It was Indira Gandhi who very much lined up with the Russians. And she was, you know, within the Commonwealth, basically one out on that.
BOB HAWKEYou’ve got to remember the Cold War was a very real thing then, so the relationship with the United States was very, very important.
More Bob Hawke Quotes
-
-
There was some suggestion that there was a rapprochement developing between China and the Soviets, but nothing could have been further from the truth.
BOB HAWKE -
You could talk to her about any of the fifty-one countries of the Commonwealth and you could have an intelligent conversation with her about the economics, the politics. She really immersed herself in the Commonwealth.
BOB HAWKE -
I got to know him well as Vice President to Ronald Reagan. And George rang me up and said, “Oh, Bob,” he said, “I’m having trouble with Brian [Mulroney].” He said, “He’s got a big wheat trade with Iraq, and he doesn’t want to upset that.” I said, “You leave it with me.”
BOB HAWKE -
While society cannot provide employment for its members, the production/work/income nexus has to be abandoned as a justification for our present parsimony to the unemployed.
BOB HAWKE -
Institutions do live on their history.
BOB HAWKE -
Nor will they perceive the distribution of wealth and resources between nations to be unalterably ordained by heaven and incapable of drastic rearrangement by the less than gentle manipulation of man.
BOB HAWKE -
Peoples have come to experience that political structures and divisions of power are not immutable.
BOB HAWKE -
Bill Heseltine had been at university with me, at the University of Western Australia. I knew him well.
BOB HAWKE -
I had no time for Indira Gandhi. She was too much in the Russian camp for my liking.
BOB HAWKE -
Brian Mulroney, myself, [and] Rajiv Gandhi; I think that was the real core [of the Commonwealth ]. That was the engine room, I reckon.
BOB HAWKE -
I don’t know who described Mahathir [bin Mohamad] as a pillar of the Commonwealth, but they don’t know what they’re talking about.
BOB HAWKE -
And that’s what brought the regime down. The last South African Finance Minister, Barend du Plessis, went on record as saying that it was the investment sanctions that put the final nail in the coffin of apartheid.
BOB HAWKE -
We had a very good relationship. Very good. I liked [Sonny Ramphal]. I thought he was a genuine man.
BOB HAWKE -
I assumed the leadership within the Commonwealth for the fight against apartheid. I was very much assisted by Brian Mulroney, the Prime Minister of Canada, [and] Rajiv Gandhi, when he became the Prime Minister of India. And there were trade sanctions.
BOB HAWKE -
The things which are most important don’t always scream the loudest.
BOB HAWKE