As the only nation that’s also a continent, Australia is known for its vast, empty “outback,” huge cattle and sheep ranches, and unique flora and fauna. Yet most Australians live in or near a handful of urban areas. Australia is a longtime American ally, having fought alongside the United States in both world wars and supported the U.S. staunchly during the Cold War. With a new liberal government in Canberra, however, the relationship between Australia and the United States may be at a crossroads.            

 

Location: Australia is an island continent located just south of Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. The total area is 7,686,850 square kilometers. Australia is blessed with abundant resources in both agriculture and mining. However, a large percentage of the continent is desert and most Australians live in and around half a dozen urban areas. Australia is known for its unique flora and fauna, much of which is found nowhere else. This includes iconic marsupials, such as the kangaroo and koala, as well as a plethora of extremely poisonous species of snakes, spiders, jellyfish, octopi, and even the male platypus, one of the world’s few poisonous mammals. Australia is the only country that is also a continent, and it is the only inhabited continent that is entirely in the southern hemisphere. Thus the nickname “down under,” because it is below the Equator. The word “Australia” itself means “south”..

  

Population: 20,600,856

 

Religions: Roman Catholic 26.4%, Anglican 20.5%, other Christian 20.5%, Buddhist 1.9%,

Muslim 1.5%, other 1.2%, unspecified 12.7%, none 15.3%

 

Ethnic Groups: white 92%, Asian 7%, aboriginal and other 1%

 

Languages: English 79.1%, Chinese 2.1%, Italian 1.9%, other 11.1%, unspecified 5.8%

Ancestors of Australian Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders settled the continent beginning at least 40,000 years ago. They spread out over the entire continent and separated into hundreds of tribal groups with their own languages, customs, and traditions. Most had complex social structures that bound different family groups. There is evidence that China and Southeast Asian societies were aware of Australia’s existence and in fact traded with the groups living along the northwest shore. Dutch explorers sighted and landed on parts of Australia in the 1600s, but it was James Cook, the famous British explorer, who mapped almost the complete east coast and claimed the continent for Great Britain in the 1770s.

           

In 1788 the British, having lost their American colonies to independence, needed a place to ship prisoners from their overcrowded jails.   The colonial era in Australia began as Britain began sending prisoners to a penal colony established at Sydney. From then until the practice was discontinued in 1868, approximately 160,000 prisoners were exiled to Australia. These included many poor street criminals from London who spoke with a Cockney accent, as well as political prisoners from Ireland who spoke English with an Irish accent. The blend of these two in particular, along with standard British English, led fairly quickly to the development of the distinctive Australian accent. From the 1790s on, free immigrants also came to Australia. Meanwhile, the Aborigines in the fertile areas of eastern Australia coveted by the new settlers fared poorly. Introduced diseases took their toll, and many settlers fought with different Aboriginal groups. Killings were frequent. Gold was discovered in 1840, and the rush brought many thousands more settlers and more deprivations wrought against the Aborigines.

           

In 1901 the six colonies (Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia, and Tasmania) combined to form the Commonwealth of Australia. Although the British Crown remained sovereign, slowly the Australian government became more and more independent. The Australians were quite proud of their democratic traditions, at least for whites, and it was the Australians who invented the concept of the secret ballot. Also in 1901, they passed a law limiting immigration to people of European decent. Australian troops fought in both World Wars as allies of Britain and the United States. But in World War I their units were commanded by British officers. Criticism and hard feelings were generated at the Battle of Gallipoli, when British generals ordered Australian and New Zealand troops into suicidal frontal assaults on well-entrenched Turkish positions. Machine guns mowed down hundreds. During World War II, Australia was directly threatened by the possibility of a Japanese invasion, and the northwestern city of Darwin was attacked by Japanese bombers. Noting the loss of Britain’s supposedly impregnable fortress of Singapore, Australians began to make closer ties with the United States for defense purposes. This led to the ANZUS Treaty signed in 1951.

           

After the war, Australia began to prosper and develop into a modern, industrialized nation. Restrictions on non-white immigration were eventually lifted, but then the main program to encourage immigration was ended in 1975. Aborigines continued to receive poor treatment. In what is now considered an act of cultural genocide, almost an entire generation of Aboriginal children were taken from their parents and raised in special homes. Eventually, attitudes began to change, and in a nationwide referendum the government was overwhelmingly given the authority to pass laws to benefit the Aborigines. In 2007, newly elected Prime Minister Kevin Rudd formally apologized to the aborigines for the abuses they had suffered, including the “lost generation.”

 

 

The United States has always had a close, allied relationship with Australia. The two countries were allies in the first World War, then allies again in the second, often fighting alongside each other especially in New Guinea. During World War II American troops were stationed in Australia, and U.S. General Douglas McArthur was placed in command of all Australian troops by the Australian government until the end of the war. After World War II Australia, the United States, and New Zealand entered into the ANZUS alliance, a mutual defense pact. Australia was a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, but began to see the United States as its strongest ally. Although the United States suspended its alliance with New Zealand after that country refused to allow port visits by nuclear powered or nuclear armed ships, the alliance with Australia continued. Australian troops fought on the same side as American troops in the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, the Iraq War, and in Afghanistan. Former Prime Minister John Howard was a staunch ally in American President George Bush’s War on Terror. Under Howard, the Australian Foreign Policy White Paper of 2003 declared that it was in Australia’s interest to support the United States. 

 

Current relations between the United States and Australia remain strong. Militarily, the ANZUS provisions are still in effect between the two countries. Although no attacks have occurred on Australian soil, the terrorist bombing of two night clubs in Bali killed many Australians. Australia has more than 500 soldiers in Iraq and had sent troops to the Korean, Vietnam, and both Gulf wars without any invocation of the ANZUS treaty. However, after 9/11, Australian Prime Minister John Howard did invoke the treaty to send Australian troops to Afghanistan. The 2007 election defeat of Howard by Kevin Rudd marked a dramatic change in U.S.-Australian relations. Sworn in as prime minister December 3, 2007, Rudd withdrew all Australian troops from Iraq by June 22. However, Rudd left Australian troops in Afghanistan. Most of the 1,000 Australian soldiers in Afghanistan have been stationed in southern Afghanistan’s Oruzgan Province, the birthplace of Taliban leader Mullah Omar.  

 

Economically, the U.S. and Australia are major trade partners. The United States is the third largest export market for Australian products and the largest source of imports. This is facilitated by the Australian-United States Free Trade Agreement and AUSMIN, regular meetings held since 1985 between U.S. and Australian ministers and other high officials. There are some concerns in Australia about the relationship. There is worry that if the United States makes too many demands related to the war on terror, or drags Australia into risky military adventures, or gets Australia into a conflict with China over Taiwan, the close ties between Australia and the United States would suffer. 

 

Almost 79,000 Australians live in the United States. Perhaps as many as 15,000 live in and around Los Angeles, and another large group is in San Francisco. The rest are scattered throughout the country. Generally speaking, Australia does not produce many emigrants as it is a place people usually move to, not from.

 

In 2007 the United States imported a variety of products from Australia totaling in value $8.6 billion. Some of the most important categories include medicinal preparations, aircraft parts, scientific equipment, nickel, bauxite and aluminum, industrial chemicals, nuclear fuel materials, wine, and meat. Exports to Australia in 2007 totaled $19.2 billion. This represents a steady increase from $13 billion in 2003. The highest value products include pharmaceutical preparations, cars, medicinal equipment, telecommunications equipment, computer accessories, industrial machines, materials handling equipment, and excavating machinery. Many U.S. industries have a keen interest in U.S. policy towards Australia, particularly in maintaining the free trade agreement. In 2005 the State Department authorized the export to Australia of weapons and military services worth almost $2.5 billion.

 

There are some seemingly minor controversies related to aspects of the free trade agreement that could be generating some anti-American sentiment in Australia. The wheat controversy refers to American claims that the Australian Wheat Board amounts to a monopoly of wheat exports from Australia and distorts the market. In turn, Australians are upset about U.S. government subsidies to American wheat farmers which they say distorts the market. Both sides deny any distortion due to their respective wheat policies, but Australians are genuinely concerned and anti-American sentiment is building.

The Wheat Subsidy Controversy: Australia vs U.S. (Impact Center, Washington State University)

 

The copyright controversy deals with another aspect of the free trade agreement. Australians are upset at attempts to enforce American style copyright laws as required by the treaty. This, too, seems to be generating some anti-American sentiment.

Exporting Controversy? Reactions to the Copyright Provisions of the US-Australia Free Trade Agreement: Lessons for US Trade Policy (by Kimberlee G. Weatherall and Robert Burtrell, University of Queensland) (abstract)

 

There are minimal human rights issues in Australia. Problems do exist with respect to continued discrimination and mistreatment of Aboriginal peoples. Also, labor groups are complaining about laws that restrict unions and strikes and have aggressively lobbied to get some of the laws repealed. Australia also received criticism for its plan to trade refugees with the United States, but that deal was scrapped when the government of Kevin Rudd took over.

Human Rights (by Anup Shah, Global Issues)

 

There are two situations that sometimes lead to debate in Australia, but not generally in the United States. The first is the ANZUS treaty and it’s defining of a military relationship between the United States and Australia. There was some open debate in 2004, but John Howard’s landslide victory pretty much closed the issue. Currently there are few proposals or opinions relative to changing or ending the security agreement between Australia and the United States. Some concerns were raised in 2007 when newly appointed U.S. Ambassador David McCallum admitted he hadn’t read the ANZUS treaty document.  He also said that the treaty, as he understood it, only required one country to aid the other within the constitutional processes of that country. This led to some concerns that this was not a real mutual defense pact, since a country’s constitutional processes might prevent aid from being sent. More concern has been raised over a new communications base the United States wants to build in Western Australia and over the United State’s refusal to sell F-22 Raptor fighters to Australia. Kevin Rudd’s election indicates that Australians are starting to question their relationship with the United States. 

The second situation is the Free Trade Agreement. Issues here have quieted down as well. There are no calls on either side for scrapping the agreement, but there are some concerns with some aspects of it (see above).

 

Edward William Gnehm, Jr. Aug 30, 2000 - Jun 22, 2001

Genta H. Holmes Apr 11, 1997 - Jul 23, 2000

Edward J. Perkins Nov 24, 1993 - Jul 19, 1996

Melvin F. Sembler Oct 25, 1989 - Feb 28, 1993

Laurence W. Lane, Jr. Jan 7, 1986 - Apr 29, 1989

Robert D. Nesen Jun 17, 1981 - May 2, 1985

Philip H. Alston, Jr. May 23, 1977 - Jan 23, 1981
Note: Also accredited to Nauru; resident at Canberra.

James W. Hargrove Feb 19, 1976 - Mar 8, 1977

Marshall Green Jun 8, 1973 - Jul 31, 1975

Walter L. Rice Sep 11, 1969 - May 26, 1973

William H. Crook Jul 22, 1968 - Apr 18, 1969

Edward Clark Aug 23, 1965 - Dec 31, 1967

William C. Battle Jul 13, 1962 - Aug 31, 1964

William J. Sebald Jun 7, 1957 - Oct 31, 1961

Douglas Maxwell Moffat Mar 27, 1956 - Aug 30, 1956

Amos J. Peaslee Aug 12, 1953 - Feb 16, 1956

Pete Jarman Sep 7, 1949 - Jul 31, 1953

Myron Melvin Cowen Aug 20, 1948 - Mar 17, 1949
Note: Commissioned during a recess of the Senate; recommissioned after confirmation on Mar 2, 1949

Robert Butler Sep 25, 1946 - Mar 31, 1948

Edward J. Flynn
Note: Not commissioned; nomination withdrawn before the Senate acted upon it.

Nelson T. Johnson (Envoy/Minister) Sep 12, 1941 - Apr 20, 1945
Note: John R. Minter was serving as Chargé d'Affaires ad interim when Legation Canberra was raised to Embassy status, Jul 19, 1946

Clarence E. Gauss (Envoy/Minister) Jul 17, 1940 - Mar 5, 1941

 

 

 Born August 21, 1946, in Eisenstadt, Austria, Prosl grew up in Vienna and earned undergraduate degrees at the University of Vienna in Law and French in 1969. After completing two years of military service, Prosl studied at Europe’s oldest school of international relations, the Institute of Advanced International Studies in Geneva, Switzerland, from 1970 to 1972. Prosl’s first job in the field was with the United Nations Development Program in Burkina Faso and Rwanda, where he served from 1973 to 1977. 

 

Prosl joined the Austrian Foreign Service in 1977, and served at the Austrian Foreign Ministry in Vienna from 1977 to 1979. Prosl’s first foreign assignment was as First Secretary at the Austrian Embassy in London, from 1979 to 1981. In that year Prosl began his first stint in the United States, serving at the Embassy in Washington, DC, as Counselor for Economic Affairs till 1987, as Chargé d’Affaires ad interim in 1987, and finally as Deputy Chief of Mission in 1988. 

 

Nearly ten years away, Prosl returned to Vienna in 1988 to serve at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in the Office of the Secretary General from 1988 to 1991. He then returned to the U.S., but not to Washington, DC, serving from 1991 to 1995 as Austrian Consul General in Los Angeles, where he appeared in a documentary short film, Ein Österreicher in Hollywood. 

 

Prosl then bounced back to Vienna, serving in a succession of positions at the Foreign Affairs Ministry, including Director of the Department on Western and Northern Europe from 1995 to 1998, Director General for Legal and Consular Affairs from 1998 to 2000, and Deputy Secretary General of the Ministry from 2000 to 2002. Prosl then represented Austria to the world’s only other German-speaking nation, serving as ambassador to Germany from January 2003 to early 2009. 

 

Prosl is an accredited French language translator. He is married to Patricia Prosl-Hurni and the couple has two sons.