Great Britain | Congratulating Australia

[Jamie]

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Ministry of Foreign Affairs​

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To:	Prime Minister Kevin Rudd
Cc:
Subject:	Entering Office
Security Level:	Private & Encrypted

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Greetings,


On behalf of Her Majesty's Government, we would like to congratulate you on the victory you have ceased as apart of the the 2012 Australian Federal Election. Britain has created and maintained long-lasting friendships with past Australian Governments and we would like the opportunity to work with your new government. I would like to know your thoughts and availaibility on a UK-AUS State Visit that will see senior officials from both our governments converge with the possibility of new trade, potential cooperation in Defence and generally the chance to work together.

Kind Regards,
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
Christopher Morris MP

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? mofa@gov.co.uk​

☎️ 03700 00 22 44​

✉️ Ministry of Foreign Affairs, King Charles Street, London, SW1​

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@Owen

 

[Owen]

"Dear Mr. Morris,

It's a pleasure to hear from you. We are open to this proposed UK-AUS state visit. I have no other international engagements right now, so any time right now really works for me if we can get this booked in early before I have anything else propping up. Look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,
Kevin Rudd,
Prime Minister of Australia."

 

[Jamie]

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Ministry of Foreign Affairs​

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To:	Prime Minister Kevin Rudd
Cc:
Subject:	Entering Office
Security Level:	Private & Encrypted

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Dear Mr Rudd,

Thank you for your prompt response.

Ideally, we would like to book in a State Visit for June if this is applicable for you? Allowing time for security arrangements and plans to be put in motion for you to visit the United Kingdom. If you could please advise if this is suitable for yourself?

Kind Regards,
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
Christopher Morris MP

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? mofa@gov.co.uk​

☎️ 03700 00 22 44​

✉️ Ministry of Foreign Affairs, King Charles Street, London, SW1​

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@Owen

 

[Owen]

"Dear Mr. Morris,

This is perfectly acceptable.

Sincerely,
Kevin Rudd,
Prime Minister of Australia."

 

[Jamie]

A Member of the British Government, Nathan Johnson, would begin/attempt to call a member of the Australian Government to discuss the events occurring in Australia. This call would be private/encrypted.

 

[Owen]

The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Penny Wong, would pick up the phone.

"Hello?"

 

[Jamie]

"Hello, thank you for taking my call. My name is Nathan Johnson, I work in the British Prime Ministers Office, who has authorised this call. The situation between Australia and Poland has raised eyebrows globally; with a lot of opposition towards yourselves. I would just like to re-affirm that the British Government stands in support of your move. The access to weapons is one greatly observed in the United Kingdom, and we recognise your decision and have respected it with the removal of our own weaponry in the British Embassy to Australia."

 

[Owen]

"We're quite happy with the steps the British High Commission has taken to remove its weapons. Some opposition, but generally it has been supportive. Just certain South American countries and the Eastern Europeans. U.S. has had a bit of a kick up about it, but we're probably going to turn a blind eye to them because we obviously are reliant on them."

 

[Jamie]

"South America seems to have kicked up a lot of fusses these days.." Nathan murmured beneath his breath. Clearly showing a growing concern for the activities and comments made by Brazil throughout the ordeal. "If we were in the same situation, I am sure the same steps would've occurred. Nonetheless, I would like to raise the possibilities of trade between our countries. We have some exports that I wonder whether there is anything your government is seeking to import?"

 

[Owen]

"Well Mr. Johnson, I am quite fond of Irn-Bru, if we could get more stocked in our supermarkets that would be great." The Minister would chuckle. "Trade is not quite my purview, the Department is split up between me as Minister for Foreign Affairs and Jason Clare as Minister for Trade, so any trade questions I'm sure are probably better answered by him. But anything to do with bilateral relations, I can handle, so while you have me on the phone it's probably better if we stuck to that. I'll connect you through to Jason when we're done. We are looking forward to establishing quite strong ties with the UK, given the 1.3 million UK citizens that live in Australia and the 113,000 Australians living in the UK. We wish to start establishing annual Australia-United Kingdom Ministerial Consultations or AUKMIN for short. This will see me as Minister for Foreign Affairs and our Minister for Defence meet with your Foreign Secretary and Defence Secretary for a bilateral meeting on how we can strengthen political and defence ties."

 

[Jamie]

Nathan laughed slightly, "My mistake, but yes, an arrangement to speak to the Minister of Trade would be great. For now, as suggested, we'll stick to the subject of relations." he smiled on the other end of the line. "The concept of annual consultations between our minsters could prove of great importance. Especially with the quantity of citizens we each care for within our own borders. It would allow us to discuss any current events, potential issues and proactively work to tighten ties between Britain and Australia. With that concept in mind, I would like to see such meeting occur towards the end of each year. Possibly commencing in October time? This would give us room this year to arrange one in October where our Foreign and Defence Secretaries could meet. Perhaps beginning in Australia as a sign of Britain's support regarding the current tensions surrounding your country?"

 

[Owen]

"October sounds great. Middle of Spring, the weather will be quite nice for a range of outdoor engagements. Might organise a military exercise to observe, good weather for it. Maybe hold a Koala or two. Should be a very productive meeting. We're sure we can become Britain's most reliable partner in the Asia-Pacific region and I'm sure you're probably looking at it as a key area of focus for foreign policy. I believe that defence cooperation is paramount to this due to our shared interests and values. Some nations have been quite volatile in the past in this region and have posed grave dangers to the international community. Obviously at the moment we are seeing South Americans being the ones causing the trouble, but I have no doubt that someone in Asia will eventually stir up trouble. There are obviously British territories also in this region, to the east of us there's the Pitcairns and to the west there's Diego Garcia. We're particularly looking towards cooperation in the Indian Ocean, policing the bit of ocean and particularly vital trading route between Europe and Asia. Obviously you have your naval base on Diego Garcia and we have our Fleet Base West in Perth. Also a 'bare air base' on the Cocos Islands, which gives us leverage quite deep into the Indian Ocean. Joint patrols and exercises could be particularly useful in the Indian Ocean and also in the Pacific if Britain is also focusing there, obviously the Pitcairns can't quite handle ships of that size, but we are willing to allow British ships to dock at Australian naval bases to do the 4 R's; refuel, rearm, refresh and recreation. Also looking at giving RAF/RN aircraft access to air bases as well."

 

[Jamie]

"Great! I trust we are happy to leave this with you to prepare and arrange it? I will contact our relevant ministers to book that in for October. It would be great to see Australia and Britain enhance options in cooperation. Diego Garcia is the primary interest for Britain in Asia at the moment, and ISAF itself. It's an ISAF-wide territory and possibly the most defended globally. Especially now as it becomes more vital to security of trade routes, with new trade between Britain and Pakistan Commencing. It would be nice to see Australian Involvement in the security of trade routes in that region. Along with joint exercises."

 

[Owen]

"Yes, well Defence has informed me they wish to establish a Defence Attache inside ISAF Headquarters as a point of contact between the ISAF Secretary-General and our Department of Defence and the Australian Defence Force. In this role, they hope to also serve as a Defence Attache to ETO. They've advised me that Lieutenant Colonel Natalie Leaver is best fit for this role. We're looking very closely at becoming a very formidable partner of ISAF in this region and becoming ISAF's primary point of contact when it comes to issues in this side of the world, obviously you have the United States but recently we've seen them sort of retreat from their role in the Asia-Pacific to I think would be a more North/South America focused policy. Our capabilities are quite broad and the ADF primarily focuses on quality over quantity. I mean half of the Brigade's in 1st Division are support brigades and then the 3 other combat brigades range in their combat capabilities. Given our shared values and interests, this is where we're primarily focusing our relationship with the United Kingdom, through being closer with ISAF."

 

[Jamie]

"I do not see why that could not be arranged, whilst the British Government ought to have no problem, we'd be able to speak to those such as the Secretary General and Chief of Political Affairs in the alliance to endorse it too. The Alliance is currently undergoing elections for a new Secretary General, so whilst I echo your thoughts on the lack of role in the Asian-Pacific area, that could change given both nominations want to enhance the presence globally. It's pleasant to hear of your interest in working as a partner with the group, of course our action is purely defence and supportive, and recently, working towards a more political outlook. We are hoping to raise a call with others in the alliance for a more permanently based force in Diego Garcia too, as it stands, very few activities rely there but I think it'd be useful to have some permanent units present."

 

[Owen]

"Well hopefully we would see some change there in the Secretary-General's view. ISAF has always seemed to have had a European-focused role and while not much has happened here in this side of the world, we can't be too pessimistic. We don't see any particular nation at the moment as a threat in this region and we are seeing some major internal reforms in Vietnam that we welcome with open arms and we hope to see some reforms in Vietnamese foreign policy to be more cooperative rather than threatening. I mean all in all, the threats seem to be coming from South America to the surprise of everybody. But of course we don't advocate offensively attacking another country, but as modern nations there are plenty of other issues we faced in the world rather than traditional threats. We have climate change, which we know is going to massively affect the Pacific region in particular and those nations in the Pacific are going to probably rely on us to assist them in delivering humanitarian relief. At the moment, we would see that as the biggest threat to the region. ISAF support during natural disasters would be greatly welcomed. Navy just recently took delivery of 2 Canberra-Class Landing Helicopter Docks which will greatly assist in delivering humanitarian aid to the region. We've also got probabilities of coups in places like Fiji and we also just need to monitor nations around us to make sure there's no grave violations of human rights. We're not suggesting that ISAF and Australia work in a traditional security context, we're suggesting much broader cooperation. Humanitarian relief, Intelligence sharing, Border security, Anti-piracy operations, Freedom of navigation, Search and rescue, Combating drug smuggling. All these things which we have the possibility of cooperating on. As I said, if you or other ISAF members require the use of Australian bases for operations in the region or just R&R, do not hesitate."

 

[Jamie]

"The world has been in a relatively.. dare I say, stable? State for a while. More stable than the history. It's hard to believe it's been as many years since the Battle of Europe, Dutch Civil war, etc. Yet these days, and on a positive, there is much less military intervention with the rise of the Global Assembly and new Governments who have learned from their past. Outside of South America, I do not believe there are many other potential threats... yet. We both know that could change relatively quickly with any new reforms. Iran may be a growing threat directly for Britain given the moments of the Al-Mutahida Terrorist Group but we're in discussion regarding that. Britain, and no doubt ISAF itself would be happy to extend new methods of cooperation with Australia. At the end of the day, many, if not most countries are looking for peace and to support those in need -- which is what ISAF's goal is after the defence pact. Britain itself is hoping to establish itself and support in humanitarian, peacekeeping and more smaller roles like that; so we would be happy to help and support your operations."

 

[Owen]

"Hm, that's very good to hear. Except for the Al-Mutahida group. That is a bit alarming, could you give us a bit more information on them? Do you believe they could become a threat to Australia?"

 

[Jamie]

"We had only recently learned of their existence, following their attacks in London. Our Prime Minister is engaged in discussions with the Iranian Government to establish more information, but we have no more information than an extremist group. They just seemed domestic to Iran until recently.. we are under the impression the attack on London was a response to our involvement in the conflict surrounding the last Iranian Regime, but the current Iranian Government claims they knew of their existence. We are hoping to establish more in the coming days. As for them been a threat.. it's the first time we've heard of them, and first attack we know about that they've committed so we're unsure at this moment in time. All I can do is advise normal procedure for terrorism, but the world has become much more relaxed since the decrease in terrorist activities."

 

[Owen]

"Our Department of Home Affairs is still pretty strict on the possibility of terrorist attacks in Australia and obviously we will be keeping a close eye on this Al-Mutahida group. We should enter Intelligence-sharing arrangements so we're able to pass on information and intelligence which may be harmful to each other's national security such as information on the Al-Mutahida group."