Trump's ‘decision first, diplomacy later’ approach warrants Australian security rethink

Australia is being urged to stop outsourcing its foreign policy to the United States or risk being dragged into Donald Trump’s increasingly erratic and aggressive approach to world affairs.

The US President has threatened Hamas with “complete obliteration” if the Palestinian militant group rejects his 20-point peace plan and refuses to relinquish control of Gaza.

“We have pretty much just surrendered out entire national defence to the United States and in doing so, we’ve also offloaded our thinking,” said Antoun Issa, founder of independent news site Deepcut.

Speaking on the Australia Institute’s After America podcast with Dr Emma Shortis, Mr Issa said it’s critical for Canberra to define its own priorities.

“Before we even get to assessing who our alliances are in the world, we need to articulate, what’s our position in the word as Australia, not as an attachment to anyone else,” he said.

The journalist and foreign-policy commentator pointed out that in Europe, discussions are already underway about how countries can take care of their own national security “without the US”.

“The culture of foreign policy in Australia is so closed off and it is so grounded in this mythology particularly about the US and the security alliance,” said Dr Emma Shortis, director of the Australia Institute’s International & Security Affairs Program.

“That conflation between American interests and Australian interests … the assumption is that those two things are the same and they just are not.”

Mr Issa has warned Australia needs to rethink its foreign policy dependency on the United States and its default position of, “whatever the Americans do, we’ll just follow.”

Mr Issa warns that President Trump’s ‘decisions first, diplomacy later’ approach to policymaking could pose serious problems for Australia and the country needs to stop putting the country’s own interests over automatic U.S. alignment.

“We’re falling into a space that I don’t think it works for us; the US becoming increasingly authoritarian, increasing erratic, inconsistent with the way it engages with the rest of the world.

“A government that is undermining international law, tearing apart international law at the seams.

“It’s dragging us into a pit where I don’t think we’re comfortable being in. And now, the pit is being complicit in the genocide,” Mr Issa said.

Dr Emma Shortis urged Australians to start discussing foreign policy and asking questions.

“Almost kind of perversely, Trump is giving us an opportunity, prompting us to really have this conversation in a way that we haven’t before.”

Mr Issa agreed. “People need to be engaged with foreign affairs,” he said. “People need to be following where their money is being spent to justify it not being spent elsewhere in the country.”