Former NSW premier Bob Carr, someone I have seldom found myself in agreement with, has stated an inconvenient truth though, that our local ruling elites have yet to take to heart. There are clear limits to the protection that America can, and will, deliver to Australia. “I just think we Australians have been enormously gullible and optimistic about our American partner and we’ve got to start to factor in to our view of our future in this world the prospect that America could be more unpredictable and more unreliable,” he said. Certainly, if Trump becomes president Australia would be in a much better position than if Beijing Biden, who at that stage would be on life-support, is put in the presidential office. We are in very dangerous times, and there is not the public concern that there should be.
“Former NSW premier Bob Carr says Australia has been gullible about the limits of our American partner, after President Joe Biden cancelled his trip to Australia.
“I think we need to project more realistically as Australians when it comes to American politics,” Mr Carr told Sky News.
“I just think we Australians have been enormously gullible and optimistic about our American partner and we’ve got to start to factor in to our view of our future in this world the prospect that America could be more unpredictable and more unreliable.”
“(The Quad) is a signal to China that should Chinese behaviour become more assertive this Quad could become more consequential.
“But we shouldn’t believe as we’ve been led to believe that it’s as significant a forum as some suggest. The fact the President can cancel the attendance and the meeting can apparently not proceed is a warning about the limits of America’s attention span and one that Australia ought to take seriously as we project into the future.”
He said if America was not led by Trump, it could be led by a hand-picked successor to the Trump faction of the Republican part, and the democrats “an increasingly fragile President and a vice President … who lacks any real authority in her own party”.
“Right now, India has had a rude awakening, the Quad is not what it had been held out to it, and I think Japan as well will be considering the reliability of America in the context of the cancellation of what they believe would be a consequential meeting.”