Tradeoff with US far too long in making
– whai (figh)
ALMOST three decades after the nuclear ships ban fractured the Anzus alliance, relations between the United States and New Zealand have finally been restored to full working order.
The news that annual talks between the New Zealand and US militaries are to resume next month removes the final impediment to a normal relationship between the two nations. Intelligencesharing has resumed, troops from the two countries exercise together, and next year a New Zealand frigate will dock alongside American warships at Pearl Harbour for the first time since the bust-up.
The length of time it has taken to put relations back on an even keel is testament to the bitterness engendered by the row.
New Zealand and the United States share a common language, common values and a common heritage. Troops from the two countries have fought alongside each other for nearly 100 years. New Zealanders identify with Americans in a way they do with few other peoples. We admire their vibrant democracy, their can-do spirit and the manner in which they have shouldered the responsibilities that come with being the champions of freedom and democracy.
However, we also reserve the right to plough our own furrow. It is that independent streak that precipitated the most damaging diplomatic row in this country’s history when the New Zealand public decided it did not want nuclear-armed and powered vessels entering its waters. The Americans, fearful of anti-nuclear contagion, pressured the incoming Labour government to reverse its position.
A fraught situation was made more fraught by miscommunications and misunderstandings, many emanating from this country’s larger-than-life prime minister David Lange, who gave the Americans reason to hope while assuring his party and the public the nuclear-free policy was non-negotiable.
The inevitable happened. Early in 1985 a US request for a visit by the ageing destroyer, the USS Buchanan, was declined.
Senior US officials who had gone out on a limb for New Zealand felt betrayed. New Zealand was made an example of. In the memorable words of former diplomat and prime ministerial adviser Gerald Hensley, the country ‘‘exchanged a seat at the top table in Washington for one on a bench in the corridor outside’’.
New Zealand was suspended from the three-nation Anzus defence agreement, the country’s diplomats were given the cold shoulder, military co-operation ceased, and when the US and Australia negotiated a free trade agreement, New Zealand, a logical party to the agreement, was excluded.
On the plus side, the country burnished its credentials as an independent thinker, disentangled itself from American military adventurism, and emerged from the crisis with a heightened sense of national identity.
Twenty-eight years later our diplomats no longer enjoy privileged access to the corridors of power in Washington, but we are less beholden to the world’s most powerful nation.
It’s a tradeoff most Kiwis are content to live with. The pity is it took almost three decades to arrive at a happy medium.