In an election marked by $60 billion (US$43 billion) in targeted spending promises by the government and a scare campaign about the prospect of rising interest rates under Labor, the conservatives increased their majority in the House of Representatives. They gained an extra 2 percent of votes over the 2001 federal elections, largely in the so-called mortgage belt of big cities. Buoyed by years of economic growth and government surpluses, the Liberals presented themselves as a force for stability on the economy and “national security.”

The Howard administration has pledged to keep Australian forces in Iraq as part of the U.S.-led coalition until the “job is done.”

The government recently upped the ante over its threats of regional “antiterrorist” intervention in the wake of the bombing of the Australian embassy in Jakarta a month before the federal elections. Howard pledged to launch “pre-emptive strikes” against sources of “terrorist” threats to Australian targets The Liberal Party won 71 seats, up from 68, and the National Party captured 12 seats, for a total of 83 for the incumbents in the 150-member national parliament. The main opposition, the Australian Labor Party (ALP), won 58 seats, down from 65. Independent candidates won 3, the Country Liberal Party 1, with 5 seats remaining undecided.

The conservative coalition appears likely to get a majority in the Senate. Final results will be announced October 22, due to a complex voting system, but the government already has won 38 of the 76 seats.

Meanwhile, the pro-capitalist Green Party increased its vote to more than 7 percent nationally. On October 3, the week before the polls, many thousands protested in large cities around the country at “End the Lies” rallies. These issued calls to “Kick Howard out” and for “Troops out of Iraq.” Nationalist and pacifist slogans, often pro-Green, and caricatures of Howard “government deceit” over the Iraq invasion and for the expulsion of asylum-seekers were common.

The government sent 2,000 troops to join the U.S.-led invasion last year and still has 900 military personnel in and around Iraq. Labor leaders had criticized Howard for going to war without United Nations approval. But with elections imminent, the ALP leadership backed off an earlier call by newly elected party head Mark Latham to bring Australian troops “home by Christmas.”

Labor, a social-democratic party that retains its historic ties to the trade unions, has often formed federal governments in the past that have advanced the interests of Australian imperialism. All state and territory governments are currently run by the ALP.

A convergence has emerged in recent months between the coalition and the ALP, as part of a steady shift to the right in bourgeois politics on supporting the Australian rulers’ part in the occupation of Iraq and their strengthened alliance with Washington in the “global war on terrorism.”  
 
Rearmament programs
This year, the Liberals launched a A$50 billion (US$35 billion) rearmament program for the Australian Defence Forces (ADF) with the backing of the Labor Party. During the election campaign, both the Liberals and Labor pledged to increase Australian military spending by 3 percent per year over the next decade.

In the last weeks of the election campaign, the rival parties vied to prove who would form the strongest administration for Australia’s rulers to advance their imperialist intervention in the region and new police powers at home.

In the wake of a September 9 suicide bombing outside the Australian Embassy in Jakarta, a Canberra white paper was issued on “terrorism” in the region. “Intelligence sources” tied the separatist struggle by Muslim people in the southern Philippines to “terrorist training.”

On September 19, posing as the rulers’ strongest option for keeping “Australia safe,” Howard publicly renewed his pledge to carry out pre-emptive strikes in neighboring countries against “terrorists.”

The following day, the prime minister announced plans for greater intervention in the region, with “counter-terrorism flying squads” to be sent to “high priority” Southeast Asian countries in what Howard called the “arc of instability.” The 10-member rapid response squads, some to be permanently based in host countries, would be drawn from the Australian federal police.

Howard insisted that “Indonesia would be the main focus of the new anti-terrorism offensive.” An article in the Australian cited “terrorist training grounds” in southern Thailand and the southern Philippines, especially the bases of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front on the island of Mindanao, as targets for Canberra’s intervention.

When Howard first announced Canberra’s “right” to stage pre-emptive strikes last year, Malaysia’s then prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad, reacted sharply, accusing the Australian government of racism and acting as a U.S. lackey. This time, the reaction among capitalist governments of the region was muted. ALP leaders criticized Howard’s stance as likely to “undermine co-operation in the war against terror.” In response, Howard professed the need for “collaboration” with governments of semicolonial countries in Southeast Asia saying “none of it is directed against our friends in the region.” Howard reiterated his pledge, however, that Canberra would act without consent of other governments if there was “no other alternative.”  
 
Labor boosts rulers’ ‘antiterror’ drive
The Labor Party’s attempt to pose as a better protector of Australia’s “national security” has boosted the Australian rulers’ “antiterrorism” offensive.

Latham and his “defense” spokesman, Kim Beazley, pledged an extra A$500 million to strengthen Australia’s military September 20. They were surrounded by armored vehicles at an army base in what Latham called the “garrison city” of Townsville, north Queensland. The ALP officials also pledged to double the size of the Ready Reaction Force, based in Townsville, to 3,000 troops. They proposed relocation of a paratroop battalion from Sydney, creation of a new light infantry battalion, and provision of more air and sea mobility for the army.

The troop increases would enable Canberra to deploy a brigade of 3,000 to one “trouble spot” and a reinforced battalion of 1,000 to another, Beazley said. This would “enhance Australia’s capacity for independent military operation in the region, with the ADF able to move joint forces quickly, with superior firepower.”

Canberra has announced plans to fit its F-18 Hornet fighters and Orion long-range patrol planes with cruise missiles, and to purchase new destroyers equipped with Aegis air-warfare systems, which would expand the ADF’s air and sea superiority in the region.

On September 19, Latham called for setting up a force of 50 armed sea marshals to board “suspect” ships before they berthed. This adds to Labor’s call for the formation of a coast guard separate from the navy, run by the Australian federal police. The ALP proposed a new force with high-speed patrol boats armed with cannons and some larger ocean-going cutters carrying helicopter gunships. Labor’s plan envisaged the main base in Darwin, in the Northern Territory, to release the Australian navy for intervention if “political trouble” flared in Indonesia or north Korea. The ALP also used the election campaign to call for a new department of homeland security, modeled on that in the United States. It would take over security functions of the Immigration, Customs, and Attorney General’s departments.

An editorial in the September 21 Sydney Morning Herald, “Regional terrorism, regional response,” noted that Washington’s proposal for the U.S. Navy to patrol the strategically vital Malacca Straits was recently “vetoed by Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur.” It said that the Australian government “must now push for new measures, including better intelligence co-operation, better police co-operation, and tighter border controls.”

The liberal capitalist daily said, “Australia and its South-East Asian neighbours know any successful counter-terrorism strategy must cast its net region wide.” It said the government’s “proposed rapid response ‘flying squads,’ two of which would be based in Asia, and Labor’s coastguard plan, with its potential for joint interdiction exercises in regional waters, recognise this reality.”  
 
 
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