Book. As I said in an earlier rave about Freudenberg, his life experience as a journalist and political insider gives him the rare ability to inject the proper level of politics into an account of geo-politics.

2. Paul Kelly is the doyen. To see why, pick up 'The March of Patriots: The Struggle for Modern Australia.' In Patriots, Kelly has interviewed everybody who was a player, to give us the first half of a two-volume account of Keating and Howard as the defining figures of the past two decades. With this and earlier books such as End of Certainty, Kelly moves from the daily reporting of Australian politics to shaping the way it is debated and even remembered.

3. Rather than the sweep across the decades, Peter Hartcher captures a turning point in Oz politics with 'To the Bitter End: The dramatic story behind the fall of John Howard and the rise of Kevin Rudd.' As always with Hartcher the writing is elegant and the thinking clear. In an account sympathetic to Costello, Hartcher encapsulates in one sentence Costello's fundamental misjudgement in dealing with his leader: 'This was not a morality play – it was a power play.'

Plus, Hartcher has a wonderful eye for the wicked anecdote that tells the wider story. Loved the yarn about Howard and his top aides meeting the research gurus before the 2007 election to get a reading on the pulse of the voters. The news was not good: '...the Howard Government was seen as out of touch, too old and too tired. When participants turned to see how the Prime Minister was taking this news, they discovered that Howard had dozed off.'

4.A different politics and a vastly different voice is offered by Tony Maniaty in 'Shooting Balibo – Blood and Memory in East Timor'.  Maniaty covered East Timor as a young ABC journalist in 1975. Three decades later, he goes back with the crew shooting the movie Balibo. The book skips back and forth across the years – the terror of war meets the madness of movie making. The technology of journalism has been utterly transformed since 1975, but the same dilemmas haunt hacks in the field.

As the journalist who fled Balibo, Maniaty offers a unique meditation on the five journalists murdered during the Indonesian invasion. In the hands of a lesser writer, this could have been mawkish. From Maniaty, it is masterful.

5.One choice on the list is offered not for fine writing, but because it is the most wonderful tool for anybody who has to think or write about Australia: the journalist Ross Gittins and Professor Rodney Tiffen have created 'How Australia Compares', showing how Oz lines up against 17 other developed democracies – socially, economically, politically — from taxation to traffic accidents, homicide rates to health expenditure, and international trade to internet usage.

Having got the figures, they then write about them clearly and logically. See there thoughts on how Australia performs in military spending and foreign aid. And consider their essay on what the figures say about how John Howard changed Australia.

6. On the military side, the winner is David Kilcullen's 'The Accidental Guerrilla – fighting small wars in the midst of a big one'. Kilcullen's book – and his public personality – encapsulate the conundrum of the modern military man. The Army plays the ultimate team game. So Army prefers that its superstars be generals. If the media stars are also those who wear the stars, that makes things cleaner all round. Kilcullen certainly stands out as a sparkler in his generation of young Army officers. To really let his mind shine, though, he had to leave the Army. Go figure, as they say in the US.

Kilcullen is the media age version of a soldier. Clearly, he has a fine intellect. Just as importantly, he can turn his thoughts about complicated issues into excellent sound bites. Consider this interview with Kerry O'Brien as both performance and analysis.

Kilcullen's line that 'the media are the battlespace' is both quotable and a succinct summary of an important dimension of the fight against terrorism. Or as Kilcullen puts the idea in the concluding chapter of his book: 'The information side of Al Qaeda's operation is primary: the physical is merely the tool to achieve a propaganda result.' This is a tough concept for the military mind to accept: the achievement of the bang-bang is not as important as the picture of the bang-bang.

Accidental Guerrilla is several books trying to cram into the one space – personal journey, notes from various battlefield and plenty of theory mixed in. It doesn't fit into any of the normal military book genres, but that is part of its charm.

7.Finally, not a conventional book, but a literary journal for the electronic age – the website of that wonderful Australian writer and thinker, Clive James. All sorts of goodies are here. I especially like his series of radio talks for the BBC. Since Alistair Cooke went to the great studio in the sky, we have been short of broadcasters who can transform journalism into philosophy. Clive James knows the tricks as well as the truths.

Wahid reversed the national stereotypes when he dealt with John Howard. Gus Dur was the knockabout larrikin, Howard had all the mannered stiffness of a high-born Javanese. My enduring memory of Wahid will be the jest he used at a meeting with Prime Minister, John Howard. It was the best fast ball I ever saw bowled during the grip-and-grin that all leaders have to stage for the cameras.

As Wahid reached to shake Howard's hand he announced: 'I always worry about being killed when I visit Australia.'

The smile on the face of the Australian Prime Minister froze just shy of a horrified rictus. You could see the shiver race instantly through Howard's political antenna: What was this Indonesian maverick saying? There'd been nothing in the briefings about threats to Gus Dur's life in Australia.

The two leaders clasped hands and Wahid delivered the punchline in a passable version of an Australian accent: 'It's a lovely day to-die. How are you to-die!' Howard managed a relived 'Ho, Ho'.

Wahid's short presidency is too quickly dismissed as a failure. After the long repressions of the Suharto decades, who could tell what demons might have been unleashed in Indonesia? (That was the nightmare side of Australia's eternal Indonesia fixation.) Then along came Gus Dur who laughed at the demons. As Greg Barton argues, Habibie and Wahid should be judged as transitional presidents who played a vital role in shifting Indonesia into the political light:

The great strengths of both Habibie and Wahid as accidental presidents was precisely that they were not bound by conventional rational calculations about the limits of their scarce political capital. Had they behaved as professional politicians, they would have done much less and likely survived much longer, but it's also very likely that Indonesia's transition to democracy would not have succeeded as it has today.

Wahid may not have been a great president, but he was a wonderful Indonesian. Gus Dur's personality and the breadth of his religious views were a magnificent gift to his country. His presidency, in all its chaotic glory, was a major step on a rapid journey of Indonesian rediscovery.

Photo by Flickr user World Economic Forum, used under a Creative Commons license.

My journey from optimism to pessimism about Fiji has lasted more than nine years. That's because the real start to the crisis was Frank Bainimarama's seizure of power and imposition of martial law back in 2000. Frank eventually installed his own choice as prime minister but hated the result. The Supremo came back to resume power in 2006, and here we are today.

Fiji has lived through a slow-motion crash-dive that has lasted a decade and shows no sign of bottoming.

The coconut wireless in Suva says the Supremo is careful about his movements in public these days. The gossip machine reports that Frank's son, also a military man, has had to stop going out to pubs drinking with his mates. People kept coming up to Bainimarama junior and punching him. In Fiji these days, that is one of the few ways to land a political point.

The punch-up story illustrates the personal problem confronting the Supremo. How does he create an exit plan that guarantees his own safety and freedom? To 'save' Fiji, the Supremo has laid waste to just about every institution of stature, from the legislature to the law to the chiefs. What institution can Frank rely on to protect him if he ever leaves the barracks?

The longer he lingers, the harder it becomes. At the moment, the target date for the end of military rule is 2014. Yet it all depends on the inclinations and interests of one man.

The old joke about Brazil now fits Fiji far too well: Fiji is the country of the future, and always will be.

Photo by Flickr user tommydavis209, used under a Creative Commons license.

In thinking about the impact of this international manoeuvring on Australia's federal election, start by considering the implications of the collapse of the high politics consensus in Canberra. That consensus was crystallised in the 2007 election. At that poll, both sides of politics agreed on the science of the human impact on the climate. And both sides agreed on the principle to be used in responding – the creation of an emissions trading scheme.

The ETS was one of the key pledges in the election policy platform of the Howard Government. Go to the Liberal Party website today and the first thing to come up is a virtual bumper sticker proclaiming, 'Say No to Rudd's ETS...help us fight Labor's Enormous Tax Slug now.'

One reason Malcolm Turnbull thought he could roll over the top of the climate change sceptics and deniers in the Liberal Party was his assumption that the high politics consensus reluctantly accepted by Howard would prevail. Instead, the consensus broke and so did Turnbull's leadership.

The high politics breakdown is not just over the principle of the response mechanism. It is also a rupture over the central issue – human impact on climate. Is this science or is it just politics? As noted before, Senator Nick Minchin has delineated that difference in explicit terms.

The death of the high politics agreement on climate change means it will be a far more contested (rancorous?) issue in the 2010 election than in 2007. Back then, Kevin '07 could trump Howard on most levels of the global warming argument. Howard was a late convert – that was why the high politics consensus only firmed in the year of the 2007 election. And internationally, Rudd was able to promise to immediately ratify Kyoto, which was just a step too far for Howard.

Rudd will not be able to use Copenhagen against Abbott as he used Kyoto against Howard.

Photo by Flickr user 10 Ninjas Steve, used under a Creative Comons license.

As the representative of a robust middle power, Bruce wrote to Canberra asking for some cash so he could join the flag race. However, he recounts, 'our investigations took so long that by the time the money was available for a new pole our enthusiasm had run out.'

As the home of the Oscars and other such showbiz baubles, the Americans have some advantages in the Madeleine game. Take, for instance, the former Defence and State Department official, Richard Armitage. One part of any interchange with Armitage is the import of his jokes. When the Philippines was negotiating with Armitage over the future of the US bases, Manila quickly deduced the importance of analysing jests as well as position papers.

Armitage's judgement on George W Bush is conveyed in the joke he tells about the Pope stranded by floods in St. Peter's Square. The Pope declines offers of help from two passing boats and a helicopter with the words, 'I have faith — God will save me.' The next scene takes place in heaven. The Pope is remonstrating with the Almighty, to which God replies: 'My son, I sent two boats and a helicopter. Faith alone is not enough!' Mark that as a succinct Armitage judgement on the faith-based decision-making of George W Bush.

Anyone can play for a Madeleine, as North Korea has shown. Using a nuclear explosion to send a signal is too serious a ploy for this award. But I like the story told by an international bureaucrat who said he always had a good idea of the tone and temperature of the coming meeting as his car arrived at the meeting. His North Korean interlocutor would be standing on the steps to greet the car. If the North Korean was at the top of the steps, a bad day was in prospect. If the he was near to the bottom of the steps, more harmony was in prospect.

The world of 2009 awaits judgement. Who was wackiest in their attempt to be On Message? The winner is…?

Photo by Flickr user talkradionews, used under a Creative Commons license.

Australia's multilateral aspirations for the Pacific have developed a Fiji-sized hole. After four years of effort, the Pacific Plan is wallowing. The Plan's vision is to help the Islands by centralising functions; in other words, ceding some sovereignty to the Forum. But the Plan has little chance of getting much air amid the sovereignty war between Fiji and the Forum.

The conduct of the free trade effort points to the same structural tension. Cast out of the Forum, Fiji's regime is not allowed to take part – directly – in the PACER Plus negotiations. But at each step in the process, Fiji will be briefed on what is happening in the talks by a Forum representative. Fiji can then express its views on the negotiations via this representative.

Vital issues are being pursued through the Pacific Plan and the PACER negotiations – ideas of pooled sovereignty and economic integration, perhaps even greater labour mobility which would be vital to the future of the Pacific, especially Melanesia.

In all of these areas, Australia and New Zealand have the power to give. Yet it is now in Fiji's interest to resist Australia and New Zealand at every turn. So the big country at the centre of the South Pacific, the home of the Forum secretariat, has set out to weaken the Forum and exclude Australia and New Zealand from the region.

If the Forum is damaged, the institution to benefit will be the Melanesian Spearhead Group. Australia and New Zealand are central to the Forum (they pay for it). But Canberra and Wellington have no role in the MSG, which is funded by China.

Bainimarama is starting to talk up the MSG, and thinking about widening the institution's ambit beyond the existing members – Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea. Fiji will chair next year's MSG summit and the supremo thinks it would be wonderful to ask all the other Island members of the Forum to come along as observers (excluding Australia and New Zealand).

If Bainimarama sticks around until 2014, as he promises (or even longer, as his past actions suggest) the supremo will have the time to degrade Pacific regionalism just as he is afflicting Fiji's economy and polity.

Photo by Flickr user lucias_clay, used under a Creative Common license.

The ten orders rather ignore the fact that, since Frank's coup in 2006, Fiji's economy has been shrinking. That's right — the man ordering his GDP to jump to it in double time has so far delivered negative growth. The Supremo has been borrowing big overseas and giving quite a bit of what cash there is to the military and the police.

For a check on how Frank's orders line up, consider this analysis from a Fiji economist who points out that GDP is going backwards, overseas investment has halved and the country is actually producing less of its own food. Perhaps that reality does not permeate too deep behind the fence at the military barracks in the hills above Suva where Bainimarama still spends much of his time (and still enjoys playing his video games).

Bainimarama has set quite a relaxed timetable for his promised move back to democracy in 2014. Maybe the supremo is looking beyond 2014 and thinking about what he has to do to ensure that his orders have been carried out by 2020.

The JSF will come with inevitable technical problems and cost blow-outs. The comfort for Canberra is that the US Air Force and the US Marines both need this plane even more than we do. As the Defence Materiel Minister expresses the sentiment, 'one of the important things about it that does give the Government confidence...is that the US is really throwing all of the resources that they have at this particular aircraft.'

The relaxation point for the JSF is where the worries start for the submarine. At present, Defence is 'delivering' a bit under two out of the six Collins submarines. With that as context, consider Greg Combet's acknowledgment that 'the extraordinarily complex task' of building the future submarine lies 'at the margins of Australia's present scientific and technological capacity.' Translation: we might just have the ability to build a new sub, or it could sink to the bottom.

This is a $30 billion dollar call. As Combet puts it: 'The design and construction of a fleet of 12 new advanced submarines will be without doubt the largest defence acquisition this country has ever engaged in. I would go as far as to say that it is possibly the most complex and sophisticated industrial project ever pursued in this country.'

Combet has called in the RAND Corporation to do a quick study on Australia's capacity to design a submarine. This work and the many studies that will follow will have one question throbbing just outside the formal terms of reference: Should we actually do this? Nothing is certain — the 12 subs figure is a pledge or a promise rather than a decision. Canberra has decided on the JSF, but we are several elections — and a couple of White Papers — away from the same moment for new subs.

Patrick Walters offers this judgement: 'The planned doubling of the submarine fleet does not enjoy a strong constituency on Russell Hill, let alone among senior naval figures who worry about the future capability of the RAN's surface fleet...There are no guarantees a post-Rudd government would fund his plan for a doubling of the submarine fleet.'

To put it another way: the Air Force is certainly happier with its JSF lot than Navy is with its submarine ambitions. It's a lot easier to take delivery than manufacture delivery.

 Photo by Flickr user adam.hyland, used under a Creative Commos license.

The Rudd invitation to the region to think bigger thoughts is linked to a warning about the chances of things going wrong: 'As a region, we cannot passively stand by with full knowledge of the challenges we will face and simply hope for the best...My view is simple: either we shape the future, or the future shapes us.'

Beyond the Rudd welcome page, the discussion starts to build. Some three dozen papers have been commissioned and many are already on the site. The ASEAN dimension is a fascinating mixture. In the overview paper on ASEAN's role in Asia Pacific multilateralism, the former Philippines President, Fidel Ramos, argues that to deal with an ever larger China, the region must move from a Pax Americana to a Pax Asia Pacific.

He describes the new regional entente cordiale 'as the logical successor to the Pax Americana that has enforced stability in the Asia-Pacific region for decades. Unlike the "American Peace" — which is at bottom imposed by US military force — an "Asia-Pacific Peace" will be the peace of virtual equals.'

Singapore's Tommy Koh argues that ASEAN is still best placed to lead the way to this peace. He says that Australia's original idea was to replace ASEAN with a core group of the eight largest countries in the Asia Pacific: the US, China, India, Japan, South Korea, Russia, Indonesia and Australia. Now, Koh says, Canberra has seen the error of its ways:

Although Australia has withdrawn the idea, it is useful for us to reflect on the unique role which ASEAN plays in Asian regionalism. All the big countries of the region would like ASEAN to continue to play the role of convener, facilitator and catalyst. Why? Because ASEAN is neutral, welcoming and has a good track record of nurturing such institutions. Given the rivalry between the big countries, it would be impossible for any one of them to replace ASEAN. The idea to replace ASEAN with a G8 of the Asia Pacific is both impractical and a violation of the Pacific ethos of equality and consensus.

A similar Singapore perspective is offered by Simon Tay, who worries about 'a Directorate of Asia driven by the larger Asian and Pacific powers in collaboration and dialogue with he US, not a true community of the region – which has many smaller and medium sized nations.'

From China, Professor Li Shaoxian comments that Australia's early soundings were seen as giving too much emphasis to Indonesia rather than to ASEAN: 'This caused discontentment from other ASEAN countries, which were suspicious that Australia had a divide-and-rule plot.'

Image courtesy of www.apc2009conference.org.

For the conservative side of politics, the only entry into this Parthenon is the party machinations that deposed Robert Menzies as Prime Minister in 1941. World War II was central to the revolt, but political personalities were nearly as important. Menzies did not fall in a party room vote. Having decided that 'my political leadership clearly rested upon nothing better than quicksands', Menzies resigned as leader and went away – in one of his great phrases – to 'lie down and bleed awhile.' Menzies then constructed a new entity – the Liberal Party — better suited to his personality.

What does this history offer to today's Liberal Party? One observation is that almost all the great splits over international policy have occurred to parties holding government. This is logical. Governments must decide, and the bigger the stakes – international as well as domestic — the harder the choice. It takes a special sort of leader to force an idealogical split in opposition, when the party doesn't hold power. Come in, Doc Evatt. Welcome, Malcolm Turnbull.

Another piece of the history lesson is that big splits over international issues take a long time to repair. In dealing with such wounds, the party must come up with a set of arguments about the vexed international issue that it can sell to the voters. In striking against Turnbull, Nick Minchin has painted his leader as a dupe of left wing forces:

For 10 years the left internationally have been very successful in exploiting peoples' innate fears about global warming and climate change to achieve their political ends.

 The Liberal Party cemented itself in office for decades as the anti-communist defender of Australia. Consider that context, then, for Minchin's description of climate change as the new version of communism:

For the extreme left it provides the opportunity to do what they've always wanted to do, to sort of de-industrialise the western world. You know the collapse of communism was a disaster for the left, and really they embraced environmentalism as their new religion.

Such an argument is useful in speaking to the conservative base in Australia. It reinforces the slogan deployed by the National Party that climate change action is just another term for taxation.

The point about international policy conundrums in Australian politics is that they always, by definition, have a global context. The Liberal focus has been on the struggle inside the party room, not the international context. The Liberals may be about to resolve the personality issue, yet leave the party an even bigger set of policy headaches.

Photos courtesy of Wikipedia and www.malcolmturnbull.com.au.

The relationship with the other Asian giant also had its moments. For India's mass media and populace the issue was the bashing of Indian students in Australia while the policy types in New Delhi are nearly as agitated at Labor's refusal to sell uranium to India (a policy Howard was edging towards abandonment).

In dealing with Chinese investment and uranium sales to India, the Rudd Government has shown some ability to say 'no'. That is as it should be, but it does provide some see-saw moments.

The big relationship which has been on the up-and-up is the one where the initial fireworks were expected — with the United States. Rudd has had a smooth — even positive — ride from two vastly different administrations in Washington.

Rudd withdrew Australia from Iraq. But Labor told the US what it intended to do, consulted constantly, and moved deliberately. The withdrawal was not so much 'cut and run' as a measured stroll. On Saturday, a welcome-home march took place at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra to mark the end of Australia's military operations in Iraq. For Australian politics, Iraq is moving from the front pages to the history pages. The war that now matters is Afghanistan.

If Iraq was John Howard's war, then Kevin Rudd's words and actions mean he has taken political ownership of Afghanistan.

Photo by Flickr user Arthaey, used under a Creative Commons license.

I was reminded of a story I have used before about another charismatic British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, who laboured mightily to ensure that the ex Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser did not become secretary-general of the Commonwealth.

Ahead of the vote in 1989, Malcolm had been jetting around pledging that he'd put new force and energy into running the Commonwealth. Margaret Thatcher rang all the other leaders saying they should take the former Australian Prime Minister at his word. 'Do you realise,' she warned, 'if Malcolm gets in, he'll want to do things!' Exit Malcolm.

Blair had the same problem. Europe took him at his word. Tony wanted to do things.

The role of personality in creating a political narrative and projecting messages is an infinitely varied topic. For some excellent ruminations on this theme with an Australian application, consider Annabel Crabb's depiction of Kevin Rudd as a 'shape shifter', constantly changing his stance — even vocabulary — as audience needs dictate.

Crabb describes Tony Blair as another contemporary shape-shifter of the broad left, who used to talk defensively about his 'irreducible core'. The question she then poses: what is at the irreducible core of Kevin Rudd? And the answer offered: It depends who you ask, and when you ask.

The collective leadership of Europe would completely understand.

Photo by Flickr user Ben Ward, used under a Creative Commons license.

If the Government sticks to the program it has been talking about, the announcement will be made in the next few weeks. The public timetable is for the Government to give Second Pass approval before the end of 2009 to three JSF squadrons and a training unit, a total of 72 planes. The decision on the fourth squadron would come later — linked to the to use-by date for the Super Hornets. 

But what odds for a more staggered timeline? Given the slippages already, an immediate commitment to three squadrons would rate as brave (in the 'Yes, Minister' sense of rash heroism).

A Prime Minister who hopes to be in The Lodge still in 2015 should be wary of having too much political capital riding on three JSF squadrons that may not be on the 2020 horizon. The immediate politics argue for a 'Go' decision on the JSF, in line with what was announced in the White Paper. The longer term — looking out to the middle of the next decade — cautions about cost blowouts and big delays.

Photo by Flickr user Steve Snodgrass, used under a Creative Commons license.

But the cunning in the $20 billion demand from Government is that it introduces a new 'show us' element into the way the rest of Canberra deals with Defence. Over the next decade, there will be one immediate measure available each year of the level of budget discipline in Defence.

The 'show us' demand is not just a Labor sentiment. It reflects the deep frustrations at Defence's ability to ignore budgets that built up in the breast of Peter Costello during his record term as Treasurer. The 'show us' imperative explains why the new secretary of Defence comes from the Finance Department.

This is the reverse of the cliché about making the poacher a game keeper. Putting Ian Watt in charge is more like promoting the Chancellor of the Exchequer to princely rank and ordering him to control the Lords and Barons spread across the Defence kingdom.

Photo by Flickr user jaxxon, used under a Creative Commons license.

Nobody would dare complain if we were cogent and crystal clear about what will constitute success and how we will get there…We are a loyal friend accompanying others in Afghanistan because it is right but our presence is not and never has been unconditional. In Vietnam our voice was not heard. It is in our national interest that it is heard among our allies at this critical time in Afghanistan.

Cosgrove repeated his view that, in hindsight, Australia's commitment to the Vietnam war was a mistake. After eight years in Afghanistan, he is not yet ready to make the same hindsight judgment. Instead, he offered a set of measures drawn from Vietnam that produce uneasy answers when applied to Afghanistan:

• Look not only at the reasons why we go but also at the prospects of success.
• Consider the methods that will be used to win.
• What price are we prepared to pay?
• What would be the cost of failure?
• Remember the law of unintended consequences.

The Cosgrove lecture is thoughtful and balanced with a few sharp edges. But ultimately he does not put the sword to the throat of his government in the manner of US or British generals.

In the US, General Stanley McChrystal's 'real truths' and 'high stakes' speech has told his president to put up or shut up. In London, the ex-generals are going after the Brown Government with a vengeance while eminent journals ponder the strains imposed on the covenant between the British military and the country. The Financial Times has editorialised that Afghanistan is now 'the biggest test' of Brown's premiership.

These Afghanistan schisms are not being replicated here. Maybe the boat people drama trumps all else for the Australian media. Partly, the Rudd Government has political cover because it is dealing with one of John Howard's wars. Add to this the balance struck by Rudd's mantra: we are fully committed but this is our full commitment.

Rudd has to keep Labor's left in mind, especially as the casualty toll mounts. Having a Lion of the Left as Defence Minister is useful for this calculation. On the right, the Prime Minister has less to fear than Obama, who can be attacked by Republicans with the charge that he is a wimp who is not doing enough to win. Rudd has more troops in Afghanistan than were sent by John Howard.

In maintaining the bipartisan political consensus, Brendan Nelson is set to be the former Liberal Leader and former Defence Minister who just keeps on giving for this Labor Prime Minister. As with most things Brendan does, he put a large measure of personal emotion into his attachment to the Afghanistan mission. Making him NATO ambassador means that commitment will have continuing policy — and political — relevance. The Nelson ambassadorship ranks as a useful bit of insurance against any Liberal retreat from the Afghanistan consensus.

 Photo by Flickr user Greything, used under a Creative Commons license.

Consider the different treatments of APEC and the G20 in Stephen Smith's recent speech on the Asia Pacific century. APEC is still pre-eminent but only as the 'regional forum for Australia's economic engagement with Asia and the Pacific.' For the Foreign Minister, the G20 shapes as an exciting new toy with a more avowedly political reach:

Australia has high ambitions for the G20 and the region's role in it. It should become the political driver of stronger global cooperation and governance, responding to the full range of global challenges that will confront us in the Asia-Pacific century.

The Rudd view of APEC has probably never been as enthusiastic as that of Labor predecessors such as Hawke or Keating. To get a fix on the Prime Minister's view of APEC, come back to 2001 when Rudd was still a not-so-humble Labor backbencher. Rudd was using his position as chair of the Parliamentary Party Committee on National Security and Trade to push for a position on the front bench — specifically, the Foreign Affairs portfolio (to the mounting chagrin of the then holder of the shadow Foreign Minister job, Laurie Brereton).

Then, as now, Rudd was prone to essaying, and he penned a chapter entitled 'Inserting a new dialectic: Governance', for a book on globalisation. You can find the full essay here. This old essay reveals both consistencies and shifts in the Rudd position. For a start, in 2001 Rudd was able to talk about neo-liberalism without exactly spitting — although he is certainly critical.

What also comes through is a distinct scepticism about APEC that you would not have heard from Howard, much less Keating. Rudd judged — correctly — that APEC had been slow to respond to the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis and had been 'irrelevant' to whatever recovery the region had achieved. Rudd's view was that APEC had shown little ability 'to proceed beyond its own narrow neo-liberal trade agenda':

In summary, APEC was founded on neo-liberal principles, and has so far seemed institutionally incapable of substantially addressing pressing policy challenges to its regional economic environment. As a ginger group on trade liberalisation, it has performed a useful function, but given that most substantial liberalisation measures are likely to be negotiated in the Millennium Round of the WTO, its main trade-related functions will consist of 'maintaining the faith' on the Bogor commitments and pressing the raft of practical trade facilitation programs currently underway. Still, APEC must formally address the critical, unresolved challenges from the 1997 crisis concerning the future regulatory regime for world currency markets, and the region's environmental issues are pressing. If and when APEC takes up these and other policy challenges in a substantive way, regionalism in the Asia-Pacific may have something new, positive and even dialectical to contribute to the globalisation debate.

We now know that Rudd's answer to world currency markets is not APEC, but the G20. As for maintaining the faith on Bogor, next year will be an embarrassing reminder that politicians should be careful about setting target dates, no matter how far into the future. The 1994 Bogor Declaration committed APEC to achieving free and open trade and investment in the Asia Pacific — the developed economies by 2010, the developing economies no later than 2020. There's a deadline they'll have to tip-toe around during the Singapore summit.

One of APEC’s wise owls, Andrew Elek, writes that there is no need to be overly concerned that APEC's Bogor goals will not be met in full, even by 2020. And he offers this excellent summary of what APEC can and can't do:

APEC should play to its strengths; building consensus on policies, including trade and investment policies, which can help each Asia Pacific economy to achieve its potential for sustainable growth. This means accepting the limitations of a voluntary process of cooperation. APEC’s successes have come in areas where governments have perceived the benefit of cooperating, voluntarily, to achieve agreed practical objectives. Problems, together with perceptions of failure, have arisen when participants in a voluntary process sought to engage in negotiations.

Image courtesy of APEC Singapore 2009.

Now the US is also talking to Burma, marking a change in the tone if not the content of the approach to the Generals. Kurt Campbell's visit to Burma is the highest level contact between the two governments for more than a decade. And it means the US is now able to sit in the same room as Burma — a handy change if the Asian community/Community process is built on the East Asia Summit.

Signing the ASEAN Treaty of Amity also means the US can engage on the security dimensions of the community discussion. Washington can even consider a structure based on the East Asia Summit. To give an old US metaphor an extra layer: the alliance hub-and-spokes could support a new community umbrella.

Obama will get a further chance to charm the ASEANs at the APEC summit in Singapore. He and the ASEAN leaders are to have a 90-minute summit on 15 November at the Shangri-La Hotel. And Obama will invite the ASEANs to a follow-up summit in Washington next year. That really is talking to Burma, even if done with an ASEAN cover.

All this US movement is good news for Kevin Rudd. Obama is heading into territory that Rudd started exploring — bravely/recklessly — last year. Some in ASEAN have responded positively to Rudd's effort to give 'a new impetus to the idea of shaping the regional architecture through regionwide discussions at the highest level.' The praise is from Indonesia’s Jusuf Wanandi in a piece he wrote back in February.

Wanandi reflected the consensus that the region will not attempt 'a totally new architecture', but it will consolidate existing institutions. The fascinating point is to read Wanandi's lament that ASEAN is not really up to the job: 'ASEAN's limited cohesion has become a limiting factor. Many question if ASEAN can really get its act together to face future challenges (global or regional).' That is probably far from a majority view in ASEAN, but aving remade itself as a democracy, Indonesia is prepared to think about remaking ASEAN's role.

Jakarta's ability to think new thoughts about ASEAN opens the way for the US to pose its own set of questions. Hillary Clinton said signing the TAC was evidence of the US 'smart power'. The real smarts in this is that the US enhances its ability to influence the emerging game or even act as a game changer.

Photo by Flickr user Rambis, used under a Creative Commons license.