Letter to Tony Abbott
Dear Tony
I must apologise for the time lag in responding to your recent anti-China tirade delivered from the very door-step of the PRC. Blame it on the prolonged Melbourne Covid lockdown, okay? I must say that baiting the fire-breathing Chinese dragon outside its den sure takes oodles of guts. Don’t push your luck too far – your Oxfordian boxing skills may not save your bacon against the whiplash of the dragon’s tail the next time round.
We truly held our breath when you took a leaf out of Sir Lancelot’s play book on dragon slaying. But remember, the good Arthurian knight was always garbed in shining armour from head to toe when he went dragon hunting. You were only in your budgie smuggler when you hollered across the Taiwan Strait. Next time, if you really decide to stare down the red dragon aka President Xi Jinping, try borrowing the good knight’s antique armour from Buckingham palace. If your name doesn’t ring a bell (most likely it won’t) with the Queen, then get on to ebay pronto – their second-hand armour suits are selling out fast because of the long Western queue waiting to poke the dragon in the eye. You should know that China-bashing is the flavour of the month. Should ebay run out of stock, I suggest you try borrowing one from Defence Minister Peter Dutton who is wont to joust with China whenever he thinks nobody is paying attention to him. However, be warned: The breastplate of Dutton’s suit is quite battered because of all the gorilla-like chest- thumping anti-dragon dances that he regularly performs outside his Canberra office.
In Taiwan, you announced to the world that you are heading a one-man crusade to rally support against China. How commendable, but, sadly, it did not cause a single ripple in the South China Sea. That’s because of your very poor timing in the wake of Prime Minister Scott Morrison making waves earlier with his volte-face of the century: abandoning his $90 billion submarine deal with France and going nuclear instead with subs to be built with the help of the United States and Britain. That was a class act which is incredibly hard for you to replicate. However, your anti-Beijing tirade did raise some eyebrows. Who would have thought you would finally make a clean breast of your dalliance with President Xi whom you invited to Australia in 2014? Then, you waxed lyrical about “wanting to be a true friend of China” and also led negotiations over a China-Australia free trade deal while prime minister (2013-2015). To save your face now for being such a geopolitical novice, you had better blame President Xi for pulling the wool over your eyes during those halcyon days. For ingratiating yourself and Australia with Beijing, perhaps you should consider doing penance by tilting at the Great Hall of the People in Tian An Men Square for the next ten years in just your budgie smuggler and astride a kangaroo, of course. Just don’t give anybody any idea that you should instead prostrate yourself every step of the way to Lhasa’s holiest temple like indefatigable Tibetan pilgrims seeking merit. How else can you make amends for jumping into bed with President Xi so soon after your Tinder tryst?
By the way, strutting on the world stage in second-hand armour means you’ve to work hard to burnish your image as a gainfully unemployed former prime minister of Australia now doubling as a peripatetic prophet of doom and gloom when you warned in Taiwan that China could “lash out disastrously very soon.” Your oracle-like pronouncement seems a bit too rich, but you got to start somewhere, don’t you? Meanwhile, don’t do anything rash to further trash your international image. Recently, when you were caught out without a mask in your Sydney hometown and fined $400, you were clearly in breach of Covid-prevention rules. But your response was pathetic even though the cops said you failed to comply with the law. It was cringe-worthy when you explained thus, “I believe that I was well within the law, reasonably interpreted. But I am not going to challenge the fine because I am not going to waste police time.” My advice: If you are ever slapped with a fine again, just simply parrot what Victoria’s Premier Dan Andrews so graciously said (“while this was an oversight, oversights matter – everyone needs to follow the rules and I am sorry it occurred”) when he ,too, was fined twice for not masking up. I know that speaking in measured tones has never been your forte. I’ll let you in on a secret Beijing recipe: President Xi maintains his sangfroid at home and abroad by dosing on No. 1 grade Yunnan bird nest soup twice a day. Interested? Try Sydney’s Chinatown for a start. Just pinch your nose when you down the brew.
I know all this advice is beginning to pall, so I’ll let you go – for now.
Your best buddy
PS: Never shirtfront the dragon because you may never make it back alive; instead, sneak up on the dragon from the rear, and with the Excalibur in hand, execute the coup de grace. Voila!