An insight into why Australians find it hard to love America

[ben]

AND the Australian government... This is how we see things on our side of the pond. From today's "The Age" newspaper:


US lashed over 'double standards' on Hicks trial
By Annabel Crabb
Canberra
July 10 2003


As the United States prepares to try Australian David Hicks in a military tribunal that could impose a death penalty, Australia is finalising arrangements to issue American citizens with immunity to prosecution by the International Criminal Court.

Former prime minister Malcolm Fraser yesterday excoriated the US Administration for pursuing "double standards" and said Australia should be refusing to sign any agreements with the US to exempt Americans from the new international court, especially when an Australian was being denied legal rights.

"The Americans have said that they should be above the reach of international law, but that doesn't mean we have to agree with them," he said.

Attorney-General Daryl Williams' office yesterday confirmed that the Government is negotiating with the US to sign an agreement in which Australia would promise never to hand American citizens over to the recently established International Criminal Court.

His office refused further comment, saying negotiations were continuing.

Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said there were still "quite a lot of outstanding issues that need to be resolved".

The US has successfully approached around 30 countries to sign the agreements. It refused to sign up to the court, but Australia did ratify it last year after passionate debate.

Mr Fraser said the world had been "trying for 50 years" to construct a system of international law that would govern relationships between states. "The criminal court was a very significant advance," he said. "To exempt by special treaty the citizens of any one country is putting that country over and above the reach of international law."

Tim McCormack, a Melbourne University international law expert, said the US approach was "blatantly inconsistent".

"If it was an American national in Australian hands, the Americans would have gone absolutely berserk about it," he said, pointing out that the sole American occupant of Guantanamo Bay detention camp for suspected terrorists, John Walker Lindh, had a criminal trial, while non-US citizens, such as Hicks, will be tried by military tribunals with fewer legal rights.

Prime Minister John Howard yesterday denied he had prejudiced Hicks' hearing by claiming this week that the Adelaide-born detainee had admitted to training with terrorist organisation al-Qaeda, claims his family denies. "No, I haven't prejudiced his trial," Mr Howard said, but refused to disclose the basis for his claims.

- with Greg Roberts, Mark Russell


This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/articles/20...430274727.html

[slidercrank]

If an American citizen is captured while fighting in the jungles of East Timor against Australian troops for an organization that has a part in blowing up the Sydney Opera House full of people, I doubt any American administration is going to do much about the guy.

Contrary to your impression, plenty of Americans are in prison all over the world, many for crimes that are quite heinous. You don't see the Delta commandos storming here and there to rescue them, do you?

Of course, I'm presuming that David Hicks fought for Taliban and that Taliban had a culpable role in 9/11. These presumptions are not in any case the foucs of the Australian press, or so I gather.

Many foreigners sometimes cannot quite comprehend what 9/11 meant to Americans. They'd say, "oh, it's terrible, someone will pay." To us (actually, not all of us) , it's nothing less than Pearl Harbor. Incidentally, more people died on 9/11 than at Pearl Harbor. If some of the US government's actions seem extreme (and some of them do seem extreme even to me), it's because when one's security and existence are threatened, one tends to respond extremely. Even a western democracy is not immune to it. Witness the unconditional detention of Japanese-Americans during WW2. That was a mistake, but perhaps unavoidable given the time and circumstance. Compare the current military tribunals and detentions at Guantanamo to what happened in WW2 both in the US and others, at least we can say we have progressed a bit.

If Australians cannot love America, all I can say is that Australia's security and prosperisty have not been so threatened.

[xvikingx]

here here slidercrank... well put.

By the way Ben, I don't think anyone here asked why Aussies don't like yanks. So bugger off...

[Simon]

Perhaps Ben was referring to why Aussies don't like the American approach to Foreign Policy more so than americans per se...

The article is specifically referring to the fact that an australian (guilty or not, who cares) is being tried with less than the rights an american got for the same crime (while the 2 countries were allies) and at the same time that government is attempting to ensure that the australian government will not "extradite" (I guess that isn't really the correct term for an international court but you get the idea) american citizens to a court which which will give the american citizens different legal rights to what they would receive in the US.

See the double standard?

This is of course a fairly easy article to write as most governments are behaving inconsistently when their entire actions are viewed (there are different departments with different agenda so of course the behaviour is inconsistent if viewed as being by a single entity).

However the australian populace is aware that an australian (who may or may not be guilty) is being tried by an allied country without the rights that the person would get in Australia for a crime committed in another country altogether. The logic doesn't quite appear to be there... surely as allies the US would extradite the suspect to Australia for the trial under australian law. That would make more sense than being tried in the US for a crime committed in a country that the US and Australia invaded...

Of course the whole thing is rather distasteful to a lot of americans as well and so perhaps that is why Ben's comment should be read without taking personal offense....

[ben]

Originally posted by xvikingx
here here slidercrank... well put.

By the way Ben, I don't think anyone here asked why Aussies don't like yanks. So bugger off...

I never said I didn't like the people. I use the term "America" as a term that refers to an ideology or a state of mind, rather than a person. It's also why I put this in the Flames forum.


b

[John W]

All I can say is that the ripple effects of 9/11 will be felt for a long, long time to come yet

[LNGUYEN]

It doesn't have to be 9/11 to be use for any thing happen. Just read it this way: I am powerful, I don't go around to mess you up but if you are messing with me. You will be on my dinner menu and we will cook you any way we please. If anyone hurts someone else because of his ideology, he has just lost his human right and we should treat him as animal and we can chase him anyway we want.

[Ben F.]

The stupidity in US foreign policy can be clearly explained in just one word: Dubya.

[samurai999]

Well at least he did something about it unlike Clinton. Clinton had a chance to get Bin Laden when he was in custody. So the only thing Clinton did was to lob a couple of cruise missiles at a hospital and sat idling after the failed op in Somalia, the initial WTC bombings, the USS Cole and the US embassy bombing in Tanzania.. What good did that do?

John, you are right, the ripples that those few terrorists set off will propogate for a while. I think that the rest of the Islamic community should be ashamed of the people who set the wave in motion if they are the peaceful people that they claim to be. Nothing against Islam, but from all of the news that I see, it seems that they use their religion as some sort of divine reasoning to "rebel" against other people. At times, it looks like another cult. Like David Koresh's. Also, they seem to go to regions in strife and hard times in order to "recruit" people for their cause. Is something getting lost in the translation? There was even an article in Hokubei Mainichi that said that there was one Al Qaeda operative in Japan trying to learn how to dig tunnels and caves and trying to spread the word of "jihad" to other Japanese people. Well anyways, I'm not one to be prejudice and have some Islamic friends in kendo, but the religion of Islam has shown me nothing but images of kids waving AK-47s, suicide bombings, men wearing masks with Islamic writing waving guns in the air happy that their people take part in their holy war.


My $0.02 (US of course),
Tim

[Hongsermeier]

I do agree with Simon. The US foriegn policy is crap!!

Now for the second part of this. I appologize if I upset or offend anyone by saying this. I spent 1 year in the gulf serving my country. We made many port calls and got to meet lots of native people there. They do not like, respect, or care about anyone but themselves. They will shake your hands as friends then turn around and stab you in the back. Religion has nothing to do with it. It is taught to them from birth to be this way. If we had a bomb big enough to melt Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, United Arab Imerates, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Oman I would gladly push the button.

[Ben F.]

As opposed to us here in the US who always welcome strangers or foreigners with open arms. What a load! Look at the post Sept. 11 attacks on Americans of Arabic heritage or some people who weren't even Arabic.

The reason the Arabs hate us is our never ending, blind, unthinking support of Israel: a nation that oppresses Arabs and steals their land. I'd hate us to if I were them.

[Old Warrior]

"The reason the Arabs hate us is our never ending, blind, unthinking support of Israel: a nation that oppresses Arabs and steals their land. I'd hate us to if I were them."

The above is the most historically ignorant and blatant anti-semetic garbage that I have read in a while. Forget about learning Kendo - spend some time on history. Better yet, join Hamas a or get a job with Al Jazeera - they can always use another moron.

[Hongsermeier]

They do not only hate the US. They hate everyone who is not of the same thinking as them. Be that US, Japan, China or anyone else. They simply attack us more because we are a bigger target. Then they run and hide behind religion.

Ben..the people you speak of attacking people of Arabic decent are simply idiots looking for an excuse to beat up on someone. Just like the Rodney King riots. The dumb ass's burned down their own neighborhoods.

[JSchmidt]

" but the religion of Islam has shown me nothing but images of kids waving AK-47s, suicide bombings, men wearing masks with Islamic writing waving guns in the air happy that their people take part in their holy war. "

Then you are not looking very hard. ..imagine if people chose to only form their opinion of christinaity based on the recent cases of Catholic priests abusing children...or Northen Ireland.

Jakob

[xvikingx]

Then you are not looking very hard. ..imagine if people chose to only form their opinion of christinaity based on the recent cases of Catholic priests abusing children...or Northen Ireland.

Jakob [/B][/QUOTE]

Very true. The same goes for alot of negative opinions about Americans. It is a bit tiresome. I say this not because of this thread but because of repeated bashings from uninformed people. One of my favorite new ones is being compared to Nazis. About "taking this personal" from before I apologize.