Sipping Spinfizz in the S. Pacific

Press, 29 December 1986, Page 16

Sipping Spinfizz in the S. Pacific

From ‘The Economist,’ London Mutinous murmurs are being heard in the Australian Navy. It is fed up with the quarrel between New Zealand and the United States over New Zealand’s refusal to allow nucleararmed or nuclear-powered ships to use its ports. To continue to do its duty under the defence agreement between the three countries, Australia is now carrying out separate naval exercises: it steams around a bit with the Americans, then moves across the horizon to say ahoy to the Kiwis. This is not only a dubious way to deter a possible enemy; it is costly. “Marked additional expense” was the phrase used by the Australian Foreign Minister, Mr Bill Hayden, on a visit to New Zealand which ended on December 14.

The New Zealanders seem to believe that the Australians can be the big brother to them that America formerly was. No way, said Mr Hayden. Australia was no substitute for America “as the security partner for New Zealand.”

If New Zealand wanted more protection it would have to spend more money on defence itself: but there had been no such proposal from its Prime Minister, Mr David Lange. The reality is that Australia’s navy, though larger than New Zealand’s is still pretty small. It has half a dozen submarines and a few destroyers and frigates. It is the presence of America’s mighty Seventh Fleet near at hand in the Pacific that gives clout to the three countries’ defence agreement.

The Americans would love New Zealand to change its ways and would offer instant reconciliation if only it would. They are holding their hand on economic retaliation, although on December 15 the American Navy Secretary, Mr John Lehman, said that America should ban New Zealand’s farm products.

A new Government in New Zealand is the best Americanhope, but the opinion runes say that Mr Lange’s anti-nuke policy is still favoured by a majority of New Zealanders. For the present, the Americans are trying to limit the spread of what they call “nuclear allergy.” One symptom of this allergy is a piece of paper setting out a treaty for a South Pacific nuclear-free zone (SPNFZ — Spinfizz, as it has come to be known). Signatories to the treaty agree not to make nuclear weapons in the South Pacific or to store them permanently there, and ask states that have these weapons not to use them in the region. It was composed at a meeting of the 13-nation South Pacific Forum in August 1985, and soon afterwards, was signed by seven nations, most of them small: Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, New Zealand, Tuvalu, Western Samoa

and Niue (which is very small indeed, with a population of 3500 and declining). On December 11, Australia became the eighth country to adopt the treaty, and it was followed on December 15, by Russia. The United States and Britain are having a look at Spinfizz and may possibly sign too.

France is the one country which says it will have nothing to do with the treaty and regards it as yet another conspiracy by a largely francophobe part of the world. On the day Australia signed, France let off another nuclear explosion at its Pacific testing ground in Mururoa. All treaties spell mischief for someone. But Spinfizz seems less troublesome than most. Its beauty is that signing it amounts to little more than saying you are against nuclear war in the South Pacific.

It has been a godsend, if that is the word, for the Australian Prime Minister, Mr Bob Hawke. It enables him to give a nod to the anti-nuclear instincts of his Labour party without interfering with his defence promises to the

Americans. The treaty allows individual States to make their own decisions about visits by nuclear ships. It would seem that countries can even store nuclear weapons, providing the arrangement is not “permanent.” The Russians could not resist signing Spinfizz. It has enabled them to make a peace-loving gesture without offering a single commitment that matters, and without the cost of a single rouble. It harmonises with their Pacific policy, which is to worry America and its allies as much as they can without spending very much money.

Russian canniness with cash is the other current subject of conversation in the Pacific. In 1985 the Russians made a much-pub-licised deal with Kiribati (formerly the Gilbert Islands) allowing Russian tuna boats to fish in Kiribati waters. It was said to be worth about $3 million. i

When the deal came up for renewal a year later the Kiribatis, believing reports of American alarm and despondency over

the deal, asked the Russians for more money. The Russians offered half the 1985 sum, saying that the fishing had not been up to much.

The deal has fallen through. Perhaps the fishing really was poor, or perhaps the Russians decided that there was not much more American despondency to be extracted over Kiribati. The Russians are discussing possible fishing deals with a number of other island states, among them Vanuatu, but, after Kiribati’s experience, none of them is expecting to get fat by exploiting East-West tensions.

The island States did have an exploitable grievance when American tuna boats fished in their waters without permission. But this grievance was ended in October when the United States Government and the American tuna industry agreed to pay $l2O million over the next five years for fishing rights.

The negotiations had lasted an agonising 25 months, during which the islanders’ .usual admiration for America sank and

sank. In the end the American Government’s contribution to the deal was far more than it wished to pay. It wants the friendship of the islanders.

It feels historically close to the Pacific, for which it fought Japan in the Second World War. But in contemplating the scattered islets in the southern part of the ocean it reckons, in the words of the old song, that “the Pacific isn’t terrific.”

The region is mostly water, tedious to cross, with poor communications and few people. Its States are mostly resourceless rocks miles from anywhere, relying on handouts from rich countries. The future of the world is not going to be decided there.

The Pacific is often muddled with the economic concept called the Pacific rim, which has energetic countries like Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong on one side selling things to rich American buyers on the other. An understandable mistake, if you are an' optimist living in Kiribati.

Copyright — The Economist.