Posted on 09/30/2021 5:02:45 AM PDT by Kaslin
Washington -- One of the unsung prophets of Aukus last week was the great British historian Andrew Roberts, who soon will be recognized throughout the English-speaking world as the man who has attempted to retrieve the reputation of King George III from the sneers of ... well, of people like me. His biography of George III will come out in early November, and of course, I have not had a chance to read it, but Roberts will have his work cut out for him with George's treatment of Gen. George Washington during our Revolutionary War and George's lapses into madness.
Though Roberts now will have assistance from the new Tories here in America, I am speaking of the "woke folk" who want to remove the Washington Monument and replace it with public housing. Then there are the more violent woke folk who want the statues of Washington beheaded and even, I am told, his white stallions decapitated. Yet if anyone can accomplish the feat of reviving George III's reputation, it will be Roberts, the author of some 16 books, among them a biography of Napoleon and the best one-volume biography available of Winston Churchill.
Roberts is at one with the great wartime prime minister in calling for an alliance of the English-speaking people. Churchill called for it after World War II. Roberts called for it at the end of his "History of the English-Speaking Peoples Since 1900." With Aukus coming to life, the thing has begun. Australia, the United States and Great Britain are headed for an alliance to check Chinese power plays in the Pacific. Add a few more countries such as Canada and New Zealand, and Churchill's dream is taking shape. Roberts' promise is at hand. He has been calling for something like Aukus for years.
It is amazing that resident Joe Biden is for Aukus, but he is. When he heard that people on the right, in the middle and Brits across the pond such as Roberts favored Aukus, I would have thought Joe would have reversed himself. Perhaps he would have sided with Vietnam. Possibly he would enter a treaty with Liechtenstein. But no, Joe is going along with Australia and Great Britain. This is the first time ever that Joe and I have agreed on anything, even ice cream. But China is a threat that even Joe can recognize.
Despite talk of the United States and Great Britain having a "special relationship," we were not seeing eye to eye on China as recently as 2015. There was the disagreement over Huawei. There was an apparent disagreement about the nature of the Chinese strategic intentions. In 2015, Great Britain rolled out the red carpet when the Chinese leader, President Xi Jinping, came to London. He had a sleepover in Buckingham Palace. The police shut down every protest. Yet now, Great Britain is no longer even remaining neutral on China. It has sided with the United States and Australia. Australia wanted an enduring relation with France, which France could not provide. So, Australia looked to Britain, and the United States was willing to share with Australia its nuclear-powered submarine technology. Great Britain, as James Forsyth, the very well-connected politics editor of London's Spectator, wrote last week, "has firmly sided with the United States. It looks as if the contours of the next 30 years of British foreign policy have just been fixed."
The "institutional nature" of the alliance makes it special. Forsyth explains by quoting "a source," obviously from Great Britain's own deep state. "The relationship has foundations deep enough that it can survive whatever political winds are blowing." This is where Forsyth gets his 30-year lifetime for the Aukus treaty.
For years, the critics of China have been saying if China overreaches, it will have much of the world against it. With the Wuhan Flu, saber rattling at Taipei and its military activity in the South China Sea, it looks like the English-speaking world has had enough. Canada is rumored to be interested in Aukus. Next will come New Zealand.
There is, of course, Japan taking a great interest in the English-speaking peoples. I got Roberts on the line. He reminded me that Great Britain and Japan were in an alliance from 1904 to 1918. He continued, "Japan has been a friend of ours when it's been a Democratic country." Fortunately, the Japanese already speak pretty good English.
"The right wing, where I stood, was exposed to and received all the enemy's fire...I heard the bullets whistle, and, believe me, there is something charming in the sound."
King George III, upon reading this quote from Washington in a newspaper account from the colonies, had reportedly said drily to someone:
"He would not say so had he heard many."
Quite certain Gen. Washington heard many many more than crazy G3 ever could imagine.
Washington’s near misses, clothing perforations and wounded horses are quite well documented.
George Rex was a pussy.
Quotes of the legendary democrat, er, British king GIII:
“A traitor is everyone who does not agree with me.”
– George III
“We are determined to listen to nothing from the illegal congress.”
– George III
“I wish nothing but good; therefore, everyone who does not agree with me is a traitor and a scoundrel”
– George III
Sounds like a Nazi, lil bit stronger version than Krauts, Pol Pot comes to mind.
I hope AUKUS works but our experience with NATO informs us it will probably END UP an ALL US show with the other LIBERAL “partners” laying down on us. Let’s face it, there is no bigger deadbeat among western nations than Canada. They are down to only several working ships now if they can find fuel for their purple haired pregnant woman to drive it.
With 5,000,000 people, New Zealand has a standing military of 9,000. Nuff said there. Historically, NZ signed the Anzus treaty but then quickly refused any involvement with nuclear weapons causing the US to consider NZ had “effectively” withdrawn from the treaty.
The big question is can Australia pay for 8 nuclear boats.
Or just a typical democrat leftist in the United States government...
AUKUS should be only the beginning.
In time, other democracies in Asia, and only democracies, should be recruited to join, until the formal alliance extends to India, Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia and one day Taiwan. Yes, I intentionally leave out Vietnam, hoping one day the ruling party in Vietnam will go the way of the Kuomintang on Taiwan, becoming just another political party among others in a democracy.
“The big question is can Australia pay for 8 nuclear boats.”
We’ll “lend” them the money for the boats on some ridiculous “$99 down and $199/month” type of deal. The American taxpayers will foot the bill again.
Japan is the joker in the deck.
Anyone seriously considering confronting China needs to have Japan at their side. Japan knows their precious lives are on the line and they aren’t going down without a fight. Why, I bet they could whip up some nuclear warheads and missile quicker than you can day Rumplestiltskin. Probably have the components already laying around just waiting for The Word.
Vietnam, India and Taiwan also need to be in the loop. They have more to lose to China than anyone.
Heh, reminded me of “Custer was a pussy.”
That said, the quote from Washington was from during the French and Indian war when Washington was still a loyal subject.
I agree completely. During the Revolutionary War, Washington walked the walk. That man was amazing. A hero to me.
I don’t even consider New Zealand. I am told it is a beautiful country, but it is run by rabid Leftists, and that won’t change.
I have always been an admirer of Australia, and grateful, too.
When our other “allies” (like France and England) were spitting in our face in Vietnam, the Aussies were right there beside us. Same in the Gulf Wars.
I am not for sharing our submarine technology with anyone, but if I was to share it with someone, it would be Australia.
You make a valid point-can they afford it?
Austrailia had 521 killed in Vietnam and 3,000 injured. I’m sure some of those wounded were horrible injuries. And, this was when the population of Austrailia was only slightly over 10 million. Today it’s 25 million.
I worry though that Australia has given up their guns and gone full Bernie on us.
Rabid Leftists—
I agree with you but’s it’s only based on one experience I’ve had with a New Zealander, so maybe it isn’t fair. He came to my house with the owner of a roofing company who we had asked to give us a quote on a new roof. He was the project manager. While his boss was on the roof he decided to chat with me. “Can’t get workers to do the work,” he complained, meaning Americans. I said nothing seemed to be working anymore; the country was in a mess. I blamed Biden and his administration.
This guy said Trump was no good either—he withdrew from the Paris Climate Accords, Nafta, the nuclear agreement with Iran, etc., etc.. What most infuriated him about Trump, though, was that Trump “took away his right to vote.” This guy has been in the U.S. for 15 years, has been employed here for that long, and is a green card holder. Never become a citizen, but apparently, he’s been voting. He was very much put out and disgusted with Trump. Said he paid taxes and therefore should have the right to vote.
His politics were definitely left wing. And he’s been voting in our elections. How many others are there like him?
I worry about our Aussie friends too.
We have a gentleman on this forum who is from Australia, and I greatly respect his perspective because it is so hard to get one in this country regarding Australia.
He went to great pains to explain that Australia and the US have very, very different types of government. They don’t run the same way as us, and it sounds like they have a very weak Federal Government, and the “state” governments have all the power and run things as they see fit. It looks very different to our eyes, since we see everything through the prism of an American viewpoint.
It is also a fact that there are far more handguns today in Australia, even if there may be fewer long guns.
Hell. That's a DEAD giveaway.
Of all the things that Trump did, that filled me with a great deal of hope. It wasn't just that he did it, it was HOW he did it and in a public forum, described the climate change movement for what it was-from his mouth-a "wealth redistribution" scheme.
I simply cannot tell you how refreshing that was to hear from The President of The United States giving a public speech from the Rose Garden...:)
That would be our esteemed correspondent naturalman1975. Scroll down and see his wise explanations. He's even good at resisting flamethrowers to make his points.
In a sense, yes. It's probably more accurate to say that both the federal (Commonwealth) government and the state governments are strong in their own domains, but weak outside those domains. And at the moment, it's one of the domains that is in the hands of the state governments (public health) that is driving most domestic policy in Australia. COVID has given the states a once in a century chance to control the entire country. It isn't normally that way.
The Commonwealth government controls the defence force. It controls international trade. It controls foreign relations. It controls most of the money. It controls immigration. It controls most of the taxation system. It controls the welfare system (including the funding of parts of the health care systems, but explicitly not the policies of health care). These are the big ones. It also has control over a wide range of smaller areas. But any area not specifically and explicitly given to the Commonwealth in the Constitution remains with the states by default.
The big ones that are in state control are school level education, and public health. And it's the public health power that has put them in charge right now.
There's a number of reasons why I'm confident Australia will reset to more normal conditions in time - which I predict will be next year, probably early next year, unless we get a new and worse strain of COVID. One of those reasons is because once COVID numbers - specifically deaths - come down to very low levels (they are already low by world standards, but they are still significantly higher than we generally face from disease in Australia) the states won't have the public health emergency reason to remain in charge, and if they try to maintain such a level of control (and I don't honestly think they would, but I'll allow for the possibility they are that corrupt) the Commonwealth government would be justified at that point to intervene - if need be the matter could be taken through the state courts, and if they didn't give relief at that point it would fall into the jurisdiction of the High Court of Australia which could, and would, invalidated the public health orders - but that can only happen once the public health situation is back to at least near normal levels.
That's not the only reason I expect things to revert, but it's one of them.
.....yes, I read that article and found it very informing.
That said, the Aussie’s, in general, remain hard for us to understand.
After reading his article, my conclusion was that the vast majority want or will take all the government largesse the governments, federal or local, will regurgitate. To an admittedly shrinking majority, we in the US think taking government handouts is toxic. If I’m right, that’s one big difference between them and us.
Thank you for that ping AW, much appreciated.
Funny. Throughout the course of our nation’s history, we have had Francophiles (people who love the French) and Anglophiles (those who cheer the British) and over time I have come to realize I am a bit of an unapologetic “Aussiephile”...:)
It is good to have a Freeper who presents to us Americans, with his reasonable and educational discourse (even under fire) why someone like me would be an “Aussiephile”...:)
(I just made that word “Aussiephile” up, there is probably a real word that describes it)
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