[Mass protests forced a nuclear-free policy on Lange. We need to rediscover this tradition.]
There was a flurry of news recently
about the US and NZ building “better relations” as Leon Panetta, the US
secretary of Defence, visited
the country. There hasn’t been such a visit since NZ was suspended from the
ANZUS military agreement because of the ban on nuclear warships docking in NZ
ports. Panetta wants to station US troops in NZ.
Whenever there is discussion about
‘better military relations’ we must wonder who will these relations be better
for? Will closer military relations benefit working people or will it benefit
the wealthy?
The New Zealand capitalists want closer
relations with the USA for, as I see it, two main reasons. First there is the
access to trade deals and other economic benefits from the plunder of the
Middle East and other imperial exploits. For resources such as cheap labour and
raw materials and access to markets to sell goods there is a section of the NZ
elite that supported the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq. Can
anyone remember Don
Brash or John Key
talking about how ‘we’ should have joined the invasion of Iraq to get better
‘trade deals’. These so called ‘Free Trade’ deals, like the Trans Pacific
Partnership Agreement will mean the continued race to the bottom in terms of
wages and conditions for workers in all countries.
The second reason capitalists in New
Zealand support a return to ANZUS is that it would tighten up the already
strong economic and political alliance in the pacific that is in competition
with China. Ever since the end of World War Two the USA and its allies like
Australia and New Zealand have dominated the Pacific. This is more than simply
economic exploitation to Military interventions. Troops and police have been
sent to Tonga in 2006 and the Solomons in 2003 under Helen Clark’s Labour
government to
prop up corrupt governments that protect the profits of NZ, Aus, and US
corporations.
['Why, I can smile; and murder while I smile']
China is a growing threat to this
political bloc in the Pacific. While it is one of NZ’s, the USA, and
Australia’s biggest trading partners there is a political tension growing
between the US led countries and China. In the pacific the most glaring case of
political tension is over Fiji. However in many places, including NZ, there is
competition between Chinese investment and aid and western investment and aid –
where both groups are trying to buy influence. It is unlikely that any open
conflict in the Pacific will erupt any time soon especially since the US and
NATO forces are still continuing the predatory occupation of Afghanistan. Even
this being the case it would be a big step backwards for working people, in
China, the USA, and NZ for NZ to re – enter ANZUS.
Nuclear armed and powered warships (or
warships of any kind) can only benefit the capitalists by providing them
strategic advantage over their competitors in other countries. Working people,
students, and the oppressed should reject any appeals that say we need
‘defence’. It was ordinary people that put the pressure on the government
and business community to ban all nuclear powered or armed warships.
Above all it was the wharfies on the ports in NZ that forced the government’s
hand. There was a campaign of strike action that escalated to the point where
the workers would shut down the ports whenever a US warship docked. This is the
kind of power that can defend ordinary people from the horrors of war abroad
and poverty at home. We should look to building a stronger workers movement
that has international links with the workers movement in both China and the
USA/Aus.
If we want to stop the wars around the
world or any conflict between ANZUS and China in the Pacific then we must
understand that these alliances and wars are for profit. There is no benefit
for working people in military alliances of any kind as the old saying goes:
It’s the rich who start wars and the poor who die in them.
Derwin Smith
