Howard and East Timor (interesting notes on the US/Australian alliance)

The Weekend Australian ^ | 5th September 2009 | Paul Kelly

[naturalman1975]

EAST Timor was John Howard's coming of age, the point at which the novice was transformed into a national security leader. This was Australia's most important military involvement since the Vietnam War. From this point Howard became a bolder prime minister. His actions after 9/11 cannot be comprehended without reference to East Timor.

.....

The East Timor story is riddled with myths. Three of the benchmarks should be defined at the outset.

.....

Second, the crisis became an example of Australian-American alliance co-operation and not the disaster often depicted.

.....

The Risk of War: Australia took a deliberate decision that the ballot should proceed despite flawed security. This responsibility fell on Howard and Downer. The moral justification, ultimately, was that this was what the East Timorese leaders wanted.

UN secretary-general Kofi Annan promptly rang Howard to ask if Australia would be prepared to lead a multinational force. Howard agreed. But he told Annan that Australia must lead.

.....

For US president Bill Clinton, East Timor was not on the radar. Misjudging this, Howard expected Clinton to support the international force not just in political terms but with a US troop commitment. Howard rang Clinton, only to be turned down.

.....

On the eve of the operation US secretary of defence William Cohen went to Jakarta for meetings with Habibie and Wiranto. Cohen told them the world expected Jakarta to co-operate with the Australian-led UN operation. "Any Indonesian forces that contest them will meet US forces," Cohen said. This was a reference to a marine group in the Pacific. "The marines were just offshore and everyone knew they were there," former commander of the International Forces in East Timor Peter Cosgrove says.

[naturalman1975]

I hope this gets publicity.

Significant numbers of Australians are under the impression that the United States failed to support us fully in East Timor.

Those of us who were well informed knew better - while there was some initial reluctance (from the Clinton administration's perspective, Australia's request for help came out of nowhere) a Marine Expeditionary Unit on the USS Belleu Wood was made available, if necessary, to support us. If Australian troops had encountered heavy resistance going ashore, US Marines could have opened a second beach head to ensure a successful landing or, in a worst case scenario, cover a withdrawal.

The knowledge that US troops were ready, and the US was willing, was a large part of the reason why they weren't necessary. The Indonesians decided not to resist but to cooperate instead. They might have decided to take on Australia. They weren't going to take on the US.

But for diplomatic reasons, we all had to act like there wasn't any real tension and so this was all kept fairly quiet.

[Retired Greyhound]

Thanks for posting, mate.

The U.S. and Australia have been consistent allies for over 100 years, making you guys down under our longest standing allies. I’m not sure a lot of Americans realize this, but I sure do.

[tanuki]

Fascinating. Reveals a lot about one of the more significant interventions of our time.