WSWS :This week in history: February 1-February 7

[amyrose2712]

This week in history: February 1-February 7
1 February 2010

This Week in History provides brief synopses of important historical events whose anniversaries fall this week.

25 Years Ago | 50 Years Ago | 75 Years Ago | 100 Years Ago

25 years ago: Australia, New Zealand rebuke US nuke policy

Responding to mass popular hostility toward the Reagan administration's rapid nuclear build-up, the governments of Australia and New Zealand this week in 1985 delivered separate rebukes to US military planning, rattling the South Pacific military alliance, the Australia, New Zealand, United States Security Treaty, or ANZUS.

In New Zealand, as part of a "nuclear free" policy passed months earlier, the Labour government of David Lange demanded that the US declare which of its naval vessels were carrying nuclear materials. The US refused, and in February sent the USS Buchanan to test Auckland's adherence to the policy. New Zealand refused entry.

The Reagan administration was even more stunned by the decision of Robert Hawke’s Labour government in Australia to bar the US military from using Australian territory to monitor MX missile tests. On a visit to Washington just after the New Zealand rebuff, Hawke was at pains to reaffirm ANZUS. He blamed the decision on a split within the Labour Party over the question.

The US reacted hysterically toward New Zealand while attempting to minimize the controversy with Australia. It called New Zealand's decision "a matter of grave concern," cancelled joint naval exercises and warned of "appropriate responses," mentioning punitive trade measures and hinting at the break-up of ANZUS. The Reagan administration openly declared it wished to make an example of New Zealand.

"Some Western countries have antinuclear and other movements which seek to diminish defense cooperation among the allied states," said State Department spokesman Bernard Kalb. "We would hope that our response to New Zealand would signal that the course these movements advocate would not be cost-free in terms of security relationships with the United States."


more

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/feb2010/twih-f01.shtml

[dcsmart]

1. love history...thanks for posting...

:toast: