The reluctant deputy sheriff

摘要

On two successive days in October 2003, Australia's two houses of Parliament met in joint session to hear first President George Bush and then President Hu Jintao of China. Though many Australians, and not just of the left, found it hard to decide whether it was the warmonger or the tyrant whose presence they found more objectionable, the visits proved one point: Australia has become a country of disproportionate consequence in world affairs. It has achieved the unlikely feat of close friendships with both the world's most powerful state and its most populous one, friendships that are being turned into hard cash. Last year Australia signed a free-trade agreement with America; in April it opened negotiations on one with China. These days, Alexander Downer, Australia's effective if prickly foreign minister, can plausibly say that "there is no need to trade off America against Asia": Australia has managed to have both.