Expanding AUKUS Declares Hostility to China

https://thedefensepost.com/2024/09/17/canada-aukus-alliance-china/

Even as Justin Trudeau's government is on the ropes, the Canadian Establishment is moving to bring Ottawa into the growing Pacific alliance. The UK's membership is rooted in historical interests and the fact that it is America's essential ally. Or perhaps it should be worded the other way around? Australia has gone through a stream of scandals and failed governments to finally come to the right conclusion that Washington wanted all along - membership in a military alliance against China. Japan has now made moves to join and South Korea and New Zealand have expressed interest.

All the language surrounding AUKUS speaks of the 'Indo-Pacific' - a recently coined term which seeks to include India in this geo-strategic framing. New Delhi has to carefully thread such needles as it as part of BRICS and maintains decent relations with Moscow. Canada's participation will be seen as important not just for its numbers, financial contributions, and military but because it is also part of the Five Eyes network and (though its not being spoken of) it holds key territory in the Arctic.

Other nations such as the Philippines are in formal military alliances with Washington but unless AUKUS changes it's nature, it remains a somewhat elite club and it's unlikely such smaller nations will be permitted to join. Japan and South Korea are already US satrapies with tens of thousands of troops based in their territories. And both (with controversy) have hosted US nuclear weapons. Their current status remains somewhat an open question as no one wants to openly admit their presence - and the US is known to lie about this as I personally witnessed during my unfortunate and ill-advised term in the American Air Force. Japan may still have them and while the American arsenal was officially removed from the Korean peninsula in the 1990's, the South Korean public supports domestic development.

The Canadian proposal to join AUKUS is limited to computer technology but this is misleading. As Canada is already a member of NATO - any Chinese war involving AUKUS would easily include both the UK and the United States, regardless of NATO's official doctrine regarding the southern hemisphere.

The article's claims about Chinese assertiveness are questionable as it would be just as easily argued that the US is the aggressor. Like NATO, AUKUS claims to be defensive in nature and yet NATO's record tells otherwise and while the alliance was ostensibly meant to deter Russia, it is in fact the primary reason Moscow is at war in Ukraine and now trapped in a proxy war with the Western alliance.