John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

... a significant power vacuum, greater human suffering, regional destabilization, and a threat to the global economy.

It would produce a situation where:

Al Qaeda would depict our withdrawal as a historic victory.

Yet that is the policy of the Australian Labor Party. The Australian Labor Party cannot have it both ways: they cannot require immediate Australian withdrawal without morally acknowledging that if it is good enough for Australia to pull out it is good enough for the United States and the United Kingdom to pull out. The Leader of the Opposition is chained to a policy that would have the disastrous consequences outlined by the bipartisan report to which he has just referred.

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