What Was The Role Of Communism In Australia In The 1950's

Communism is a system where there is no private ownership of business or property and the country’s wealth gets shared among the population. Vladimir Lenin started the communist international which was an organisation with an aim of spreading communism throughout the world. Communism really was a threat to Australians in the 1950s, the events of the Korean War, different alliances being formed, the banning of the Communist party of Australia (CPA) and the Petrov affair all tell us that communism could spread to Australia.
Australia responded to the threat of communism by joining the Korean war in 1950, Australia joined the Korean war to prevent fighting communism in Australia, so they fought overseas. The war was between the United Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR) backed North Korea and the United States (US) backed South Korea. The war started on the 25th of June 1950 and ended on the 27th of July 1953 when the US threatened a nuclear attack.
Another response to the threat of communism from the Australian Government was forming alliances
with other countries to protect Australia from communism. During the 1950s the world was split into two, the communists led by the USSR, China and North Korea and the Capitalist which were led by the US and The United Nations (UN) including Australia. As a result of the threat of communism in 1951 the Liberal Prime Minister Robert Menzies signed the ANZUS treaty with the US and New Zealand. The treaty stated that if one of the three nations were attacked the other nations would aid them in defence. As well as the ANZUS treaty to assist Australia’s defence Robert Menzies signed the SEATO Alliance in 1954. It was an agreement between the US, Britain, France, New Zealand, The Philippines, Thailand and Pakistan. It was specifically created to control the threat of communism spreading in south east Asia.
The Australian Government responded to the threat of communism with the banning of the CPA, which the Liberal party saw as a threat to Australian Security. On the 20th of October 1950 the Menzies government passed the CPA dissolution bill which declared the CPA unlawful and the government could take the parties property and the members could be jailed. This law was later challenged by the CPA and the law was withdrawn. In 1951 Menzies held a referendum to change the constitution so the communist party could be banned but it was unsuccessful.
A real communist threat for the Australian government became a reality in 1954 when the Petrov Affair occurred right in our backyard.
Vladimir Petrov was a third secretary of the Soviet Embassy. Petrov stated that there was a communist spy-ring in Australia and their role was to stop Anti- Soviet activities. On the 3rd of April 1954 Petrov chose to defect from the USSR and gain asylum in Australia, it is believed he did this to protect himself from the USSR as he was scared of what would happen to him if he returned to Russia. Vladimir’s wife was forced by soviet officials to return to the USSR, they forced her on a plane but at a fuel stop she was offered asylum by Australian officials and she accepted. Menzies used this affair to help him win the election that year; due to Menzies saying the Labor party brought communist spies into Australia and this led to Australians believing the Labor party had a communist
influence.
The threat to Australia from communism was very real, it was real in the fact that geographically Australia is so close to the Asian Communist Nations and the speed that communism was spreading around the world. It was also real because communism targeted poorer nations and there are a lot of these in the South East Asian region. Australia had many ways of responding to the threats of communism such as the Korean war which Australia joined to fight communism in another country not theirs, the alliances Australia formed to protect themselves, the banning of the CPA to keep Australian Security strong and the Petrov affair so they could eliminate the USSR presence in Australia. In a quote that a Chinese leader Mao Zedong said “Communism is not love, Communism is a hammer which we use to crush the enemy”. This quote shows that the leaders of communist’s countries were happy to use force to spread the communist beliefs.