USA 2024 Elections Thread

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‘Toxic’ Values Undermining US Ability to Tackle Beijing: Senator

https://www.theepochtimes.com/toxic-values-undermining-us-ability-to-tackle-beijing-senator_4734585.html

Visiting Australian Senator Andrew Hastie says basic struggles with
identifying gender are undermining the ability of the United States to
lead the developed world in opposing military aggression from Beijing.

“These tensions are tearing at the fabric of our democracies, many
among us are no longer confident of truth, tradition, and our
democratic values,” Hastie, a former Special Air Service operative,
told the Hudson Institute on Sept. 15.

The now-opposition defence minister pointed to research by Prof. James
Kurth, of Swathmore College, who said the real culture clash was not
between the “West and the rest” but within the West itself.

“This is a clash between Western civilisation and a different grand
alliance, one composed of the multicultural and the feminist
movements. It is, in short, a clash between Western and post-Western
civilisations,” Kurth wrote in The National Interest in 1994.

The professor predicted in his article that there would be a lack of
consensus on basic issues like humanity, justice, and within politics.
Epoch Times Photo Andrew Hastie during Question Time in the House of
Representatives at Parliament House in Canberra on Nov. 27, 2019. (AAP
Image/Mick Tsikas)

In turn, Hastie said this conflict was no longer just playing out in
universities but in the mainstream.

“Toxins are in the mainstream now, seeping through the media,
entertainment, in our schools, and our families. It has brought
disruption and political consequences for the Western body politic. It
makes it harder for our leaders and policymakers to deal with the
strategic challenges,” the senator said.

Hastie said smaller nations could not set into play grand strategies
and could only follow bigger countries like the United States.

“Put starkly, if we can’t agree on basic definitions of gender, how
can we possibly agree on national strategy? If we can’t agree on
Western values, how can we defend the West?” he added.

“If we look up from the cultural chaos at home, we see China
encroaching on Taiwan and Russia on Eastern Europe.”

An example of the ongoing debate regarding gender identity is recent
orders within the U.S. Pacific Air Forces for leaders to stop using
gender, age, or race pronouns in written format, claiming such a move
would improve “lethality.”

“We must embrace, promote and unleash the potential of diversity and
inclusion,” according to an email sent out in May to commanders in
Guam, a U.S. territory just hours away from the South China Sea.
Speakers Take Aim at Media Mischaracterising AUKUS

Hastie also joined a panel discussion moderated by senior fellow Peter
Rough, along with Patrick Cronin, Asia-Pacific security chair of the
Hudson Institute, and Bryan Clark, former submariner and expert in
naval operations.

Cronin took aim at Australian media for focusing too much on issues
like capability gaps, money wastage, “alienating options” for dealing
with China, and mischaracterising the deal as one where Australia was
becoming an “adjunct to the U.S. Navy.”

“While there is some validity to these points … it completely misses
the fact that America is taking a big gamble on Australia. We’re not
talking about just any technology transfer … we’re talking not just
about nuclear propulsion, but about technology writ large,” he said.

“Are we going to get ahead of it? Are we going to harness it? At the
university level, or governments and militaries? Or are we not going
to do that, we’re going to cede that ground?”

While Clark said AUKUS institutionalised several decades-long
arrangements between Australia, the UK, and U.S., particularly “in the
area of undersea warfare.”

“Sometimes it misses the fact that this is something that’s been going
on for a while now, and we’ve actually taken it and codified it in a
way that’s going to allow us to get a lot more benefit for the next
decade.”

Hastie also said he was telling school kids to get ready to be
involved in AUKUS over the “next 20 years” across a range of areas,
including quantum technology, artificial intelligence, and
hypersonics.

AUKUS was formed to counteract ongoing military aggression from
Beijing in the South China Sea and towards Taiwan. The deal could
potentially shift the power balance in the Indo-Pacific substantially
and give the United States a strong anchor (Australia) in the region.