> Less they've forgotten, Australia was engaged with trade war with China earlier

Oh, we haven't forgotten. The war was triggered by madness from both sides. Madness from someone taking violent exception to a nickname like Pooh is to be expected. Whatever your private opinions on that, it's understood here one must be pragmatic in your public positions when dealing with such people when they are your biggest trading partner. Even innocent mistakes could cost you billions. Our prime minister fanning conspiracy theories about the origins of COVID wasn't an innocent mistake, it was fiscal insanity. He was ousted in a landslide at the next election. And despite China being being our biggest trading partner, we won that war. It hurt China far more than it hurt us. It turned out Australia is far better and faster at rejigging its international trade than China.

> Australia wanting to investigate the origin of covid that killed thousands of Australians.

Australian's see it differently. What hurt us was the refusal of OECD countries to honour agreements to ship vaccines we had bought and paid for. With no vaccines (the one we did produce ourselves, AstraZeneca, got unapproved after we had produced huge quantities of it) we had to shut down internal borders, trade and large parts of our economies to prevent the spread, until we could get the vaccines. It was a difficult time. Yet despite those challenges, Australian emerged from COVID sooner, and with less economic damage that most other countries.

But you are right in thinking Australian's in general are anxious about what is happening in China. It's constantly in the news. I'd be stunned if Australian citizens weren't better informed on China is doing in the South China Sea, of it's real estate crash, and premier Xi's actions than USA citizens. But you know what? We watch what Trump is doing in the USA equally closely, and it causes us just as much anxiety. Trump closing the USA off from the rest of the world would likely have far worse consequences for us than a trade war with China that we won. When it comes to damage inflicted on it's citizens, nothing beats a countries own incompetent management. Trust me, we know. Or if you don't trust me ask someone from Türkiye, or Venezuela. On the up side, I do have a lot of faith in the USA's political institutions. They've survived a lot worse than Trump.

When China attacks Australia again, either via a trade war again, or a territory war like Chinese ships water torpedoing Philippine ships or China killing Indian soldiers, perhaps Australians will then change their mind, at least the ones that had dollar signs only in their head.

People respected Australia before for standing up to China and calling China out for covid origins.

Trump said he would use Russia to destroy Europe, and was more interested in blackmailing Ukraine then helping them ward of Russian aggression. It’s no wonder Trump is so popular in Russia and hated very much in rest of Europe.

The whataboutism works two ways.

The better way to “fight” China is to lobby your government to actually compete and build its own manufacturing base.

1. Wages in the US are still way higher than China.

2. Cost of manufacturing something is much more than just raw workers' wages. There's environmental regulations and protections as well, insurances, taxes, pension contributions, etc all being significantly less in China than the US or the west.

Especially the environmental part. Also work accidents. If a worker in China looses a thumb, it's no biggie, If a worker in the US does, he'll sue and win a 6 figure payout.

All these make manufacturing in the US much more expensive even if wages were to the same.