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Politics : Don't Blame Me, I Voted For Kerry -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (52222)	10/10/2004 3:11:05 PM
From: Elroy Jetson	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 81568

So what you are saying is that for the Australians, Iraq was not the main issue since they have a very small military personnel in the coalition, something like 2000 troops compared to US' 140,000. Australia frequently sends similar sized contingents of their specialized troops for peace-keeping into troubled areas in the South Pacific. Most Australians have no problems with this. Sending troops to Afghanistan, in support of America after 9/11, was widely popular and helped solve a refugee problem Australia had been experiencing since the Taliban took control of that nation. However Iraq was different, even though there are only 850 Australian troops there. Many Australians felt that John Howard was becoming a "weak sister" and Australian policy was being hijacked by America in many areas. During 9/11 Howard had been in Washington DC negotiating a free-trade agreement with America. Farmers, a significant part of Howard's coalition were leery of this and subsequently very unhappy with the slow 16 year phase-in for this treaty. Australians saw no clear reason why participation in Iraq was in Australia's interest other than toadying up to an American President few Australians like. Keep in mind that Bill Clinton had been in Australia for many months prior to 9/11 and was wildly popular. In a very real sense this had echos of Australia's much larger participation in Vietnam which grew and grew over time for no apparent reason other than America was there. Sending troops to Iraq was and is wildly unpopular, but once done Australians wanted to know that their participation was capped. It seems Howard, very much on the defensive on this issue every single day, was able to give this assurance to enough Australians to not be an issue. Any expansion of the Australian role in Iraq or any new American adventures, outside of the UN, will likely bring down the Howard government within days - as a no confidence vote in the Senate brings about a new government.