Kevin Rudd declares China an ‘adversary’ that binds Australia and the United States

Kevin Rudd, Australia’s Ambassador to the United States, has declared China an “adversary” that binds Australia and the Trump Administration.

He also also revealed that US President Donald Trump took a warm view of Australia’s compulsory superannuation scheme introduced by former Labor prime minister Paul Keating.

Speaking at the Australia Day Gala Awards ceremony at the US Embassy in Washington, DC, the former prime minister said he had kicked real goals during his tenure as ambassador, including the critical minerals deal that Mr Trump and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese signed at the White House last October.

“As a result of this, billions of investment are now flowing. It’s not just your average G2G (government to government) MOU (memorandum of understanding) which gathers dust in a corner,” he said.

“It actually changes things on the ground as we deal with the challenges posed by our common adversary and those who seek to restrict the supply of critical minerals and rare earth to free countries around the world.”

China has a near-total dominance of rare earths and critical minerals, and last year began imposing restrictions on their exports to Western democratic countries. The materials are used for everyday technological items as well as advanced weapons such as fighter jets and the AUKUS submarines.

Mr Rudd’s speech came on the same day that the Chinese Ambassador in Australia threatened the Australian public with more economic coercion, if Labor went through with its election promise to remove Chinese control of the Port of Darwin.

His tone was noticeably tougher than that adopted by Mr Albanese, who has sought a stabilisation of ties with the CCP after the economic coercion imposed on Australia during COVID when the Coalition was in power.

For example, Mr Albanese has refused to even back Mr Trump’s view that AUKUS is about deterring China from taking self-governed Taiwan.

John Blaxland, Professor of International Security and Intelligence Studies at the ANU’s Strategic and Defence Studies in DC, attended the event.

“The term adversary is used in sport, play, business and politics,” Mr Blaxland said.

“This also reflects the sentiment captured in Mr Rudd’s book, On Xi Jinping. It also points to a level of what I think can best be described as unrestricted competition in the cyber, economic, security, trade and information domains.”

Mr Rudd later said that both countries stood for freedom.

He recalled his time in Beijing during the Chinese Communist Party’s crackdown on student protesters demanding more rights at Tiananmen Square in 1989, saying he had seen freedoms being denied to people.

“And when people don’t have it (freedom), let me tell you they know it,” he said.

“What animates us as Australians and Americans? We’re on the good ship freedom, and it’s a good ship to be on.”

Mr Rudd is also a China scholar and is leaving Australia’s most important and prestigious diplomatic posting one year early to take up the presidency of the New York-based Asia Society think tank at the end of March.

He will be replaced by Defence Department secretary Greg Moriarty. Mr Rudd did not mention his now infamous tangle with Mr Trump in the White House when the US President berated the former prime minister on live television for historical criticisms.

But he did address the turmoil that the Trump Administration has created for its allies.

“This has been obviously a turbulent time in American politics,” he said.

“Let’s not pretend it’s been anything other than that. We Australians just call a spade a spade — it’s been pretty turbulent.

“It’s also been a critical time in the Australia-US relationship but we have come through and gone from strength to strength. That’s what I’m so proud of, this Australia-America relationship.”

Mr Rudd revealed that Mr Trump was highly interested in Australia’s compulsory pension scheme which mandates employers set aside 12 per cent of their income for retirement.

Superannuation funds currently hold about US$3 trillion that can be invested. Mr Rudd as ambassador has convened a first-ever “Super Summit” to encourage funds to invest around one-quarter in the US. Mr Trump has made attracting direct foreign investment in the US a key priority of his America First agenda.

“When I sat in the meeting with President Trump and Prime Minister Albanese, the President was so engaged by how we in Australia have crafted this retirement income fund in Australia,” Mr Rudd said.

“And the fact that it’s been now going for 20 or 30 years and we require Australians to save first 9 per cent and because of yours truly when he was prime minister up to 12 per cent — 27 million people can save US$3 trillion.

“And we’re not big enough to invest it all at home, we want to invest it here as well, we’ll become one of the larger foreign investors in the United States and we’re proud of that fact.”

But he poked fun at Mr Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs, which were imposed on the uninhabited Heard Island and McDonald Islands.

“It’s only 27 million of us, at the end of the world down there on the way to Macquarie Island,” Mr Rudd quipped.

“We got a few tariffs, the penguins are still unhappy.”

He praised Australians to his US audience as an “innovative, practical and entrepreneurial mob” who work hard and therefore were “completely comfortable” about also “playing very hard”.

“Australians are a bright mob. We sometimes understate how smart we are, but we’re seriously smart folks.”

The gala, which was sponsored by many Australian corporates operating in the United States, including BHP, recognised prominent Australians in the US.

Mr Rudd said that meant everyone could have a great party without having to abide by DFAT rules or answer to Senate estimates, as not a single dollar of taxpayer funds was spent on the gathering.

The black tie event is another of Mr Rudd’s signature events that he introduced as ambassador, but this year’s gala, held in the days after heavy snow hit the US capital, did not attract the high-profile names that attended last year such as Australia’s richest woman Gina Rinehart and golfer Greg Norman, who is close to President Trump.