4.6 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 22 September 2023
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
“We have no greater friend, no greater partner, no greater ally than Australia,” declared Antony Blinken, America’s secretary of state, during a recent visit down under. Is that really true, and how is the threat from China reshaping America’s relationships in the Indo-Pacific?
John Prideaux hosts with Charlotte Howard and Anton La Guardia. They’re joined by Eleanor Whitehead, The Economist’s Australia correspondent.
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0:00.0 | 650 million people across the world watched one of the great American achievements of |
0:08.0 | the century on their television sets. There was Neil Armstrong in his bulbous white |
0:13.1 | space suit, gingerly stepping off the lunar module, down onto the surface of the moon. |
0:19.0 | Soon after, he and his space suit twin, Buzz Aldrin, plunged a flagpole into the dusty |
0:23.8 | surface and unfurled the stars and stripes. |
0:27.8 | With the satellite dish that transmitted man's small step onto the moon, wasn't in Houston |
0:32.4 | or Cape Canaveral, but in the hills south of Canberra at a tracking station called Honey |
0:37.8 | Suckle Creek. The giant leap for mankind, an iconic American moment, was shared with |
0:44.0 | the world via Australia. It's one of the many ways Australia has assisted American |
0:49.8 | endeavors over the past century or so. Now, the US is counting on the same support as |
0:55.5 | tensions rise with China. I'm John Prado and this is Chex and Balance from the Economist. |
1:01.6 | Each week, we take one big theme, shaping American politics and explore it in depth. |
1:17.8 | Today, is Australia America's closest ally? |
1:25.5 | We have no greater friend, no greater partner, no greater ally than Australia, declared |
1:36.0 | Anthony Blinken, America's Secretary of State, during the recent visit down under. |
1:41.5 | If America were ever to go to war with China over Taiwan, Australia would be both a strategic |
1:46.6 | launch pad for American troops and US officials' hope, an ally in combat. How is the growing |
1:53.8 | threat from China reshaping America's relationships in the Indo-Pacific? |
2:13.5 | With me this week to discuss America's alliance with Australia, |
2:16.9 | our Charlotte Howard in New York and Anton Lagadia, the economist's diplomatic editor, |
2:22.6 | who is also in New York this week because the UN General Assembly hunger is underway. |
2:27.8 | Idris, of course, is off in Japan at the moment. Anton, how are you finding New York? |
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