ELVIS
02-09-2005, 04:34 PM
February 10, 2005 (http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,12202087%255E25377,00.html)
SO here's the scenario. A conservative prime minister, much reviled by the liberal press and disliked personally by all the left-wing intelligentsia, sends hundreds of his country's troops to Iraq in support of the US operation there and in the next general election wins a victory far beyond expectations.
John Howard, right?
No, the scenario was played out by Thaksin Shinawatra in Thailand last weekend.
The Thai election should have received a lot more attention. Thailand is important to us. With 65 million people, it is as big as any European Union member except Germany. Its economy, the second largest in Southeast Asia, is growing faster than any in East Asia except China. And it has signed a free trade agreement with Australia.
Now, I don't want to be too cute with the Thaksin/Howard comparison but there is something in it worth noting. Thaksin did not send troops to fight the Iraq war, but despite its being generally unpopular he did send two consecutive troop deployments of 450 soldiers for the peacekeeping phase. And despite some Thai fatalities he did not bring his troops home until the scheduled end of the second six-month deployment.
This is a fascinating detail to observe. All of the US's East Asian allies and de facto allies ended up adopting the same or similar positions. Australia, as the most intimate and active US ally in the region, sent troops to the combat phase as well as the peacekeeping phase. The other US allies did not send troops to the combat phase but offered political support to the US and sent troops for peacekeeping.
The South Koreans sent more than 3000, the Japanese several hundred. Even the Filipinos sent a small contingent which they tragically withdrew as a result of terrorist intimidation.
Far from Howard's support of Bush alienating us from Asia, Howard took an absolutely orthodox Asian position, for an ally of the US, on Iraq.
The left-wing intelligentsia (to use the term recently coined without a trace of irony or self-awareness by the great poseur of our time, Robert Manne) frequently contend there is a contradiction between Howard's support of Bush and our position in Asia.
In reality, if there is any choice it is between the Asian position and the EU position, which of course numerous European nations do not subscribe to.
Howard, like Thaksin, has chosen Asia over Europe.
With the partial exception of Indonesia and Malaysia, Asian states have found they feel comfortable with the US in the age of terror. They understand and generally sympathise with the US's operating principle in this period. All of us in this part of the world have come to our similar positions through our distinctive cultural and political processes, but the commonality of the pro-US posture is almost an illustration of the central tenet of classical realism in foreign policy – that states, regardless of who runs them, will generally act in their strategic interests.
The Bush administration understands it is in much better shape in Asia than in Europe. A US official in Washington recently explained to me why: "There is a structural, or strategic/cultural reason. In Europe the nation-state is 500 years old. Polls show many Europeans have either a pan-European or a sub-national identity. Nationalism is in decline.
"In Asia, nation-states are young, especially the post-colonial states. Sovereignty is incredibly sensitive.
"So a 19th- century balance of power approach comes naturally. US policies, even if they're unpopular, fit the Asian Zeitgeist. In response to 9/11 Southeast Asian leaders really got it. They understand power and are reassured by the US use of power."
This is in great contrast to the EU view which sees nation-states as primitive and wants to dissolve their identitites and sovereignties in the postmodern EU virtual reality.
Nonetheless a balance of power approach is hardly a comprehensive agenda for the US for the future in Asia. But the US official had an answer for that too: "The trend in the region is towards democracy and market liberalisation. No one is going backwards except Burma. So we, the democracies, own the future."
That may constitute characteristic American optimism but it is a constructive approach to the region. The question it begs is whether Thaksin himself can be classified as representing democracy and market liberalisation.
Thaksin, like most democratic politicians, is a mixed grill. There is good and bad in his record. The good is very good. He has comprehensively rebooted the Thai economy, securing high economic growth for Thailand. Once again the left-wing intelligentsia, displaying their infallible ability to get everything wrong, don't much like high economic growth. But in Thailand it has had this simple result: the poverty rate before Thaksin came to power was over 14 per cent, it is now below 10 per cent.
Call me old-fashioned, but I'm almost always in favour of declining poverty rates.
There is at least one sense too in which Thaksin can be seen as the most democratic of Thailand's leaders. He ran on a specific program, polarised politics around the program, got elected on the program and implemented the program, all of which are extremely novel innovations in Thai history.
Of course there are real negatives as well. Thaksin's role as uber-conglomerate boss gives him an obvious conflict of interest with being prime minister, though he has formally divested himself of personal corporate holdings. He has either bought, co-opted or been a bit rough with the media. His anti-drugs crackdown was very heavy-handed and his government has handled Muslim rebellion in the south with great clumsiness, including the shocking deaths of 78 protesters when they were crammed into trucks and left in the baking sun.
For all that, Sunday's election was an authetnic expression of the Thai national will. It is a result which upsets left-wing intelligentsias everywhere. No wonder it was ignored.
:elvis:
SO here's the scenario. A conservative prime minister, much reviled by the liberal press and disliked personally by all the left-wing intelligentsia, sends hundreds of his country's troops to Iraq in support of the US operation there and in the next general election wins a victory far beyond expectations.
John Howard, right?
No, the scenario was played out by Thaksin Shinawatra in Thailand last weekend.
The Thai election should have received a lot more attention. Thailand is important to us. With 65 million people, it is as big as any European Union member except Germany. Its economy, the second largest in Southeast Asia, is growing faster than any in East Asia except China. And it has signed a free trade agreement with Australia.
Now, I don't want to be too cute with the Thaksin/Howard comparison but there is something in it worth noting. Thaksin did not send troops to fight the Iraq war, but despite its being generally unpopular he did send two consecutive troop deployments of 450 soldiers for the peacekeeping phase. And despite some Thai fatalities he did not bring his troops home until the scheduled end of the second six-month deployment.
This is a fascinating detail to observe. All of the US's East Asian allies and de facto allies ended up adopting the same or similar positions. Australia, as the most intimate and active US ally in the region, sent troops to the combat phase as well as the peacekeeping phase. The other US allies did not send troops to the combat phase but offered political support to the US and sent troops for peacekeeping.
The South Koreans sent more than 3000, the Japanese several hundred. Even the Filipinos sent a small contingent which they tragically withdrew as a result of terrorist intimidation.
Far from Howard's support of Bush alienating us from Asia, Howard took an absolutely orthodox Asian position, for an ally of the US, on Iraq.
The left-wing intelligentsia (to use the term recently coined without a trace of irony or self-awareness by the great poseur of our time, Robert Manne) frequently contend there is a contradiction between Howard's support of Bush and our position in Asia.
In reality, if there is any choice it is between the Asian position and the EU position, which of course numerous European nations do not subscribe to.
Howard, like Thaksin, has chosen Asia over Europe.
With the partial exception of Indonesia and Malaysia, Asian states have found they feel comfortable with the US in the age of terror. They understand and generally sympathise with the US's operating principle in this period. All of us in this part of the world have come to our similar positions through our distinctive cultural and political processes, but the commonality of the pro-US posture is almost an illustration of the central tenet of classical realism in foreign policy – that states, regardless of who runs them, will generally act in their strategic interests.
The Bush administration understands it is in much better shape in Asia than in Europe. A US official in Washington recently explained to me why: "There is a structural, or strategic/cultural reason. In Europe the nation-state is 500 years old. Polls show many Europeans have either a pan-European or a sub-national identity. Nationalism is in decline.
"In Asia, nation-states are young, especially the post-colonial states. Sovereignty is incredibly sensitive.
"So a 19th- century balance of power approach comes naturally. US policies, even if they're unpopular, fit the Asian Zeitgeist. In response to 9/11 Southeast Asian leaders really got it. They understand power and are reassured by the US use of power."
This is in great contrast to the EU view which sees nation-states as primitive and wants to dissolve their identitites and sovereignties in the postmodern EU virtual reality.
Nonetheless a balance of power approach is hardly a comprehensive agenda for the US for the future in Asia. But the US official had an answer for that too: "The trend in the region is towards democracy and market liberalisation. No one is going backwards except Burma. So we, the democracies, own the future."
That may constitute characteristic American optimism but it is a constructive approach to the region. The question it begs is whether Thaksin himself can be classified as representing democracy and market liberalisation.
Thaksin, like most democratic politicians, is a mixed grill. There is good and bad in his record. The good is very good. He has comprehensively rebooted the Thai economy, securing high economic growth for Thailand. Once again the left-wing intelligentsia, displaying their infallible ability to get everything wrong, don't much like high economic growth. But in Thailand it has had this simple result: the poverty rate before Thaksin came to power was over 14 per cent, it is now below 10 per cent.
Call me old-fashioned, but I'm almost always in favour of declining poverty rates.
There is at least one sense too in which Thaksin can be seen as the most democratic of Thailand's leaders. He ran on a specific program, polarised politics around the program, got elected on the program and implemented the program, all of which are extremely novel innovations in Thai history.
Of course there are real negatives as well. Thaksin's role as uber-conglomerate boss gives him an obvious conflict of interest with being prime minister, though he has formally divested himself of personal corporate holdings. He has either bought, co-opted or been a bit rough with the media. His anti-drugs crackdown was very heavy-handed and his government has handled Muslim rebellion in the south with great clumsiness, including the shocking deaths of 78 protesters when they were crammed into trucks and left in the baking sun.
For all that, Sunday's election was an authetnic expression of the Thai national will. It is a result which upsets left-wing intelligentsias everywhere. No wonder it was ignored.
:elvis: