Transcript

(This transcript is partly AI-generated and may contain inaccuracies.)

Charles Edel

He is clearly interested in yes having strong personalities, but having a model that looks much less like a team of rivals and one that's much latched tighter to what he sees as his agenda.

Bianca Birdsall

It does seem like there's more of a coalescence and a view that President Trump and his agenda has a mandate and so is therefore more likely to happen.

National Security Podcast

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Bianca Birdsall

Welcome to the National Security Podcast. I'm Bianca Birdsall, Senior Advisor at the National Security College here at the ANU. Today we are recording on the lands of the Ngunnawal and Ngambri people and I pay my respects to their elders past and present. The world is facing its most challenging strategic context since World War II, in part because of the continuing rise of great power competition between the US and China. The election of Donald Trump to the US presidency two weeks ago will inevitably add to this complexity.

Today I'm joined by Dr. Charles Edel, Senior Advisor and inaugural Australia Chair at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies. He previously taught at the University of Sydney, where he is also a Senior Fellow at the United States Study Centre. Prior to that, Dr. Edel was a Professor of Strategy and Policy at the US Naval War College and served on the US Secretary of State's Policy Planning staff from 2015 to 2017. Welcome to the podcast.

Charles Edel

Thanks so much for having me on.

Bianca Birdsall

So I'm just going to dive right in, and I think this is a subject that for Australians, many of us have quite a focused interest in it, not least because of course the US is Australia's most important ally, as well as the outside impact that the US and even your domestic politics can have on the rest of the world, but in particular for the Indo-Pacific region.

 I obviously want to leave room for discussion on the implications for Australia and for our region. But first, I thought it might be useful if you could just briefly explain the US transition process for our audience, obviously it's very, the election process and the transition process is much more drawn out and much more complicated than what Australians are generally used to. So is that something that you could?

Charles Edel

Not at all. No, I'm happy to do that. Look, one of the things that I always find interesting is kind of attempting to translate Australian into American, attempting to translate American into Australian, our systems are similar, but they're certainly not the same, right? Obvious differences between a parliamentary Westminster system and a presidential system.

So the big difference, right, especially as you guys are looking to election next year, is we're all waiting as we watch it for when the prime minister shoots the starting gun, otherwise known as no fixed terms, just a limit of how long it can be. In the US system, obviously it's quite different. A fixed term at the presidential level, also at the congressional, both the House and the Senate levels. It's in the Constitution of the United States. Now, over the past 250 plus years, there's been some tinkering on the edges as well there should be. There used to be a transition period that was much longer than we see right now. That is the elections will be held in November, but the new administration does not become government until they are sworn in, until the votes are certified by the Senate, right? That became very famous on January 6th about the certification and whether or not it would happen.

But they are then sworn in certified and the new inauguration then will happen on January 20th or thereabouts. It used to actually be not till April and we thought that you know, not everyone has to ride a horse to get to Washington so we need to speed things up a little bit. So it's a shorter transition period, but we're still in a transition period. It's not caretaker government. It is still the Biden administration, but of course everyone is watching what's happening as various nominees for cabinet positions are rolled out as we begin to kind of look at what the policies might be as the president himself, president-elect I should say, starts meeting with, having phone calls with others.

And then more recently written into and codified into law in the United States, there is a transition process that takes place as well. So there are landing teams from the elect teams that will go to State Department, to Defense, to the intelligence agencies to ask whatever they want to ask. Where are you? What are the budgets? What are the personnel? So that they can begin to name what they're going to do, figure out their own plans of action. So that's kind of the process that we're in right now.

Bianca Birdsall

Yeah, and I think it's been interesting for Australians to actually see how that process has worked. And it does seem to have been more organised this time around than in 2016 with the first transition, perhaps because the Trump team was not necessarily expecting that they would be in that position, but possibly it's also because the Biden administration has been spending some time to actually ensure that that transition of power happens as peacefully as possible. Do you think that that shows a more strategic forethought from the Trump team and that that is going to lead to them being able to implement their policies more successfully from sort of the 20th of January?

Charles Edel

Yes. I mean, actually, the way that you laid out, Bianca, I actually think it's much more the former than it is the latter. I think that in 2016, everyone was surprised by the election outcome, including some people in the president's camp himself. So there actually wasn't a transition team, a transition plan for them. That's not how they're operating this time around. Not to mention that they were in power for four years. They know how to do these things and they know what things did not work. So they're developing much more of a plan. Look, I know we're going to talk substance in a bit. I hope we're going to talk substance in bit, not just process. But one of the big questions I think hovering around this, and I'm just teeing this up for a conversation, is the first time around, people would say, don't look at what President Trump says, listen to what he does. Now I just reversed that, right? Listen to it, not what he says, but what he does.

This time around, some of the concerns, the fears, or if you're a rabid Trump supporter, what you're most excited about is that the policy actually might look closer to what he says. And so the pencil sharpening on the strategy, on the teams is orienting around this. I should, though, on process, I want to throw one other thing out, that it's a massive difference between the Australian systems and the American systems. Our system is much more political in the execution of policy. There are more than 4,000 jobs that switch back and forth between a new administration. And when we say that these are political jobs, they are by appointment, not all of them need to be Senate confirmed. That is really only at the cabinet level. But, you know, the executive assistant to undersecretary of transportation, you know, is a political position. Our system, that is a consistent facet of how our system works.

 

We have a huge civil service, much like Australia does, but at the top and sometimes at the peripheral level, there are huge inflows in and out of our system in the way that does not happen in Australia.

Bianca Birdsall

 Well, and I think one of the interesting policy issues that was under discussion during the election campaign was whether or not Trump would bring back what's often referred to as Schedule F. So this was an executive order that he introduced at the end of his first administration around politicising more of the civil service jobs. Do you think that that is something that he will or his administration will pursue? And if so, what do think the impact might be?

Charles Edel

So I do think that they are going to pursue it. We don't know if it will land because in fact, Schedule F was introduced at the tail end of the Trump administration and didn't quite achieve lift. And I think the idea, the impetus behind this was we heard this consistently while he was president. We've heard this while he was campaigning too, that he wants to be able to have tighter control, tighter reign, on various departments and agencies across government, and therefore wants to have the ability to categorize more people in a political sense and therefore be able to dismiss them if he does not like them.

Look, if you're kind of scouring the American political scene on this, various think tanks, particularly those that are aligned more in Trump camp, so partisan ones, have developed lists of people who might staff a new administration. That's a very normal thing for any new administration. Everyone will say you should bring my friends on, not those other guys. So there are long lists of this. There are also reports kind of circulating that people are going on witch hunts and kind of scouring the social media accounts of civil servants and saying, here's a list of people who we want to get rid of, some of whom are political and would necessarily probably be heading for the exodus, some of whom are civil servants. There is potential, I think your question was, is this, are they looking into this? They are looking into this. The question is whether or not it will take.

Bianca Birdsall

Well, I suppose in some ways, just the threat of it or the idea that there will be more of a political test when it comes to, you know, more of those civil service jobs will sometimes have the same effect whether or not the actual mechanisms introduced, as in if people feel like it's not going to be a friendly place for them to work or where they're sort of going to be frustrated by their work, then they might choose to leave anyway.

Charles Edel

Well, they might choose to leave. They might also choose to censor their own social media too, but you bring up a very fair point. And look, again, I keep kind of looking at where this is going, but one area where we're watching this potentially play out in a very big way is what might be happening at the Department of Defense, particularly the discussion that we hear ongoing with the incoming team wanting to convene a board of retired flags to review. Every three and four star general and admiral who currently sits. With the idea of, if you hear what the Trump team has been saying, what the secretary of defence nominee has been saying, that the military is ‘too woke’ and so they want to go against anyone who has been promoting diversity and inclusion efforts.

 

 

 

Bianca Birdsall

And I mean that's a discussion that a lot of Australians are actually familiar with as well because we've had similar discussions over the last couple of years about how much a progressive agenda actually might diminish or advance our defence forces and our department as well.

Charles Edel

Yeah, but it's different. And I think it's important to point out it's different too because one of the things that we've heard is, that large part about kind of social and the role that kind of social issues might play within our military, that's a debatable point. But whether or not generals, for that reason and for their past service, will be deemed treasonous in behaviour, which is some of the words that we're hearing, that is not something that you have to deal with in the Australian discourse. And I would add that's probably a good thing as well.

Bianca Birdsall

Yes, and I think also interestingly, just before we turn away from talking about the Civil Service and our defence forces, there were a lot who felt like the civil service did provide some breaks or some checks and balances on some of the more extreme policy ideas under the first Trump administration. And also, you know, under the Biden administration as well, that having that break can actually be an important aspect of democracy. And so I'm sure people will be paying close attention to see what these changes might mean.

Charles Edel

Well, look, there are two models writ large about how you approach government, how you approach coalition building, how you approach governing. One is at the senior level, right? You staff it and again, it's a difference in the Australian system for the American system. When I talk to American friends and I point to who their counterparts might be in the Australian system, I say, oh you know, look, Richard Marles, he's a Defence Minister, Penny Wong, she's minister for DFAT. Don't forget their day jobs, which is also to do constituent services. That's not how it works in the US, right? These are appointments. You might get a politician, see Marco Rubio, who might become secretary of state, but they then relinquish all of their political duties. I mean they are political actors, but they don't have to do the nuts and bolts, the bread and butter, of doing constituent services of sitting on front bench. I say that because the models that you have are either one, you appoint a team of rivals who will give you various perspectives, will argue vociferously in cabinet, and then the president decides and they move forward. Or you staff up your administration with a bunch of loyalists who will not be as strongly opinionated as you want but will carry out what comes down from the top. Now, every administration has a small degree of this, but I think it's very clear when you ask the question about the checks that were in there internally, of the cabinet members last time around in Trump 1.0, that he is clearly interested in yes having strong personalities, but having a model that looks much less like a team of rivals and one that's much latched tighter to what he sees as his agenda.

Bianca Birdsall

Yeah and I imagine the constituents who voted for him would actually prefer that as well. You know, they have voted for him to enact his agenda. And I think there was a lot of discussion during the election around threats to democracy, and this idea of politicising previously non-politicised mechanisms of state, but generally that didn't really catch fire because most people expect that those things are politicized. They expect that the president will be bringing in their political operatives and those sorts of things.

Charles Edel

Well, it's clearly in alignment with how Trump wants to run the government, that he wants people rowing in the same direction, not at cross purposes is where he's at.

Bianca Birdsall

You mentioned briefly a couple of the Trump nominees for key positions. I thought before we sort of talk further about that, it might be useful to have a brief discussion about that confirmation process and including there's been quite a lot of talk about whether or not Trump will move to a recess appointment process instead.

Charles Edel

Yes. So in the Constitution, it is the prerogative of the Congress and more specifically of the Senate or upper house to confirm nominees. The clause, I think it's section two, says ‘it is to the Senate to advise and consent’. Consent just means more than 50 % of who the president's nominees are. So they will go in and meet with senators, they'll be grilled by the unfriendlies, they'll be praised by the friendlies, and then there's an up-down vote on all the cabinet positions. There's a clause though, right below that, that says that, so sorry, let me back up Bianca, that means you simply have to win 50 % of the vote, and if it's actually tied, the vice president can cast a deciding vote, but it won't be tied because Republicans have more than Democratic senators at this point. Now, what happens if the president appoints someone and kind of can move around that? Now there is a clause in the Constitution because it used to take a long time to convene Congresses. You had to ride your horse from Boston or up from South Carolina, and so there's a clause written into the Constitution that the president can put in nominees temporarily, right? Can do an end run if the Congress is in recess. It's time limited until they are in recess next, but therefore there is no vote on them. Now, last time Trump was president, he loved this. He talked about it all the time that he loved his actings, right? They weren't confirmed, they were just actings because he didn't have to subject them to scrutiny. I think that's quite clear. And so by the end of the Trump administration, you had multiple senior members of the administration in defence and a bunch of other areas in intel at one point who are all in acting capacity.

Now, Trump has already flown the trial balloon, saying that he wants the Senate to act now to go on recess so he can put in who he wants. Will he get it? We will see. But that is a constitutional power of the Senate, so it would take the Senate putting themselves in recess and abrogating a duty of theirs. In politics, you know, I know Australian politics a little bit, not a lot bit. It's really unusual for different elements in the political process to willingly cede power to a different part of the government. So I think this will happen maybe on some, but not on all for sure.

Bianca Birdsall

It's particularly interesting because normally in the US system, the presidential administration operates quite separately and has separate responsibilities. And you will, even if the Senate or Congress is held by the same party, they will not necessarily be fully aligned with the president's agenda. But it does seem like there's more of a coalescence and a view that President Trump and his agenda has a mandate and so is therefore more likely to happen. And as you said, more likely to voluntarily cede some of their power and responsibility in those...

Charles Edel

I think that's largely true, but it will depend on a case by case and on a person-by-person basis. So for instance, you are entirely right that there is much more of a mandate. It's not disputable. This was clear the outcome of this. And therefore, President Trump elect assumes that he has a mandate to carry forth. Now, that doesn't necessarily cut against how close this vote was, because this is a very close vote. America is very divided. Clearly, the direction moved towards the Republican camp, towards Trump, than where it had been previously, in either 2016 or 2020. But we still have a very divided nation. Now, your question, though, was therefore because he has won more of a mandate because the popular vote is his for the first time the first time a Republican president has won the popular vote since 2004, I think 20 years, and because he has all three houses, therefore they're more likely to accede to his wishes.

I think that's probably true, but not necessarily true and it depends on what we're talking about because if we remind ourselves and if we go in the kind of the time machine and go back to 2016, early 2017, the Republicans had the White House, the Senate, and the Congress. And for the first two years of President Trump's term, before we had midterm elections, they got virtually no legislation passed at all. So it really does depend, although I, look, I'm giving you the caveats. I think you're largely right that the political context is different this time around. We have to acknowledge it.

Bianca Birdsall

Yeah. And I think just for our audience, midterms obviously, the presidential election is, as you said at the beginning, on a fixed four-year cycle, but there are congressional and a third of the Senate come up for a re-election in two years' time. Historically, I believe every president except for Clinton and Biden actually had quite strong swings against whoever the sitting president was. So you will have some senators and congresspeople who, if they are in marginal electorates, are therefore not just with a view to their party, but also with them actually being able to retain their own seat as well. And so may take some different sort of positions on some of Trump's...

Charles Edel

It depends which issues we're talking about, but that's entirely right.

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Bianca Birdsall

Yeah, exactly. So, I'll move on to some of Trump's nominees. In particular, I mean, there's been some interesting characters who have been put forward so far, but I'll focus more on those who are more likely to have an impact directly for Australia. Probably starting with one of the more traditional nominees, so Marco Rubio, who has been put forward for Secretary of State, which for the Australian audience is the equivalent of the Foreign Minister. He's been in Congress for quite a long time, is considered to be a China and Iran hawk. But he did also at one point sponsor legislation to stop the US President from being able to withdraw unilaterally from NATO without congressional approval, so there are some differences of points of view with with President-elect Trump there. Any thoughts for you on sort of likelihood of Marco Rubio being confirmed and what sort of Secretary of State he might be, and particularly around the Indo-Pacific?

Charles Edel

Yeah, absolutely. But I'm going to jump your question and kind of span out a little bit too so that we can kind of assess all the cabinet picks to date. But then we can get more specific if you want to. So Bianca, look, first of all, the likelihood of Senator Marco Rubio being confirmed is very, very high. He is a sitting senator, he is well respected, he's co-chaired a whole bunch of very important committees, including the Senate Intelligence Committee. He is seen as very hawkish on China, has helped lead the way, but also has served in a very bipartisan manner. Who knows what happens, but this is a very, very high likelihood of his being confirmed and with very high margins, I would say too. I wanted to zoom out though, and then you can dig into any of particular characters that have come out because we've seen a bunch of different types emerge. As I got on the plane to fly here to Australia, we had seen Marco Rubio, we had seen Mike Waltz, who's been put forward as national security advisor, a position that does not have to be confirmed by the Senate. And then we saw some more interesting characters start to emerge, be it Tulsi Gabbard, be it Hegseth for Defence, a bunch of others. And when I step back here, some people say, well, you know, this looks like a more organized effort the first time and then we have these others. We should remind ourselves of the history lesson of 2016 to 2020, which is to say that Trump really enjoys pitting his advisors against each other. You know, we've all watched The Apprentice, but this is how he prefers to manage. That is not going to change.

And so I make that point because you have some, more traditionally recognizable type figures, and then you have some figures that are more MAGA-like, right? And they're both going to be competing for time and attention and bandwidth from Trump. Now, when we begin to think about what this means for foreign policy and national security, we can also say that when you have someone like Rubio, we don't know who's going to be at Treasury or Commerce, which are really key portfolios as well, we can say that Marco Rubio has been outspoken on the China challenge for a very long time and how you work with allies and partners on this. It is suggestive of a continuation of the competitive approach that we've seen and acceleration of it. And it's going to get pointer in a lot of ways.

We've also seen from Trump himself towards the end of his first term, but some of the nominees, that we're seeing a much more transactionally, a prosecutor approach. Not across the board, but issue by issue, and we're willing to trade space on one for outcomes in the other. We don't have a clear answer for which way the Trump administration will go. I think it will be based on who is assembled, who has the ear of the president, who has the ear of it most frequently, who has the ear of it outside of the cabinet as well. So when we begin looking at and evaluating the potential of these people, A, to be confirmed, but B, to be influential inside the cabinet, we have to think that they represent different factions and Trump will listen to them, but ultimately in the US system, again, we're talking a lot about differences, which is I think helpful here in understanding, in terms of foreign policy and national security, the president has a lot of power, much more power than he has domestically. And so these group of characters who will be swirling around him matter, but he will ultimately make the decisions on a lot of different points.

Bianca Birdsall

Well, and as you said, he does tend to be quite transactional and so presumably it will also depend on the particular context and the particular situation as opposed to having an overarching long-term ideological view about a lot of the foreign policy and national security issues that are likely to come up over the next four years.

Charles Edel

I mean, he has long-term views. He's had long-term views about trade and about alliances for a long time. But your point about kind of: What have you done for me today? What does this get the United States? What does this get me? That's much closer to Trump I think than it is for long-term competitive views that you hear emerging from some of his nominees.

 

Bianca Birdsall

Yeah, and I think, I mean, one thing that Australia certainly learnt during his first administration was while he might have a long-term view and, you know, the Australian-US alliance is, you know, a long-term partnership which has prospered under both sides of the aisle over many, many, many decades. At the same time, he is possibly more willing to bring that into conflict when it comes to individual decisions. So you mentioned trade, for example, and also an expectation that Australia, much like his expectation around NATO and other partners, increase their own domestic defence spending and capability to defend themselves as well.

Charles Edel

This will be the least surprising thing in the world because he's been telegraphing this for years.

Bianca Birdsall

Yep, you can't say that he is not clear on this and that it is not a long-held belief that he is willing to actually follow through with as well.

Charles Edel

Correct.

Bianca Birdsall

So we talked a little bit about Marco Rubio. You also mentioned the prospective defence secretary. I mean, I think our defence department would welcome your views on how you think they might best be able to engage with a former, you know, Pete Hegseth, who is a Fox News, Fox and Friends weekend host, but former veteran from both, I think he served in both Iraq and Afghanistan and also spent some time down in Guantanamo Bay. Any advice?

Charles Edel

Well, they should probably start watching the reruns from his segments on Fox and Friends. Look, Pete Hegseth, I think, has made many statements, not all of them which are going to serve him well when he goes up for confirmation. That doesn't mean he won't be confirmed, but there is scrutiny around this already. Most of his statements that have caught lots of attention are around kind of social issues and social issues within the military. That's not a useful area, I don't think, for Australia to engage in. The areas of conversation that I think are useful are kind of discussing the alliance. Australia does stand in good favour and that's important to talk about the history. I think I would bet you someone should be scouring the records at Russell, for understanding who served where and if he came into contact with any Aussies because that is an obvious point of contact. But the other ones too are he has made lots of statements about the importance of having a robust, very large, very lethal military. That is a conversation to be carried forward between them and obviously the continuity of talking about the broad sweep of what it is that the United States and Australia have done, be it forced posture initiatives, which have been expanding, be it AUKUS, which is unique to the Biden administration. So there's some danger and some voltage, know, stray voltage around that one, but talking about critical minerals, these are all areas that I think are important areas of continuity and contact that should be music to the ears of any SEC-DEF nominee and then secretary.

Bianca Birdsall

Well, and I mean, you mentioned AUKUS, and I think that's probably a really good example of the strengths of the Australian and US alliance and of course our partnership with the UK as well. I know pillar one is generally what gets talked about most in the media but there's important partnerships happening under pillar two with advanced capabilities but I think also the systemic changes that have managed to be enacted and would be complicated to unwind around you know ITAR reform and also us increasing and you know, investing in the industrial base of the US. These are all things that are actually well in line with what President-elect Trump has said that he wants to see from allies around actually contributing more to our defence and taking threats seriously and working closely with the US. I mean, you mentioned Mike Waltz, who has the potential NSA, who has himself publicly claimed to be a fan of AUKUS. But Trump has not commented on it himself, obviously, and there is still some room there, but at least there are some positive signs.

Charles Edel

Yeah.

Bianca Birdsall

Particularly given our foreign minister has herself come out and said that that will be the key priority when it comes to dealing with the new administration.

Charles Edel

Well, absolutely. Look, I think it's important to note that Trump has never said anything on AUKUS. Therefore, we have questions around which way he will ultimately decide if he's supportive of it or not. But I think as you laid out very well, presumably, this is what you're hearing from people who are supporters of AUKUS in Canberra, in the United States, cards on the table, I'm a supporter of AUKUS myself, that it's a pretty compelling case that you could put to the Trump administration, but we don't yet know how that will take and how that will play. You know, it's something that you said though in a larger context, which I think is really important and I would underscore for an Australian audience, no less for an American audience too. That this idea about countries that are willing to do more for themselves, that's long been a bugbear of Trump's, obviously. And Australia is not in NATO, it doesn't sit in Europe, so the fears are probably a little bit lower than they are there too. But I think we need to say a couple different things about this. So first of all, it's consistently been a challenge of Democratic and Republican administrations alike to figure out ways that allies can contribute more to their own defence. Trump had one particular take, which was to really scare you, really lean into you, talk about it sometimes in ways that sounded like a protection racket in order to force countries to do more. The Biden administration's approach was quite different, which was, at least from the outside, it looked to me like we're going to hug you really hard in a way that we can both do more together. Now, there are virtues to both of these approaches.

We know that Trump tends to think allies and partners, even ones that we like a lot, like Australia and the United States, are free riders on the system. So they will be looking for allies, this is true for Australia, it's true for Japan, it's true across NATO, to be demonstrating that they are doing more, not for the United States, but for collective defence. But I think there's a larger point here that is a strategic one and we can move away from the political for a second, which is countries have to do more because strategic circumstances have changed and deteriorated.

This old kind of way that we talk about it, that you're a good friend or a bad friend, you're a good ally or a bad ally, simply predicate on whether or not you spend 2 % of your gross domestic product on defence, is a totally arbitrary number pulled from a decade ago when Russia invaded Ukraine for the first time and the United States was working with its NATO allies to try to get them all to juice up their defence budgets. That was a decade ago. It is an arbitrary marker of how we evaluate allies and partners. It's the wrong arbitrary marker because the right one, at least from my perspective here, is not whether or not you hit this number, but whether or not you're spending enough relative to those who would do you harm. And the strategic circumstances have vastly shifted from 2016 to 2020 to 2024. Frankly, they vastly shifted over last two months. Bianca, I'm guessing that you didn't predict that North Korea would have 10,000 troops fighting in Ukraine at the beginning of this year. Maybe you did. Maybe you had special insight on this. But the point is we have a new series of challenges in front of us that are confronting all of us. And yes, there will be pressure from Trump for countries to do more. You're heading into election season yourself, so there might be pressure from one party against the other about what the defence budget looks like, but there is also a real-world pressure to keep up with those who are arming up and then using what they've brought on in more coercive ways.

Bianca Birdsall

I think that's a really important point. I mean oftentimes we'll hear in the region and in Australia, we're often very sensitive to this idea that AUKUS and Australia, that we are escalating tensions, that we are militarising in a vacuum. Whereas in fact, it is in, as you were saying, in response to the actions of others and changes in the way that they are behaving within the international sphere and particularly in defence and national security.

Charles Edel

Yeah, no, I think you're entirely right that, look, I'm sure Australian diplomats take this one on the chin, take it on the nose occasionally, that you are stirring the pot here. But that's a really myopic, look, I'm sure that feels uncomfortable, but it's a really myopic view because when we begin to broaden out the lens and look what's happening around the region and who is deciding that they need to do more on defence, do more on diplomacy, do more on trade, do more on aid. It's Australia, it's Japan, it's South Korea, it's India, it's New Zealand at this point. So the list goes on and on here. It's the Philippines in a really remarkable kind of change of circumstances. And let me just simply underscore the point that all of these are responses to the same set of stimuli. And it rhymes with China. Because we know that China has really not only plowed into its military modernisation, but has used the assets that's brought online in much more coercive ways to change the balance of power in the region. So it is the least surprising thing in the world, to my mind, that multiple countries are responding to this in ways that give them more agency by having more capabilities.

Bianca Birdsall

And I think a lot of people will look to those changes in behaviour from our partners and try and suggest that it's because we're acting at the behest of the US, but actually it's a more nuanced point and something that I think we should remember, even if there is uncertainty about exactly how the US will act and whether they become slightly more isolationist or more transactional, those partnerships don't exist in a vacuum. They are strong. They are continuing to be strengthened, not just with the US, but actually amongst ourselves as well. I mean, the Quad, our increased engagement with Japan, with Singapore, with Korea, and as you said, with the Philippines as well, which has been quite a remarkable progression over the sort of the last 10 years. Those are actually really important for us, not just when it comes to the US, but actually more broadly and how we operate within our region. And also how we set our own domestic policy settings as well.

Charles Edel

Yeah, no, I find this, you know, frustrating sometimes to hear this debate that, you know, the Americans are like the puppeteer, probably the evil puppeteer behind the scenes, like, would we have that much power? We do not. And actually, if you want to look for evidence of this, you can look for it. You pointed to Quad, you looked at kind of some of the efforts with the Philippines, but you can simply look to the efforts that nations like Australia, like Japan, like Korea have undertaken without the United States. If we look at, I know we talk about AUKUS here in a lot of Australia, but if we look about the partnership between the British, the Italians, and the Japanese to build a sixth generation fighter, there's the US nowhere in sight on this, and it's the same set of stimuli that's kind of responding to this. Now, I think critics of this would say that you're over-hyping the threat that occurs from China. That's a different argument to prosecute, but it's not what we see as sovereign decisions being taken in multiple locations, because the United States tells you to do this.

Bianca Birdsall

Yeah, and you know, if we look slightly closer to home and in the Pacific, there's been some really important partnerships and some increased engagement and investment from a lot of partners outside of the US into the Pacific and recognizing not just from a national security perspective, but also from a human development and a socioeconomic perspective as well, the importance of the region and working together on those sort of important issues.

Charles Edel

Right, so now let's turn it back to the Trump factor here. Because all these things that we've pointed out strike me as indicative of countries seeing a change in security environment, wanting to have more capability and capacity themselves, and wanting to find partners. And when I look at what has emerged, both from this coalition about building aspect, but also what's happened because of Ukraine, that we see in some ways the emergence of new blocks, right? Ukraine has really turbocharged this. We mentioned the North Koreans fighting inside of Ukraine, but we also know that the Iranians are now setting up and building drone factories and missiles for the Russians. We can see all the help, all the material help that the Chinese have given them. So this is not the same way that our alliances look, but the partnership, the alignment of these issues is something that's new. And so to my mind, the big strategic question that we're now seeing, and let's note, too, that this is a pretty new strategic development, about what it is that we are being confronted with. The new question becomes not how powerful the United States is vis-a-vis China, but how much throw weight you have with your allies and partners. How much, how big the team is, it's team, foreign policy is now team sport. And so the question becomes, and I think this is one that we're all going to be really keenly watching, with the advent of a Trump presidency is, do they buy this and how good are they on the coalition building aspect?

 And then on certain aspects, and we were talking about this before about a competitive aspect as opposed to transactional aspect, you know policy is all about trade-offs, but there are certain things that will cut against a competitive aspect. I'm teeing you up to ask me a question about tariffs here, but this is, I think this important strategic point here is simply the fact that it is no longer bilateral, great power, great man competition. It's team sport, and the team that can bring more along I think has advantage on this.

Bianca Birdsall

No, I think that's right. I mean, it's also been in some ways a positive for multilateralism with the US sort of not being as focused or supportive of that sort of across the board. And I'm in particular thinking in the World Trade Organization, but also in the UN more broadly and the WHO. But in the WTO, it was actually useful to see that people-

Charles Edel

I'm sorry, I have to stop you. For an American, the WHO, are we talking about the British Rock Band? Oh, the World Health Organization!

Bianca Birdsall

Yeah sorry the World Health Organization. Which, I mean, if Trump's nominee for health secretary is confirmed, I'm not- you know, it could be an interesting time for the World Health Organisation. But certainly within the WTO in the first Trump administration, but also within the Biden administration, because they themselves have continued to sort of along the same lines with their frustration with how the WTO and how the sort of the economic multilateral order has operated. But you have then seen new partnerships and stronger bonds being formed between other liberal democracies. And but also you've seen how a lot of geopolitical issues have then been fought through through the trade system. Obviously, Trump has some quite big plans, shall we say, for tariff, and while economists are always very, very careful not to be too definitive about it, it will have if they are enacted, have domestic ramifications for US citizens. I think I saw some calculations it'll be about a seven thousand US dollar impact on each individual, potentially have a 5 % impact on the GDP,  but then could have global ramifications, but also have ramifications when it comes to our relationships and sort of our willingness to follow along with a lot of these things. What are you hearing about how likely the 10 % tariff on everything and the 60 % tariff on China is to happen and what do you think the impact of that may be?

Charles Edel

Well, it's not 10%. We're talking about 20%. So it's 10 % above the 10%, right? And look, let me be candid. I have not been asked by Trump, you know, his strategy for this.

Bianca Birdsall

So just for confirmation, you are not going to be his nominee for US Trade Representative?

Charles Edel

 I can definitively confirm that one.

Bianca Birdsall

That is unfortunate.

Charles Edel
If you say so. Look, I think sometimes, again, with Trump, unpredictability is a place that he likes to swim in. He says all the time in almost every circumstance that he doesn't want someone to know this is the art of the deal, right? That I like Xi Jinping, he thinks I'm a man-man. And so therefore it can be hard to deduce which of these are posturing just to negotiate a different type of end and which are these are things that he believes in and will prosecute. I have heard and again like I don't want to play and kind of room it in because you don't know how this will go but as the knives get sharpened probably by the time our podcast is out. we'll have a treasury nominee, but he is asking people to say that you will carry out my tariffs if you undertake that position. We'll see about that one. I do think he's pretty serious about tariffs and potentially about the universality of them. He said this during the campaign trail. He says all the time, time and again, that tariffs are the most beautiful word in the English language.

The more important point here is that tariffs are the policy tool that he reached for most often regardless of the problem. So this is something that I think absolutely has a very high likelihood of moving through.

Now the more pointed question becomes, will Australia, for our podcast circumstances here, be able to escape, be able to get a carve out? And the answer is we do not know the response of where they might be. Is Australia positioned to prosecute the case pretty well? Absolutely. It has a trade deficit with the United States. That's something that matters very much to Donald Trump. You would also imagine that when we talk about the types of goods that are exported from Australia to the United States, they're goods and services that are really well needed and wanted. And you would also think from a policy perspective that the argument would land decently well to say that we understand tariffs are useful, that they can potentially bring great benefit to the US economy, economists notwithstanding, but you have to think about how you use them. If you use them on friend and foe alike, if you use them on those who run a trade deficit plus those who have a trade surplus, where's the incentive for countries to change their trading practice? That's a pretty good argument. Malcolm Turnbull has written on this several times about how he prosecuted this, and what he says is you just kind of steady on and come armed with facts and figures and Trump will listen to that. It might be a hard argument, you'll get a lot of sharp questions, but facts and figures will matter a lot. Now that's all of us kind of doing some tea leaf gazing about where this will ultimately fall and if he wants to go hard in the beginning or if there will be carve outs later, and we don't know, but I do think that on this, plus with AUKUS, plus with a lot of things, that it is incumbent on Australian leadership to not only do the outreach but to present the case forcefully, respectfully, but as dispassionately as possible about why this makes sense not only for Australia but also for the United States.

Bianca Birdsall

Yeah, absolutely. And I think you mentioned earlier on about critical minerals, but I think it is imperative for Australia to remember we actually do bring a lot to the table. We have a lot to offer when it comes to Trump delivering on his own agenda, as you said, both from this idea of you know, he needs to incentivise this idea that people do behave in the way that he wants them to, because if there is no upside, then behaviour won't change. But also, if he does want to move his economy away from China and from other actors, then he will need to have access to a lot of what Australia actually does have to offer.

Charles Edel

And then again, back to our earlier point, that if you are thinking of foreign policy as team sport, this makes more sense. If you were thinking of it as solo pursuit, it makes less sense. So this is again, one of the most important areas that we're gonna see play out over the next couple of weeks, if not months.

Bianca Birdsall

Exactly, and I think, I mean, there'll be those within our system who are thinking about how they can manage climate change and the importance of that within our own region and our own domestic commitments as well, as well as the importance of combating that for the future of the world. But also thinking about how we can nuance that messaging to make sure that it is still something that is supported by the US. I mean, there's been some talk about whether the Inflation Reduction Act will stay in place and those sorts of things. But I think there's a way you can frame critical minerals and energy expansion. And actually, there's a lot of complementarity within Australia and the US economy on those sorts of issues as well. So sometimes it's about holding our metal, but just making sure we're speaking with the right language.

Charles Edel

So to speak, holding your metal. Got it.

Bianca Birdsall

Pun intended.

The current US ambassador to Australia, Caroline Kennedy, addressed the press club this week in advance of her returning, she was saying at the press club that one of the things that Australia needs to remember is that we are and I mean, the UK High Commissioner was there and I'm not sure how the UK might have felt about this with their views on their special relationship, but that Australia is a long term and close friend of the US and that isn't just at the leader level, but it goes all the way through the system and also through our societies as well and that we need to remember that and see the value in that and use that as a guiding force as we navigate our way through the complexity of the next couple of months.

Charles Edel

Look, just to bring it to a close, we were lucky enough to have the Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles come over right after your election to give one of his first talks, certainly I think the first big public speech in the United States. He talked about the wellsprings of the US-Australian alliance. He obviously took this through the prism of the defence partnership because that's his brief. And one of things that he said in that, it's a speech worth re-reading, the conversation we had totally forgettable, because I was forgettable, the speech is worth reading, because one of the things that he said was an almost exact echo of what you said that Ambassador Kennedy laid out today. He said, look, this is a long and storied partnership, but it's one that is not really in treaties nor interoperability, but is found in the people-to-people connections that have been forged. The Alliance is actually something that's lived by Australians who come into the United States and vice versa. So I think that's a really important point to remember.

Bianca Birdsall

Absolutely. I mean, I always remember one of my first bosses who said to me that a piece of paper is only ever worth the relationship that sits behind it. And I think that's a really valuable place for us to end. So thank you so much to our guest, Dr. Charles Edel.

Charles Edel

Well, thank you.