John Howard, Garran argues, has almost single-handedly brought Australia’s foreign policy into complete alignment with the views of the Bush administration in the United States. More than any previous Prime Minister, Howard is a ‘true believer’ not only in the benefits of the alliance to this country but in the values of the current Republican administration in Washington. According to Garran, however, support for the United States comes at too high a price. True Believer is a vigorous indictment, written in a readable style and with a good grasp of history and politics in both the US and Australia. Whether readers will agree with the charges laid by the author is another matter.

John Howard’s commitment to the US alliance is explained in a number of ways: his upbringing and obvious admiration for Churchill as a leader in difficult times; his realist perception of international politics as a dangerous environment that demands vigorous efforts to maintain security; his strong personal ‘bond’ with George W. Bush who is also ‘conviction politician’ prepared to assert his ‘moral rectitude’; his relative lack of interest in Asia which is seen more as a source of problems than of security; and his belief that Australia and the US are closely, inevitably and inextricably bound by democratic values and a shared history and culture. Howard, in short, has been impressed by America’s hard power and co-opted by its soft power.

All of the above help explain Howard’s attitude towards the US. But it is more difficult to assess which factors carry greatest weight. Would Howard have gone all the way with President Clinton (with whom he had a strong and mutual antipathy) or even with President Gore? Would he have been less emotionally committed if he had not been in Washington on the day the Pentagon was attacked which apparently influenced him to invoke the ANZUS pact for the first time? And without the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, would Howard have been able to show his true colours?

In Garran’s view, Howard’s support for the alliance not simply a foreign policy judgement, it is also part of his attempt to re-claim Australian nationalism for the Liberal side of politics. Only the Liberals, Howard claims, can and will pursue Australia’s true national interests. They had originally negotiated the ANZUS treaty (albeit with some internal disagreement, as Garran notes) and only they can now be relied on to maintain it in good health. Likewise, only the Liberals, Howard has recently asserted, could have negotiated the free trade agreement with the US. At the same time, Howard’s position allows him to denounce Labor for its dogmatic anti-Americanism and its failure to understand the need for security against major, new and long-term threats.

An important part of Garran’s argument deals with what he sees as the costs of ‘bandwagoning’ with the United States. These include consequences for Australia’s foreign policy such as a claimed diminution of Australia’s standing and influence in Asia and an overestimation of the value of force in international politics at the expense of multilateralism. More generally, Garran believes Australia has encouraged the US to damage the international system through its unilateral widening of the doctrine of self-defence to extend not only to pre-emptive strikes against looming attacks but also to preventive war against possible long-term dangers. At the same time, Garran argues, Australia has unwisely supported the US in downgrading the value of the United Nations as a means of managing international and internal conflicts.

Joining in the war on Iraq — ‘Howard’s war’, as Garran terms it — is likely to prove the most costly mistake. A country that was not a terrorist threat has been turned into one; and a future government of Iraq, if Shia-dominated as seems likely, may align more closely with Iran, another member of the ‘axis of evil’. Garran finds Howard guilty of what might be called the ‘Turnbull doctrine’ — ‘my ally, right or wrong’. The Prime Minister, of course, does not appear to believe the US venture in Iraq to be doomed (and if he does, he is unlikely to admit it). But Garran and Howard would agree on one thing: John Howard is a true believer in the alliance.

Robert Garran, True Believer: John Howard, George Bush and the American Alliance, Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 2004, paperback, 228pp, RRP $24.95.