All Eyes on Five Eyes
The AUKUS is just the latest in a new era of international politics. We can see the next steps of international politics unfolding by looking at online politics.
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As I wrote last week, the AUKUS agreement is a big deal, but we may already be seeing the unfolding of a broader strategy. In short, the AUKUS pact shifts competitive focus to the rest of the Five Eyes alliance: New Zealand and Canada. In Brief 1.7.0, I mentioned that New Zealand now finds itself in a difficult spot, because international competition is putting pressure on New Zealand’s long-standing policies and its strongest alliance commitments. Canada has fewer tensions to overcome to join with its historical allies to balance against the Peoples Republic of China’s (PRC’s) influence globally.
New Zealand Will Either Cave on Nuclear Power or its Position Internationally
New Zealand is in a tight spot because of three issues they are confronting, creating a trilemma. First, New Zealand’s closest ally is Australia and has been for a long time. New Zealand is also a member of the Five Eyes intelligence-sharing alliance that also includes the UK, US, and Canada. Second, New Zealand has a long-standing cultural taboo and policy against anything nuclear. Third, the PRC is leaning heavily on New Zealand to forgo participation in any alliance to contain the PRC. A big part of the PRC’s pressure includes cyberattacks including a DDoS that shut down New Zealand’s stock exchange.
New Zealand will be unable to maintain its current position on all three issues for long. Although Australia is (so far) committed to not acquiring nuclear weapons, New Zealand’s anti-nuclear prohibition includes nuclear power, too. Unfortunately, conventionally powered vessels are simply not viable in the Pacific in competition with nuclear-powered vessels. Both diesel and nuclear submarines use electric motors, but diesel submarines cannot operate underwater as long as nuclear submarines can. The Pacific Ocean’s expanse makes endurance necessary for any submarine.
Nuclear submarines’ importance for naval competition in the Pacific essentially compelled Australia to purchase nuclear-powered vessels. The shift from conventional to nuclear submarines also signals a shift in how Australia views the security environment in the Pacific. New Zealand has already prohibited the imaginary Australian nuclear subs from docking in New Zealand. Prohibiting Australian vessels from New Zealand’s ports pushes New Zealand further from its traditional ANZAC allies, and marginalizes the New Zealand navy.
The rest of the Five Eyes really want New Zealand on the team, but playing cagey for too long risks alienating the rest of the Five Eyes. If the New Zealand Navy does not purchase its own nuclear fleet, it will have limited range at sea for defending its own interest. Prohibiting allied vessels travelling under nuclear power from docking in New Zealand’s ports makes it difficult for allies to assist in that defense. Defending a New Zealand could become a liability to the AUKUS. It may be tempting to appease the PRC, rather than balance against them, but appeasement may hurt traditional alliances, too. The US forbade the sale of F-35s to Turkey over Turkey’s purchase of S-400 missile systems from Russia. It is conceivable that meeting Chinese demands might cause a rift between the AUKUS and New Zealand.
Canada Is a Natural Participant in any Pacific Alliance
Canada, like New Zealand, is a member of the Five Eyes and is a long-standing ally of all the other participants. Like all but Great Britain, Canada is also a Pacific country, with ports and naval forces along the Pacific Rim. The US and Canada also share the world’s longest non-militarized border. Canada is also a founding member of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade alliance largely established as an economic counterweight to the PRC. It seems highly likely that Canada will eventually join a balancing alliance on the Pacific Rim, even though Canada has yet to join.
The PRC and Canada have already butted heads, most notably over Meng Wanzhou the CEO of Huawei. The US requested that Canada detain Meng to face fraud and sanctions violations charges in the US. In response to Meng’s detention, the PRC detained two Canadian men. The ensuing diplomatic row has been a consistent facet of Sino-Canadian relationships for the past two years.
Despite the structural pressures to balance the PRC, the current Canadian government has been reluctant to overtly align itself with the US. The Trudeau government has tried to walk a fine line by treating the PRC with kid gloves. It was likely that, had the Trudeau government fallen, Canadian foreign policy would have shifted rapidly. As it stands, for the moment at least, Canada will try to appear to be tepidly accepting of the PRC’s rise.
International Politics is Unfolding Primarily Online and Adjacent Spaces
Part of the reason this newsletter exists is to point out exactly how expository online politics and behavior are for real-world politics, and nowhere is the importance of online politics more obvious than the Pacific balance of power. The PRC has used cyberpower to hammer New Zealand and may have attempted to interfere in Canada’s most recent election. However, we can already see hints of the clandestine counter-maneuvers the US and its allies are making online.
This past week, Canada released Meng Wanzhou and received the two Canadians in return because the US changed its policy. The majority of the coverage focused on the bilateral exchange between Canada and the PRC, but the exchange only happened because of a deal brokered with the US DoJ. Brokering a deal with Meng simultaneously took pressure off Canada and returned the entire sordid affair to the Canadian news cycle. The US and Canada both now have one less problem to overcome to align their political interests in the Pacific.
Although Meng’s release from house arrest happened in the real world, Meng is primarily interesting and influential because of her position at the head of Huawei. The US and several other countries have identified Huawei as a security threat and a tool for expanding Chinese control internationally. Just this week the US announced it is preparing to spend $1.9 billion to remove Huawei-produced equipment from the internet infrastructure, and Lithuania encouraged citizens to replace Huawei smartphones because of security vulnerabilities. The US and its allies are not lifting pressure in their online competition with the PRC, they are just shifting to other venues.
It is possible that American or other allied intelligence have already played a clandestine role online to help bring New Zealand into full alignment with the rest of the Five Eyes. When Kaseya, an American company, was hit by ransomware several of the hardest-hit victims were organizations in New Zealand like elementary schools. After three weeks, Kaseya suddenly had a key to decrypt encrypted files from a mysterious source, which we have since learned was the FBI. Although some internationally have groused that the FBI could have acted sooner, but the FBI could have done nothing at all or helped only American firms, and no one would have been the wiser. If reporting is accurate, the FBI delayed out of concern for disrupting ongoing counter-ransomware operations.
The PRC did not attack Kaseya, but the US government acted to shore up support for cybersecurity which is fast becoming an aspect of balancing against the PRC. American assistance may be having its desired effect because PRC-based cyberattacks are pushing New Zealand towards the US and Australia. In July, New Zealand joined its Five Eye partners to condemn Chinese cyberattacks. New Zealand may join a more formal organization to counter Chinese cyberthreats.
Alliances are a Part of Balance of Power
What we seem to see playing out in the Pacific is hard-nosed, realist foreign policy. Unfortunately, too often casual observers can transmogrify realist concern with the “balance of power” into a cartoonish obsession with “national power alone.” Allies and alliances have always been an important part of the balance of power. The AUKUS drew international attention yet again to the Pacific, but AUKUS is just one of several groups explicitly established to deal with a rising, and seemingly revisionist, PRC. Both “the Quad” and the Five Eyes stand athwart the PRC’s ascension. It was not foreordained that alliances would become balancing coalitions, nor are these groups predestined to success. We can see a glimpse of the future by looking around us, and at least for the time being, balancing alliances seem to be the order of the day.
David Benson is a Professor of Strategy and National Security focusing on cyberstrategy and international relations. You can reach him at dbenson@osiriscodex.com.
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