{"id":68945,"date":"2021-11-29T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-11-29T03:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=68945"},"modified":"2021-11-29T13:01:19","modified_gmt":"2021-11-29T02:01:19","slug":"australia-needs-an-entente-cordiale-with-indonesia-over-nuclear-propulsion-and-non-proliferation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/australia-needs-an-entente-cordiale-with-indonesia-over-nuclear-propulsion-and-non-proliferation\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia needs an entente cordiale with Indonesia over nuclear propulsion and non-proliferation"},"content":{"rendered":"
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However relaxed and comfortable<\/a> Indonesian Defence Minister Prabowo Subianto might be about Australia\u2019s plans to acquire nuclear-powered submarines (SSNs), the visit to Jakarta of French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian has probably validated the very different view of Le Drian\u2019s counterpart, Retno Marsudi. And whatever Le Drian may have intended to achieve on this theme in Jakarta, he may well have compounded the Australian government\u2019s problems with Indonesia over this central plank of the AUKUS agreement while stoking Jakarta\u2019s suspicions of Canberra\u2019s trustworthiness.<\/p>\n

Le Drian ostensibly visited Jakarta last week to mark the 10th\u00a0anniversary of the France\u2013Indonesia strategic partnership. The Quay d\u2019Orsay\u2019s official pre-visit announcement<\/a> noted that Le Drian would \u2018address the implementation of French and European Indo-Pacific strategies in support of a free, open space based on the respect for international law and multilateralism\u2019, and that the visit came as France was preparing to assume the EU Council presidency and Indonesia the G20 presidency.\u00a0Both sides\u2019 priorities in these roles were to be on the agenda in his meeting with Marsudi, along with bilateral issues.<\/p>\n

One of those issues was undoubtedly Indonesia\u2019s interest in possibly procuring Rafale fighter aircraft, which would add to why Le Drian also separately met Prabowo. The Rafale option looks to be among the most appealing to Prabowo, though only time will tell whether French jets patrol Indonesia\u2019s skies rather than the alternatives that he\u2019s also been conspicuously exploring, such as the latest US F-16 variant. Securing a significant defence sale was presumably at least as big a motive for Le Drian\u2019s visit as any \u2018tin anniversary\u2019, especially given that the relationship is unlikely to rank among France\u2019s most important.<\/p>\n

Details of what Le Drian discussed with his interlocutors, who included President Joko Widodo and Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment Luhut Panjaitan, are sketchy. The French foreign ministry stated that,<\/em> inter alia, the \u2018principle of joint meetings of foreign affairs and defence ministers (2+2 format) was endorsed\u2019. This, it added, made \u2018France the third country\u2014and the first non-Asian country\u2014to benefit from this dialogue format with its Indonesian partner, commensurate with joint cooperation ambitions\u2019 (which is presumably a ringing French endorsement of the notion that Australia is an Asian country, since Canberra already has such an arrangement with Jakarta).<\/p>\n

Official Indonesian statements are sketchier. Prabowo\u2019s defence ministry at least has announced that ministers discussed defence cooperation such as training and education, science, technology and industry issues, terrorism, and \u2018defence research and development, including joint production\u2019. And the two foreign ministers reportedly signed an \u2018action plan\u2019 to strengthen the strategic partnership and improve ties in defence and maritime affairs.<\/p>\n

As for Le Drian\u2019s courtesy call on the president, Jokowi reportedly<\/a> raised \u2018five main points\u2019 relating to the bilateral relationship. Most were typically focused on economic issues, including Jokowi\u2019s hopes that negotiations for a comprehensive economic partnership agreement with the EU would be accelerated and \u2018bring concrete results\u2019. He also thanked France for providing 4.8 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine.<\/p>\n

From the perspective of Australia\u2019s interests, the most striking moment of the visit came during Le Drian\u2019s address to Indonesia\u2019s leading international affairs think tank, the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). While his speech focused on issues such as multilateralism and the EU\u2019s position on the Indo-Pacific, his response to a question on \u2018minilateralism\u2019\u2014specifically, AUKUS and the Quad\u2014took on a very different tone.<\/p>\n

Ignoring the Quad, he levelled his remarks at AUKUS, stressing four points. The first two reiterated the theme of \u2018betrayal\u2019 in terms of both being \u2018cheated\u2019 out of a deal and being deceived by NATO allies and, in Australia\u2019s case, a historical ally. He talked about American efforts to restore trust through various US commitments to France. He didn\u2019t mention Australia in this context.<\/p>\n

More significantly, his third point was that AUKUS was about \u2018pressing a sense of confrontation with China\u2019 (as the simultaneous translation put it). He said that, while France was not oblivious to China\u2019s military threats and risks, he believed that the best way to respond to these threats was to \u2018develop an alternative model rather than to first of all oppose\u2019.<\/p>\n

Perhaps his most significant point for Australian interests was his fourth, which went to the transfer of nuclear technology for submarine propulsion. He pointed out that until now no nuclear-weapon state had done this. But \u2018if tomorrow Australia has some nuclear-powered submarines, why not, some other countries could ask for similar technology, it could be Indonesia, why not?\u2019\u00a0He continued that, even though this technology was not covered by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the risk the arrangement posed of starting a trend was nonetheless of concern.<\/p>\n

Irrespective of Le Drian\u2019s intentions in answering the question in this manner\u2014and it\u2019s noteworthy that he didn\u2019t cover AUKUS in his formal address\u2014he would surely have known that his words would resonate powerfully with his audience, both at CSIS and more generally among Indonesia\u2019s foreign policy establishment. While his depiction of Australia as duplicitous was evidently personal and heartfelt, it would also have struck a chord with those Indonesians who have characterised Canberra the same way over such issues as East Timor, Papua and spying allegations, irrespective of how justified that judgement might be.<\/p>\n

Le Drian\u2019s last point went directly to concerns about nuclear proliferation\u2014issues that Indonesia highlighted in its official statement on AUKUS and the planned submarines. It corresponds closely \u2018in spirit\u2019 with subsequent official commentary<\/a> to the effect that Indonesia was considering advocating a change to the NPT aimed at preventing non-nuclear-weapon states from acquiring SSNs.<\/p>\n

Le Drian did not imply France\u2019s support for any such move in his public remarks. But given the correspondence between the sentiment he conveyed at CSIS and Indonesia\u2019s expressed position, it\u2019s easy to speculate that the subject got an airing during the foreign ministers\u2019 meeting.<\/p>\n

Unsurprisingly, the Morrison government seems a long way from changing Le Drian\u2019s mind on AUKUS and the submarines, irrespective of the best efforts of Australia\u2019s highly capable ambassador in Paris and her team.<\/p>\n

But whoever governs in Canberra now and into the future should at least make a priority of assuaging Jakarta\u2019s worries on this subject, however overstated and unbalanced they are. While Indonesia\u2019s prospects of changing the NPT and precluding Australia from having SSNs look remote at best\u2014not least because several of its ASEAN colleagues do not share its views of Australia\u2019s ambitions\u2014the sooner the two countries can put this latest irritant to rest the better.<\/p>\n

In the circumstances, the onus for doing so must primarily rest with Canberra. But if Jakarta is serious about treating Australia as a \u2018comprehensive strategic partner\u2019, it might weigh up how conscientiously Australia has pursued the goal of nuclear non-proliferation over many decades and meet it halfway. Our shared strategic interests are too important to do otherwise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

However relaxed and comfortable Indonesian Defence Minister Prabowo Subianto might be about Australia\u2019s plans to acquire nuclear-powered submarines (SSNs), the visit to Jakarta of French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian has probably validated the very …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1241,"featured_media":68947,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3111,291,8,864],"class_list":["post-68945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-aukus","tag-france","tag-indonesia","tag-prabowo-subianto"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAustralia needs an entente cordiale with Indonesia over nuclear propulsion and non-proliferation | The Strategist<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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