Anti-Alliance Speech Blows Up in New Zealand Leader’s Face

A strange thing happened to New Zealand Prime Minister David Lange after he returned from a trip to the United States earlier this year: He found his government in an uproar and his popularity down to the lowest level ever.

Lange had traveled to Yale University to deliver the George Herbert Walker Jr. lecture, named--ironically, as it turned out--for President Bush’s grandfather. There, in an otherwise mundane review of New Zealand’s relations with the United States, Lange dropped a bombshell.

“There has been some concern from the United States that New Zealand might try and pretend that we have edged back to what is referred to as ‘business as usual,’ ” Lange said. “To ensure that there is no misunderstanding, I think it best to say clearly that as between the United States and New Zealand, the security alliance is a dead letter.”

Treaty Undermined

The alliance Lange mentioned is the ANZUS Treaty, signed in 1952 by the United States, Australia and New Zealand, which had already been undermined by Lange’s decision to ban from New Zealand’s ports ships carrying nuclear weapons. The United States will not confirm or deny that any of its vessels carry nuclear weapons, so U.S. Navy ships simply stopped calling at New Zealand ports.

Back in Wellington, government ministers protested that they were not consulted before Lange’s Yale speech. In the press, one newspaper commented that there had been a “conspicuous failure of communication” and that the prime minister had “shot himself in the foot.”

An opinion poll showed that popular support for Lange’s Labor Party, which won the 1987 election with a healthy majority, had fallen to just 30% and that the opposition National Party was supported by 63% of those polled.

Lange’s personal popularity dropped to 11%, the lowest level recorded for a prime minister since poll taking began after World War II.

‘Bolt From the Blue’

“It came like a bolt from the blue; people were just bewildered,” said Donald C. McKinnon, deputy leader of the National Party.

If New Zealand was surprised by Lange’s words, Washington reacted furiously. The Bush Administration regarded it as a personal insult to the President that Lange had used Bush’s alma mater and a lecture funded by his grandfather to attack the ANZUS alliance. Lange was not invited to visit Washington, while McKinnon, who was in Washington on a private visit at the time, was welcomed with open arms at the State Department and the Pentagon.

Lange poured fuel on the fire by joking that he preferred not to visit the White House because of the “bums” who were invited there. This further enraged the Bush Administration.

Just a year earlier, Secretary of State George P. Shultz had put a seal on the sour relations with New Zealand by remarking that “we part as friends, but we part.” At the United Nations, Shultz received the foreign ministers of every country in attendance but four--Iran, Libya, Nicaragua and New Zealand.

For the 3.5 million fiercely independent and proud people of New Zealand, it was an unsavory rebuff. After all, this is a parliamentary democracy, and its people greatly admire the United States. Many thought they deserved better treatment. Britain, too, has stopped sending warships to New Zealand because of the ban on nuclear weapons, but relations have not become as strained with London.

The ANZUS fiasco--Lange said later that it had been cooked up by the media in New Zealand to embarrass him--is only the latest in a series of problems facing Lange after five years in office. Indeed, if the opinion polls are any guide, Labor will lose handily to the National Party in elections scheduled for next year.

Last December, Lange fired Finance Minister Roger Douglas, formerly one of his closest confidants, because of the unforeseen strictures the country endured during a period of economic liberalization. Unemployment soared from virtually nothing to 10%. The minister of agriculture went so far as to advise farmers to think about going on welfare.

Lange’s popularity also has been damaged recently by a dramatic rise in racial tension between New Zealand’s whites and its 400,000 citizens of Polynesian origin, known as Maori. Lange’s government has agreed to settle land claims arising from an 1840 treaty with the Maori, and this has caused a severe backlash among the whites.

Lange’s current woes were symbolized by a photograph on the cover of the local edition of Time magazine, which showed Lange lying supine in the grass. Lange protested that the photo was several years old, but many New Zealanders regarded the controversy as another example of the kind of troubles now dogging their leader.

“There is a sort of sullen mood,” said Mike Moore, minister for external trade and the No. 3 man in government. “Governments get themselves in positions where they can’t do anything right. For a long time, we couldn’t do anything wrong.”

In fact, more people seemed concerned about the timing of the ANZUS speech than about what it actually said. By coincidence, the speech was delivered on ANZAC day, when Australia and New Zealand honor their war dead.

New Zealand’s anti-nuclear stand is supported by voters across a broad spectrum and is regarded as more of an environmental issue than as an aspect of the Cold War. The primary concern is radioactive fallout from nuclear testing by countries such as France in the South Pacific.

Paradox in Opinion Polls

Opinion polls have shown that up to 70% of the public support the government’s anti-nuclear position. Paradoxically, 70% also support ANZUS, which may help account for Lange’s decline in popularity.

Even the National Party does not suggest overturning the ban imposed on ships carrying nuclear weapons. But it has said that the United States would respect New Zealand’s wishes in this regard. Party leader James Bolger quipped that he trusts the United States more than Lange.

Some political analysts speculated that Lange made the ANZUS speech to galvanize the disorganized Labor Party into action in preparation for next year’s election. There was also some talk that Lange was attempting to get support for a plan to buy four frigates, arguing that because New Zealand had no one looking after its defenses, it would have to do so itself.

Meanwhile, relations with the United States are frozen in a state of non-cooperation, although trade and economic relations have not been affected by the ANZUS dispute.

Not only do U.S. ships no longer call at New Zealand ports, Washington has banned all defense cooperation, including military exercises, downgraded New Zealand from ally status, suspended ANZUS security guarantees and lowered the level of contacts at ambassadorial and ministerial levels.

New Zealand warships visiting Hawaii these days must stop at commercial piers instead of U.S. naval facilities. The New Zealand government still lets U.S. naval aircraft bring supplies to the small U.S. station at Christchurch that provides services to American facilities in Antarctica.

“We’ve gone from a very substantial relationship to a much-attenuated relationship,” one official said.