Antinuclear

Buck-passing inside the murky arms trade

Australia bears responsibility for how Australian-made weapons are used in conflict zones around the world

Undue Influence, Michelle Fahy, Aug 10, 2024

‘It is almost literally true that Australia cannot go to war without the consent and support of the US.’

This statement, made in 2001, is key to understanding the deceit and denials by the Albanese government regarding weapons exports bound for Israel.

In his 2019 book Secret: The making of Australia’s security state, veteran journalist Brian Toohey quoted the 2001 research paper by the Australian parliamentary library.

Toohey explained that: 

The US requires almost all countries that buy its weapons systems, including Australia, to send sensitive components back to the US for repairs, maintenance and replacements without the owners being allowed access to critical information, including source codes, needed to keep these systems operating.

To rephrase Toohey: Australia cannot use its advanced weapons platforms for any length of time without US support. 

Two decades later, the F-35 fighter jet is one such advanced weapons platform.

Australia reliant on the US

Australia is now more embedded in and reliant on the US military than it was in 2001. 

After nine months of denials, Defence Minister Richard Marles and Foreign Minister Penny Wong finally admitted in June that Australia is still exporting parts into the global F-35 supply chain, a point of contention because Israel is using its F-35s in its war in Gaza. Both senior ministers also noted at the same time that Australia’s F-35 fleet forms the heart of our air force’s “fast jet capability”. 

Is Australia’s continuing supply of parts to the US somehow linked to the need to maintain our own F-35 capability? 

The UN has stated only that supply to Israel of weapons, parts, components, ammunition and munitions should cease. It has not said all exports into global weapons supply chains that include Israel as a recipient nation should cease. Australia could continue supplying the US-led global F-35 supply chain and be compliant with UN requests provided the US has agreed that none of the Australian exports will be sent to Israel.

I asked the Defence Department whether it had sought assurances from the US and Lockheed Martin, the manufacturer of the F-35 fighter jet, that they would cease transferring Australian-made parts and components to Israel. The Department had not responded by deadline.

I also asked whether it was correct that Australia does not have access to the necessary source codes, or other critical information, needed to repair, maintain, upgrade or replace the sensitive components in our fleet of F-35s. Again, no response had been received at deadline.

As Toohey concluded in his 2019 book:

Although the ability to operate our major weapons systems independently is crucial to defending Australia, our leaders prefer to ignore this fundamental flaw and become more tightly integrated with US forces.

This may explain why the Albanese government has been intent on obscuring the extent of Australia’s involvement in the F-35 supply chain and unwilling to take decisive action to ensure that no Australian parts and components could end up in Israel.

Hot denials

“I am saying we’re not sending parts.”

That was Richard Marles, Australia’s deputy prime minister and defence minister, on ABC Radio Melbourne in June talking about Australia’s arms exports to Israel.

Marles then admitted, however, that Australia was continuing to supply parts into the F-35 global supply chain. But that was “worlds away” from claims that “we are directly supplying weapons to Israel” which, he said, “is just a falsehood”.

Marles insisted that claims by the Greens that Australia was supplying weapons to Israel were “absolutely false”, “a total lie”, “completely wrong”, and “utterly, utterly false”.

He repeated the government’s line that “there have been no weapons exported to Israel…for the past five years” and stated this to be “the absolute truth”. I have reported previously on this highly misleading statement. 

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August 11, 2024 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | weapons and war