Australia offers U.S. a vast new military launchpad in China conflict
Australia is expanding its northern military bases, with U.S. support, to counter China’s growing threat. Critics quip it’s become the “51st state.”
Washington Post, By Michael E. Miller, August 24, 2024
ROYAL AUSTRALIAN AIR FORCE BASE TINDAL, Australia — Deep in the outback, a flurry of construction by Australia and the United States is transforming this once quiet military installation into a potential launchpad in case of conflict with China.
Runways are being expanded and strengthened to accommodate the allies’ biggest airplanes, including American B-52 bombers. A pair of massive fuel depots is rising side by side to supply U.S. and Australian fighter jets. And two earth-covered bunkers have been built for U.S. munitions.
But the activity at RAAF Tindal, less than 2,000 miles from the emerging flash points of the South China Sea,isn’t unique. Across Australia, decades-old facilities — many built by the United States during World War II — are now being dusted off or upgraded amid growing fears of another global conflict.
“This isabout deterrence,” Australia’s defense minister, Richard Marles, said in an interview. “We’re working together to deter future conflict and to provide for the collective security of the region in which we live.”
The United States has ramped up defense ties with allies across the region, including with the Philippines and Japan, as it tries to fend off an increasingly assertive and aggressive China. Australia offers the United States a stable and friendly government, a small but capable military, and a vast expanse from which to stage or resupply military efforts.
U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, hailing the “the extraordinary strength of our unbreakable alliance with Australia,” said after a meeting with Marles earlier this month that deepercooperation — including base upgrades and more frequent rotational bomber deployments — would help build “greater peace, stability, and deterrence across the region.”
Australia has also joined the AUKUS agreement, under which the United States and Britain will provide it with nuclear-propelled submarines, some of the world’s most closely guarded technology.
These moves underscore a bigger shift, as Canberra has grown increasingly tight with Washington as they both grow wary of Beijing. Military cooperation has become so extensive that critics quip Australia is becoming the United States’ “51st state.”
Mihai Sora, a former Australian diplomat who is an analyst at the Lowy Institute, a Sydney think tank, has a different metaphor. Australia is “an unsinkable aircraft carrier right at the bottom of the critical maritime sea lanes.”
“As the stakes increase in the South China Sea, as the risk over conflict in Taiwan increases, northern Australia in particular becomes of increasing strategic value for the United States,” Sora said.
American representatives ona recent congressional delegation to Darwin,onAustralia’s northern coast, agreed.
“This provides a central base of operations from which to project power,” Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Tex.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said during the trip.
Some Australian experts, however, argue that the growing U.S. military footprint doesn’t deter conflict with China so much as ensure Australia will be involved.
“I have deep misgivings about the whole enterprise” of increased U.S. military activity in Australia, said Sam Roggeveen, a former Australian intelligence analyst who is also at the Lowy Institute. “It conflates America’s strategic objectives in Asia with ours, and it makes those bases a target.”
……………………………………….Australia has spent roughly $1 billion on upgrading the Tindal air force base. Built by U.S. Army engineers in 1942 to stage bombing raids on Japanese targets in Papua New Guinea and Indonesia, Tindal is now the site of dozens of construction projects. A key one is the new parking apron capable of accommodating four of Australia’s biggest planes: KC-30 tankers that can refuel fighter jets and allow for far more distant attacks.
But there are also plans for the United States to build its own parking apron here, big enough for six B-52 bombers capable of reaching mainland China.
“That is absolutely something China would pay attention to,” Roggeveen said.
Marles declined to comment on the increasing rotations mentioned by Austin but said the trajectory is “an increasing American force posture in Australia.” We see that as very much in Australia’s national interest,” he said. “People understand that we are living through challenging times, when the global rules-based order is under pressure.”………………………………………………………………..
Australia is also surveying three “bare bases” — skeleton facilities in remote parts of western Australia and Queensland — with an eye to upgrading them so heavier Australian and American airplanes can use them, said Brigadier Michael Say, who leads Australia’s Force Posture Initiative. He said it’s still being determined whether the United States will pay for some of the improvements. [WHAA-A-AT!]
In the Cocos Islands, tiny coral atolls in the Indian Ocean northwest of the Australian continent and just south of Indonesia, Canberra will soon begin upgrading the airstrip to accommodate heavier military aircraft, including the P-8A Poseidon, a “submarine hunter” that could monitor increased Chinese naval activity in the area. A U.S. Navy construction contract published in June listed the Cocos as a possible project location, but Say said it hasn’t yet been decided whether the United States will contribute.
Diversifying — or redistributing?
These “bare bases,” which stretch for 3,000 miles from east to west, fit a new U.S. strategy of dispersing forces to prevent China from delivering a knockout blow.
“If one location gets taken out, the U.S. can still project force, it can still replenish and resupply and reinforce its troops,” Sora said. “Australia is fundamental to that but is just one plank in America’s regional force posture.”
Roggeveen questioned, however, whether the United States is actually increasing its capabilities in the region or merely moving assets out of places like Guam that are more immediately threatened by China’s improving missile capability. Under AUKUS, the United States will begin rotating up to four nuclear-powered submarines through western Australia in 2027………………………………………
Some concerns linger in Washington over Australia’s commitment, however. During the visit to Darwin, McCaul and other representatives asked about the 99-year lease a Chinese company holds over the port surrounding the Australian naval base. Australian officials said two reviews had found there wasn’t a security concern, and that in the case of a conflict, the port could be nationalized.
“Australia relies on China for prosperity and on America for security,” Rep. Jimmy Panetta (D-Calif.) told The Post. “That’s the balance they are playing.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/08/24/us-military-base-australia-china/—
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Western world complicit in Gaza Hellfire attacks
By Alison Broinowski | 26 August 2024, https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/western-world-complicit-in-gaza-hellfire-attacks,18907
Gaza schools and hospitals continue to be bombarded by Israeli weaponry, much of which has been supplied by Western governments. Dr Alison Broinowski reports.
BY HALFWAY through August, the Israeli military had bombed at least five schools. Accused of using six-bladed American-made “Ninja” missiles, they have chopped to pieces the Palestinians inside, most of them women and children.
On 19 November 2023, head of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) Martin Griffiths wrote:
‘Shelters are a place for safety. Schools are a place for learning… Civilians cannot and should not have to bear this any longer. Humanity needs to prevail’.
This was the day after Israel’s military bombed the Al-Fakhoora school in northern Gaza, where displaced people were sheltering. On the same day, they bombed another nearby school with a combined total of more than 150 dead.
Humanity still has not prevailed in Gaza, where the surviving Palestinians are bearing even worse consequences. It’s alleged that the massacres are now being delivered by Ninja Hellfire AGM-114R9X missiles. These are nicknamed “assassination” missiles for having killed Al Qaeda’s leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, in 2022.
Soon after the Hamas breakout on 7 October, Israel cut off supplies to Palestinians and pushed them into northern Gaza. It then forced displaced people to flee south to Rafah, where shelter and supplies were as limited as in the north. The fact that Hamas is the elected governing authority in Gaza didn’t stop Israel’s cynical, genocidal pursuit.
First were bombs on hospitals, which the Netanyahu Government claimed harboured Hamas, leaving them ruined or barely functioning.
Next, Israel’s military made schools their target, with the same excuse. On 6 and 7 June, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) attacked a UN-run school at Nuseirat refugee camp, killing 33 people, and another school in Deir al-Balah in northern Gaza killing more. Some of the victims (including an 8-year-old boy) were claimed to be Hamas militants.
At the same time, Israel expressed outrage in the UN at being listed as a nation violating its obligation under the Fourth Geneva Convention to protect children in armed conflict.
School bombings then multiplied. On 9 July, an attack on Abbasan, east of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, hit the entrance of al-Awdah school, killing at least 30 people who were sheltering there and wounding 53. Palestinian medics said most of the victims, as always, were women and children. The Israeli military said its sole target was a ‘terrorist from Hamas’ military wing’ near the school.
In the first ten days of August, Israeli attacks on five schools in Gaza City killed more than 179 Palestinians. On 1 August, Israel’s military attacked the Dalal al-Mughrabi school, and on 10 August, at least 100 displaced people were killed at the Al-Tabin school in Daraj, part of Gaza City. In this deliberately-timed attack as the Palestinians were preparing for dawn prayers, or were already in the mosque area, many bodies were shredded into unrecognisable pieces.
Three Israeli rockets reportedly hit the school, setting fire to the building that housed hundreds of displaced people. Described as the deadliest massacre in the ten-month-old war, this attack confirmed a deliberate pattern of Israel killing and maiming defenceless civilians sheltering in schools. It was the latest of 174 UN-identified bombings of shelters, and Al Jazeera reports 500 school attacks over the last ten months.
Fragments of at least two shells used at al-Tabin school on 10 August were identified as being of the American GBU-39 SDB type, manufactured and exported to Israel by Boeing.
Columbia’s Professor Anthony Zenkus alleges that AGM-114 Hellfire missiles were also used, made of 45 kilograms of dense material with six blades flying at high speed, supposedly to crush and cut a targeted person. If they were, in fact, used in crowded spaces in Gaza, Israel cannot claim they “targeted” any Hamas individual.
Zenkus claims that by 2 July, 3,200 Ninja Hellfires had been sent to Israel by the Biden–Harris Administration, and thousands more will be included in the $23.5 billion worth of weapons they have approved.
As every day brings news of another school massacre, the choice facing Australians is between psychic numbing and motivated, active outrage. How can we make our government protest on our behalf against Israel’s atrocities? Ministers know that all the U.S. has to do is cut off the funds and stop the export of weapons of terror like the Ninja Hellfire to Israel. How many more schoolchildren will be shredded before Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Defence Minister Richard Marles and Foreign Minister Penny Wong come out and say it?
When will they adhere to Australia’s obligations to the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court? When will they stop exporting the multiple Australian-made components for the F-35 bombers made by American companies that Israel uses for its attacks on schools and hospitals?
We are already complicit in Israel’s genocide. How much worse can it get?
Is the USA now considering withdrawal from AUKUS?
A little bird sent me this:
“I have just had it from a strong source in America that if Australia fails to reach an article 14 arrangement with IAEA within the next three months then irrespective of the presidential result America will give notice of withdrawal from AUKUS
However it may negotiate with Australia to use Garden Island as a base for its Indian Ocean fleet
Apparently major contractors involved with the first phase of AUKUS are lobbying the USA government to continue irrespective of what occurs with AUKUS but so far with little success”
Answers to the Questions on Notice are published in due course on the Australian Parliament House website.
Civil Society faces imposition of an AUKUS military High Level nuclear waste dump
by David Noonan, Independent Environment Campaigner 22 August 2024
The Federal ALP belatedly disclosed a secret pre-condition in AUKUS plans to buy second hand US
nuclear subs: for Australia to keep US N-Subs US origin military High Level nuclear waste forever.
In a breach of trust the ALP is seeking to ‘normalise’ High Level nuclear waste in Australia. Claims of
‘nuclear stewardship’ in taking on US N-Subs and in retaining untenable US N-Sub wastes are a farce.
Disposal of High-Level nuclear waste is globally unprecedented, with our AUKUS ‘partners’ the US &
UK having proven unable to do so in over 65 years since first putting nuclear powered subs to sea.
Minister for Defence Richard Marles MP has still not made a promised ‘announcement’, said to be by
early 2024, on a process to manage High Level nuclear waste and to site a waste disposal facility, he
saying “obviously that facility will be remote from populations” (ABC News 15 March 2023).
Defence is already working to identify potential nuclear waste storage and disposal sites, assessing
existing Defence lands, and appraising potential regions with areas to compulsorily acquire a site.
The public has a right to know who is already being targeted for imposed AUKUS N- waste storage.
Political leaders in WA, Qld and Vic have already rejected a High-Level nuclear waste disposal site.
Our SA Premier has so far only said it should go to a safe ‘remote’ location in the national interest.
AUKUS compromises public confidence in Gov and sets up a serious clash with civil society:
In setting the offer for a next Federal Election, Labor must become transparent and be made
accountable over AUKUS and associated rights and interests that are at stake in Labor’s intended
High Level nuclear waste dump siting process. For instance:
- Federal and SA Labor must commit to comply with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights
of Indigenous Peoples Article 29 provision of Indigenous People’s Rights to “Free, Prior and
Informed Consent” over storage or disposal of hazardous materials on their lands. - Defence must declare their intension to over-ride the SA Nuclear Waste Storage (Prohibition) Act
2000 to impose an AUKUS nuclear dump on outback lands and unwilling community in SA. - Federal Labor must fully set out the array of AUKUS nuclear wastes to be stored in Australia.
The ALP National Platform (2021, Uranium p.96-98) makes a commitment to oppose overseas waste:
Labor will: 8.d. Remain strongly opposed to the importation and storage of nuclear waste
that is sourced from overseas in Australia.
In contrast, AUKUS aims Australia buy existing US military nuclear reactors in second-hand N-Subs
that are to be up to 10-12 years old, loaded with intractable US origin High-Level nuclear wastes that
are also weapons usage fissile materials – and remain as Bomb Fuel long after decommissioning.
Further, in an affront to public trust Labor’s AUKUS Bill has been written to provide a federal legal
power to take existing US and UK N-Sub nuclear reactor wastes for storage and disposal in Australia.
Labor claims that it is not their ‘policy’ to do so – but it is their proposed Federal Law…
Q: Is Federal Labor already targeting the Woomera Area in SA as a potential site to impose an AUKUS military High-Level nuclear waste dump?
A Labor AUKUS Bill assumes a power and a right to over-ride State laws by naming State laws in
Regulations that are to be made in 2025. Section 135 “Operation of State and Territory laws”, states:
If a law of a State or Territory, or one or more provisions of such a law, is prescribed by the
regulations, that law or provision does not apply in relation to a regulated activity.
The Bill provides for regulated activities in ‘nuclear waste management, storage and disposal’ at
AUKUS facilities in future nuclear zones, which are to be authorised in part under Sec.135.
The national press has reported the Woomera rocket range is understood to be the ‘favoured
location’ for storage and disposal of submarine nuclear waste (“Woomera looms as national nuclear
waste dump site including for AUKUS submarine high-level waste afr.com 11 August 2023).
A ‘Review’ of the Woomera Prohibited Area has just been announced by the Minister for Defence
Richard Marles MP: “to ensure it remains fit for purpose and meets Australia’s national security
requirements.” The Review is due to report in mid-2025 – after the federal election…
AUKUS will aim to compulsorily acquire and declare a High-Level nuclear waste dump site, with over-
ride of State laws through this Bill, long before the 2032 first purchase of a second-hand US N-Sub.
It was left up to a US Vice Adm. Bill Houston to reveal the proposed sales of in-service Virginia-class
subs will be in 2032 and in 2035, with a first new N-Sub in 2038 (US Breaking Defence 8/11/23).
If Federal Labor wants to locate an AUKUS nuclear waste dump in SA, it will have to over-ride our
existing State Law to impose the dump. This AUKUS Bill is a threat to the safety of the people of SA.
Storage and disposal of nuclear wastes compromises the safety and welfare of the people of South
Australia, that is why it is prohibited by the SA Nuclear Waste Storage (Prohibition) Act 2000.
Labor Premier Mike Rann strengthened these laws in 2002 and now Federal Labor may over-ride them.
The Objects of this Act cover public interest issues at stake, to protect our health, safety and welfare:
“The Objects of this Act are to protect the health, safety and welfare of the people of South
Australia and to protect the environment in which they live by prohibiting the establishment
of certain nuclear waste storage facilities in this State.”
The import, transport storage and disposal of High-Level nuclear reactor waste is prohibited in SA.
However, Federal Labor are taking up legal powers to impose a dangerous AUKUS nuclear dump on
SA or on the NT, through an undemocratic override of State laws and compulsory land acquisition.
Question: Will Federal Labor also disregard Indigenous Peoples UN recognised Right to Say No?
In the lead up to a federal election Labor must now declare if they will respect or ignore an
Indigenous Right to Say No to an AUKUS nuclear waste dump on their country.
South Australians have a democratic right to decide their own future & to Say No an AUKUS dump.
AUKUS 2.0: Albanese Drives It Like He Stole It, and Then Gives It Away to the US
by Paul Gregoire, 15 Aug 2024, Fact Checked, https://www.sydneycriminallawyers.com.au/blog/aukus-2-0-albanese-drives-it-like-he-stole-it-and-then-gives-it-away-to-the-us/
On his jaunt to the US last week, not only did defence minister Richard Marles glorify the US presence across the entire Australian military domain at the AUSMIN, but he also signed an updated version of the AUKUS Exchange of Naval Nuclear Propulsion Information Agreement (ENNPIA).
Then in announcing the updated AUKUS agreement had been tabled on Monday, Marles explained that it “will be central to Australia’s acquisition of a sovereign nuclear-powered submarine (SSN) capability from the 2030s”, including US-made SSN and UK-assisted Australian-made SSN.
“It will also enable Australia to prepare for Submarine Rotational Force-West (SRF-West) at HMAS Stirling from 2027, supporting the rotational presence of up to four Virginia class submarines from the US and one Astute class submarine from the UK,” the deputy PM added in his press release.
Yet, while Marle’s first proposition, that Australia will ever acquire any of the eight proposed SSN of its own, has been shown to be full of holes, a recent paper by the US congress’ thinktank reveals that the mainly US submarine force stationed in WA is a given and it recommends no Australian SSN.
And despite these questions, the Albanese government did table the updated EENPIA, which, if all parties provide a note assuring that domestic requirements are completed, will replace the 2022 original agreement, and this rather lopsided treaty will continue to be in force until the end of 2075.
A lack of sovereignty
The AUKUS ENNPIA establishes a legally-binding framework to facilitate the communication and exchange of naval nuclear propulsion information and nuclear material and equipment from the UK and the US to Australia – the AUKUS powers – in regard to our own coming “sovereign” SSN.
The reason it’s questionable that any boats we may acquire will be sovereign is that the deal adheres to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), which guards against new states acquiring the ability to produce such weapons, so therefore, the reactors in the subs are off-limits.
The plan is to purchase three to five second-hand Virginia class SSN from the states, starting in the early 1930s, with sealed nuclear reactors in them, and in terms of the five Australian-made AUKUS subs, the UK will provide welded naval nuclear propulsion plants to be inserted into the AUKUS SSN.
And author of Nuked, investigative journalist Andrew Fowler told the ABC last month in reference to the Virginia class SSN that if Australia buys these boats, it’s questionable that they can every really be referred to as owned solely by the nation, as treaty obligations guard against that final step.
Non-proliferation requirements
The updated ENNPIA further requires Australia to establish an Article 14 Arrangement under the Agreement between Australia and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for the Application of Safeguards in Connection with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.
This 1974 agreement permits Australia to use nuclear material in relation to “peaceful” activities, which is safeguarded under its provisions, and this further entails ensuring that the “material is not diverted to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices”.
Article 14 of the agreement requires that if Australia plans to use nuclear material in a “non-proscribed military activity”, that our nation and the IAEA must come to an arrangement, so that Australia is permitted to use it in this non-safeguarded manner.
And if Australia is found to be in breach of the NPT, it’s agreement with the IAEA or the Article 14 agreement, the US and the UK have the right to cease the AUKUS agreement and will require the return of all nuclear material and equipment transferred to it, which again raises sovereignty.
Pulling the plug
Australians have been told that the nation is committing at least $368 billion to this AUKUS sub deal, which certainly signals a nation sliding towards a war economy with less social services. And the ENNPIA notes that no public consultation has been undertaken because the process is classified.
But as Greens Senator David Shoebridge told Sydney Criminal Lawyers in April, our nation has already committed AU$4.6 billion to the US for its nuclear submarine industrial base, and another AU$4.6 billion for the UK’s nuclear submarine industrial base.
The updated ENNPIA further provides that “any party may, by giving at least one year’s written notice to the other parties, terminate this agreement”. Yet, there is nothing within it stipulating that Australia will be receiving any refunds on these already progressing investments.
And on such termination or if one party has breached the deal “each other party has the right to require the return or destruction of any naval nuclear propulsion information, nuclear material and equipment that it communicated, exchanged, or transferred pursuant to the agreement”.
So, while this last clause does technically apply to all AUKUS powers, it doesn’t really have any bearing on our nation, as we are to pay for the transference of information, nuclear material and related equipment, and we’re not supposed to provide any in the other direction.
So, Australia is left in a precarious situation where everything can be taken away.
A dumping ground for nuclear waste
In terms of nuclear waste, the AUKUS ENNPIA only “obligates Australia” to store and dispose of “any spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste resulting from naval nuclear propulsion plants that are transferred”.
However, this document only relates to the exchange of naval nuclear propulsion information coming from the US and the UK. And it does not, for instance, dictate what will happen to the nuclear waste generated by SRF-West: the US and UK SSN force that will operating out of WA from 2027 onwards.
Indeed, the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency last month, signed off on storing the nuclear waste produced by SRF-West on Garden Island, off the coast of Perth, and this will be both low-grade and intermediate-grade waste. And such arrangements could be expanded.
And the Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Bill 2023 continues to sit in the lower house, after it went through the parliamentary committee process, which, amongst other measures, facilitates the establishment of a high level nuclear waste dump/s on First Nations land.
There’s a new sheriff in town
So, while the new AUKUS ENNPIA doesn’t facilitate our nation taking on high grade radioactive waste that the US and the UK hasn’t been able to store themselves, the updated document neither rules out that this will be facilitated via other means in the future.
And nor does it spell out what was clear at last week’s AUSMIN meet, which was that increasing interoperability between the US and Australian defence forces is coming, with Washington being the senior partner, and it will have a much greater military presence and in turn, control on the ground.
“If you look at the force posture of the United States on the Australian continent, we’ve seen a growth in marine rotation in Darwin,” our deputy PM said during the AUSMIN, and added that “in fact, that force posture lay down of the United States in Australia is across all domains”.
The anti-renewables groups pushing the nuclear option to rural Australia.
SMH, By Bianca Hall, August 26, 2024
Conservative economists, lobbyists, commentators and energy boffins have descended on regional communities nominated by the Coalition for nuclear sites, in a raft of events aimed at changing hearts and minds in the bush.
Organisers hope the events will create grassroots support for nuclear energy and stoke scepticism about renewables, particularly wind farms. The events, which organisers say aren’t linked, have featured climate science denier Ian Plimer, who recently wrote a treatise mocking the “blackbirding” slave trade, anti-wind farm activist Grant Piper, and others.
A matter of detail
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton announced a future Coalition government would build seven government-owned nuclear facilities on the sites of existing coal-fired power stations, using existing transmission poles and wires.
To get there, it would need to overturn the federal ban on nuclear energy, and overcome state bans in NSW, Victoria and Queensland. It would also need to overcome community opposition to nuclear energy.
Dutton is yet to offer detailed costings for his nuclear policy, but CSIRO’s latest energy cost report card, compiled with Australia’s energy market regulator AEMO, estimates a large-scale nuclear reactor could cost $16 billion and take nearly two decades to build.
While the Coalition’s policy details remain scant, Nuclear for Australia, a lobby group founded two years ago by 16-year-old Will Shackel and backed by entrepreneur Dick Smith, has been growing as a political force to sell nuclear to Australia.
The group has more than 10,000 followers on Facebook; it has paid ads on Meta’s social media platforms that can reach up to 500,000 people; and it held a standing-room only pro-nuclear event recently in Lithgow.
Shackel said he wasn’t a political party member, and his organisation received no funding from any party.
But there are clear links between anti-wind farm activists, the pro-nuclear movement and conservative think tanks like the Centre for Independent Studies.
The pro-market CIS in January launched its new Energy Program, focusing on nuclear energy. Its energy research director Aidan Morrison was a keynote speaker at Nuclear for Australia’s Lithgow event.
Morrison, a data analyst, in June told CIS senior fellow Robert Forsyth he was no expert, and that he was still learning about climate science.
“I haven’t, like many people, dived deep into the science on climate change and tried to map out my assessment of all the different mechanisms and how it’s worked, so I rely – like most people – on trusting those in public spaces.”
Nuclear for Australia was established as a charity in October, but it isn’t required to report its financial statements and reports until December.
Three people are listed as directors of Nuclear for Australia: former ANSTO chief executive Adrian (Adi) Paterson, also the chairman, Will’s mother Kylie, and Matthew Faint.
Paterson, who told The Guardian he was not a climate change denier, in May nonetheless described concerns about human-induced climate change as “an irrational fear of a trace gas which is plant food”.
Tony Irwin, a member of Nuclear for Australia’s “expert working group”, told this masthead the group was trying to convert hearts and minds in communities earmarked for nuclear sites by the Coalition.
“You’ve got to have a bottom up approach to lifting the ban, and also be able to influence the politicians and the people at the top,” he said.
Irwin said his group had been contacted by communities in NSW and Queensland opposed to the rollout of renewables.
“I’ve just been in Queensland and the Great Dividing Range, who’ve been absolutely devastated with wind turbines and just bulldozing through all the forests up there,” he said. “We seem to be destroying the environment to save the environment.”
Concerns about land use have been promoted by the Institute of Public Affairs, which in December said “one third of Australia’s prime agricultural farmland” could be covered in solar panels and wind turbines by 2050.
(It’s an assessment rejected by Australian National University professor of engineering Andrew Blakers, who estimates we could fulfil Australia’s solar and wind energy needs in just 1200 square kilometres, a tiny fraction of the 4.2 million square kilometres devoted to agriculture.)
Professed concerns about wind turbines, and their effects on landscapes, are common among pro-nuclear campaigners.
Also speaking was Dr Alan Moran, an economist and former director at the conservative think tank the Institute of Public Affairs, who on his website derides “green radicals”.
……………………. Nuclear for Australia has secured frequent and positive coverage in News Corp outlets, including front page coverage in the Daily Telegraph and on Sky News, Chris Smith’s show TNT Radio, and with 2GB’s Ben Fordham.
Exclusive polling conducted by Resolve Political Monitor for this masthead in June showed voters are open to the prospect of nuclear: 41 per cent support it, and 35 per cent are opposed.
But renewable projects have far stronger support: 73 per cent are in favour, amid warnings that investment in wind and solar may weaken after Dutton promised to set up seven nuclear plants if he wins the next election………………………………………
What we hear matters
It’s a truth of politics that a simple message repeated often enough becomes accepted wisdom. But this month a group of Australian National University academics released research that shows this is also true of climate change and renewables.
The team, led by PhD candidate Mary Jiang, showed even the most committed climate science believers could be swayed by hearing repeated scepticism; while sceptics could be affected by repeated statements of science.
“It shows that the power of repetition is quite strong,” Jiang said. “It can influence truth assessment.”
Nuclear for Australia’s Shackel said his group was now planning events across the country.
“If a community want to know about nuclear, we will provide our experts and support our experts to get out there,” he said.
For those living in regions under a nuclear shadow the questions are more complex, says Kate Hook, who is considering a run against Nationals MP-turned-independent Andrew Gee in Calare next election.
“[What] I’m hearing from people is the nuclear proposal, as a best-case scenario, could be up and running in 15 years [and] that’s not a ‘now’ thing. Whereas you can see renewable energy projects coming up in the region, and that is a ‘now’ thing,” she said. https://www.smh.com.au/national/the-anti-renewables-groups-pushing-the-nuclear-option-to-rural-australia-20240812-p5k1mp.html
1 This month
of the week – Disrupting War & Militarism in Oceania. Active solidarity. Radical practice.
Antinuclear 