Universities and the AUKUS Military-Industrial Complex
Last year, the submission of Universities Australia to the Defence Strategic Review was almost begging to link universities with the defence needs of the country. All the Defence Department and Australian Defence Forces needed to do was ask.
How fortunate, then, that AUKUS came bumbling along.
April 12, 2023, by: Dr Binoy Kampmark, https://theaimn.com/universities-and-the-aukus-military-industrial-complex/
Here they go. Vice-chancellors, university managers, and creatures with titles unmentionable and meaningless (deputies, semi-deputies, sub-deputies), a whole cavalcade of parasitic creatures in need of neutering, keen to pursue another daft idea. Australian universities do not want to miss out on the military-industrial-education complex, whatever its imperilling dangers. With the war inspired AUKUS security pact, which promises the stripping of the Australian budget to the tune of $AUD 368 billion over the course of three decades, a corrupt establishment promises to get worse.
The AUKUS distraction could not have come at a better time. The tertiary sector in Australia is becoming increasingly cadaverous, marked by cost-cutting, rampant casualisation and heavy teaching and workloads for those battling away in the pedagogical trenches.
In a recent piece by Guardian Australia’s higher education reporter, an academic, who preferred to remain anonymous fearing institutional retribution, likened the modern Australian university to a supermarket. Students were the customers filing through the self-checkout counters; the staff, increasingly rendered irrelevant, were readily disposable.
The stories have been familiar for years, even as the offending by university management continues unabated: tutors being paid insufficiently to read and grade work adequately; virtually non-existent job security; the suppression of academic freedom and criticism of ghastly management practices. Given the pathological secrecy under which universities work under, essential data shedding light on class sizes, staff-student ratios, and contracts with private business interests, is virtually impossible to attain.
But despite the Australian university sector proving unsustainable, unprincipled, and ungainly, individuals such as Catriona Jackson, the CEO of Universities Australia, are on the hunt for new frontiers.
Last year, the submission of Universities Australia to the Defence Strategic Review was almost begging to link universities with the defence needs of the country. All the Defence Department and Australian Defence Forces needed to do was ask.
As the Australian Financial Review reported at the time, “The universities need to be prepared to respond in an adaptable and efficient manner to a clear demand signal from defence in terms of workforce needs – both skills and numbers – as well as technology and hardware needs.”
How fortunate, then, that AUKUS came bumbling along. For Jackson, principles in education are less important than inflated commercial opportunities or, to use her lingo, commercialisation. Distant from the process of learning itself, unaware of the delivery of courses and the classroom, she sees this war making security pact as packed with promise. “It’s workforce, workforce, workforce,” she sloganeered to her Sky News host Kieran Gilbert. “It’s not just nuclear physicists we need, although we do need some of those and it’s a very specialist profession. Almost every area of human endeavour we need a capacity uplift, so engineers, doctors, nurses, psychologists, pretty much everyone.”
Evidently hearing the war jingles around the corner, Jackson is journeying to Washington for meetings with national security officials from the US State Department and National Science Foundation. It is her hope that the number of Australian university partnerships will be expanded, “with more than 10,000 formal partnerships already in place with fellow institutions around the world.” The message she takes to the US capital will, however, be focused on “developing the capability [of Australian universities] to deliver the project, including through the provision of skilled workers and world-class research and development.”
Certain publications have also exuded jingoistic cheer on the new role of Australia’s tertiary sector. The Australian, one of Rupert Murdoch’s premier rags of froth and bile, is ever reliable in this respect. The paper’s higher education editor, Tim Dodd, in a March contribution [paywalled], posed two questions to those in the university sector: Had Australian universities ever played such a vital role in national defence as they would be likely to do over the next two decades in building nuclear-powered submarines? Would they even want to be involved?
Throughout his piece, Dodd seems to think that a university system untethered to the defence establishment is a morally questionable thing. In doing so, he betrays his ignorance of those wise words from US Democratic Senator J. William Fulbright, who warned that “in lending itself too much to the purposes of government, a university fails its higher purposes.”
Dodd can merely observe that, “In the post-war period universities were still not critical to defence programs.” AUKUS and the nuclear submarine program had changed matters. “Australia is now embarking on an enormous program to build, operate and maintain nuclear-powered submarines and a clear goal is sovereign capability.” All in all, it was “a critical national priority that universities are right to give their full support to. Their backing is critical.”
Leaving aside such platitudinous nonsense as “sovereign capability” – the technology, expertise, control and guidance over this new promised machinery will always be directed from Washington – the sentiments are clear. The military-industrial-university complex is a matter to be celebrated. There are, for instance, “other parts of AUKUS” that will involve “our top universities” in such areas as “advanced research cyber security, artificial intelligence and quantum technologies.”
Bizarrely, Dodd gets the question about academic freedom the wrong way around: that expressing a choice in favour of the blatant war drumming of AUKUS is something that should be one for academics. If he had any idea about despotic university environments, he would be aware that academics, whatever they agree with, will have little say in the matter. Distant, estranged managements, unaccountably enthroned in administrative towers, will be making such decisions for them; the only real free expression will be exercised by those opposing the measure.
Former Pacific leaders blast Australia over nuclear powered submarine deal
https://www.abc.net.au/pacific/programs/pacificbeat/aukus-pacific/102211602 13 Apr 23, A group of former Pacific leaders have blasted Australia’s nuclear-powered submarine deal with the United States and the United Kingdom.
Marshall Islands’ Hilda Heine, Palau’s Tommy Remengesau, Tuvalu’s Enele Sopoga Kiribati’s Anote Tong say the “staggering $368 billion” allocated for the deal flies in the face of Pacific island countries which are crying out for support for climate change.
They accuse Australia and its two allies of triggering an arms race and demonstrating a complete lack of recognition for the climate change security threat faced by the island nations.
Former Kiribati President Anote Tong said Australia and its allies need to do more consultations with the Pacific before the plan develops further.
Corruption in the Ukraine government, as Zelensky skims $millions from USA for diesel, while buying cheap diesel from Russia.
“Zelensky’s been buying discount diesel from the Russians,” one knowledgeable American intelligence official told me. “And who’s paying for the gas and oil? We are. Putin and his oligarchs are making millions” on it.
Many government ministries in Kiev have been literally “competing,” I was told, to set up front companies for export contracts for weapons and ammunition with private arms dealers around the world, all of which provide kickbacks.
TRADING WITH THE ENEMY Amid rampant corruption in Kiev and as US troops gather at the Ukrainian border, does the Biden administration have an endgame to the conflict? Seymour Hersh, Substack, Apr 12
The Ukraine government, headed by Volodymyr Zelensky, has been using American taxpayers’ funds to pay dearly for the vitally needed diesel fuel that is keeping the Ukrainian army on the move in its war with Russia. It is unknown how much the Zelensky government is paying per gallon for the fuel, but the Pentagon was paying as much as $400 per gallon to transport gasoline from a port in Pakistan, via truck or parachute, into Afghanistan during the decades-long American war there.
What also is unknown is that Zelensky has been buying the fuel from Russia, the country with which it, and Washington, are at war, and the Ukrainian president and many in his entourage have been skimming untold millions from the American dollars earmarked for diesel fuel payments. One estimate by analysts from the Central Intelligence Agency put the embezzled funds at $400 million last year, at least; another expert compared the level of corruption in Kiev as approaching that of the Afghan war, “although there will be no professional audit reports emerging from the Ukraine.”
“Zelensky’s been buying discount diesel from the Russians,” one knowledgeable American intelligence official told me. “And who’s paying for the gas and oil? We are. Putin and his oligarchs are making millions” on it.
Many government ministries in Kiev have been literally “competing,” I was told, to set up front companies for export contracts for weapons and ammunition with private arms dealers around the world, all of which provide kickbacks. Many of those companies are in Poland and Czechia, but others are thought to exist in the Persian Gulf and Israel. “I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that there are others in places like the Cayman Islands and Panama, and there are lots of Americans involved,” an American expert on international trade told me.
The issue of corruption was directly raised with Zelensky in a meeting last January in Kiev with CIA Director William Burns. His message to the Ukrainian president, I was told by an intelligence official with direct knowledge of the meeting, was out of a 1950s mob movie. The senior generals and government officials in Kiev were angry at what they saw as Zelensky’s greed, so Burns told the Ukrainian president, because “he was taking a larger share of the skim money than was going to the generals.”
Burns also presented Zelensky with a list of thirty-five generals and senior officials whose corruption was known to the CIA and others in the American government. Zelensky responded to the American pressure ten days later by publicly dismissing ten of the most ostentatious officials on the list and doing little else. “The ten he got rid of were brazenly bragging about the money they had—driving around Kiev in their new Mercedes,” the intelligence official told me………………………………………………………………………….. https://seymourhersh.substack.com/p/trading-with-the-enemy?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1377040&post_id=114123549&isFreemail=false&utm_medium=email
CONTAINING THE BOMB: AN ASSESSMENT OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS FREE ZONES – Australia is especially problematic
Australia poses a unique challenge to the SPNFZ due to its defensive alliance with the United States.
Australia is in a dilemma then of being a party to the SPNFZ and an ally of an NWS poised to potentially assist in a nuclear attack.
The Australia, New Zealand, and the United States Security Treaty (ANZUS) was signed in 1951, joining the three nations in a collective security arrangement.18 New Zealand banned nuclear-powered vessels in 1984 and later created its own nuclear-free zone with the passage of the New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament, and Arms Control Act 1987. In response, the Reagan Administration suspended New Zealand’s obligations under the ANZUS Treaty.19 Australia remains a party.
Center for International Maritime Security, By LtCol Brent Stricker
This article is part of a series that will explore the use and legal issues surrounding military zones employed during peace and war to control the entry, exit, and activities of forces operating in these zones. These works build on the previous Maritime Operational Zones Manual published by the predecessor of the Stockton Center for International Law, the International Law Department, of the U.S. Naval War College. A new Maritime Operational Zones Manual is forthcoming.
Nuclear Weapons Free Zones (NWFZ) are an attempt to prohibit the use or deployment of nuclear weapons within a nation’s territory. None of the signatories to these treaties possess nuclear weapons, where NFWZs stand as a pledge not to develop these weapons. The established nuclear powers of the world have similarly pledged to respect some NFWZs.1 It remains to be seen whether such pledges will be observed or dismissed as a simple “scrap of paper.”2
Background
The legality of the use of nuclear weapons is an unsettled issue. The International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion stating the threat or use of nuclear weapons must be examined under the United Nations Charter Article 2(4) prohibition on the use of force and Article 51’s right of self-defense.3 The Court could not “conclude definitively whether the threat or use of nuclear weapons would be lawful or unlawful in an extreme circumstance of self-defense in which the very survival of the state was at stake.”4
The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) was an early attempt to limit and eventually eliminate nuclear weapons. Article 1 of the NPT prohibits Nuclear Weapons States (NWS) from transferring nuclear weapons to a Non-Nuclear Weapon State (NNWS) or encouraging a NNWS to develop nuclear weapons. Article 6 of the NPT requires states to “pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.”
Since the signing of NPT, the number of NWS has expanded. Two of the newly acknowledged nuclear powers, India and Pakistan, never signed the treaty. North Korea signed and subsequently withdrew. Finally, Israel, a suspected and unacknowledged nuclear power, never signed the treaty.5……………………………………………………………………..
Current Nuclear Weapons Free Zones
There are currently nine NWFZs in existence. Five of these were created by regional agreements. Three of them were created by international treaty but only occur in unpopulated areas: Outer Space, the Moon, and the seabed. The last NWFZ was created unilaterally by Mongolia. NWFZs cover more than two billion people and 111 countries.13
African NWFZ (ANWFZ)
The Treaty of Pelindaba established the African NWFZ. It was opened for signature on April 11, 1996, and came into effect on July 15, 1990.[14] Article 3 of the treaty renounces nuclear weapons, and the signatories pledge “not to conduct research on, develop, manufacture, stockpile or otherwise acquire, possess or have control over any nuclear explosive device by any means anywhere” and “not to seek or receive any assistance in the research on, development, manufacture, stockpiling or acquisition, or possession of any nuclear explosive device.” Article 4 is a prohibition on stationing nuclear weapons on their territory, but it allows individual nations the ability to allow foreign aircraft and ships to visit or exercise innocent passage without reference to whether such aircraft and ships may be armed with nuclear weapons. This thereby creates a loophole allowing nuclear weapons within the NWFZ…………………………………………….
South Pacific NWFZ (SPNFZ)
The Treaty of Rarotonga established the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone. It was signed on August 6, 1985, and came into effect on December 11, 1985. All five acknowledged NWS have signed onto its Protocols. Annex 1 to the treaty describes the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone, which includes both territorial land, waters, and the high seas. Article 3 of the treaty pledges signatories “not to manufacture or otherwise acquire, possess or have control over any nuclear explosive device by any means anywhere inside or outside the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone” and “not to seek or receive any assistance in the manufacture or acquisition of any nuclear explosive device.” Article 5 prohibits stationing nuclear weapons on the territory of signatory states.
Article 5 also includes a loophole allowing signatory states to allow visits and transit by foreign aircraft and ships that may be armed with nuclear weapons. Article 7 includes a prohibition on dumping radioactive matter within the SPNFZ.”16
A second loophole appears in Article 3(c) of the treaty. There is no prohibition on the research of nuclear weapons. This leaves signatories the option to research nuclear weapons. The most likely being Australia if it needs to rapidly develop such weapons for nuclear deterrence.17
Australia poses a unique challenge to the SPNFZ due to its defensive alliance with the United States. The Australia, New Zealand, and the United States Security Treaty (ANZUS) was signed in 1951, joining the three nations in a collective security arrangement.18 New Zealand banned nuclear-powered vessels in 1984 and later created its own nuclear-free zone with the passage of the New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament, and Arms Control Act 1987. In response, the Reagan Administration suspended New Zealand’s obligations under the ANZUS Treaty.19 Australia remains a party.
Australia has publicly stated in its 2017 Foreign Policy White Paper it would rely on the deterrence power of the United States’ nuclear weapons.20 Australia also hosts US military installations that are vital to worldwide command and control.21 Undoubtedly, these facilities would be part of the Communication, Command, Control, and Intelligence (C3I) the United States would rely on during a nuclear crisis. Australia is in a dilemma then of being a party to the SPNFZ and an ally of an NWS poised to potentially assist in a nuclear attack. The treaty does not address this issue of C3I by a signatory state, with Article 3(c) only prohibiting the manufacture or acquisition of nuclear weapons.22…………………
Southeast Asian NWFZ (SEANWFZ)
The Bangkok Treaty established the Southeast Asian Nuclear Weapon Free Zone. The treaty was signed on December 15, 1995, and went into effect on March 28, 1997. The ten members of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) agreed not to “develop, manufacture or otherwise acquire, possess or have control over nuclear weapons; station or transport nuclear weapons by any means; test or use nuclear weapons.”23 The Treaty also prohibited control, stationing, or testing of nuclear weapons in the SEANWFZ.24 The Bangkok Treaty thus closed the visit, transit, research, and control loopholes for vessels and aircraft with nuclear weapons.
Finally, the Bangkok Treaty prohibited dumping or discharging into the atmosphere of radioactive material or waste.25
The SEANWFZ is striking due to the size of the zone defined in the treaty. The zone is expanded to include the continental shelf and exclusive economic zones of the signatory nations.26 The Zone embraces an area of strategic importance to maritime shipping. The treaty would prevent the 5 NWS from transporting nuclear weapons through this zone. This is likely why no NWS has signed onto the treaty’s protocols and provides a negative security assurance to the ASEAN signatories.27
Central Asian NWFZ (CANWFZ)
The Central Asian Nuclear Weapons Free Zone was created by the Treaty of Semipalatinsk. The treaty was signed on September 8, 2006, and went into effect on Mar 21, 2009. The CANWFZ is defined as the land, internal waters, and airspace of the signatories.28 Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, all former Soviet Republics, agreed to prohibit research, development, manufacture, stockpiling, acquisition, possession, or control over any nuclear weapon. The treaty also prohibited the location of such weapons in the zone. ………………………
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan have a similar problem to Australia noted above. They are members of the 1992 Tashkent Collective Security Treaty, which includes the Russian Federation, one of the five acknowledged NWS. Article 4 of the treaty requires the Member States to provide all assistance, including military assistance, if one member is attacked.29 It remains to be seen how this will affect the CANWFZ.
Mongolian NWFZ
The Mongolian Nuclear Weapons Free Zone is unique as a unilateral action by domestic law similar to the New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone noted above. Mongolia made this declaration in 1992 and called for a regional NWFZ.30 This seemed improbable as Mongolia is surrounded by the Russian and Chinese NWS. The Mongolian NWFZ was recognized with UN General Assembly Resolution 53/77 D.31
Mongolia’s history makes its NWFZ unique, considering it was caught between the two struggling NWS for most of its existence…………………………………………
Latin American and the Caribbean NWFZ
The Treaty of Tlatelolco created the Latin American NWFZ. It was signed on February 1967 and went into effect on April 25, 1969. Article 1 of the treaty prohibits “the testing, use, manufacture, production or acquisition, by any means, of any nuclear weapon [signatory states] by order of third parties or in any other way,” and “the receipt, storage, installation, location or any form of possession of any nuclear weapon, directly or indirectly, by [signatory states], by mandate to third parties or in any other way.”
The Latin American and Caribbean NWFZ has a similar problem shared by Australia and the CANWFZ due to the mutual defense obligations imposed by the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance. This treaty was signed in 1947 by all of the states in North and South America, including the nuclear-armed United States. While it may be in decline with the withdrawal of member states and attempts to replace this treaty with sub-regional treaties, it remains valid international law.
Antarctica, the Moon, and Seabed NWFZ
It is interesting to note that the first NWFZs were created in places that humans normally do not inhabit: Antarctica, Outer Space, and the deep seabed. Article V of the Antarctic Treaty prohibits nuclear explosions or the dumping of radioactive material on the continent. Article IV of the Outer Space Treaty prohibits the stationing of nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction in space or on celestial bodies. This prohibition also prohibits the militarization of celestial bodies. The Outer Space Treaty does not address military activities in orbit, though. Article I of the Seabed Arms Control Treaty prohibits the emplacement of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction including structures to test, launch, or store such devices on the deep seabed.
It has been speculated that support for these NWFZs by the five acknowledged NWS was to limit the area to deploy nuclear weapons and the increased pressure on the arms race this would impose.36 The strategic value of making Antarctica off-limits for nuclear weapons seems to belie this argument since all NWS, acknowledged or not, are located in the Northern Hemisphere. The future possibilities for weaponizing outer space may render the Space NWFZ irrelevant.
2017 United Nations Nuclear Prohibition Treaty
The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons could create the largest NWFZ in the world. It was proposed on 23 December 2016 with UN General Assembly Resolution 71/258. It was open for signature on September 20, 2017, and in effect on January 22, 2021.37 The NWS acknowledged and unacknowledged, do not support the treaty.38
Under Article 1 of the treaty: “Each State Party undertakes never under any circumstances to:
(a) Develop, test, produce, manufacture, otherwise acquire, possess or stockpile nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices;
(b) Transfer to any recipient whatsoever nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices or control over such weapons or explosive devices directly or indirectly;
(c) Receive the transfer of or control over nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices directly or indirectly;
(d) Use or threaten to use nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices;
(e) Assist, encourage or induce, in any way, anyone to engage in any activity prohibited to a State Party under this Treaty;
(f) Seek or receive any assistance, in any way, from anyone to engage in any activity prohibited to a State Party under this Treaty;
(g) Allow any stationing, installation, or deployment of any nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices in its territory or at any place under its jurisdiction or control.”
………………………………… more https://cimsec.org/containing-the-bomb-an-assessment-of-nuclear-weapons-free-zones/
German government rejects new call to delay nuclear shutdown
The German government has dismissed calls for a last-minute delay in shutting down the country’s last three nuclear power plants this weekend
By FRANK JORDANS – Associated Press, Apr 12, 2023
BONN, Germany (AP) — The German government dismissed calls Wednesday for a last-minute delay in shutting down the country’s last three nuclear power plants this weekend.
Opposition politicians and even some members of the Free Democrats, a libertarian party that’s part of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s governing alliance, have demanded a reprieve for the remaining reactors, which were already operating without requisite safety checks.
“The nuclear phase-out by April 15, that’s this Saturday, is a done deal,” Scholz spokesperson Christiane Hoffmann said.
Successive German governments planned a phase-out of nuclear power. The last three plants originally were scheduled to shut down on Dec. 31, 2022. Scholz ordered a postponement last year amid concerns that Germany might face an energy shortage due to the war in Ukraine.
Lawmakers approved the extension on the condition the plants, which began operation more than 30 years ago, would cease operating by mid-April of this year……………..
[Keeping the reactors going] would be both illegal and costly, according to Environment Ministry spokesperson Bastian Zimmermann. The ministry oversees nuclear safety in Germany.
Zimmermann said the three reactors — Emsland, Neckarwestheim and Isar II — last underwent safety checks in 2009 and such inspections normally need to occur every 10 years. The requirement was only suspended due to the shutdown planned for the end of 2022, he said.
Any further lifetime extension for the plants would require comprehensive and lengthy security checks again, Zimmermann said.
The country is still searching for a location to permanently store almost 2,000 containers of highly radioactive waste for thousands of generations.
The Economy Ministry dismissed concerns that Germany won’t be able to meet its energy needs without the nuclear power plants, which currently produce about 5% of the country’s electricity.
Ministry spokesperson Beate Baron said recent studies showed Germany would be able to maintain its power supply with coal and gas-fired power plants and renewables such as wind and solar, while remaining a net exporter of electricity.
Baron said the government wants to phase in the use of hydrogen that can be produced without greenhouse gas emissions and fired up quickly on days when there’s little sun or wind for renewables. https://www.atchisonglobenow.com/news/world/german-government-rejects-new-call-to-delay-nuclear-shutdown/article_93c1beb6-7d8a-51ed-b48d-68ac8ba0fbb3.html
An operational domain’: Fear UK nuclear power plan for moon may lead to militarisation of space
Rolls-Royce’s director of future programmes Abi Clayton tellingly said: ‘The technology will deliver the capability to support commercial and defence use cases.’
These activities are all completely contrary to the legal commitments the UK made a half century ago to preserve space for peace.
It may mirror the plot of classic ‘70s British sci-fi series, Space 1999, which also features a moon base and the threat posed by radioactive waste, but the UK/Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities also have real concerns that the development of a future British moon base powered by nuclear fission could represent a further unwanted development along the road to the militarisation of space.
Today is the UN International Day of Human Space Flight. On April 12, 2011, the UN General Assembly established the day on the 40th anniversary of Major Yuri Gagarin becoming the first human being to circle the Earth in his spacecraft ‘Vostok’. UN delegates reaffirmed ‘the important contribution of space science and technology in achieving sustainable development goals and increasing the well-being of States and peoples, as well as ensuring the realization of their aspiration to maintain outer space for peaceful purposes’.
Last week, the UK Space Agency announced a £2.9 million grant is to be awarded to Rolls-Royce SMR to collaborate with academic institutions to develop mini-reactors for deployment in space, with most media reports focusing on its potential to power a future moon base as part of the UK’s commitment to an international project to colonise the Earth’s near neighbour (Project Artemis). However, in welcoming the new funding, Rolls-Royce’s director of future programmes Abi Clayton tellingly said: ‘The technology will deliver the capability to support commercial and defence use cases.’
Whilst projects in outer space can be both benign and beneficial, the UK Space Strategy and UK Space Defence Strategy both identify that ‘NATO has made space one of five operational domains’,[1] and the UK Space Defence Strategy is subtitled ‘Operationalising the Space Domain’.[2] To make this a reality, the UK Government is intent upon investing £6.4 billion in a ‘Defence Space Portfolio’[3] for defence ‘in and through space’.[4]
For these purposes, the UK has joined the US and France in developing its own Space Command, and a nuclear moon base could in time become a part of the ‘portfolio’ from which UK Space Command operates,[5] in line with the government and military’s desire to ‘assure our access to, and operational independence in, space’.[6]
These activities are all completely contrary to the legal commitments the UK made a half century ago to preserve space for peace.
“Ironically the UK was in 1967 one of the first three co-signatories of the Outer Space Treaty which pledged the sponsors to ensure ‘that the Moon and other celestial bodies shall be used exclusively for peaceful purposes’”,[7] said Councillor Lawrence O’Neill, Chair of the NFLA Steering Committee.
“Our fear is that any future nuclear-powered moon-base could be ultimately crewed by military personnel from Space Command conducting operations that would be far from benign and beneficial, whether this be the permanent surveillance of perceived hostile states on Earth or more sinisterly as a platform for offensive weapons systems to project military power ‘through space’.
“And of course, once one major power establishes such a base, then the others, all not wishing to be outdone, will seek to do the same.”
The NFLA also has real practical concerns about the environmental impact of such a nuclear-powered base.
Councillor O’Neill added: “We have worries about the transfer of nuclear materials into space. It is not unknown for rockets to malfunction and explode on take-off or in early flight, indeed sadly this has led to the loss of human life, nor for radioactive material to be distributed across the surface of the Earth by exploding space vehicles, witness the accident involving Soviet satellite Kosmos 954.[8] And the UK Government’s own Committee on Radioactive Waste Management dismissed the idea of blasting radioactive waste into space on the grounds of both risk and cost.
“And in turn, a nuclear-powered moon base would generate radioactive waste. Where would this be put? If it came back to Earth, there would remain the risk of an accident on re-entry and states parties to the Outer Space Treaty also pledge to ‘avoid harmful contamination of space and celestial bodies’ so burial in situ below the lunar surface or blasting it into space would be unlawful”.
Lastly there is also a latent threat posed from outer space itself to the facility.
n 2016, NASA announced the findings of their Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) mission. Observing the lunar surface since launch in 2009, NASA scientists reported that ‘200 impact craters (had) formed during the LRO mission, ranging in size from about 10 to 140 feet (approximately 3 to 43 meters) in diameter’. Consequently, NASA recommended that ‘equipment placed on the moon for long durations – such as a lunar base – may have to be made sturdier. While a direct hit from a meteoroid is still unlikely, a more intense rain of secondary debris thrown out by nearby impacts may pose a risk to surface assets.’
In concluding Councillor O’Neill said: “We have all been concerned recently with the potential damage that could be caused on Earth to Ukrainian nuclear facilities from shelling and missile strikes so what happens if a meteoroid, or a fragment thereof, with massive kinetic energy hits a nuclear reactor based on the surface of the moon?[9]
1 This month
of the week – Disrupting War & Militarism in Oceania. Active solidarity. Radical practice.
Antinuclear 