I noticed under the Pauline Hanson thread there was some concern that there had been outside influence in Gough Whitlams sacking.
I guess we all heard the theories at the time, especially the one about Gough wanting Australian observers inside Pine Gap and "outside" didnt...but would it have occured?
What power did the "outside" have in Australian politics in those days anyway?
Are we merely obsessed with conspiracy theory and just like the ring of their tone more than any truth?

Dear Gibo,

Donald Horne, a journalist, wrote in his book, "Death of a Lucky Country," the following about the Whitlam Govt. sacking:

"The Governor-General secretly made a decision, the effect of which was to support the political plans of the Liberal and National Country Parties.

Against all contemporary practice he did not discuss that decision with the Government that was then in power. But having contemplated the decision secretly he secretly got for it the support of the Chief Justice...

The Governor-General then mounted a time-tabled operation, for which the phrase "constitutional coup d'etat" seems a useful description. It was an operation which had the general effect of leaving the Prime Minister with a false sense of security; then without discussing any alternatives, kicking him out of office, installing the Minority Leader as Prime Minister, then dissolving Parliament.

It all happened so quickly that no preventative action could be taken."

Gough Whitlam pointed out, in a speech he made, twenty years after,
(Nov. 8th 1995) that the two great insights of Donald Horne's above listed passage, are these:

1) That what was called the constitutional crisis of 1975 was essentially a political crisis fully capable of being resolved by political means.

2) The essence of the operation by which the government was dismissed "kicked out," as Donald Horne says was secrecy.

Whitlam stressed that if you understand these two points - they are the keys to understanding everything that happened.

Thanks Foxy for your imput. What you said, much I didnt know.
I havent read any of Donald Hornes material.
I dont normally get into secular works and much of the period has passed.
I find it distracts from The Word. But thats me.
Nothing has ever come out about an "outside" connection to those secret decisions, so Im generally taking it that all of the stories about "who done who in", beyond what you mentioned, are just stories.

Dear Gibo,

You're welcome.

I fully understand where you're coming from.

You'll probably live longer and happier as a result.

I doubt if anyone on here will know everything that went on behind the scenes.
However it did seem fairly straightforward to me.
The senate rejected money bills.
The house sent them back.
The senate rejected them again, and again.
Whitlam started to organise loans from Kemlani, a shady arms dealer in
order to keep the government operating.
The loans were illegal because they had not been approved by parliament or the executive council.

Whitlam was called in by the Gov General and asked if he would give in.
He refused so the Gov General dismissed his government and appointed
a caretaker government and called an election one month later.
Whitlam lost that election in a landslide.

Thats how I remember it.

Sounds like chaos Bazz.
Gough doing wrong, secrecy all over the place. Maybe shadowing others in the background.
Strange to have happened in a democratic country.
All I remember was being in a patrol vehicle when Gough got the bullet and the Radio Telephone person told the story to the troops over the air and everyone jumped on the two-way radio and shouted for joy.
I dont think Gough was as loved as we have been led to believe.

I'm not surprised the troops cheered Gibo. Most of our military's eyes glaze over at the mention of America if you hadn't noticed, or at least the commander's and upper ranks do. Back then, the CIA was intimately involved with our nation and Whitlam apparently didn't like the thought or thought it wise to investigate (most Australians would agree). Now the CIA funded our political parties and gave money to enemies of Whitlam and made friends in the military elite.

Gibo,

It may well be that suggestions or allegations of 'outside influence' are helpful or even necessary in sustaining the 'folk myth' that is presented (and re-presented) to us all as 'The Dismissal'. True or not, such serve to provide a scapegoat for the removal from office of the Whitlam government, and thus help in 'maintaining the rage'.

The important point to recognise is, that even presuming such allegations to be true, the initiation of such external interference was not necessarily confined to the directors of the US intelligence community's policy, but could have been done by any party to shared intelligence arrangements inputting information upon which the US might be depended upon to subsequently act. Australia was, at the time, party to such intelligence sharing arrangements with the US, and could have been just such an 'initiating' source of 'interference'.

The actual form of the interference would in all likelihood have consisted of the provision of information relating to such things as the attempted borrowings being sought through Khemlani. Convincing 'proof', if you like, of intended constitutional impropriety. A logical pathway for any such information would ultimately end at Yarralumla. All that would be required in addition would have been a well-credentialled messenger to carry it.

Whitlam stood head and shoulders above the rest of his party in more than just the physical sense. Foxy has helpfully re-stated Whitlam's two observations as to the keys to understanding the Dismissal. Sir David Smith has dealt with the first of these by explaining that Whitlam gave the Governor-General defective advice with respect to effecting a political solution. The only question with respect to the second, that of secrecy, is as to secrecy on the part of whom and about precisely what?

There is no need for conspiracy in order to understand the Dismissal. There is a need to think hard for oneself, however, in attempting to provide answers to the questions put by Sir David Smith, eyewitness, to the Australian news media in his paper 'The 1975 Dismissal: Setting the Record Straight'. Questions unanswered still.

A double dissolution was not required. A half-senate election brought forward would have sufficed.

Oliver,

To talk of the 'bringing forward' of a half-Senate election in the context of what happened on 11 November 1975 reveals only a misunderstanding of the provisions of the Constitution with respect to the Senate.

The holding of such an election in December 1975, irrespective of what may have been its outcome with respect as to what the state of the parties may have then stood to become in the Senate when the new Senators were to finally take their seats, ignores the fact that although elected in December 1975, such Senators would not have taken their seats until 1 July 1976. Such an election in December 1975 would have offered no certainty of resolution of the supply problem that the Whitlam government was already facing, only the prospect of that problem continuing unresolved for at least another seven months.

Presumably this was the defectiveness of Whitlam's advice to the Governor-General at that time; defective advice being referred to by Sir David Smith in his public lecture 'The 1975 Dismissal: Setting the Record Straight' (delivered on 7 November 2004 in the Senate Chamber of Old Parliament House) as being the reason for withdrawal of Whitlam's commission.

Now it may well have been that Whitlam may have believed that the outcome of a half-Senate election may have resulted in a prospective change in the balance of power as between the parties when once the newly elected Senators took their seats in the following July. It may even be that Whitlam thought that in the event of prospectively winning a majority in the Senate as from July 1976, that the Opposition in December 1975 could be browbeaten into granting supply as from the outcome of such election becoming known. There would have been no CERTAINTY of a resolution of the supply impasse, however, and, seemingly with this in mind, the Governor-General took matters into his own hands to rectify the defect in the advice he had been given.

Any ALTERATION of the balance of power in the Senate alone could not have been brought forward.

I reproduce below the questions put by Sir David Smith to the Australian media at the conclusion of his 2004 public lecture.

"Why did [Whitlam] claim that the Governor-General acted too soon on 11 November 1975, when it was Whitlam himself who chose that date to force the Governor-General's hand, by giving faulty and defective advice?

Why did he tell the crowd in front of Parliament House on 11 November 1975 that I had arrived at the back of the building, when he had just been told that I had arrived at the front?

Why did he incite the mob against me, when he knew that I was a public servant simply doing my job?

Why did he claim that Fraser's car had been hidden at the back of Government House, when it had been moved closer to the front and was in full view?

Why did he ignore the Senate in planning his Party's parliamentary tactics following the withdrawal of his commission as Prime Minister?

Why did he describe my reading of the proclamation from the steps of Old Parliament House as a needless provocation when he knew full well that it was a long-established practice, and that the previous year I had carried out the same duty for him and his Government?

Why did he describe the Senate's actions in 1975 as unprecedented, when his Party had created 170 precedents and he himself had created two of them?

Why did he describe the consultation between the Governor-General and the Chief Justice as almost unprecedented, himself acknowledging only one precedent, when in fact there were many precedents?

Why did he claim that his scheme to get money from the banks was lawful, and would have solved the supply crisis, when the banks had legal opinions that it was not lawful, and had decided not to participate?

Why did he say that the Governor-General had received a joint legal opinion from the first two Law Officers of the Crown, when he knew full well that there was no such legal opinion?"