Whispering Sweet Nothings

By Russ Hoyle

Australia's Prime Minister makes a friend in the White House

The scene is familiar. Ronald Reagan and a visiting foreign dignitary step before cameras and microphones on the White House lawn and try to look as if, despite the policy differences separating their countries, the two have really become fast friends. Only this time, by all accounts, the feeling was genuine. "The President and Prime Minister hit it off," said a senior Administration official after Australia's Labor Prime Minister Bob Hawke emerged from a two-hour chat with Reagan last week. The personal rapport was evident when the two men appeared together afterward. Said Reagan: "We had a productive session and, more importantly, we've had a chance to put our relationship on a personal basis. We have much in common." Indeed, the meeting was so successful that Hawke felt compelled to reassure Australians that he had not become a Reaganite. Said Hawke: "Just because you saw me on the front page whispering sweet nothings in Ronald's ear, you shouldn't assume that means an identity of view on all things."

Hawke and Reagan found themselves on common ground from the outset. Both, for instance, spoke warmly of their days as union leaders. The Prime Minister, who headed the Australian Council of Trade Unions for ten years, and the President, onetime chief of the U.S. Screen Actors Guild, agreed that one of their biggest union problems had been opposition from obstreperous left-wing members. More substantively, Hawke assured Reagan, along with Secretary of State George Shultz and Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, that he did not consider himself bound by the rigid foreign policy planks favored by the left wing of his Labor Party. Those planks call for, among other policies, an end to Australia's military aid to Indonesia and resumption of aid to Viet Nam. Indeed, Hawke's main purpose in coming to Washington was clearly to reaffirm the close political and security links that have governed relations between the U.S. and Australia for decades. He also wanted to impress upon Reagan the extent to which Australia's recovery from its worst economic crisis since the Great Depression depends on U.S. economic policy. He apparently succeeded. Said a U.S. business leader: "He's deft, tough and a man of considerable substance. He's a man you can do business with."

Hawke's ten-day stopover in North America came near the end of a 25,000-mile, 19-day world tour that took him to Port Moresby, Jakarta, London, Paris and Geneva before he arrived in Washington. On the final leg of the trip, Hawke strongly reiterated Australia's commitment to the 1951 Australia-New Zealand-United States (ANZUS) Security Treaty for the defense of the Pacific. He pledged that there is no country that the U.S. "will be able to rely on more than Australia." In a speech before Washington's National Press Club, Hawke added: "Australia is not and cannot be a nonaligned nation. We are neutral neither in thought nor action. We are linked with the U.S. by a whole range of common interests, attitudes, aspirations, institutions and perceptions."

At a breakfast with TIME editors in New York City, Hawke noted that it was a Labor government during World War II that moved away from Australia's historic tie to Britain toward a closer U.S.-Australia relationship. He added: "I did say [to Reagan], and I repeat it, that that relationship would not be one of sycophancy or unquestioning acceptance of every decision of the United States." When Australia disagrees with the U.S., he promised, "we won't be slow to tell you."

Hawke offered Reagan his government's services to help improve deteriorating relations between the U.S. and mainland China. At the TIME breakfast, he recalled his meeting in April with Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang: "We were surprised at the depth of feeling . . . over what the Chinese perceive to be a deterioration between the U.S. and the People's Republic of China. What concerned them most was the question of the transfer of technology from the U.S. to China. They objected very deeply to being put in the same category as the Soviets and the Communist bloc countries." Hawke said he told Reagan that China believes it should be considered a "friendly, nonaligned country."

Hawke's economic message to the U.S. was less reassuring. With an inflation rate in Australia of 11.5%, unemployment at more than 10% and a $8.2 billion budget deficit inherited from the previous government, the Prime Minister warned repeatedly that any Australian economic recovery is largely dependent on moderate U.S. interest rates, unfettered trade and continued American investment in Australia.

Before a gathering of the Foreign Policy Association at New York's Plaza Hotel, Hawke warned that any slackening of trade in the region, including the adoption of protectionist measures aimed at the Japanese, could indirectly slow Australia's economic recovery. He also made a plea for continued American investment in Australian industry (which has totaled $6 billion over the past five years). "We look forward to trade with and investment from the United States playing an important role in [our] recovery," said Hawke. "Ours is a relationship which goes far beyond the defense, strategic and security concerns. Trade and investment form a significant part of the total relationship."

Back home, Hawke's foreign travels, and his encounter with President Reagan, met with mixed reviews. Sniffed the conservative Australian Financial Review: "Many Australians will dismiss Mr. Hawke's jawboning with Mr. Reagan as a mere B-grade movie publicity stunt." Predictably, Labor Party left-wingers were furious with the Prime Minister for playing fast and loose with what they consider key elements of the party's foreign policy. Labor M.P Ken Fry blasted Hawke's repudiation of party policy on Indonesia, among other things, accusing him of "sacrificing principle for expediency."

On balance, the Prime Minister of three months earned considerable political capital from his world travels. "Mr. Hawke . . . seems to have developed a real rapport with President Reagan and his colleagues which should service Australia well," gushed the Australian. Taking a somewhat longer view, the Melbourne Age editorialized: "When Mr. Hawke's warm memory of his days in Washington begins to fade under the pressures at home, he can at least take some comfort from the fact that the cozy pictures with President Reagan will not have done him any harm in terms of Australian politics." Hawke's domestic political honeymoon is almost certainly ending. But his world trip allowed him to demonstrate a confidence, intelligence and friendly manner that consistently impressed foreign leaders--and should come in handy in the political rough-and-tumble ahead.

--By Russ Hoyle.

Reported by John Dunn/Melbourne and Ross H. Munro/Washington

With reporting by John Dunn, Ross H. Munro This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.