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Security and Disarmament in the Asia-Pacific: The Issues from a Non-Official Australian Perspective

by Marika Vicziany and John Mckay

The nuclear tests by India and Pakistan in May 1998 provide us with further evidence of the extent to which the familiar scenarios of the cold war era have come to an end(i). We are now on new terrain. India and Pakistan probably were nuclear weapons capable states before May 1998, but until the tests were conducted their actual status was ambiguous. The nuclear club of five has been expanded to a nuclear club of seven, despite whatever questions Western scientists may have about the size and potency of the explosions by India and Pakistan. Our position since May 1998 has been that there is no point in denying that India and Pakistan are now unambiguous nuclear weapons capable nations. Given that, this paper addresses a number of issues which arise from that recognition. Our purpose in this paper is to raise some of the questions which now need to be asked about how to go forward from the present situation. In particular, we are concerned with the configuration of US and Australian policies and the lessons to be learnt from the recent history of Australian and American reactions to developments in South Asia and on the Korean peninsula.

We do not expect to agree with the official views of governments in the Asia-Pacific region, not even with those of our own government. As academics, our role is to go beyond the official boundaries and contemplate scenarios, which are more creative and medium to long term than those which are currently embraced by government. For this reason we have organised a number of security dialogues to identify pathways along which it might be possible to influence government policies and actions. Armed with new information, new insights, and alternative scenarios, our purpose is to influence governments to change direction in those areas where policy changes are clearly necessary and desirable.

As Australians, we begin with stating our concerns about where Australia stands on the question of regional security in the Asia-Pacific. From this we move to consider the position of the USA, in our view the world's only superpower for the foreseeable future (although we acknowledge that a multipolar world order is emerging). We also raise questions about:

Concerns About Australia's Position

We do not question Australia's need to remain a close ally of the USA and believe that Australia falls under the American nuclear umbrella. There is now a new school of thought which questions the general value of military alliances given that the cold war has ended. (Bandow, 1996) Within Australia, critics of the Australia- US alliance are divided into two camps. First there are those who doubt that the USA would come to Australia's assistance in any security scenario in which Australian interests are paramount (ii). This school emphasises the asymmetry between Australian and US commitments: the US would not 'rescue' us but we stand by the US regardless of the situation. For some, the recent refusal of the US to intervene in East Timor in contrast to Australia's deep concern and involvement provides the evidence about the divergent security interests of the two nations. The second and related camp questions that Australia actually falls within the US nuclear umbrella, pointing out that American priorities are sharply focussed on Europe and the Middle East. The nature of the US -Australia alliance is certainly something which deserves close analysis, and we are sympathetic to the need for such a study. This is not, however, the place to engage in such a discourse. Hence our starting point is the assumption stated at the beginning of this paragraph.

If Australia is to remain closely tied to the USA it needs to self-consciously begin to play a more imaginative and creative role within that framework. Australia should not merely follow America's lead. Australia's recent history of immigration, commerce and general involvement with the Asia-Pacific places her in a position to make a unique contribution to the development of US foreign policy in the region. America needs a creative ally of the kind we are proposing that Australia become. There are parallels, therefore, between our position and the official position of the Australian government, which has been driven for some decades with the worry that the USA is under increasing domestic pressure to disengage from the Asia-Pacific. Australian foreign policy, as articulated by the two major political parties, has placed a premium on keeping the US engaged in our region. This is a familiar refrain in the Australian press. Our response to articles such as the most recent one by Paul Kelly (Kelly, 1999) is that it is not sufficient for Australia to seek American engagement on any terms which merely suit the US . An effective engagement by the US in this part of the world requires Australia to play a more actively creative role, especially in the design of strategies and approaches to security. In our view, this more active role does not, however, mean that Australia should merely act as the USA's deputy - the latter is one interpretation which is being given to the recently announced "Howard Doctrine".

On a number of issues in the recent past, Australia has indeed played an imaginative role in the region. For some decades, we have had a sensible policy of engagement with Indonesia and we recognised the People's Republic of China before the USA . The recent downturn in our relations with Indonesia is, hopefully, a temporary phenomenon and, as Paul Dibb as argued, something which can be resurrected if we continue to apply the sympathetic approaches we have in the past. In the field of nuclear matters, we established the Canberra Commission for Nuclear Disarmament. In the university and business sectors, Australia has developed a solid reputation of being more in tune with the needs and sensitivities of Asian nations than our American counterparts.

Emerging from this record, has been a school of thought in Australia emphasising Australia's potential as a middle power. From time to time successive governments have also suggested that Australia can play a significant part in shaping the future of the Asia-Pacific region, far more influentially than its small population might suggest. So our position on Australia playing the role of a leader rather than a passive follower is not a new one. In some senses, medium powers may have more freedom of action than the much larger powers. They can ask questions and pursue innovative policies that are not open to the bigger players. They can afford to take morally superior positions, to lead ethical crusades, to act as a conscience for the world. Some writers have suggested that there are three distinct aspects to the constructive role that middle powers can play (McKay, 1996):

  1. Catalyst-providing intellectual and political energy to trigger initiatives and build coalitions;
  2. Facilitator-developing agendas for action, cementing coalitions to leverage power, setting priorities;
  3. Manager-taking a central role in building institutions, creating confidence-building systems.

In terms of style, middle powers can often demonstrate quick and thoughtful diplomatic footwork superior to that of the big powers. They can also act as bridges between different groups, and be perceived as credible without being hypocritical, threatening or unduly self-interested in the solution to particular issues.

On the surface it seems as if Australia could play a unique, constructive and innovative role. Our strong historical and cultural links to North America and Europe give us access to the Western nations, but without severing links to Asia, and with our developing expertise in the Asia-Pacific we can act as a useful link between East and West. Australia's initiative in the establishment of APEC is one example of how such a role might work in a multilateral context.

Unfortunately, in 1998 Australia missed out on important opportunities to play the modest but constructive role we have mapped out above. The official Australian reaction to the nuclear tests by India and Pakistan in May 1998 and our response to the difficulties on the Korean peninsula provide telling examples of how in certain key areas of foreign policy Australia failed to play the innovative role that many of us expected. In both cases Australia responded to regional crises by giving uncritical support to American policies rather than acting as an allied innovator.

In the case of South Asia, a consensus emerged outside official circles that the Australian government's reaction to the nuclear tests by India and Pakistan in May 1998 was too hasty, too strong and too limited. We disengaged very quickly from India and Pakistan and found ourselves 'out of the loop'. For most of 1998, the Australian response to India and Pakistan was full of contradictions. On the one hand, we closely identified ourselves with the US policy position on nuclear non-proliferation, but on the other hand we distinguished ourselves by exceeding the level of anger and disappointment expressed by America. Again, in contrast to the American approach, in our eagerness to reprimand India and Pakistan we voluntarily cut ourselves off from any official dialogue with India and Pakistan except for the intermittent contact possible at multilateral fora.

While Australia suspended all official visits, the US engaged in its first serious diplomatic initiative on South Asia by sending its envoy, Strobe Talbott, to meet Indian and Pakistani officials at no less than eight rounds of talks. Australia, by contrast, decided to prevent even eminent, non-official visitors such as Soli Sorabjee, the Attorney General of India, from visiting Australia. In this way, Australia recklessly abandoned any possibility of playing the kind of middle power leadership role we mapped out above and left it to America to bring India and Pakistan back into the international arena of discourse on nuclear control and disarmament issues.

The Australian reaction to nuclear tests in South Asia was needlessly extreme not only in content but also style. At every opportunity, Australia seemed to distinguish itself by 'yelling and screaming' at the impudence of India and Pakistan. We continued to loudly condemn India and Pakistan, even when the US was reported to be 'mute' such as on the occasion of the ASEAN meeting in Manila in 1998. The perception in India was that Australia was leading the 'Western pack' in articulating a level of unprecedented hostility towards a country which did not deserve this kind of treatment because it had never signed the CTBT and so had not broken any international agreement in conducting the nuclear tests. Elsewhere, we have already commented on the unacceptable language in which some Australian government representatives attacked India and Pakistan within Australia and abroad (Vicziany, 1998 and 1999).

Only on the matter of economic sanctions was Australia softer and more pragmatic than the US. The US imposed wide-reaching economic sanctions including self-damaging constraints on American exports to South Asia (iii). Australia, by contrast, limited itself to restricting official non-humanitarian aid. In India, the perception was that Australia was too selfish to bear the cost of its own moralistic rhetoric - however much we condemned India and Pakistan, our favourable balance of trade with South Asia was not to be jeopardised.

Not only did Australia loose a significant opportunity to play the role of a middle ranking power on the occasion of the nuclear tests by India and Pakistan, but also the extremity of Australia's official response marked a significant reversal in our recent and carefully constructed relationship with the subcontinent. After the recommendations of the 1989 Senate Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Australia had worked to improve its bilateral links with India. It slowly developed a reputation as a relatively neutral, friendly, multicultural country with much to offer in the field of commodity exports, scientific-technical know-how and foreign investment. By the mid1990s, Australia had become the ninth largest foreign direct investor in India (Vicziany,2000). Australia's mining expertise, for example, was welcomed by India, which acknowledged the contribution made by the Australian industry to the gradual deregulation of the Indian mining sector. Australian exports to India began to grow quickly, making India into an important emerging market and one in which Australia's market share was growing at a time when market share in other Asian economies was falling (Mathur,1999). Australia's good relations with India were also reflected in important consultancy projects involving Australian firms working closely with Indian public sector companies such as Coal India (Vicziany,1999).

All of this goodwill and pragmatism was jeapardised as a result of Australia's strident rhetoric against the nuclear tests. Despite the advances in the India-Australia bilateral relationship noted above, Australia's image in India has not been without blemishes, so the position taken in May-June 1998 refocused attention on the negative aspects of the bilateral relationship. In particular, India has been very disappointed with Australia's failure to support her objective to join APEC. The Australian position on this has always seemed much harder than the public US position on an expanded membership including India. Indeed, the US Ambassadors to India have typically stressed general US sympathy for India's inclusion. At one Australia-India public forum, Chidambaran expressed this disappointment in strong language: APEC without India, he said, was like Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark.

Since December 1998, Australia has softened its stance on India and Pakistan and sought to normalise relations. Whilst no official declarations announced the shift in attitudes, by February 1999 the change was sufficiently pronounced to enable the Australian Minister for Trade, Mr Tim Fischer, to visit India and deliver the keynote address to the Annual Australia-India Business Council meeting. It should be noted, however, that whilst Mr Fischer's visit was the first official exchange between India and Australia since May 1998, it was initiated by the Australia-India Business Council not the Australian government. This provides another example of how public opinion in Australia has been ahead of official government policy when it comes to India-Australia relations.

Unfortunately, Australian governments now think that things have gone back to normal - that the Australia-India relationship can continue to develop from the point reached prior to the nuclear tests by India and Pakistan in May last year. We have serious doubts about this. There has always been in India a residual element of suspicion about Australian foreign policies and intentions. Our reactions to the events of May 1998 have heightened these. But more importantly, within Australia, our reactions to the nuclear tests demonstrated how little in-depth knowledge and sympathy there was in the highest circles of government for the needs and priorities of the nations of South Asia. It is this which will hold back the evolution of our bilateral relationships with the region for the reasons explained below.

First, an inquiry by the Senate Standing Committee during the second half of 1998 revealed the extent to which Australian civil servants and politicians lacked sufficient understanding of the legitimate security concerns which led India and Pakistan to conduct the nuclear tests in May 1998. It fell to the academic and business community to persuade the senators of these legitimate preoccupations. Fortunately, the Report by the Committee demonstrated that the senators and secretariat had listened very carefully to the evidence given by the non-official witnesses. Despite this, it is very doubtful that this evidence can make a sufficient, long term difference to the understanding of the Australian government. Government reports are not always taken seriously even by the government which commissioned them. More importantly, the information gathered by the inquiry needs to be internalised by the government departments which design our foreign and defence policies. As we argue below, the institutional obstacles to this absorption are considerable.

Second, the official Australian condemnation of India and Pakistan was expressed in not merely strong language, but language, which was often deeply rude, offensive and on occasion abusive. The tone came as a great shock to the Indian and Pakistan High Commissions in Canberra which made it widely known that they and their representatives had never been spoken to in such demeaning terms by seasoned practitioners of the art of diplomacy. The shock within the High Commissions was shared by the Indian and Pakistani communities in Australia and the scholars and business communities who are in regular touch with South Asian networks. The dismay spread back to India and Pakistan through these community networks, and even small-medium Australian business firms found that they had a lot of explaining to do as part of their normal business discourse in South Asia. At the level of people-to-people links, we all found ourselves apologising for the language of the Australian government. Unfortunately, the memories of these incidents will continue to mar our bilateral relationship if not in overt ways then in more subtle ways which determine the mutual respect and ease of discourse between nations.

Third, Australia's position in 1998 demonstrated that Australia was not merely a close ally of the USA but was indeed prepared to take on the onerous burden of denouncing India and Pakistan so that the USA could occasionally remain silent or adopt a more subdued tone. The low-key position adopted by America enabled it to concentrate on applying real pressure out of the public gaze. This has created the impression in South Asia that Australians, despite their professed ties to Asia, have only a poor understanding of the sentiments of the people and governments in the region. Given that governments and the public in South Asia are unaware of the more imaginative dimensions of Australian foreign policy in Asia, our position on the nuclear tests in South Asia signaled that we were a reactive and follow-the-leader nation. Despite the hoopla about bilateral closeness as expressed by Australian initiatives such as the trade-cultural fair "Australia-India New Horizons", many Indian friends and colleagues pointed out that 'new horizons' in our bilateral relations with South Asia were shrinking rather than expanding. During our first dialogue in Melbourne, a number of South Asian participants challenged our argument that Australia could play the role of a middle power. They believed, on the basis of reactions to the nuclear tests in May 1998, that we lacked a stand sufficiently independent of US foreign policy to achieve this position.

It is our view that the history of the past year or so has represented a major setback in Australia's bilateral relationships with India and Pakistan. To quote one source: "Australians seem to forget that we Indians have long memories�" At the same time, we believe that the opportunities for Australia playing a moderating role in South Asia have expanded rather than diminished. The nuclear tests in South Asia have not abated the delicate security situation in the region -this was dramatically demonstrated by the conflict in Kargil in mid 1999. We will return to the question of Kargil shortly, but first we need to demonstrate how Australia's failures in South Asia are echoed in our policy towards the Korean peninsula.

As with South Asia, Australia's policy on Northeast Asia in general, and on the Korean peninsula in particular, has been too uncritically supportive of US policy. In many cases this has not helped to develop solutions to particularly difficult problems, but we would even argue that in some cases it has even been detrimental to the position of our allies. Australia has certainly not played the creative role that might be possible given our very special advantages of history and geography.

Australia has a clear interest in the peaceful development of the Korean peninsula-in part because South Korea is our second largest export market. As Ralph Cossa (1999) has stressed recently, the Agreed Framework worked out in 1994 is certainly not perfect, and by itself it cannot resolve all nuclear-related issues, much less bring lasting peace and security to the Peninsula. But its importance should not be underestimated. While successful completion of the Agreed Framework alone is not sufficient to ensure peace in Korea, its failure would certainly be a serious setback to that process. However, in the periods both before and since the Agreed Framework, Australian policy on North Korea has involved a simple repetition of US positions, and in some cases this hard line has been maintained even after the US has softened its own response. In the present situation in North Korea a strong case can be made for the engagement of the DPRK in constructive dialogue and a variety of confidence-building measures. The priority to develop low-cost and small-scale methods of energy generation, and even the more pressing need for assistance in the modernisation of North Korean agriculture, provide important opportunities for Australia.

Similarly Australia can play a role in the engagement of the DPRK with a range of multilateral, regional organisations such as the Asian Development Bank and the ASEAN Regional Forum. The official Australian response is that we need to avoid giving offence to either the United States or South Korea, but it seems very clear that both of these governments would welcome such initiatives, provided that they were carefully consulted and were kept informed at every stage. Even if one accepts that the solution of the Korean problem will ultimately be solved only by the Korean people themselves, most Koreans accept that sympathetic and well-intentioned initiatives by outside nations can play a useful role. Similarly, even if one accepts that the North Korean regime must be made aware that there are limits to its freedom of action and that it must line up to its agreed obligations, there is still room for a smaller nation such as Australia to play a very different and much more constructive role - a role which explores dialogue, limited cooperation and alternative options for the future (see for example by Kim Kyung-Won and Han Sung-Joo, 1998). In the next section of this paper we explore the need for Australia to take independent initiatives by considering the dangers of following US policies too closely.

Concerns about US Policy

As the only global superpower for the time being, the USA has special difficulty in getting itself heard as a legitimate voice. Four things come together to work against the US being viewed as a legitimate actor in the Asia-Pacific region by the nations in that region:

As a result of these perceptions, American interest in regional security is often viewed by Asia-Pacific nations as a drive for regional and global hegemony. The recent bombing of Kosovo by NATO and US forces has underscored this point as far as the nations in Asia are concerned. America's determination in Europe is seen as a reflection of her wider global interests.

These perceptions create difficulties for Australia when Australia is seen as having reacted unthinkingly to US foreign policy and defence initiatives. We were accused of doing just this in our reaction to the nuclear tests by India and Pakistan. Our strong condemnation of the nuclear tests was also seen as hypocritical because Australia's position under the US nuclear umbrella is seen as giving us the protection which neither India nor Pakistan have. India and Pakistan, by contrast, argued that they have to make their own way in a world which had seen considerable, vertical nuclear proliferation amongst the existing five nuclear powers. Given India's serious concerns about China, this vertical proliferation is not something, which a relatively small and secure country like Australia can dismiss.

In the current economic and political turmoil in various parts of Asia, the continued engagement of the United States in the Asia-Pacific is extremely important, but the present form of interaction with the region is quite problematic and needs to be revised. The difficulties beyond the South Asian region are multi-faceted.

First, the close relationship between the US and IMF , while necessary in the initial stages of the Asian Currency crisis, gave rise to an enormous upsurge in anti-American feeling in the region. While the Asian 'economic miracle' was generating high levels of economic growth, the earlier ground swell of Asian resentment against the perceived economic hegemony of the United States was to some extent muted. Criticisms of the operations of the global economy could be countered by citing the examples of Korea, Taiwan or Singapore. These arguments now carry much less weight in Asia, and there has been an upsurge in interest in, for example, neo-dependency theories of development. In Korea there is a significant body of opinion, which blames the United States and Japan for the economic problems of the last few years. Even if this is not reflected in the policies of the current government, this ground swell of popular resentment is potentially very serious and damaging to the US image in the region.

Secondly, US policy in the region is seen to lack continuity and ongoing careful review. The pressures on the US as the only global superpower are, of course, tremendous, but US policy appears to lurch from one crisis to another. There are certain areas of constant concern, notably the Middle East, but in East and South Asia the engagement of the US appears to be merely sporadic. The North Korean nuclear crisis of 1994 brought forth an enormous diplomatic effort, but after the successful negotiation of the Agreed Framework US concern moved on to the next crisis. In 1998-1999, the DPRK threatened to restart its nuclear program because the United States had not delivered on its promises to build replacement Light-Water Reactors and to fund the supply of fuel oil until these reactors are operational. Given the domestic focus which typifies the American Presidency as it reaches the end of its term of office, foreign policy is likely to receive even less attention in the coming months. The feeling in Asia is that US policy in the region is in considerable disarray. There is also an impression that the US is unable to deliver on promises. The DPRK, for example, seems to be amazed that such a large and prosperous a country cannot fund the relatively small amount of money needed to implement the Agreed Framework. They argue, with justification, that the costs of a renewed crisis on the Korean peninsula are likely to be many times larger.

Thirdly, the United States is seen as lacking the capacity and interest to understand Asia in sufficient detail to be able to anticipate problems and new crises. The perception in the region is that not only does the US not understand Asia but that it is unwilling to make the effort to improve its information. In part this is the result of the dominance of the view that the region, and indeed the whole world, is in the process of establishing a liberal democratic system indistinguishable from that of the United States. It has been argued that the US is the only nation in the world that still believes in the 'Enlightenment project' and assumes that there is a single economic, social and political system so superior that all nations are bound to adopt it. Since diversity is bound to be short-lived, there is no need to understand other systems. Such an opinion may be extreme, but there is certainly a view in the region that the US regards Asian institutions and systems as inferior, and this contributes to the anti-American views now prevalent there.

In this situation the potential role of Australia becomes even more important. Australia needs to foster and improve its capacity to understand and deal with the region. Australia can play an important role as a major centre of expertise on Asia, and needs to develop channels to the United States to make this kind of specialist information readily available. Australia also needs to develop the confidence to tell the US government, when appropriate, that the American understanding of events and sentiments in Asia is limited, partial or simply plain wrong and that US policies are misguided. Australia has always had the capacity to do this on economic issues such as tariffs, but it has lacked the necessary determination and forcefulness on more general matters of security. Links between Australian and US universities, for example, can be improved to assist this process. In the North Korean case, for example, Australia's stocks on the peninsula are very good at the moment. Australia has lived up to all of its promises to contribute to the Korean Energy Development Organisation (KEDO) and has assisted South Korea in its current crisis. Australia thus has a unique role that it can play on the peninsula and should not be afraid to propose new initiatives.

Concerns about the Position of South Asia in American and Australian Thinking

It is unfortunate that the official Australian reaction to nuclear tests in South Asia was a policy of disengagement. It will take Australia time to recover from that ill-advised decision. We are not saying that Australia needed to condone the nuclear tests. Indeed, it would have been possible to be critical of the tests, concerned about nuclear proliferation and still follow a policy of engagement - in fact, an intensified engagement of the kind adopted by the US. So why was Australia's position so hostile, why did we turn away and how might a more appropriate approach be developed in the future? In considering this question, we have been struck by the similarities between Australian and American approaches towards the formation of policies on South Asia and the neglect of the region which has followed from these. Let us begin with the US case because it is better documented and because Australia's weaknesses in this area appear to echo those of America. In the US , critics who are keen to see a closer engagement with India and Pakistan have noted the following points (see Gould, 1996; Haass, 1997; Frankel, 1995; Cohen, 1999):

With some modification, most of these criticisms also apply to Australian policy formation on South Asia (iv). In particular we note the following factors which have constrained the evolution of an Australian foreign policy which could give South Asia the kind of significance it deserves.

First, Australian policy places high priority on northeast and southeast Asia, and whilst India and Pakistan have been identified recently as two of our five important, emerging markets, South Asia still ranks low in the consciousness of Australian bureaucracy, politicians and the business community. We believe, for example, that had the Indian market been perceived to be vital to Australia's interests in Asia, our reaction to the nuclear tests might have been very different.

Second, there has been no special effort to recruit South Asia specialists into Australia's foreign, defence and intelligence services, and the secondment of such experts from outside government is rare. Whenever it did exist, South Asian expertise within the federal government, has always been too narrowly based. It never had the opportunity to develop any weight or momentum large enough to pass onto the next group of incumbents. For example, the assassination of Indira Gandhi disrupted the evolution of Indo-Australian affairs by compelling India to be more internally focussed. A year later, the Indian emergency had passed but by then those people in Canberra who had developed some commitment to the Australia-India relationship had moved out of the relevant sections of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade to other areas. The people who next inherited South Asian affairs had none of the background or understanding which had been painstakingly acquired by the previous incumbents, and so the gap between India and Australia began to widen again. This kind of problem might have been overcome if India had some prominent public champions or lobby groups, but outside of academic circles, no such champions have emerged with the possible exception of the present leader of the opposition, Kim Beazley and the Australia-India Business Council. Canberra's lack of interest in South Asia is reflected more widely in Australia by a number of indicators, for example, the virtual absence of South Asian Studies in Australian schools.

Third, the bureaucratic structures and processes with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (hereafter DFAT ) have also militated against any special attention being paid to India and Pakistan. Despite its size and growing importance, India for example, has never been regarded as sufficiently significant to merit a separate unit. Typically it has had to share bureaucratic space with units dealing with other parts of Asia. And within those units, the political volatility of other Asian countries has worked against India. Foreign affairs in Australia, as in the US, is typically crisis driven, and given the relatively stable nature of Indian democracy, India has on balance attracted little special attention. Sri Lanka, by contrast, has absorbed disproportionate amounts of bureaucratic energy in Canberra because of the terrorism and civil war in that country.

Finally, we believe that Australia's relations with India and Pakistan have suffered because of major cultural and ideological differences. This manifests itself within Australian bureaucracy as an inexplicable aloofness or even dislike towards South Asia, which stands in sharp contrast to the way in which we have wooed China, Japan and Indonesia. The long-term failure by the Australian government to meaningfully engage with, especially, India stands in sharp contrast to Australian attitudes towards the other emerging superpower, China . No one has yet provided a satisfactory explanation for this perceptual difference, but there is plenty of evidence to back up its existence. In the words of one well placed informant:

"there is a real cultural gap between India and Australia which has become progressively worse. There are misunderstandings and questioning of each other's motives�. The misunderstanding and suspicions in Canberra are quite significant - there has been a feeling that India was working in international fora against our interests. The nuclear issue and the IOR- ARC are but two examples. This, combined with a feeling that the Indians are far too difficult to deal with, has led many bureaucrats and politicians to prefer not to deal with India at all�. [Moreover] there are not too many India supporters amongst the Australian population. To most Australians it is too big, too complex, and too mystical. As a result �. Even our PM can cancel a visit without any flack in Australia and even a PM can make offensive jokes about Indian leaders without flack in Australia�. It is interesting that the factors and the sympathy which flows through the China, Japanese and Indonesia expertise within DFAT leads the bureaucracy to act quiet constructively in one situation and to attempt to ignore or plead powerless in the other. It is quite normal for Australia to become involved in the most constructive ways possible when those countries suffer crises, including in their relations with the US . When India is in crisis, e.g. over Pakistan, there is impatience and a reluctance to get involved at all". (June 1999)

In summary, the lack of importance given to South Asia means that American and Australian attitudes have been conditioned in the long run by a lack of continuous, in-depth and enthusiastic engagement. In the Australian case, the pattern of neglect and indifference has only been broken by intermittent outbursts of constructive excitement such as the odd trade fair (e.g. Australia-India New Horizons in 1996) or explosions of anger brought on events such as the nuclear tests in May 1998.

In the case of US -India relations, there has been a recent tilting in Washington towards India largely as a result of Pakistan's attempt to push for a resolution of the Kashmir question by a military engagement in Kargil. But whether this will produce a major shift in US policy towards India in particular, and South Asia more generally, is still uncertain, especially because the timing of these changes coincide with the final period of Bill Clinton's presidency. The crisis over Kargil has certainly produced a heightened awareness in America of the importance of South Asia, especially now that South Asia has two nuclear powers in its midst. Prior to Kargil, there were also glimmerings of an American reassessment based on the relatively good economic performance of India and Bangladesh, especially during the Asian Currency Crisis. In the case of India, American engagement has intensified since the liberalisation of the international sector of the Indian economy in 1991. American firms have become major investors in the Indian economy. The growing interconnectedness between India and the USA is recognised by both partners, with the result that the Indian government has employed professional lobbyists in the US to explain why India tested nuclear devices in May 1998. The American President, in turn, has been keen to moderate America's position on economic sanctions against India and Pakistan. The pressure behind the President is located in American companies with interests in India, as articulated through the India-American Business Association which has been persistent in its call for the lifting of economic sanctions against India. Then there is also American interest in the merging trade triangle between India/Bangladesh, Burma and Yunan Province in the Peoples Republic of China. Finally, one notes that the 1.4 million strong American-Indian community is beginning to find a voice and is arguing for closer links with India (Lancaster, 1999; Chandran b,1999).

So despite America's condemnation of India and Pakistan at the time of the nuclear tests in May 1998, the US appears to be moving towards a reassessment of its position and policies on South Asia. In contrast to this fluidity, Australia appears to have fallen back into its paradigms of indifference and non-action, occasionally punctured by words of concern such as those expressed on the occasion of the sacking of Nawaz Sharif's government. The emergence of two nuclear powers in South Asia, the conflict in Kargil and the recent military coup in Pakistan - none of these events has been sufficient to push the Australian government into any kind of re-evaluation of its thinking on South Asia. This should worry Australians.

Concerns About the Viability of the Doctrine of Nuclear Non-Proliferation

The doctrine of non-proliferation was in trouble before May 1998 and the question now is whether it continues to offer a viable approach to developing a secure environment in the Asia-Pacific. The problem with nuclear non-proliferation ideology has been threefold:

On 13 October 1999, speculation came to an end when the US Senate threw out the bill in an overwhelming "no" vote which has caused commentators to compare this event with the failure of America to sign the Treaty of Versailles in 1920 (v). The uncertainty up till then had seriously undermined the legitimacy of America's non-proliferation stance and opened her up to charges of double standards and hypocrisy. The question now is whether anything remains of the doctrine of nuclear non-proliferation, given that its flagship, the CTBT, has been thrown out by the American government (vi).

Above all else, the nuclear tests of May 1998 demonstrated the inability of the non-proliferation doctrine to prevent the horizontal spread of nuclear weapons when national governments decide that the acquisition of nuclear weapons is an overwhelming national interest. In the bilateral discussions between India, Pakistan and the US in late 1998, the US started to concede this by agreeing that a new notion of "minimum, credible nuclear deterrence" had some validity. We will return to this concept shortly.

Apart from its inability to prevent proliferation, another difficulty with the doctrine of non-proliferation is that it has tended to overshadow all other concerns in the US understanding of what matters in South Asia and on the Korean peninsula. The failure to integrate US defence and strategic policies with other policies which give sufficient importance to the political, economic, technical, scientific, social and cultural needs of South Asia and the Korean peninsula is a point of great weakness in the US engagement with the Asia-Pacific. It also opens up the US to the criticism that it does not understand, and indeed is unsympathetic, to the regional security and other practical problems, which face individual nations living in the region.

A related matter, which we need to raise, is the assumption by the US that the preferred position she and her allies adopt, is automatically the preferred position of the global community. When James Rubin (spokesman for the US State Department) stated in mid 1998 that there existed an 'international non-proliferation consensus' he was clearly confusing the hegemony of the paradigm amongst the US and its allies with an unswerving global commitment to it. The expectation was that everyone would now condemn India and Pakistan, in the same way that the US did. However, not even all signatories to the CTBT have been prepared to condemn those states that have not conformed to this supposed "international consensus". For example, Sri Lanka refused to criticise India. The Sri Lanka view was that it 'accepted the Indian position and that the N?club membership should not be limited to five'. Even the Sri Lankan opposition failed to censor India. Stanley Kalpage, for example, 'defended India's right to carry out the nuclear tests'. Whilst expressing strong concern about the spread of nuclear weapons in the region, he blamed India's determination to acquire a nuclear deterrence on the failure of the existing nuclear 5?club to make any serious progress on nuclear disarmament.

In South Asia, the legitimacy of the doctrine of non-proliferation was been undermined since the beginning by the inability of its champion, the US , to ratify the CTBT which it is trying to compel other nations to sign.(Mohan,1999). This has led to the view that the US is again being hypocritical by compelling others to do that which she herself is not prepared to do (see for example Rajagopalan, 1999). Most recently, American plausibility has been undermined by mounting evidence showing that the US secretly maintained nuclear arsenals in no less than 27 countries, including three non-countries - Japan, Greenland and Iceland (anon b, 1999) In India accusations of double standards have been bolstered by even more loudly expressed criticisms of the neo-colonialist pressures, which the US has brought to bear on India to get her to the treaty table. The pressure of economic sanctions, verbal scoldings and official moral outrage have all backfired by making it harder for any Indian government to sign the CTBT despite the official Indian position that it would do so by the end of 1999.

It is important for the US and Australia to understand how deeply felt anti-colonial sentiments swell up and resist this kind of hectoring. For example, a prominent left wing commentator and publisher such as N Ram came out strongly against India signing the CTBT despite his having opposed India's testing of nuclear devises in May 1998 and continuing to oppose the development of a nuclear arsenal. For people like N Ram, signing the CTBT means giving in to US pressure and to do this infringes India's independence. India must only sign the CTBT if the compulsion to sign comes from within India itself. Caving in to US pressure is totally unacceptable. This view has been most recently expressed by Muchkund Dubey who writes about India's in-principle agreement to sign the CTBT as follows:

We should have insisted that the removal of sanctions is the indispensable pre-condition for achieving this purpose �. bilateral relations between self-respecting nations cannot flourish as long as the stronger partner keeps sanctions dangling over the head of the weaker partner.

In January 1999, Dubey insisted that the sanctions have worked against India's national interests by pressuring India into delaying the testing of the Agni missile. As it happened, the Agni was tested in April for reasons unrelated to American or domestic Indian policies. However, Dubey's comment remains important because his perception of the unacceptable nature of US pressure on India is widely shared by the Indian public. There has been a chronic failure in America and Australia, on the part of decision-makers, to comprehend how sanctions and other 'sticks' serve no purpose other than to remind Indians of their recent colonial past.

Perhaps the most compelling reason behind Indian resistance to non-proliferation has been their concern with the emergence of China as an economic, political and strategic consideration in the Asia-Pacific. Paradoxically, the US shares the same concerns but her strategies for dealing with these are unsurprisingly very different. What distinguishes the Indian case is the fact that India has common borders with China, has to contend with the history of the Indo-China war; and has global ambitions for prestige and status that mirror those of the People's Republic of China. As far as India is concerned, Indian concerns about China far outweigh those of the US on the basis of the first point alone - geographical proximity. In the final analysis, the US does not 'live' in Asia and does not have to contend with the myriad problems that emerge from that daily and mundane engagement. This does not mean that Indian politicians and bureaucrats automatically agree with the manner in which the Indian Minister for Defence, George Fernandes, publicly declared China to be India's foremost 'enemy'. The Minister suffered heavy criticism for his unguarded comments. At the same time, we need to recognise that Fernandes' outburst revealed something of the truth about Indian views on China.

Demonstrating her nuclear capabilities was, for India, merely one further step in the direction of contesting what Indians see as the emerging power of China in the region. In Indian eyes, America's willingness to engage with China is seen as only further evidence of this hegemonic quest. The Indian view is that America, despite her uncontested global powers at the moment, is relatively na�ve when it comes to Asian affairs. According to this view, China has fooled the US on a whole range of issues - economic liberalisation, the quest for democracy and the desire for regional security and peace. Indian disillusionment with America's wooing of an authoritarian and communist state reached a high point when the US and China issued a joint communiqu� condemning India and Pakistan for their nuclear tests. Conversely, anything which undermines American confidence in the good intentions of the Chinese government is well received in India. Two developments in early 1999 boosted Indian confidence on this account: first, the release of the Cox Report and the accusations which surrounded it and second, the Chinese response to American plans to include Taiwan in the TMD system. These developments have reinforced the opinions amongst Indian experts that they have a better grasp of Chinese intentions than the Americans who lack any experience in dealing with China.

Finally, Indian confidence in the US position on non-proliferation has been undermined by the inability of America to follow-through on the promises it made to North Korea under the Agreed Framework of 1994. It is significant that the Indian press has closely followed the unfolding of events on the Korean peninsula. On the one hand, the press reports continue to criticise North Korea because India accuses North Korea of helping Pakistan to build up its modern defence systems; on the other hand, the failure of the 1994 Agreed Framework is sending out negative signals about the willingness and ability of the US to render the assistance promised to North Korea (Anon e, 1999). To some Indian commentators, this is just another case where US promises have not delivered the promised results. The growing economic despair in North Korea has affected India in others ways, as was seen during the Kargil crisis when a North Korean boat carrying missile parts to Pakistan was intercepted in Indian waters. The weaknesses of the Agreed Framework between the US and North Korea has therefore, indirectly, increased Indian insecurity.

In short, American pushiness has, not for the first time, produced the unhelpful outcome of alienating potentially valuable allies in the Asia-Pacific region. The language and style in which the doctrine of non-proliferation has been so vigorously promoted, has probably hindered progress on the non-proliferation front as much as the inconsistencies in the doctrine itself. An important question which arises from this situation is whether sufficient remains of non-proliferation as a legitimate doctrine to enable us to build a more secure Asia-Pacific environment? It seems to us that there are two possible options: either re?establish the legitimacy of non-proliferation by linking it to a deeper and broader US commitment to the general welfare and security of South Asia and the Korean peninsula or discard the doctrine of non-proliferation in favour of advocating universal disarmament. A subsidiary question is whether the refusal of the American Congress to ratify the CTBT has now so severely damaged the non-proliferation option as to make it totally non-viable, even in a revamped form?

What is clear from the history of the nuclear issue in North Korea is that once a nation has decided that it needs to develop a nuclear capacity, outside coercion is unlikely to have any impact. This is true even if a small nation such as the DPRK, with a population of a mere 22 million, is faced by the might of a global superpower. The attempt by the Bush administration to use the International Atomic Energy Agency to police the DPRK's nuclear program was a clear failure. North Korea was told to live up to its obligations under the Non-proliferation Treaty or else. The US also pressured South Korea to hold up economic and other ties with the North until full compliance by the North was achieved. It has been argued that no country has been the target of more nuclear threats than North Korea (at least seven since 1945) but all to no avail. Clearly, even when dealing with a very small country, coercion is simply ineffective. In the final analysis, as Jannuzi has argued, it is unlikely that the United States could cause the collapse of North Korea, and more importantly such a hard-line policy would be disastrous. As Jannuzi himself concludes, the purpose of engagement is not to prop up Kim Jong Il, but is designed to minimise the risk of war and lay the groundwork for eventual peaceful reunification. Of course, there are dangers of the moral hazard kind in that North Korea should not be seen to be rewarded for its frequent erratic and intransigent behaviour. There also is a strong body of opinion in Seoul that the DPRK should be forced to make clear choices about its future, rather than being seen to be bluffing and threatening its way out of the current economic and political situation. But the fact remains that an agreement was reached in Geneva, the best that was available at the time, and the United States and its allies have little option but to agree to their side of the bargain.

As Kang has recently reminded us, North Korea's conception of security is essentially defensive and realist. It is a small power facing a rising power, and it has gradually lost all of its allies. Progress in the Korean case was only made when some attempt was made to understand the insecurities and feelings of vulnerability in North Korea, and the factors that gave rise to the decision to build a nuclear capability. This demanded much more than a series of threats: it required an understanding of the entire situation in North Korea and the place of the nuclear option within a much broader strategy for regime survival. Importantly, as Leon Sigal has argued, a solution demands that real efforts are made to overcome the reality that 'unfamiliarity breeds contempt'. The world media, dominated by US companies, were only interested in asking the trite questions: did North Korea already have the Bomb?; was it about to start a war?; how soon would it collapse, like the rest of the communist bloc? This kind of 'analysis', and the simple assumption that North Korea was a 'rogue state', merely clouded the issue and got in the way of good policy formulation. The North Korean example also reminds us that nuclear non-proliferation is not a narrow issue of the possession or otherwise of nuclear weapons. Rather, it is necessary to focus on national security as a much broader issue of collective survival in the face of perceived threats.

In the case of South Asia, America and Australia have paid insufficient attention to the national security issues confronted by India and Pakistan preferring to put the bulk of their efforts into 'bolstering the existing international nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament regime'' (Stokes, 1998). In giving evidence before the Australian Senate Inquiry into the Nuclear Tests by India and Pakistan, a number of academic specialists were struck by the extent to which Australian senators knew so little about the national security interests of the nations of South Asia and also dismissed these as unfounded. There was a tendency amongst the Senators, and also amongst specialists in the Department of Defense to see the Indian nuclear tests as dramatic gestures aimed at domestic voters. According to this view, the newly installed Bharatiya Janata Party government was desperate to show that its coming to power heralded the birth of a new political era for India. The minority of Senators who had a longer-term perspective saw the nuclear tests as part of the Indian strategy for global prominence. The latter interpretation is not unreasonable. But what is significant is that at no time did any of the Senators suggest that legitimate national security interests compelled Pakistan and India to test nuclear weapons. Most worrying of all, there was little attempt to differentiate between Indian and Pakistani motives for nuclear weapons. During the first dialogue on 'Security and Disarmament in the Asia-Pacific' by the Melbourne Group (vii), two important insights emerged: first, that India's nuclear policy (and more generally her defence policy) was directed to a range of issues, but in particular, concerns about China; and second, that Pakistan's nuclear policy was, by contrast, "India specific".

In late 1998, and largely as a result of the intense series of bilateral dialogues between America, India and Pakistan, Washington started to acknowledge some of these security concerns by conceding that 'minimal, credible nuclear deterrence' might have a role to play in South Asia. India and the US have disagreed on what 'minimal,credible nuclear deterrence' means. The US insists on New Delhi quantifying what the minimum is; India refuses to do this saying that "its threat perception cannot be static"(Anon, 1999). Another commentator reported that "We (India) said to the US tell us what China's definition of minimal nuclear deterrence is and we will match it". Not surprisingly, the People's Republic of China has been strongly opposed to giving any recognition to this new concept, insisting that the nuclear tests of May 1998 contravened Resolution 1172 of the UN Security Council.

Australia's reaction to 'minimal, credible nuclear deterrence' has been ambiguous. Rather than embracing the notion, seeking its finer definition and talking to the Indians in order to find out where the middle ground might lie, Australia remains cut off and cut out of the debate entirely. The official Australian position has been that if the concept can be absorbed into the doctrine of nuclear non-proliferation without weakening the doctrine itself, then it is acceptable. But how these two are to be reconciled is not a problem which has exercised Australia. We have not actively pursued this question. The reality is that the Australian position is 'let's wait and see what the Americans come up with'. Many of us regard the passivity of the Australian government on this as unfortunate. Instead of playing the kind of leadership role which we mapped out at the start of this paper, we have until now followed the American lead so closely that we made ourselves irrelevant.

'Minimal, credible nuclear deterrence' represents, in our view, the first major crack in the doctrine of nuclear non-proliferation as understood by the original five members of the nuclear club. This crack had to appear, however, in order to bring about a reapproachement between South Asian and American views about how best to ensure regional stability. The second, possibly devastating attack has come from the American Senate's refusal to ratify the CTBT. The withdrawal of US government support to this major test ban treaty underpins all the criticism which had been leveled against the CTBT by the Indian and Pakistan governments in the years leading up to their nuclear tests in May 1998. The survival of the nuclear non-proliferation doctrine is now very much in doubt, given that the leading champion has been dealt a severe, some say self-destructive, blow from within his own camp. The Clinton administration has asserted its determination to fight on for the CTBT, but its capacity to do this is now highly questionable. Within India, the extent of cynicism about US motives is so deep that the "scuttling" of the CTBT merely confirmed "the fears many senators [ie US senators] have that abandoning forever the right to conduct explosive nuclear tests will undermine the hegemonic position of the US" (Varadarajan, 1999). Despite this, or perhaps because of the US Senate's decision not to ratify the CTBT, the Indian government is now seriously considering the desirability of signing the treaty but not ratifying it until the other key nuclear powers do so (Anon c, 1999)

In the meantime, an optimistic scenario has been suggested by, amongst others, Stansfield Turner (1999) (viii). In his eloquent attack on the slow, cumbersome and uncertain process of treaty making he has made a persuasive argument for strategic escrow or other non-treaty approaches to the reduction of the world's nuclear arsenals. Certainly, the ability of the US to provide leadership in this field is unchallenged given the vast size of its nuclear capacity. Rather than adopting the carrot and stick approach which typified the years when the nuclear non-proliferation doctrine dominated American thinking, a vast fillip can be given to the non-treaty process by America first taking a significant dose of the medicine she has been prescribing to other nations. Strategic escrow, amongst other options, will be the one of the themes of our third dialogue in Beijing next May.

Concerns About the Role of Economic Sanctions

Perhaps the most dated doctrine to re?emerge in the response to the nuclear tests in South Asia has been the Woodrow Wilson notion of economic sanctions. A number of recent reassessments argue that economic sanctions have limited effectiveness as a US foreign policy tool unless applied multilaterally-i.e. by numerous nations. One view has been that economic sanctions are most effective when lifted-the promise of lifting them can and has been used for leverage. Another, widespread view is that the sheer number of economic sanctions currently enforced by the USA makes them into a blunt foreign policy instrument. A related view is that sanctions have proliferated and are now widely used not only against the enemies of the US but also against its friends, allies and fellow democratic governments. The American President himself has gone on record as saying that US policy has become 'sanctions-happy':

'We're in danger of looking like we want to sanction everybody who disagrees with us and not helped anybody who agrees with us ...' (Clinton, 1998)

Under these circumstances, in October 1998 the American President was given the right to waive sanctions as he saw fit for a period of twelve months. This was followed on 6 November 1998 with the partial lifting of the sanctions (ix). The growing flexibility of the US government on the question of economic sanctions against India and Pakistan was a welcome sign of the start of a pragmatic re-engagement with South Asia. At the same time, the piecemeal rolling back of economic sanctions, also has disadvantages:

On the positive side, however, it needs to be noted that it has been the US debate on sanctions which more than any other factor has led to a reassessment of the importance of South Asia and a more general critique of US policy on India and Pakistan. This point emerged dramatically from a statement by Roger Majak, Assistant Secretary for Commerce for Export Administration, when amongst other things he insisted that:

Finally, we need to acknowledge that the US positions on economic sanctions has enormous impact in the policies of multilateral aid and funding bodies. It was Bill Clinton's demand for changes in US sanctions policy in mid 1998 which influenced the attitudes of, for example, the World Bank. By June 1998, the World Bank had approved about US$1 billion in loans to India for energy and infrastructure projects (xi).

As for the effectiveness of US economic sanctions in South Asia, the history of recent years merely demonstrates what is already well known; namely that sanctions can bring great harm to economies which are already weak and have little impact on economies which are strong. Pakistan is an example of the former case (Schaeffer, 1999) and India of the latter. But in both instances there is no compelling evidence to demonstrate that economic sanctions have actually assisted in bending the national will to the designs of American foreign policy. By October 1999 the US government was ready to permamently lift trade sanctions against India and Pakistan (Chandran c, 1999) The military coup in Pakistan on 12 October has indefinitely postponed that event in the case of Pakistan (Anon d, 1999) and also created the possibility of further economic punishment. It is our view that if the US Government decides to extend the sanctions against Pakistan, it will have no impact on the policies of General Musharraf's administration and at the same time dangerously push the country into a position of economic despair. This desperation cannot but do irreparable harm to the security of South Asia whilst further eroding the capacity of the US to have any useful influence in the policy directions taken by Pakistan (xii). In the case of India, the US President now has the authority to lift sanctions, but already Democratic Congressman Pallone has decided to campaign for a return to the status quo of the Pressler Amendment (Krishnaswami, 1999).

In the case of North Korea, it is particularly difficult to evaluate the precise impact of sanctions, but it is probably safe to say that while sanctions have had a negative effect on the economy, they have done little to persuade the ruling regime to change its chosen course of policy. In that sense, the North Korean experience is very similar to that of Pakistan. North Korea's philosophy of Juche or self-reliance has limited the level of linkage with the outside world. Hence the power and leverage of sanctions to have an impact on policy, even in this small country, have been limited. In general, economic sanctions succeed when the costs, both economic and political, of the sanctions are greater than the costs of complying with the demands that are being made. In North Korea's case the very survival of the regime and the nation was seen to be at stake; hence sanctions, while imposing significant costs and hardship, were unlikely to sway national policy. On the other side, the danger has always been that sanctions will provoke a violent counter-reaction that can be much more serious than the original cause of the dispute. At the moment, North Korea is arguing that the failure to lift sanctions, as promised under the Agreed Framework, could be a major reason why the DPRK should restart its nuclear program.

Another lesson from the Korean situation is that with particularly difficult and complex issues of this kind, it may be most productive to have a series of responses or policies operating simultaneously. There is still a strong argument for the United States to maintain a firm policy of deterrence in the region, supporting the South Korean policy that while negotiations with the DPRK continue, armed provocations of any kind will not be tolerated. At the same time, it is necessary to reassure the DPRK that its security is not threatened as long as it too lines up to its obligations and behaves as a responsible global citizen.

It would also be useful to encourage the DPRK to interact more fully with a range of international organizations such as the ARF, APEC or the ADB and to assist the North to reform its economy, in particular its food sector. Such multi-layered policies are difficult to implement and balance and may well be beyond the capacity of the rather clumsy Asia policies now being followed by Washington. In this case, it may be that a country like Australia can play a constructive role, especially in the economic area. While accepting that the solutions to the problems of the Korean Peninsula will depend very largely on the Korean people themselves, and acknowledging that only the United States can play a dominant military role, Australia could still be a useful contributor. This could be done without undermining relationships with South Korea or the United States, indeed such initiatives could be a helpful addition to the constructive engagement of 'Sunshine Policy' approaches of South Korea. Recent conversations between the authors and various officials from the DPRK suggest that assistance from Australia in developing links with a number of regional organizations would be particularly welcomed, along with assistance in agricultural development.

CONCLUSION

We have argued that Australia has the potential to play an important role as a middle power in improving the security of the Asia-Pacific. We believe that the US needs a moderating force such as we propose that Australia become. Unfortunately, Australian policy towards South Asia and the Korean Peninsula has seriously constrained that potential until now. In both cases, we have sheepishly followed the US lead and often exceeded it when it came to moral outrage and diplomatic reprimands. But perhaps most damaging of all, in the case of South Asia and the Korean situation we have remained curiously aloof and disengaged. In contrast to our policies and orientations towards other Asian countries, especially China, we have not been imaginative and flexible and nor have we taken useful initiatives.

In view of that, we call on Canberra to review its position on South Asia and the Korean Peninsula and devise strategies for engaging with these regions. We do so because the cumulative evidence demonstrates that Australia's long term interests in the security of the Asia-Pacific can no longer allow us to treat India, Pakistan, North and South Korea as areas of marginal interest. Finally, we believe that Australia is uniquely positioned to play the role of a catalyst, facilitator and manager capable of mediating between the big power conflicts which seem to be looming on the horizons of Asia-Pacific in the coming millennium. As this paper goes to press, we are conscious of the emerging debate in Asia about the Howard Doctrine. It is too soon to comment on the meaning of the Australian Prime Minister's statement, but we believe that the notion of Australia acting as the deputy to the US sheriff as not a position or metaphor which serves the long term interests of Australia or America in the Asian region.

Endnotes

i. Research for this paper was funded by research grants given to the Asian Economies Research Unit in the Department of Economics, Faculty of Business and Economics, Monash University, 1998-1999.

ii. Sir Malcolm Fraser, the former Prime Minister of Australia, is of this persuasion.

iii.For a list of the economic sanctions imposed on India and Pakistan by the US Government see: White House Fact Sheet on US Sanctions of India and Pakistan, June 18, 1998 in 'Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Site', http://www.clw.org/pub/clw/coalition/wh0618.html

iv. The following observations are based on a number of sources, including in-depth interviews with retired personnel from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade who prefer not to be cited.

v. "This is the first time in modern history that American has failed to ratify a major arms control agreement" - Richard Burt 1999, former Chief US Negotiator in the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (Burt, 1999)

vi. The US unfortunately joins a large number of nations which have signed but not ratified the 1996 CTBT: only 47 of the 154 nations who have signed up have also ratified it; 44 of the signatories are nuclear capable states and of these only 23 have signed it. (Babington, 1999.)

vii. The Melbourne Group is a loose association of specialists who meet to discuss regional defence and security issues. The Group was formed by the National Centre for South Asian Studies and the Monash Asia Institute, and has held two meetings so far - the first in Melbourne in August 1998 and the second in Washington DC in February 1999. For information about both dialogues and the third one scheduled for Beijing in 2000 see http:/www.monash.edu.au/mai/savirtualforum

viii. Stansfield Turner is a retired US Admiral and a former Director of the CIA, 1977-1981.

ix. For a list of the changes under the Brownback Amendment see: Government of India, 'Partial Lifting of US Sanctions Announced', in India Economic News, http://www.indiaserver.com/ieconews/1998/11.

x. James Rubin's insistence that President Clinton is only using the waiver of sanctions to strengthening his bargaining power to bring India and Pakistan in line with the USA policy of non-proliferation does not sound very convincing. The timing of the US waiver indicated that the real reason was to enable Pakistan, the third largest buyer of US wheat, to purchase US $300 million worth of wheat on credit at a time when the US farmers were in great financial difficulty.

xi. The World Bank accepted the argument by the Government of India that to withhold project funding would adversely effect the fifty percent of the Indian population, which still lives below the poverty line.

xii. Evidence before the US Subcommittee on Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs by, amongst others, Karl F Inderfurth, stressed that US sanctions against Pakistan had for numerous years been steadily eroding US leverage (Chandran 1999a).

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