- by Graham Holton
- The Guardian
- Issue #2118
Kanak house – Tjibaou cultural centre, Nouméa, New Caledonia. Photo: Fanny Schertzer – Creative Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Since 2016 the Australian and French governments have seen the Indo-Pacific as a major theatre of competition against Chinese economic, political and military influence, especially in Kanaky/New Caledonia. To counter China’s ‘influence’ French President Emmanuel Macron and former Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced a “France-India-Australia Axis” in 2018. Australia signed a $90 billion contract with France’s Naval Group to build diesel-electric submarines. Three years later Morrison cancelled the contract and announced the AUKUS alliance for US and UK-made nuclear submarines which will cost at least $368 billion.
In 2020, the Australian Defence Force appointed a liaison officer in Noumea to work with the Forces Armées de la Nouvelle-Calédonie (FANC). That year, FANC participated in Australia’s Talisman Sabre War games. In December 2023 France hosted the South Pacific Ministers meeting for the first time, with the Australian Defence Minister, Richard Marles, attending. In the 2024 federal budget, the Albanese government allocated $20.7 million over five years towards an Australia-France Road Map. France already had made a significant defence contribution through the FRANZ (France, Australia, and New Zealand) arrangement, which was signed in 1992.
French imperialism has a long history in New Caledonia, dating from 1853, when it established a penal colony. Settlers and miners waged a genocidal war that killed more than 70 per cent of the indigenous Kanak population. In 1871 3,000 Kanaks were killed in an uprising, followed by the 1917 rebellion, which was also violently put down. In the 1960s new hopes for independence led to the student revolt and mass strikes of May 1968. In 1972 French Premier Pierre Messmer wrote that French control would be threatened by nationalist demands by the indigenous population. He had a plan: “Massive immigration of French citizens should make it possible to avoid this danger, by maintaining or improving the numerical ratio of communities.” Kanaks soon became a minority.
Between 1984 and 1988 there were a series of violent clashes, and massacres of Kanaks by militia and police. Negotiations culminated in the Nouméa Accord of 1998, which did not solve the independence question. The Kanaks, who make up 40 per cent of the population, continue to face racial discrimination; there is a 40 per cent unemployment rate, and 90 per cent of those in prison are Kanak.
Macron visited New Caledonia in 2018, warning that China, “will soon be a hegemony that will reduce our freedoms and our opportunities, and we will suffer.” French paranoia about the Communist Party of China (CPC) was being used to justify French imperialism. In September 2018, the Five Eyes intelligence alliance (Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the UK, and the US) called for the need to counter foreign interference in the region. In Australia, Macron announced France’s new Indo-Pacific strategy to develop the role of France in the area, including countering the regional expansion of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). New Caledonia’s independence is seen as weakening France’s military and economic power in the western Pacific.
In 2022 62.3 per cent ($2.65 billion) of New Caledonia’s exports went to China, showing its economic dependence on that market, which France and Australia see as needing to change.
In May 2024, following the introduction of a French law which would have expanded the number of non-Kanak voters, the most violent riots in 40 years killed eleven people, leading to the declaration of a state of emergency. French security forces were brought in to restore order, and many of those arrested were taken to France. The call for independence had led to social unrest, making the French territory of great political significance for Australia, which fears independence would lead to increased Chinese influence.
In August 2024 the reliably pro-war and anti-China Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) released its report, When China knocks at the door of New Caledonia, examining the military agenda and geostrategic role of the CPC. The report argues that nickel and cobalt deposits are strategically crucial to miliary materiel for China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA). The Australian government sees the CPC and Chinese companies as using “interference tactics” targeting political elites.
To further increase Australia’s concerns, in 2021 L’indépendant reported that if New Caledonia achieved independence, the independence group, Front de libération nationale kanak et socialiste (FLNKS), would increase relations with the PRC, including a Chinese military base to raise finances. France and Australia see this as creating significant instability in the west Pacific. The ASPI report argues that France, Australia, New Zealand, and the US, should bring New Caledonia fully under their Pacific security umbrella.
In 2021, French analyst Sébastien Schneegans, asserted that although there was no evidence of Chinese influence, “it is obvious that this is set to develop in the next decade.” He concluded that the French government should “adopt an all-of-government, total-defence, approach to the China challenge.” In 2023 Macron warned of China’s covert activities in the region, especially if there was a Chinese military base in New Caledonia. There isn’t such a base.
The Five Eyes countries have accused China of “foreign interference” by using “coercive, deceptive, and clandestine activities” to manipulate public discourse and disrupt markets for the “purpose of undermining our nations and our allies.” FLNKS supporters say that these baseless allegations are being used “to justify the French presence.” The Chinese state media accused France of needlessly demonising China.
Macron maintains the necessity of French sovereignty in the Indo-Pacific. New Caledonia will remain firmly under French control, ruling out independence for the Kanaks.
The Australian government supports French imperialism in the region, also targeting China as a threat to regional security, even though the Chinese government has done nothing threatening. Australian attacks on Chinese influence in the region will continue to grow.
