Former prime minister Paul Keating has lambasted Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, saying his claim that China should be denied access to artificial islands it has built in the South China Sea threatens to involve Australia in war.

He says Australia must tell the Trump administration “from the get-go” that we will not be part of such adventurism, “just as we should have done on Iraq 15 years ago”.

Tillerson, a former ExxonMobil chief executive, told his confirmation hearing in Washington overnight that China’s control and construction of artificial islands in waters claimed by neighbouring countries was “akin to Russia’s taking of Crimea”.

Tillerson said China was declaring control of territories that did not rightfully belong to it, and it would threaten the “entire global economy” if it was allowed to control access to the waterway.



“We’re going to have to send China a clear signal that, first, the island-building stops and, second, your access to those islands also is not going to be allowed,” he said during his confirmation hearing to become America’s top diplomat.

“They are taking territory or control or declaring control of territories that are not rightfully China’s. The failure of a response [from the US] has allowed [China] just to keep pushing the envelope on this.

“The way we’ve got to deal with this is we’ve got to show back-up in the region with our traditional allies in south-east Asia,” he said.

Tillerson did not elaborate on how the US would bar China from the islands.

China claims sovereignty over almost the entire South China Sea, and has built seven artificial islands on reefs and rocks, and outfitted them with military-length airstrips and anti-aircraft guns.

Keating issued a public statement on Friday, castigating Tillerson for his recklessness.

“When the US Secretary of State-designate threatens to involve Australia in war with China, the Australian people need to take note,” Keating said.

“That is the only way Rex Tillerson’s testimony that a ‘signal’ should be sent to China that ‘access to these islands is not going to be allowed’, and that US allies in the region should be there ‘to show back-up’, can be read.

“We should tell the new US administration from the get-go that Australia will not be part of such adventurism, just as we should have done on Iraq 15 years ago. That means no naval commitment to joint operations in the South China Sea and no enhanced US military facilitation of such operations.

“Tillerson’s claim that China’s control of access to the waters would be a threat to ‘the entire global economy’ is simply ludicrous. No country would be more badly affected than China if it moved to impede navigation.

“On the other hand, Australia’s prosperity and the security of the world would be devastated by war,” Keating said.