Unholy Fury (46 page)

Australian officials, especially Defence Department Secretary Arthur Tange, were almost apoplectic at these developments, Tange believing that if the prime minister followed through on his threat to publicly oust Stallings and the CIA's association with Pine Gap, Australia would be ‘cut adrift' from the United States.
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Whitlam was due to make the statement in parliament on 11 November, and on the weekend before Tange engaged in a desperate attempt to divert the prime minister from his intentions. He told members of Whitlam's staff that ‘this is the gravest risk to the nation's security there has ever been'.
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In Washington, the State Department issued an official denial that Stallings was employed by the CIA, and William Colby, CIA director, dismissed the suggestion that his agency was involved in Australian domestic politics. But there was no doubting that the CIA now held grave concerns about the future of its operations in Australia. Its bitterness about the whole affair was revealed in a cable drafted in Washington by the agency's East Asia bureau chief, Ted Shackley, and sent to the head of ASIO in Canberra. Although this was meant to be a message between the two agencies only, it was shown to Whitlam on 10 November, the day before his dismissal. In it, Shackley wondered whether the public revelation of CIA employees signified ‘some change in our bilateral intelligence security related fields', and could not see how the matter ‘can do other than blow the lid off those installations in Australia where the persons concerned have been working and which are vital to both of our services and countries, particularly the installation at Alice Springs'. If the problem could not be solved, it went on, the CIA ‘could not see how our mutually beneficial relationships are going to continue. The CIA does not lightly adopt this attitude'. A few years later, in 1977, Whitlam read the entire message into the parliamentary record as vindication for his statements at Port Augusta. He referred to the tone of the cable as ‘offensive' and its implications as ‘sinister'. And he placed on record the answer that he was going to give in the parliament before his dismissal intervened.
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Whitlam believed the cable showed undue pressure being exerted by a foreign intelligence agency on the Australian government, but it remains equally significant that, in
the searing heat of political crisis, Whitlam had cracked and played the CIA card—a card he had steadfastly refused to play over the preceding decade.

Tange's efforts to deter Whitlam from making the explosive connection between the CIA and Pine Gap became the key ingredients in an elaborate conspiracy theory. In subsequent articles by journalist Brian Toohey, and in books and documentaries by John Pilger, it has been suggested that Tange organised for the governor-general to be briefed by an Australian defence official on 8 November about the CIA's concerns: in effect, that Whitlam was endangering the security of the American intelligence facilities. In
A Secret Country
, John Pilger portrayed the dismissal of the Whitlam government as the handiwork of the CIA. The implication here is that Kerr acted at the urging of the CIA in removing Whitlam from office and that Tange was the key link between the CIA and the governor-general. But as historian Peter Edwards has shown, in the fullest and most authoritative treatment of this affair, ‘neither Toohey nor Pilger could ever produce evidence to suggest that Tange had been a conduit between the CIA and Sir John Kerr just before November 11'. Paul Kelly, another to investigate the allegations, conceded that the timing of these events ‘provided the necessary material for a conspiracy theory'.
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But Pilger's theories, like those of others, have always failed to ‘show that Sir John's dismissal notice had anything to do with the CIA, intelligence links with the US or the Pine Gap base'. Whitlam himself has stated categorically that Kerr was not acting on the CIA's behalf, but his memoirs do contain mention of a specially arranged meeting at Sydney Airport in late July 1977. There, US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia Warren Christopher—who was en route to New Zealand for an ANZUS council meeting—told Whitlam that he had been instructed by President Carter to make a special detour to Sydney for the purpose of telling him that ‘the US administration would never again interfere in the domestic political processes of Australia'.
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A fuller record of that conversation—if such a record exists—has not been found.

On the day of Whitlam's dismissal, one of the more intriguing, almost poignant Australian-American exchanges took place, fittingly
enough, in that most Labor of culinary environments: a Chinese restaurant in Sydney. On that day, before the news came through from Canberra, Assistant Secretary of the NSW Labor Party Kerry Sibraa was dining with two officers from the US consulate, Frank Starbuck and Warren West. Over pre-lunch drinks at the Tai-Ping restaurant, Sibraa told of his optimism for gaining election to the parliament in the forthcoming half-Senate election, which Whitlam had just announced that morning in an attempt to break the deadlock. The owner of the restaurant, described in the report of this exchange only as ‘Michael', paid his usual compliments to ‘Comrade' Sibraa. One of the Americans noted—surely no one could have written a better script here—that Sibraa actually resembled the
Pravda
representative in Sydney, Vladimir Bolshakov, a man all three luncheon partners had seen at a Soviet reception the week before. It was not the first time the Labor Senate-hopeful had been told of his similarity to the Russian scribe, but he felt that, given Bolchakov's closeness to the Australian trade unions, he was likely to be much more than a mere journalist. Sibraa then proceeded to update his interlocutors on Whitlam's strategy to improve Labor's position in Canberra. He was upbeat, confident that a way could be found through the political gridlock.

But as the lunch drew to a close around mid-afternoon, ‘Michael' hurriedly rushed to ask if Sibraa had heard the news: Whitlam had ‘resigned'. Taken aback, Sibraa dashed to the radio near the kitchen to verify, and returned to the table ‘in shock'. He relayed the happenings in Canberra, expressing his fear that ‘the Governor-General's apparent siding with the opposition would do serious damage to the ALP at the polls'. A general election was now likely. While the lunch party was trying to digest news of the dismissal, ‘Michael' not only begged Sibraa to answer a phone now running hot, but attempted to console him as well. The restaurateur was reported as saying that ‘Whitlam would pull them through and … the Governor General was a dirty word who always did have a “funny look about him”'. All that Starbuck and West could do, as Sibraa headed back forlornly to Labor headquarters, was offer some kind of understanding, some mild, even if cautious, words of comfort. ‘We sympathised with his
position', they noted, ‘and wished him luck (on a personal basis)'.
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If ever there was a last supper for the alliance in the Whitlam era, this was surely it.

 

At the end of December 1975 Gough Whitlam received a letter from Marshall Green, writing from his new post in Washington as the State Department's Coordinator for Population Affairs. Green had turned down Kissinger's plea to stay longer in Canberra while the political storms gathered around the Labor government and had left for home at the end of July. In this brief, but personal, note—the salutation was ‘Dear Gough'—Green tried to empathise as best he could with the defeated Labor leader. Although a year earlier he had predicted to British officials that the prime minister might be gone within twelve months, Green told Whitlam that he had been ‘hard pressed to explain the events that have transpired in Australia these past few months, and I have often thought of you and what you must have been going through'. The words expressed Green's appreciation for Whitlam's ‘deep understanding of our country and of world affairs, at a time when the Australian-American connection was under re-examination'. There was genuine warmth and respect in the words, as if Green was reaching out to a friend and former sparring partner. Now dealing with the policy challenge of global population growth, he had even more reason to recall with nostalgia
the ‘vast open stretches of Australia', but above all he missed Whitlam's ‘verve and wit and warm friendliness'.
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Green's departure also witnessed the revival of some old patterns in the alliance. The first was the matter of who would replace him as ambassador. For all Green's success in steering a steady course through these turbulent times for the American–Australian relationship, the new president, Gerald Ford, was not about to send another career officer to Canberra to replace him. Whitlam's minister for foreign affairs, Don Willesee, had already spoken to Kissinger of Australia's desire for another career diplomat of Green's stature.

But the omens were not good. By December the post was still vacant, and the press sniffed a very stale breeze blowing in from Washington DC. The
Australian
had already labelled the delay ‘insulting'. Even worse, it had picked up rumours that ‘Canberra is once again to be considered a resting place for minor American politicians'. For its part, the White House believed ‘a non-career man of considerable stature' might well be a worthwhile appointment, yet it remained all too aware that ‘the sort we should avoid is the kind of political hack we used to dump on Australia before Marshall Green'.
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In its own way, that said much about America's attitude towards its junior ally throughout much of the Cold War. But it showed, too, a certain sensitivity in the White House that what had once been acceptable would no longer pass muster with an Australian government of either political persuasion.

In the end, the decision was delayed until after the December 1975 elections in Australia. When the news broke that James Hargrove, a Texas business consultant and former assistant US postmaster general, was the ambassador-designate, a collective groan emanated from deep within the Australian body politic. Hargrove was quickly dubbed ‘the unknown American', one newspaper contending that such a ‘reversion to the practice of political appointments might be tokenism twice over if applied by President Ford who himself seems to be moving into the wilderness of a lame-duck presidency'.
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Once again, Australia seemed to be receiving the runt of the American ambassadorial litter.

Hargrove was given barely ten minutes with Ford in the Oval Office prior to his departure for the post—the only substantive
message from the president being ‘you are going to a government we approve of more than when Whitlam was there'. His marching orders were short and sweet: ‘tell [Prime Minister Fraser]', the president said, ‘we support him with enthusiasm'.
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The new love was duly returned: when Australian ambassador Nicholas Parkinson presented his credentials to Ford in March 1976, he relayed a special, personal message from Malcolm Fraser: ‘you are the bulwark of the free world', he told the president, ‘and we look to you to preserve us all from those who would do us ill'.
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The old order had been well and truly restored—or so it might seem.

Some in the White House had in fact been frustrated that they were unable to shower more obvious, public sentiments of approval on the new Fraser government. One of Ford's political counsellors, Jack Marsh, was advised that there was to be ‘no full-blown ceremony' for Fraser and his new Cabinet upon their installation at Government House. The National Security Council thought this was a mistake on two counts: firstly, the US was deprived of an opportunity to ‘publicly express its friendship and affection towards the new Fraser government'; and secondly, the freshly elected Australian leader and his team ‘lost an opportunity to take advantage of the obvious affection that would have been lavished on it by the US'. It is not quite clear what the Americans had in mind, but they were clearly expecting some kind of glamorous inauguration-style event for the new Australian prime minister, a moment when the old bonds could be reaffirmed and new oaths of loyalty sworn. The language was decidedly reminiscent of the ‘love feast' that conservative Australian governments had enjoyed with their great power ally during the mid 1960s: a kiss goodbye to the troublesome Labor leader and an ostentatious embrace of his new conservative replacement. Instead, there was simply disappointment in Washington at the ‘quiet “business as usual”' ceremony to swear in Fraser and his ministry on 23 December 1975.
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That ceremony came precisely three years and three days since Whitlam had dispatched his letter of protest on the Christmas bombings to President Nixon.

COMPLACENCY

Marshall Green had written another private letter on leaving Canberra, this one to Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. In it he attempted to capture the essence of what his time in Australia had meant for the alliance. As he left for home, Green was keen to emphasise one lesson, and one lesson alone: ‘one of our biggest problems in Australia has been complacency'. But Green did not set out a plan of action to remedy this diplomatic malaise. Nor did he seek, as he had done in New York just two months before, to herald a new understanding of the alliance on both sides of the Pacific. Rather he stressed that Australia had supped long enough at the cup of ‘independence':

 

Paradoxically, the Indochina debacle, inflation and unemployment have helped make Australians increasingly aware of their dependence on outside developments and of their reliance upon the United States.

 

It was a self-serving reading of Australian attitudes, Green closing his letter by reassuring Kissinger that Whitlam's government had ‘providentially matured in its international views'.
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In effect, he was signing off on what he saw as a mission accomplished: a wayward, erratic and problematic ally had been brought to heel. Green had started his posting in Australia by warning of the risks of ‘overidentification with another country'—and he had talked often about transcending the idea that Australia and the United States had to march in a Cold War lock-step—yet now he was playing his own part in putting Australia back where it had been before: in the camp of compliance.