ONE ISSUE that's hardly got a look in during this election campaign is foreign policy-in particular, Australia's relationship with the United States and involvement in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It marks a sharp change from the lead-up to the 2004 election, when Labor leader Mark Latham outraged the political and media elite with his criticisms of the Iraq war, the US alliance and the proposed free trade agreement.

This time around both leaders are united in wanting to keep foreign policy off the agenda.

John Howard doesn't want to talk it about it because his "special relationship" with George Bush is now a liability-as highlighted by the hostility towards the US president among Sydneysiders during the APEC summit.

Nor does Howard want Australia's Iraq commitment to become a debating point. One Coalition figure told The Sydney Morning Herald that Iraq was a "sleeping dog best left alone".

So why won't Kevin Rudd give the mangy dog a kick? The answer is the Labor leader doesn't want to expose Labor to the kind of attack Latham received.

Rudd wants to avoid antagonising the elite figures such as media and corporate bosses who he's been trying to woo. He has gone out of his way to demonstrate to the ruling class that he won't tinker with Australia's relationship with the US, beyond pulling a few combat troops from Iraq.

Elite opinion

It's not as though Rudd has to bite his tongue: he's an enthusiastic supporter of the US alliance. But Labor's almost complete silence has been remarkable.

Afghanistan is a case in point. After years of being the lucky country when it came to troop casualties, all of a sudden Australian forces in Afghanistan have suffered a quick succession of deaths and serious injuries, as the resistance to foreign occupation intensifies.

Neither side tried to make any political mileage out of the casualties. There was precious little debate in the media about the situation in Afghanistan.

The lack of debate reflects how out of touch elite opinion is with public opinion, not only in relation to particular conflicts, but on foreign policy in general.

A number of surveys released in recent months suggest there has been a major shift in attitudes in recent years.

A major survey published in October by the US Studies Centre (USCC) at Sydney University reported a massive drop in confidence in the US.

Alan Dupont, the head of the USCC, told ABC Radio's AM program:

"Only about 37 per cent of Australians had confidence in the US capacity to manage global problems, and that's a very dramatic fall from the surveys conducted back in 2001, which showed almost twice the number of Australians had confidence the US's ability to handle global problems. So that's a very, very big fall."

The fall isn't hard to understand. The US's "war on terror" has been a disaster for millions of people in the Middle East and has intensified conflicts around the world.

Most commentators have sought to cast the change in attitudes as an aberration, fuelled by hostility to the Bush administration. But there is evidence of longer-term trends.

For instance, the USCC survey found that 48 per cent wanted Australia to adopt a more independent stance towards the US, up from 26 per cent in 1975.

In the same vein, Rachel Gibson and Ian McAllister observe a gradual decline in trust in the US and its ability to assist Australia in their chapter on public attitudes to foreign policy in the latest Australian Social Attitudes report.

They note that "public opinion towards the United States was more stable in the period before the end of the Cold War than in the period after it."

Among the other notable findings of the USCC survey:

• 64 per cent of respondents opposed Australia's presence in Iraq.
• Just under half were against Australian involvement in Afghanistan, even though the deployment has bipartisan support.
• 72 per cent thought Australia is more of a terrorist target because of its involvement in the "war on terror".
• 43 per cent said the threat posed by Islamic fundamentalism has been exaggerated.
• 40 per cent saw global warming as a more pressing problem than Islamic fundamentalism.

Part 2 of the USCC's survey will be released in December: sydney.edu.au/us-studies/.

By Jarvis Ryan