Transcript

How has the Australia-China relationship changed since the Prime Minister’s last visit to China in 2023? 

From China's perspective, how does its relationship with Australia fit into its current worldview? And how has US policy under Trump impacted that relationship? 

What does the future hold for the Australia-China relationship, given China’s increasingly assertive foreign and strategic policies? 

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

Rowan Callick

This whole thing of choice and alternatives, it's a confection and that in fact we have to relate to everyone. There's going to be dissonance in international relations.

Will Glasgow

in a world where Donald Trump's back in the White House. Anthony Albanese, every US ally is more interesting to China. I they always have been, right? And China pries those allies away from Washington. It's always a dream of the Chinese.

National Security Podcast

You're listening to the National Security Podcast, the show that brings you expert analysis, insights and opinion on the national security challenges facing Australia and the Indo-Pacific, produced by the ANU National Security College.

Susan Dietz

Welcome to the National Security Podcast. I'm Susan Dietz, Senior Executive Advisor at ANU National Security College. Today's podcast is being recorded on the lands of the Ngunnawal and Ngambri people, and I pay my respects to their elders past and present. This week, I'm joined by Rowan Callick and Will Glasgow to analyze Prime Minister Albanese's recent trip to China, while also looking back to his first visit in 2023 to consider how things have changed in the relationship and the broader regional security environment over that time. To briefly introduce our guests, Rowan Callick is, amongst his many affiliations, an expert associate at NSC, an industry fellow at the Griffith Asia Institute, and vice chair of the Australia-Taiwan Business Council. He was both China correspondent and Asia Pacific editor for both the Australian Financial Review and The Australian. He's won two Walkley Awards and the Graham Perkin Award for Australian Journalist of the Year.

Will Glasgow has been the Australian's North Asia correspondent since 2020, first based in Beijing, then for three years in Taipei, and since August 2024 back in Beijing. He's the only journalist working for Australian media based in China. He accompanied and reported on Anthony Albanese's first trip as Prime Minister to China in November 2023 and the PM's second trip earlier this month. He studied a Bachelor of Philosophy at ANU. Rowan, Will, welcome to the podcast.

Today's discussion, as I said, is centred around Prime Minister Albanese's recent visit to China. Our listeners will recall we recorded a similar podcast two years ago, which Rowan, you were on as a guest, when the Prime Minister made his first trip to China. The circumstances around Australia's relationship with China were quite different then. And after several years of economic coercion, China's gradually pulled the various sanctions it had imposed and the relationship entered what the Australian government described as a period of stabilisation. A lot of water has flowed under the bridge since then, not only in terms of the dynamics in the bilateral relationship, but other developments affecting the region and further afield, many of which have been in no small part due to President Trump's trade policies and attitudes towards friends, allies and competitors, but also to China's domestic political and economic imperatives and its activity and actions in the region.

So I'm really looking forward to hearing from both of you on how you see the Prime Minister's visit fitting into that context in which Australia finds itself now. So if you don't mind, Will, I'll start with you. You accompany the Prime Minister on both his visits, and I think that gives you great insight into the then and now dynamics that we're facing in the relationship. But also, if you could say something about the dynamics between the Prime Minister and his interlocutors as you observe them. President Xi, Premier Li Keqiang.

Can you give us a sense of that?

Will Glasgow

The 2023 trip that I wrote in a feature just after it was a real neck snapping change of tone from China. was kind of shocking how much the Chinese system made a fuss about Prime Minister Anthony Albanese when he went in there. And that was a trip by an Australian prime minister that was a long time coming and Australian PM hadn't been in China since 2016.

Malcolm Turnbull was prime minister. So a long gap between visits and of course so much bad will between the two countries from the final years of Turnbull's government, most of the Morrison government and then until Anthony Albanese came into office in 2022. And even then, 2022 when he came in, there were a lot of questions about whether or not the relationship could improve or to what extent it could. There was a lot of criticism from people – initially about the Albanese government's stabilisation formula from people who thought it had too low expectations, the Chinese government would never accept it. The Albanese government stuck to the formula and by November 2023, it was a real demonstration that from their perspective, from the prime minister and his China advisors, they thought the formula was working well. They went into that trip with low expectations for where the relationship was going, but as they were keen to point out, the trip itself wasn't achievement. And like I said, I there hadn't been a prime minister in the country visiting China since 2016.

Susan Dietz

Almost 10 years.

Will Glasgow

Yeah, I mean, such a long time. So, you know, they've made a huge emphasis, the prime minister on down on the importance of dialogue in the relationship and restoring that from the top down. So from Xi Jinping to his premier, Li Keqiang at the time, Li Qiang now.

And then across the ministers in the Australian government and the Chinese government, they've put a real emphasis on dialogue, not shying away. mean, the formula, which everyone can recite, agree where we can, disagree where we must, but always act in the national interest. Again, that formula has been pilloried a lot, but the 2023 trip from the prime minister's point of view demonstrated that the formula worked, that it created enough space to look at areas where Australia and China can work together, but also have the bandwidth to allow the relationship to absorb the shocks that are just going to keep coming because there's so many things that Australia and China didn't agree on before that 2023 trip, didn't agree on before this recent trip earlier this month, and don't agree after it.

So look, think, yeah, the 2023 one, huge change. This one, not so much, right? I mean, the prime minister's back less than two years later. The Australia-China relationship isn't in a totally different space now from on that trip. mean, after that trip, is the government going to move beyond stabilization against some of those critics who thought that formula is too limiting? Well, the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Penny Wong, stuck to it. They didn't stop using that term at the end of that trip. I remember the Prime Minister saying his visit to China in 2023 was an important part of the ongoing journey of stabilisation. was an ongoing journey. Now, on this trip, he has said, have been open to moving beyond stabilisation, but then with all sorts of caveats, you know, it's sort of tiptoeing beyond stabilisation. And he's looking at some areas of growth that can happen, but with all sorts of caveats and areas that for security reasons and other things, the Australia-China relationship is not going back to where it was before.

So look, I think this was an even warmer tone that the prime minister received on this trip, but it was off that base that was set on the 2023 trip.

Rowan Callick

The context is, if I can step back a bit, these kind of visits, the leaders are talking to audiences at home, as well as to the audience they're facing. So when Hu Jintao came here, and we're recording this in Canberra, and spoke to the parliament, he started his speech in most extraordinary way saying that for centuries, the Chinese sailed across vast seas and settled down in what they called Southern land. People were really astonished by this. so, you know, this was something partly came out of some bizarre research to do with the voyages of the Chinese Admiral Zheng He and so on.

The message back home was, we're everywhere, know, we're welcomed and we're lovely people and so on. Here, puzzlement. And then we also had Xi Jinping coming here 10 years ago, I think. And then he used the phrase in his speech to parliament that about his aim to turn China into a modern socialist country, prosperous, democratic, culturally advanced and harmonious.

Susan Dietz

I recall that too.

Rowan Callick

The then prime minister Tony Abbott was, I was there in the hall, the dinner that night was just profuse with his excitement about China's going to become a kind of just like this parliamentary democracy so soon.

You know, again, this was a kind of phrasing that's actually copper plate Marxist verbiage, but it was it would have been heard back home very different from the way that our prime minister heard it here. And when Donald Trump, I was there in Beijing, came during his first term to Beijing and he was shown around The Forbidden City by Xi Jinping. And Trump was so excited and he talked as if he was a really, this is a unique top rank welcome by Xi Jinping. The tone in which Xi Jinping actually presented this, as one could see quite clearly living in China was.

This is an up-country visitor, a sort of country hick being shown around this beautiful, you know, the heart of the empire by the emperor. So, you know, there are all these cross-cutting different ways of looking and, you know, and indeed on this visit, Albanese said, I want more Australians to visit. I don't know if he said like me, but anyway, so they get a better understanding.

Will Glasgow

You did saying, I've had such a great experience on my eight trips here. want them to come and have the kind of reception I've had.

 

Rowan Callick

But again, so this isn't gonna happen, know, as Will and I know. That's very different. And of course, what correspondents like Will can see going around China are some very contrasting things from the things that a prime minister is seeing, although he's of course intelligent enough to know and well informed enough to know what also is happening. Next time, maybe Xi Jinping will come here. We didn't hear anything on the visit, I think, of a receptacle invitation. And Xi Jinping is rationing out his overseas visits a bit more now. He's 72. I don't know if that's a reason, but he's got good genes, as he said, red genes. You know, his dad died at 88. His mom is still alive at 98. So he seems to be still well. He is still traveling. So maybe he'll be here next time. And again, it'd be very interesting what...messages he sends back home and how it's received here.

Susan Dietz

And how do you see comparing your observations, including on our podcast two years ago, of what the relationship was like at the time and the developments over the last two years, not only in Australia and China respectively, but in the region. How did you see the purposes of this visit and the objectives that Albanese was hoping to achieve coming out of this? There's been a bit of criticism now post visit about the, you know, was it too long? Was it serious enough? Why did he have such a prolonged contact face to face, face time with President Xi when he hasn't even met President Trump? All of these arguments to me, sorry, these criticisms to me don't really hold water in my perception about this relationship and what the Prime Minister was trying to achieve going into this visit this time around.

Just wondered from your perspective. The comparison.

Rowan Callick

I agree with you. There is endless what about-ism to do with Trump because Trump is so ubiquitous in the English-speaking media. So people are just kind of obsessed. They know all the details. They probably know what he's wearing on any particular day. But still, people in Australia actually, in my view, not too well-informed about China or about its leader. It's still...kind of hazy. And I think, as Will said, no big step forward in this visit. There were quite a few memoranda of understanding signed, but I think none that was really making a big step forward. Free trade agreement, perhaps there was a kind of understanding that there's going to be a review.

We saw that during the Morrison prime ministership that politics of course is upstream of everything in China and if China wants, it will just tear up or temporarily throw over its shoulder the free trade agreement and embark on commercial coercion. And obviously Albanese wants to prevent that happening. He wants opportunity. I'm not quite sure where that opportunity frankly is to be found.

And Trade Minister Dom Farrell has talked about this increasing trade and Albanese said, I want to see more investment here. I'm not quite sure where that's going to be. We don't have a complementary relationship on quite a few of these things like investment. We can't easily invest in areas in China, even though China complains it can't invest.

it's similar fields of activity here. But it was to do with the vibe and the vibe was obviously very positive between the two. At the same time, China is on the move. It's constantly changing, churning. Xi Jinping is always going through new institutions, making the party more responsible for all sorts of areas of government than it was before. Internationally, he's put forward his global security initiative, development initiative, civilisation initiative and so on. So there was an attempt previously or a natural desire to make the world safe for the party, but now it's actually gone a step further. think it's in order to make sure the party can itself have a role in guiding trends, institutions, changes, policies internationally, particularly in multilateral arenas and so on. So we've seen this happening and our prime minister going there at the same time. He's not going to stop that. He's not going to change it. But it's a kind of mercantilist approach, I think, that Canberra has been approaching recently. We'll make sure that our economic arrangements are in good shape and sure that's badly needed. For the rest, I'm not convinced there's much we can do actually because engagement's going to have limitations from the Chinese side, however enthusiastic we are.

Susan Dietz

And that leads me to one question I was thinking about and perhaps both of you can share some perspectives on this. We've been talking about what Australia was hoping to achieve or what the prime minister wanted to reflect has happened in terms of the state of the relationship now. But how do you see and Rowan maybe this fits into what you were just talking about China's worldview and it's thinking about what it wants in terms of strategic objectives in the Indo-Pacific or even further afield, but from the Chinese perspective, where does the relationship with Australia fit into this? So maybe Will, you could start.

Will Glasgow

Well, on what the Australian government wanted from this, just to add to what Rowan said, I mean, look, the prime minister began in Shanghai going into trip.com, the biggest tourism vendor in China, just a behemoth there. I he's marketing Australia and I think very successfully and throughout the trip, he got a huge amount of coverage in Chinese state media and across Chinese media.

Susan Dietz

Quite Positively. The message was quite positive.

Will Glasgow

Oh hugely positive! Almost entirely, yeah. So there's a big signal that Chinese consumers should think about traveling to Australia. Now look, Chinese tourism is about 60 to 70 % of the levels it was in 2019. That's not because of the bilateral relationship. It's because people in China feel less wealthy because of a monumental collapse in property values, which has a reverse wealth effect. But that's recovered more than other rich world countries. So know, Australia's out to compete against Europe and America and others. And that marketing helps, right? So the prime minister really wants that.

The last trip in 2023 was trying to get wine and lobster, the remaining products that were on that $20 billion of blocked things, one of them removed. That ultimately happened. It took a long time after that trip. Lobsters didn't stop until the start of this year. So December, January, 2025, that finally happened. So it was a long time coming, but it did.

That meant on this trip, the focus was on actually the big stuff, defending iron ore, the number one part of our export-based China, worth $100 billion a year, a fifth of Australia's exports to the world. So I thought it was good that instead of spending so much time on lobsters, which is a minuscule trade for Australia, he could focus on the iron ore trade. Now, he's trying to send a signal of reliability and that Australia wants to be a partner with China going forward.

They were talking about green steel and other ways to reduce the amount of carbon pollution that's emitted making steel, which is a very carbon polluting process. They didn't solve it or anything, but by having the prime minister there with a big four iron ore mine, SBHP, Rio Tinto, Fortescue and Hancock, that's a big signal that was sent by Australia to China. And it was in the...memorandum of understanding that the two sides will work together, this little group set up to do that.

Susan Dietz

I think they've even agreed on establishing a policy dialogue…

Will Glasgow

That’s right.

Susan Dietz

… on steel decarbonisation, which takes it into the government to government realm.

Will Glasgow

So I mean, I don't think that should be dismissed. mean, you know, it's defending existing trade, but it's a huge trade. you know, that's not something that's happening in isolation. A big iron ore project's coming on tap this year in West Africa. And Brazil's got plans to increase its share of the iron ore trade into China. So, you know, Australia has reason to... The industry certainly was very impressed to have the prime minister on their side on that. And the other thing that...the Prime Minister wanted to do on this, know, getting that meeting with Xi Jinping and our meeting in the Great Hall, but then getting a lunch with him after another hour. The Prime Minister's of the view that having an elevated or a better relationship with Xi Jinping is good for Australia and good for the national interests that he can press the case for Australia in that. It ultimately depends, I guess, on how he uses the time, right? But that's the case he puts forward. And I think there's a case to be put there.

And then the last bit of what the prime minister wanted, I think this is a concern for me and has been underappreciated on the trip. So the six day length, yeah, you can sure make the case that if there's any country in the world, I think there's two countries in the world, there are an Australian prime minister can comfortably go for six days, America and China, because they're just so important to Australia. However, if you look at the itinerary he did, did he really need to spend a day almost going to the Great Wall? To do a recreation of a photo Goff-Whitlam did? Maybe not. Did he need to go to Chengdu and spend much of a day seeing pandas, recreating a picture Bob Hawke did in 1986? Let's remember on the last trip in 2023, he went to the Temple of Heaven and recreated a picture that Goff-Whitlam did there. The prime minister sees his China policy as a big vote winner and domestic politics were also on his mind there.

He spoke about this on the Great Wall when he was criticised or criticism from the opposition was put to him at a press conference. They'd said that the itinerary looked indulgent. The prime minister really put, delivered quite sharp lines at the opposition and that they needed to sort themselves out and fix their China policy. And he also said when they were in government, they couldn't even get the Chinese government to pick up the phone. Now that plays entirely into a version of history that China tells and it told during this trip in a China Daily editorial just before Prime Minister Albanese met with Xi Jinping that everything that went wrong with the Australian-China relationship was the fault of the coalition Turnbull-Morrison government.

Now, that's an interesting dynamic to be getting into. mean, the Chinese have their reasons to do that. You can see the Prime Minister's domestic political incentive to do that. I think from a national security or national interest point of view, that's the key.

Rowan Callick

Can I just add to that? think one of the ways in which China has very cleverly played this is through the embassy and consulates constantly working with Chinese origin Australians who actually only at a very comparatively low level take up citizenship and can vote. It's about 36 % compared with twice the rate by Indians and Filipinos, for example, for various reasons to do with access back home and so on. So it's partly engineered cleverly, but it does mean that this wedging that Will's talking about has been surprisingly successful. Previously, we've had bipartisan approach actually to security, generally international security, to the US alliance and to China abruptly changed now.

And so what we've got within our political class now is an anxiety about what I might call ethnic voting. It may go on in future years to be anxiety about, you know, voters of Indian origin or whatever. But for now, the Chinese one is a very interesting one in that Marjit Sam marginal seeds with apparently large numbers of China, People's Republic of China origin voters are going to be fought over by parties vying to be appear more friendly to the PRC. This is a beautiful outcome. If you're the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing, I would have to say.

My hat goes off to them. I think they've done really well at wedging Australia on this and as a result, of course, it worked well this time for the Prime Minister and the Labour Party to an extent. I think it was over egged, but in the future this will continue to rewards, I feel.

Susan Dietz

I do recall that the Chinese have been very much more open about their pleasure that the Labor government was returned and that would mean as a consequence that the relationship would be back to normal, whatever normal means. And from the current government's point of view, Australian government's point of view, they've already defined that and they're very disciplined in their messaging about the nature of the relationship.

I come back to something you said before, Will, when you were talking about stabilisation and it giving the government space. And I think it does reflect that the relationship is what it is now and will not be going back to the so-called halcyon days of the 80s and the 90s. And that disciplined messaging also gives space for the government to be able to deal with the quite serious developments in the strategic and security environment that we face in the region. And it allows us to be more eyes wide open in how we talk to the Chinese government about the sorts of activities that are going on in the region.

National Security Podcast

We'll be right back.

In this disrupted world, Australia needs security professionals more than ever. Join the next generation studying at the ANU National Security College. Our programs uniquely fuse academic knowledge with practitioner experience and fit around your lifestyle with study offered online and on campus. Follow the link in the show notes for more information about programs and scholarships. The ANU National Security College, engaging minds for a secure Australia.

Susan Dietz

I just wanted to go back to my question about, again, coming back to Rowan's thoughts about how China sees the world and the sort of alternative universe of governance it's talking about and is happy to promote wherever possible, including with its global South brothers. But how do you see China's perspectives on the relationship with Australia and where that fits into its thinking about the region, its thinking about wedging perhaps in terms of our alliance relationships. But some thoughts on that.

Will Glasgow

A really clear take out from this trip is that Xi Jinping thinks Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is an important actor in the Indo-Pacific, right? Making two hours of time for him in Xi's busy schedule. Not everyone gets that, right? New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Luxon was up the month before. I joined bits of that trip. He had half an hour with Xi. Just a working meeting in the Great Hall, no lunch, nothing like that. So short a meeting, no lunch after, right? Not everyone gets ⁓ what Prime Minister Albanese get. Albanese didn't get a lunch on the last trip either, right? I think that's a lot to do with the Trump age that we're living in now. In a world where Donald Trump's back on the White House, Anthony Albanese, every US ally, is more interesting to China. I mean, they always have been, right? And China pries those allies away from Washington's always a dream of the Chinese. They see opportunity. How would they not in this current movement? The other thing about Anthony Albanese though is he's a rare leader in the Indo-Pacific or especially of US allies in the Indo-Pacific who's in a strong political position. He went to China this time, absolutely dominant politically back in Australia.

He's just won a thumping election win. He's, mean, unless something extraordinary happens, he'll be the prime minister for the next three years. many-

Rowan Callick

Six years I would say.

Will Glasgow

…, yeah. Well, let's see. It's a long time in contemporary Australian politics, but there's a good chance of that. Well, three years alone, let's use that timeframe. That's almost the rest of Donald Trump's second term. That's a pivotal moment for China. It's, you know, Donald Trump's don't come around very often – the come around twice now in Xi Jinping's, but the space and the opportunity right now for China on the international stage is just like the stuff of its dreams. So, yeah, clearly it sees Anthony Albanese as a key actor, if only because he's dominant and he's going to be around for that period. And Australia is not irrelevant in the region, whether it gets involved in, and it is in the South China Sea, in the East China Sea in any Taiwan Strait contingency or you name it. Australia is involved in these things and China wants to push Australia in certain directions on that. We know we have been, haven't been subtle in what directions it wants to push Australia, but it sees big opportunity right now as Donald Trump. I mean, it wasn't lost on them that Anthony Albanese had his meeting with President Trump cancelled and hadn't met him, right? They were delighted by that. Of course they were. That the Australian Prime Minister was seeing the Chinese president before Donald Trump, they gave every impression that they wanted this to go really, really well and for everyone to see it going really, really well, including or especially in Washington and in other US allied capitals to think, hmm, what's going on there?

Rowan Callick

The Chinese media, some well-established commentators have elevated Australia, kind of model country in terms of liberal democracies, Western country, in its attitude and behaviour to China. therefore, if only other countries, when they talk about other countries, they always mean the United States.

could behave like this. besides this wedging, as I talked about, between Labor and Coalition, China's very keen, and Will alluded to this just now, very, very keen to wedge us in some way from the United States for us to row back. It's, I think, well aware we're not going to quickly abrogate the alliance, but if we can step back, starting in rhetoric and so on, then this is going to be an important longer-term goal.

Will Glasgow

Yeah, I mean, the other thing is some of its wedging, right, especially on security issues, I don't know if wedging is even the right word. mean, on trade, say, it's just a, it's a weird fact that the Australian government in some areas is probably more aligned with China on say the WTO or other international just trade rules and norms. Now, of course, with a massive caveat that China waged an epic trade coercion campaign on us. Now they're kind of brush that off, but at least on their rhetoric they put out there. I mean, the Chinese have said ahead of this, know, they want to hold hands with Australia to jointly safeguard the international trading system. You know, the prime minister couldn't more quickly distance himself from that. But it is just a fact that Donald Trump's Washington is assaulting the international trade system in a way that the Australian government is really unhappy about. They've made that so clear.

And that's the context, or part of the context that the trip's happening in.

Rowan Callick

And the commercial coercion campaign isn't over. My friend, the China historian, John Fitzgerald, has pointed out that just as in all sorts of areas of abuse, the value is often in habituating the victim into behaving to try to prevent the abuse happening again. And so I think this has been quite a successful … quite successful.

Will Glasgow

Yeah, although, you know, I think there's definitely areas where I'd agree with you on that. But the one big area that jumps out, and it was partly because of reporting from me and others, we spotlight this, is the port of Darwin, right? I mean, it's pretty amazing when you look at the reception that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese got, that he took to the election a policy to end the Chinese ownership of port of Darwin. No questions. That's it, right?

And if they won't sell, Australia is going to pass laws or do whatever to do that. That's an enormous thing. I mean, that has sat on the agenda almost since the, maybe a year after the lease was done in 2015 and the Americans got upset about it under first President Obama, right? But there's been so many processes that the Australian government have run that have come back and said nothing to worry about there, including just before that 2023 visit.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, he got his department to review that. And, know, surprise, surprise, a week or two before he was going into China, the review came back and said, everything's fine. We can just keep it as it was. Well, he changed his mind during the election campaign. Now, Peter Dutton also had that policy, and so there was bidding on that. But the fact that the prime minister who won the election is now committed to that. And he made it really clear in China during the trip at a press conference – policy is the policy, he took it to an election and he delivers on his election policies. It seems that the Australian government is confident it's going to be able to navigate, again, the divestment of a Chinese-owned port. They're meant to have it for another 90-odd years in Darwin, Land Bridge, but the Australian government's going to end that. And the Australian government thinks...within its stabilisation framework, it's going to be able to negotiate that without tanking the trade relationship. I think if they pull that off, that is a stunning example of the success of that formula allowing the Chinese to tolerate things. If you think of that action done in a different way in the Morrison era, that's the kind of thing that would set them into eruptions. So let's see. It's not done yet, but let's see.

Susan Dietz

Well, it's interesting that you mentioned that example, which the Prime Minister did talk about as being firm and unwavering. And there was apparently no pushback from the Chinese while he was there. can correct me wrong. It wasn't, but it seems to me that in terms of the visit itself, the Chinese government was at pains to make sure that it went very smoothly.

Will Glasgow

Yeah, well, they just didn't raise it directly.

Susan Dietz

I don't know what was talked about versus what was not talked about in terms of the sorts of problems that we have with Chinese behaviour in the region and domestically in Australia with, you know, reports of undue influence or foreign interference as, you know, and there has been some history of that. But Port of Darwin, the Chinese did not push back to, or if they did, it was gently and we don't know the extent of it in terms of how the prime minister talked about it in press conferences, but they were very, very careful and disciplined about not provoking a negative narrative to be formed about this visit. And I wonder if it is also because there is a perception now, if it all had gone well and President Trump and the Prime Minister had had their meeting before the Prime Minister went to China, nobody would be talking about.

You know, was the six-day visit too long, all of those sorts of questions. But if there is a perception in the Chinese government that there is a subtle recalibration of Australian foreign and strategic policy going on here to respond to this uncertain and complex environment that we're in right now, then to me, that soft touch was quite deliberate, but it doesn't mean that it's going to continue that way once the publicity surrounding the high-level contact has gone away or died down.

Will Glasgow

Yeah, I think that's exactly right. like, I'll believe that the Chinese won't retaliate when it's happened and they haven't retaliated, to be honest. I mean, I think they were so determined for the trip to go positively. And they know that, you know, that's going to kind of ruin the vibe a bit if the prime minister says, yeah, yeah, they barked at me about my election commitment to reclaim a port of Darwin.

Rowan Callick

Getting apparently tough on that issue, also to an extent, lets the government be, in my view, easy going on a whole raft of other areas that China might also be wanting them to be easier on. Taiwan, Hong Kong, there's a whole heap of things and stuff that's talked and you just raised this Susan, things that are...maybe said privately, are recorded by officials in the room but are not mentioned outside. And in my view, Xi Jinping can take someone mentioning human rights or something like this, if it's privately, but it's the public discourse that matters particularly. So winning the discourse battle is very important for the party and for Beijing. And they will want to win the discourse battle here as well as at home, of course. And that's part of what's happening as China gets more on the front foot around the world.

Susan Dietz

Thinking about what comes next in terms of the relationship, but also in terms of how we are responding to the challenges that we're facing in the region, whether or not we bring the United States and President Trump's interests in terms of its alliance partnerships here and the obligations it would like to see alliance partners come to the table with. we're seeing a much more

As we all know, over the last few years, a much more assertive Chinese foreign and strategic policy, a much more assertive and aggressive build out of its military, ongoing military as well as gray zone coercion and pressure over Taiwan, activities around our region with the PLA Navy. Won't even need to mention the circumnavigation of Australia earlier this year, but activities in the Pacific as well.

These are issues in terms of how we manage our path in this region. These issues are going to be challenging ones for us in our relationship with China, even as we're setting the trade and economic relations on a more stable footing. So where do you see the challenges and how do you see Australia having to navigate those going into the future? Rowan, maybe I can start with you.

Rowan Callick

Yeah, we need to start close to home and Pacific Islands is important and Pacific Islanders have become astute at leveraging different powers who may be able to provide material advancement for them, let's put it like that. So they may be thinking, well, if Albanese is preferencing economic relations over everything and then Australia is complaining about opening us to Chinese influence. How's that different? When China is doing things with us economically, that's the weaponization of the economy. When it's doing it with Australia, that's stabilization or something different. So I think that we have to work out how to cope with that kind of conversation because China's not going to relax. And we talk about family and so on in the Pacific, quite a good way of talking, but that's not the sole answer.

So I think that's a problem. And Southeast Asia is also talking often about, and we hear commentary here about, you've...try not to choose between China and the US. In my view, this whole thing of choice and alternatives, it's a confection and that in fact, we have to relate to everyone. There's going to be dissonance in international relations between every two countries. We've just seen a war between, a little war between Thailand and Cambodia and so on. This is bound to happen. We have to accept a dissonance and stabilisation isn't going to be the only word that we can use. We may need to evolve some of the ways that we describe what's happening publicly because we need to bring, our government needs to bring the public, of course, with us. It's been a big success, as Will said, so far. But hey, we're only just starting this journey and it's going to keep going.

We all need to stay engaged with each other as far as we can, but we have to be aware that we're not being used by other people.

Will Glasgow

And this is the kind of real reality check about the trip. And frankly, I found throughout the visit, it very jarring really to see the Australian prime minister clearly enjoying himself so much in China, you know, from Shanghai to Beijing to the Great Wall to Chengdu, right? And he just looked thrilled, him and his fiance, looked like they had a ball. You know, my normal reporting life in China and what as the Australians, North Asia correspondent, I'm reporting on day in, day out and have been since that trip in 2023. But since I started doing this in January 2020, mean, almost all of it's not resolved.

Much of it's more warring to senior Australian officials than it was in 2023 or in 2020. And for all the nice press from the Chinese media on the prime minister's trip, none of it's fixed. And look, the Australian system, I mean, to speak to senior advisors to the prime minister.

They're very frank about that. mean, they're not deluded. You just look at the team who were over with the prime minister, the secretary of DFAT, Jan Adams, the head of international at PMNC and former China ambassador Graham Fletcher, our ambassador now there, Scott Dewar, who was the AUKUS envoy in the Morrison government. These people have been in the trenches from the initial breakdown in Jan's case. She was the ambassador when the...Turnbull government was frozen in 2017, 2018. then Graham Fletcher, I mean, did anyone ever have a worse posting than Graham did before he was replaced by Scott Dewar, who, I said, previously, his job before this was the AUKUS envoy, the guy liaising with the Americans on that project, which is a project all built around trying to address and create collective deterrence because of a fear of the PLA build-up and what it could.

what it could mean and trying to halt that in some way. And look, the trip happened as the prime minister's in there and for all the happy snaps and everything. The biggest ever talisman sabre exercises were happening off the North Coast of Australia with 19 other countries, US, Japan, and other mostly US allies and like-minded countries, as they say. That's a pretty key part of Australian foreign policy and defence policy that's going on. And it's all about China. It's about preparing for nightmare scenarios we all hope never happen, right?

But that's going on. Just after it, the UK Foreign Minister and Defence Secretary here, and they're talking about the importance of AUKUS and again, collective deterrence and defending the rules-based system, Australia and the UK working together on that. This week, a Sydney academic, Professor Feng Chongyi, has been added to the arrests and bounty list that the Hong Kong government's putting out.

That's happened despite the sunny trip. As the prime minister was over there, Taiwan was doing its annual defence exercises, which it's doing more and more each year. It's trying to impress on its population. These could be real. And this year's focus was really on Taiwan and what could happen to city life in such a catastrophe. And in the meeting with Xi Jinping, the prime minister brings up the...live fire drills the PLA did in the Tasman Sea during that.

The Xi's answer to that is, you do it off our coast, get used to it. I mean, that's just going to continue. the trip's gone well. It was well received, good press from the Chinese. That's going to defend trade. There's some structural reasons that trade's not going to just keep booming forever. There's some signs that some things may have peaked, but on the whole, good for the economic part of the relationship. But all those big pointy parts of the relationship remain. look, dialogue can create space to try to influence Chinese leadership behaviour. But wow, I mean, I have some scepticism that two hours with Xi Jinping, less translation time, and with the back and forth about everyone's families really got to Prime Minister Albanese convincing Xi Jinping that military conflict in Taiwan would be catastrophic for the world. You know, I think they might take a few more visits.

Rowan Callick

Yeah, I agree. We're talking about a single organization in China now, more and more hard to differentiate any to break or fracture it apart. The party is really cohesive under Xi. It is not really what we would call a friendly power. It's an illiberal power. We've seen this last week has been the 10th anniversary of the roundup of human rights lawyers in China. Xi Jinping talked about he and Putin and China and Russia as being friends of steel. So this is a difficult power to deal with. Full marks to the prime minister for having a relationship, but no one need to confuse a relationship with a friendship. And I think it's going to throw up challenges going ahead as it has in the past.

Susan Dietz

I guess that's reflected in the kinds of messages that the foreign minister, Penny Wong, and others have been delivering around the region where Australia remains committed to a rules-based order and there is value in making sure that countries in the region are all in strong dialogue with each other and understanding each other's pressures and challenges in this kind of environment where we are faced with not only an increasingly assertive and powerful country to the north, but an increasingly contentious relationship between the two major powers in the world.

Will Glasgow

And I thought that the speech the foreign minister gave in Malaysia just on the eve of the trip that you mentioned there, I thought that was a really significant address that was directed at everyone. Well, China, yes, but everyone else as well to give. mean, that for me was the best articulation of Australia's relationship with the world, including China and where the Australia-China relationship fits in. It was explicit in its defence of AUKUS, of the Quad, of Australia's attempt to secure a peaceful region that Australia's not going around looking for conflict with China or anything like that, but that Australia is not naive and it's clear-eyed on those real risks there. I thought it was a very strong speech by the foreign minister and one that will be closely read or has been closely read by capitals all around the place. And look, I think it's worth remembering that the prime minister, I mean, when it comes to who does he listen to on China, it's Penny Wong. So that speech should give comfort for people who are concerned about the panda snaps and all the rest. And the other one is Ambassador Kevin Rudd. And he knows a few things about this world that Prime Minister Almaniz has just been dealing with and Xi Jinping.

Susan Dietz

Well, that's an excellent note to finish on. So thank you both, Rowan and Will, for giving us your time and sharing these insights today.

Will Glasgow

Thanks for having us.

National Security Podcast

Thank you for listening to the National Security Podcast. We welcome listener feedback and suggestions at any time. So please get in contact at natsecpodatanu.edu.au. For more important conversations about Australia's national security, please subscribe to the podcast, our YouTube channel and follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter to receive the latest updates.