BAE lands £4bn contract for Aukus attack submarines
Britain has signed contracts worth GBP4 billion to finance a new phase of
the SSN-Aukus next-generation attack submarine project, according to
government officials. The deals, which involve British companies BAE
Systems PLC, Rolls-Royce Holdings PLC and Babcock International Group PLC,
are part of the Aukus military alliance between the US, Australia and the
UK to counter China in the Asia-Pacific region.
London South East 2nd Oct 2023
Let’s Label #USPropaganda – Call it out. Our crews at Boeing and disrupting General Mick Ryan/
Age Peace 21 Sept 23
Wage Peace friends have been out disrupting the US propaganda machine.
Last week our friends interrupted this public lecture. General Mick Ryan is there at the lectern. He’s an ex-ADF General – now a #USPropagandist – and he’s about to tell people about why we must prepare for war by buying more US weapons.
ALP stalwart Paul Lucas moves in. But even 30 minutes later we were still there telling an alternative story about what is going on!
| –Last week our friends interrupted this public lecture. General Mick Ryan is there at the lectern. He’s an ex-ADF General – now a #USPropagandist – and he’s about to tell people about why we must prepare for war by buying more US weapons. ALP stalwart Paul Lucas moves in. But even 30 minutes later we were still there telling an alternative story about what is going on!Watch on YouTube as we disrupt his latest propaganda engagement. #BewareBoeingsWars Boeing is a weapons companyOur friends also attended Boeing slowly walking up to their suburban location in Brisbane. We prevented the weapons dealers arriving for work. Beware Boeing’s wars we warned. Boeing is a weapons company. With BAE, Thales, and General Dynamics, Boeing is pushing for war while taking the big bucks from Australians. #EarthCareNotWarfare |
Australia’s Navy Pursues Nuclear Submarines and AI-Powered Ghost Sharks
the potential for AI-driven robots to make lethal decisions independently,
https://www.gktoday.in/australias-navy-pursues-nuclear-submarines-and-ai-powered-ghost-sharks 10 Sept 23
Australia’s Navy is adopting two contrasting approaches to advanced submarine technology to address the challenges posed by a rising China. On one hand, Australia is investing in a costly and slow project to acquire up to 13 nuclear-powered attack submarines. On the other hand, Australia is rapidly developing AI-powered unmanned submarines called “Ghost Sharks,” AI-powered subs will be delivered in the near future, offering a cost-effective and swift solution to enhance naval capabilities. The divergent approaches highlight the transformative impact of automation and AI on modern warfare.
How do the cost and delivery timelines of the nuclear submarines and Ghost Sharks differ?
The nuclear submarines are estimated to cost over AUD$28 billion each and will not be delivered until well past the middle of the century. In contrast, Ghost Sharks have a per-unit cost of just over AUD$23 million and will be delivered by mid-2025.
Significance of the Ghost Shark project
The Ghost Shark project illustrates the transformative impact of automation and AI on modern warfare, offering a cost-effective and swift solution to enhance naval capabilities. Such AI-powered unmanned submarines can operate autonomously, descend to greater depths, and be deployed in large numbers without risking human lives. They offer increased flexibility, cost-effectiveness, and the ability to perform maneuvers that might be impossible for crewed submarines.
Link to Geopolitical Challenges?
Australia’s investments in advanced submarine technology are linked to the geopolitical challenges posed by a rising China in the Asia-Pacific region. These developments are part of efforts to maintain military capabilities and respond to regional security concerns.
nfluence of AI
AI technology is influencing the development of various military capabilities, including autonomous weapons, fighter drones, swarming aerial drones, and ground combat vehicles. AI is also playing a role in data analysis and decision support for military commanders.
The AI technology arms race has high stakes in terms of military dominance and geopolitical influence. Winning the race could reshape the global political and economic order, with potential consequences for peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region.
Challenges of AI
Challenges and concerns include the potential for AI-driven robots to make lethal decisions independently, the need for regulation related to the military application of AI, and the ethical considerations of using AI in warfare, including the targeting of combatants and non-combatants.
Private Sector’s Role
Private companies like Anduril are actively involved in developing AI-powered military technologies. They are contributing to the development of autonomous systems, sensor fusion, computer vision, edge computing, and AI, with applications in various defense domains, including submarines, drones, and counter-drone systems.
Nuclear deterrence is a dangerous fraud
The theory of nuclear deterrence is a feeble excuse for nations to hold onto their weapons of mass destruction and a fraud that must be exposed, writes Dr Sue Wareham. 23 Aug 23 https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/nuclear-deterrence-is-a-dangerous-fraud,17833
Dr Sue Wareham OAM is President of the Medical Association for Prevention of War (Australia) and a past board member of ICAN (the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons) Australia.
HOW IS IT that “homo sapiens” has persisted with an invention that threatens our very survival, strikes fear in the heart of every rational one among us, diverts an unconscionable quantity of our collective time, labour and finances from things that are actually useful, and at the same time could be eliminated?
All we need to do is dismantle the invention and prioritise efforts to ensure that it remains a historic relic. That could all be done. Our failure to do so thus far is such an extraordinary gamble on our future that we must examine the reasons.
The invention is, of course, nuclear weapons. The answer to the opening question is not so straightforward, but given our current all-time high risk of these weapons being used, the question has never been more important. And given Australia’s rapidly growing enmeshment with the only nation that has used these weapons thus far in warfare, we in Australia have a particular interest in it.
The first response to the question that often comes to mind is that of “power”. That’s true, a tiny minority of the world’s leaders – in nine out of the nearly two hundred countries that make up the global community – see the capacity to inflict unimaginable suffering on others as a marker of global prestige and influence in world affairs.
But, as we shall see, translating a capacity for cruelty to military or political advantage is a completely different matter. And, in any event, even such leaders need to explain to their people how having horrific and widely-condemned weapons is actually a good thing. For this, they need a theory that sounds plausible; it doesn’t need to be valid, but it just needs to sound reassuring and humane.
That theory is nuclear deterrence — the theory that having nuclear weapons keeps a nation safe from attack, especially nuclear attack, because others will be too terrified of a possible nuclear response. The more inhumane our weapons appear, the safer we are and the more certain we are to prevail militarily if any armed conflict does occur — or so the theory goes. The Latin origin “terrere”, to terrify or deter by terror, sums up how deterrence is meant to work.
For Australia, the theory is extended nuclear deterrence, a belief that our ally – the U.S. – would launch its own nuclear weapons if needed to “protect” Australia (whatever that means in practice), even risking a nuclear retaliatory strike on its own shores in the process. Like nuclear deterrence itself, extended nuclear deterrence is no more than an unproven theory.
Nuclear deterrence has been so consistently presented as justification for the world’s worst weapons of mass destruction that it is worth unravelling. If it is found to be faulty, then the primary crutch that bolsters nuclear weapons policies is exposed as a dangerous fraud.
The first major problem with nuclear deterrence theory is that it hasn’t worked. Nuclear weapons have proven to be generally useless in preventing military aggression or bringing military victories. As nuclear weapons abolition advocate Ward Wilson argues: ‘It is possible for a weapon to be too big to be useful.’
History recounts multiple occasions in which a nuclear arsenal on one side of a conflict has been irrelevant to the outcome. Examples include the attacks on or by Vietnam, Afghanistan, the UK-held Falklands, Iraq (1991 and 2003), Lebanon, former Soviet republics, multiple confrontations between India and Pakistan (both nuclear-armed), and others. In addition, crises over the deployment of the weapons have triggered periods of extreme danger, such as the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
The war in Ukraine is the latest example of a war involving a nuclear-armed adversary. Whether or not President Putin follows through with his gravely irresponsible threats to use nuclear weapons in this war remains to be seen, but “winning” a nuclear wasteland would be no more than a pyrrhic victory.
Claims that attacks on non-nuclear armed nations, such as Ukraine, would have been prevented if those nations did have “the bomb” are not supported by evidence. In any event, such claims would lead us to the conclusion that the weapons are essential for every nation — including, say, Iran and North Korea. Deterrence cannot work only for “us” and not for “them”.
Have nuclear weapons played a role in preventing a war between two nuclear-armed superpowers? We don’t know, but there is no evidence for such a role. Even if they did, could we rely on this deterrent effect to always work? The answer is a categorical no; such a proposition is not credible.
This leads to the second major problem with nuclear deterrence theory which is that to be reliable, it must work in every conceivable situation for all time. Common features of human behaviour, such as miscommunication, misunderstanding, clouded judgement or plain incompetence in a period of heightened tensions could spell catastrophe.
Irrational or malevolent leaders who care little about human suffering elevate the risks, as do ongoing cyber and computer vulnerabilities. Nuclear deterrence might be fit for a fantasy world where everything goes according to plan, but it is not fit for the real world. The nuclear weapons era has produced over a dozen “near misses” when detonation of a warhead was very narrowly avoided.
Tellingly, even governments for whom the mantra of deterrence is sacrosanct know all this. Repeatedly, official documents in the U.S. and, presumably, in other nuclear-armed nations, refer to measures needed “if deterrence fails”. Events that could be terminal for much of human civilisation are passed off with those few glib words, “if deterrence fails”, to set out what military strategy kicks in next.
Part of the “what next” for the U.S. is its missile defence program, another vast money-guzzling venture that won’t necessarily work but is designed to intercept incoming enemy nuclear missiles, the ones that haven’t been deterred; it just might save “our” side at least. The response of the “other” side, not to be deterred, is obvious — more missiles, thus the race continues.
There is one thing that “if deterrence fails” scenarios steer well clear of, however — what happens to people and the planet when the bombs do hit their target cities? For deterrence advocates, that’s someone else’s problem.
The third major impediment to nuclear deterrence is that pesky constraint on so many nefarious activities — the law. Since the entry into force in January 2021 of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), even the possession of these devices, let alone use or threats to use them, have been explicitly prohibited under international law.
While the prohibition is legally binding only for nations that have joined the Treaty (those with the weapons and their supporters, such as Australia, not yet being among them) its purpose goes much deeper. It replaces whatever international prestige might be attached to the weapons with international opprobrium. The treaties prohibiting both landmines and cluster munitions strongly influenced the behaviour of even nations that hadn’t signed them.
Fourthly, and herein lies the crux of all the above problems, nuclear deterrence is a threat to commit morally abhorrent actions. The incinerating of cities condemns millions of people, guilty and innocent alike, young and old, to the same collective unthinkable punishment. To play any role in deterring, a threat must be credible and therefore acceptable to those making it, something they would be prepared to carry through with in some circumstances.
Being the perpetrator of such suffering, or even just aiding and abetting it as extended nuclear deterrence requires, challenges us to consider whether our common humanity means anything at all. If it does, then committing or even threatening acts of savagery on a grand scale against innocent people has no place. It not only destroys the victims but also degrades the perpetrator.
Beyond the fundamental flaws of nuclear deterrence theory – its failure to prevent wars, its unsuitability for an imperfect world, its illegality and its immorality – it brings further risks and harm.
Economically, the cost of nuclear weapons programs is staggering, diverting scarce funds from essential human and environmental needs. In 2022, the nine nuclear-armed nations between them spent $82.9 billion on their nuclear weapons programs, over half of that being spent by the U.S. — all this for devices with the extraordinary purpose of existing so that they are never used.
With such national treasure invested in being able to commit atrocities, an enemy is needed, or a succession of enemies to suit changing circumstances. The enemy must be portrayed as morally inferior to us, less worthy as humans, so that no fate is deemed too terrible for them.
U.S. President Reagan’s “evil empire” speech of 1983 about the Soviet Union exemplified the process of dehumanising the “other”. President George W Bush’s reference in his January 2002 State of the Union address to the “axis of evil” – comprising Iran, Iraq, North Korea and others – did similarly. While more measured in rhetoric, President Biden’s “democracy versus autocracy” speech in February 2021 carried the same message of U.S. moral authority, for which read supremacy, with which it must confront its enemies.
As our “security” is built on a capacity to destroy, or euphemistically, “deter”, the critical task of building a common future with all people is marginalised. Foreign policies become stunted and skewed far too heavily towards inflicting collective punishment on whole populations rather than the slow and painstaking work of diplomacy to manage international relationships. Cooperation on global challenges such as climate dwindles as enmity is reinforced. Deterrence policy, with nuclear weapons at the pinnacle, erodes our capacity to survive together on this small and troubled planet.
Nuclear weapons themselves must be abolished. Given that they have proven to be almost useless in deterring anything or winning anything, this goal is achievable. Exposing the fraud of nuclear deterrence and extended nuclear deterrence theories – in promising security and yet delivering existential risk – is a key part of that process.
So much Labor hope is riding on an empty vessel
Labor’s leaders have put staying in government first. But it’s a bit pointless when they cannot even persuade their own supporters why they are taking the positions they are.
AFR Laura Tingle, Columnist 18 Apr 23
On one side of the discussion there was a disparate collection of people expressing concerns about a profound policy shift which has a multitude of troubling – and unanswered – questions attached to it.
On the other, a cabinet full of ministers who before September 15, 2021, when it was announced by Scott Morrison, had never remotely considered that Australia buying nuclear-powered submarines from the Americans was obviously the strategic……………………………. (Subscribers only) https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/so-much-labor-hope-is-riding-on-an-empty-vessel-20230814-p5dw8a
‘Unbelievable’: Defence spends $8.5m on consultants for AUKUS nuclear regulator
Greens defence spokesperson Senator David Shoebridge said: “It’s genuinely unbelievable that in the middle of a national scandal about outsourcing core government functions to the big four consultants, Defence has gifted an $8.5 million contract to one of them to design a new national nuclear regulator.
“It was always wrong to have Defence in control of its own regulator for the AUKUS nuclear submarines, and now we can see how they have hand-picked a pro-nuclear consultant to design the whole thing.”
SMH, Matthew Knott, August 21, 2023
One of the big four consultancy firms will receive almost $8.5 million in taxpayers’ money over the next year to help design a new agency to monitor safety issues associated with Australia’s acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines under the AUKUS pact.
The Defence Department contract with EY, also known as Ernst & Young, comes amid a growing debate about the federal public service’s reliance on advice from external consultants for tasks that would previously have been performed in-house.
The Albanese government announced in March that it would create a new agency, known as the Australian Nuclear-Powered Submarine Safety Regulator, to “regulate the unique circumstances associated with nuclear safety and radiological protection across the lifecycle of Australia’s nuclear-powered submarine enterprise”.
The regulator, which will sit within the Defence Department, will also monitor infrastructure and facilities associated with the AUKUS pact such as the yet-to-be determined east coast submarine base.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese stared down concerns from Labor’s Left faction about AUKUS, including about nuclear safety and the risks of nuclear proliferation, at the party’s national conference on the weekend.
Earlier this month the Defence Department revealed that it had awarded a 12-month contract to EY worth $8.4 million to advise on the design of a future nuclear regulatory agency.
Greens defence spokesperson Senator David Shoebridge said: “It’s genuinely unbelievable that in the middle of a national scandal about outsourcing core government functions to the big four consultants, Defence has gifted an $8.5 million contract to one of them to design a new national nuclear regulator.
“It was always wrong to have Defence in control of its own regulator for the AUKUS nuclear submarines, and now we can see how they have hand-picked a pro-nuclear consultant to design the whole thing.”
Shoebridge said he was troubled by EY’s deep connections to nuclear companies including US firm NuScale Power Corporation and China General Nuclear Power Co, as well as its role as the longstanding auditor for Japan’s Tokyo Electric Power Company, which operated the now decommissioned Fukushima power plant.
“This contract needs to be torn up and then this core duty of government, designing a nuclear oversight agency, needs to be done by government, not by a hired gun from the big four,” Shoebridge said………………………………………………………………………………………..
EY declined to respond to questions about the contract.
During a Senate appearance in July EY Oceania chief executive David Larocca distanced the firm from rival PwC, which is under fire for leaking confidential government information to its clients.
Shoebridge said the nuclear safety regulator should sit inside a separate department – such as the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water – rather than Defence to ensure it could provide independent oversight of the AUKUS submarine program.
…………………………… The government has been widely expected to name Port Kembla, in the Illawarra region of NSW, as the east coast base for Australia’s fleet of nuclear-powered submarines, but the idea has attracted a backlash from residents and unions.
The government has said it will store nuclear waste from the AUKUS submarines on defence land. Woomera in remote South Australia is seen as the most likely location. https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/unbelievable-defence-spends-8-5m-on-consultants-for-aukus-nuclear-regulator-20230820-p5dxxo.html
The US grip on Australia keeps tightening. Can we break free and avoid war?
By Bevan RamsdenAug 9, 2023 https://johnmenadue.com/for-independence-and-peace-the-us-grip-on-australia-must-be-broken/—
AUSMIN 2023 has further surrendered sovereignty and tightened the US military grip on Australia. The integration of the ADF with the US military, insertion of US intelligence staff in our defence intelligence organisation and the increased military presence of the US including command facilities in Australia has locked us into any war plans of the United States and made us a launching pad for their wars. The US grip on Australia must be broken to give us independence and a peaceful future.
The AUSMIN 2023 talks between the Australian Defence and Foreign Affairs ministers, Richard Marles and Penny Wong and their US counterparts Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin, have further tightened the US military grip on Australia.
Australia has become the US southern Indo-Pacific base from which it will launch military operations. Under the US Force Posture Agreement the US has established, or is in the process of establishing, huge fuel, munitions, spare parts, maintenance and equipment storage facilities on our continent. It has also been given unimpeded access to our airports, seaports, RAAF, RAN and Army bases for its military aircraft, warships and nuclear submarines. Sovereignty has been cravenly sacrificed on the altar of the US-Australia military alliance.
These Australian facilities are being massively upgraded largely at Australian taxpayers expense to support these US military operations.
The ADF trains extensively with, and is under the command of, the US military in war exercises such as Talisman Sabre. The ADF is now so integrated with the US military and our foreign policy so tied to that of the US that Australia will be swept into the next US war without a whimper from our political leaders and indeed with their enthusiastic support. That the next US war will be against China, Australia’s major trading partner and that such a war will have a catastrophic impact on every aspect of the Australian people’s lives and those of the people in our region and the world, with the dreadful possibility of a nuclear exchange, apparently has not registered with our leaders.
By agreeing to the outcomes of the AUSMIN 2023 talks, Richard Marles and Penny Wong have shown that they are no more than flunkeys, willing to place the interests of the US above those of the Australian people. Some might even regard them as traitors whose actions border on treason. Either way they have accepted measures which effectively increase the US grip on Australia and infringe our national sovereignty in a most fundamental way, by denying us the ability to decide if, when and against whom we go to war.
Let’s review the decisions reached at AUSMIN 2023.
AUSMIN 2023 re-affirmed a joint commitment to operationalise the Alliance including through enhanced Force Posture Cooperation across land, maritime and air domains as well as through the Combined Logistics, Sustainment and Maritime Enterprise. They declared Enhanced Space Cooperation as a new Force Posture Initiative to enable closer cooperation on this critical operational domain.
There will be a fresh expansion of the deployment of U.S. forces to Australia including amphibious troops and maritime reconnaissance planes.
American intelligence analysts will be embedded within the Defence’s spy agency in Canberra establishing a Combined Intelligence Centre- Australia within Australia’s Defence Intelligence Organisation by 2024.
In addition to upgrading RAAF Tindal and Darwin there will be expansion and “hardening” against attacks of two other RAAF bases in the north, RAAF Scherger near Weipa in Qld and RAAF Curtin near Derby in WA.
Lightning, Super Hornet fighters and C-17 cargo planes. On November 1st 2022 the ABC ‘Four Corners’ program revealed that RAAF Tindal will be upgraded to accommodate up to six nuclear-capable B52 bombers, and on August 4th 2023 it disclosed that a search of US budget filings had revealed plans to build a US Air Force Mission Planning and Operations Centre in Darwin, plans which have never been fully disclosed by the Australian Government. Through Enhanced Maritime Cooperation there will be more and longer visits of US nuclear submarines to HMAS Stirling in WA from 2023. These visits are in preparation for Submarine Rotational Force-West involving UK and US nuclear submarines being berthed and serviced under the AUKUS Agreement.
The Americans will now conduct a “regular rotation” of U.S. army watercraft as well as deploying a US Navy spy plane to conduct surveillance flights.
The US announced its intention to pre-position US Army stores and materiel at Bandiana Army base near Wodonga in Victoria as a precursor for longer term establishment of an enduring Logistics Support Area in Queensland designed to enhance interoperability and accelerate the ability to respond to alleged ‘regional crises’ which are in reality US-perceived threats to its hegemony.
The US will collaborate with Australia in the local production of multiple- launch guided missiles, planned to commence by 2025.
We are in the grip of the US military, which is ever-tightening and underpins US control of our economy. We are indebted to the historian Clinton Fernandes for his analysis showing that of Australia’s twenty largest corporations, 15 are majority US owned. This includes BHP Billiton, once called the “Big Australian” but now 73% US owned and therefore beholden to US shareholders. The four major banks, NAB, ANZ, Westpac and the CBA, once the government- owned peoples’ bank, are all majority owned by US shareholders, a form of ‘foreign influence’ that the Government doesn’t seem to have a problem with.
The huge public expenditure on “defence”, such as the $368 billion for nuclear-powered submarines, $10 billion for Hercules cargo aircraft, $10 billion for armoured vehicles, billions for runway extensions and port upgrades – the list goes on and is at the expense of addressing urgent social needs such as urgent measures to deal with climate change and address the serious crisis in public housing, health care and public education. There is no military threat to Australia. The real beneficiary is the US military-industrial complex which has its presence in Australia through Lockheed Martin, Boeing and other corporations.
If we are to have an independent and hope of a peaceful future, the US grip on our country must be broken. There can be no social or economic justice, no real solution to the ever-worsening crises in housing, public health care, public education, care of children and the aged, and no effective measures to address climate change and no peaceful future until we free ourselves from the grip of the US militarily, politically and economically.
In order to free ourselves we must unite and we can, because increasing numbers of Australians from different walks of life and political persuasions are becoming alarmed at the suicidal direction the present Australian political leadership is taking us. We are many and are powerful when we are united, while the US collaborators and those who profit from US domination are few. We need political leaders who will serve the interests of the Australian people rather than those of the US or any other foreign power. We need a new constitution, one which will respect the people who first walked this land, will forbid the presence of ALL foreign bases and foreign troops on our soil and will give emphasis to the promotion of peace and mutually beneficial relations with all countries.
Only independence can give us back our sovereignty and self-respect and the possibility of a peaceful future.
Reducing the risks of nuclear war — the role of health professionals
By – Kamran Abbasi, Parveen Ali, Virginia Barbour, Kirsten Bibbins‐Domingo, Marcel GM Olde Rikkert, Andy Haines, Ira Helfand, Richard C Horton, Bob Mash, Arun Mitra, Carlos A Monteiro, Elena N Naumova, Eric J Rubin, Tilman A Ruff, Peush Sahni, James Tumwine, Paul Yonga and Chris Zielinski
Med J Aust || doi: 10.5694/mja2.52054, 7 August 2023
In January 2023, the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved the hands of the Doomsday Clock forward to 90 s before midnight, reflecting the growing risk of nuclear war.1 In August 2022, the UN Secretary‐General António Guterres warned that the world is now in “a time of nuclear danger not seen since the height of the Cold War”.2 The danger has been underlined by growing tensions between many nuclear armed states.1,3 As editors of health and medical journals worldwide, we call on health professionals to alert the public and our leaders to this major danger to public health and the essential life support systems of the planet — and urge action to prevent it.
Current nuclear arms control and non‐proliferation efforts are inadequate to protect the world’s population against the threat of nuclear war by design, error, or miscalculation. The Treaty on the Non‐Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) commits each of the 190 participating nations “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”.4 …………………………………………
Any use of nuclear weapons would be catastrophic for humanity. Even a “limited” nuclear war involving only 250 of the 13 000 nuclear weapons in the world could kill 120 million people outright and cause global climate disruption leading to a nuclear famine, putting 2 billion people at risk.7,8 A large‐scale nuclear war between the USA and Russia could kill 200 million people or more in the near term, and potentially cause a global “nuclear winter” that could kill 5–6 billion people, threatening the survival of humanity.7,8. Once a nuclear weapon is detonated, escalation to all‐out nuclear war could occur rapidly. The prevention of any use of nuclear weapons is therefore an urgent public health priority and fundamental steps must also be taken to address the root cause of the problem — by abolishing nuclear weapons.
The health community has had a crucial role in efforts to reduce the risk of nuclear war and must continue to do so in the future.9 In the 1980s the efforts of health professionals, led by the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), helped to end the Cold War arms race by educating policy makers and the public on both sides of the Iron Curtain about the medical consequences of nuclear war. This was recognised when the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to the IPPNW (http://www.ippnw.org).10
In 2007, the IPPNW launched the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, which grew into a global civil society campaign with hundreds of partner organisations. A pathway to nuclear abolition was created with the adoption of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in 2017, for which the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons was awarded the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize……………………………………………………………..
We now call on health professional associations to inform their members worldwide about the threat to human survival and to join with the IPPNW to support efforts to reduce the near‐term risks of nuclear war, including three immediate steps on the part of nuclear‐armed states and their allies: first, adopt a no first use policy;12 second, take their nuclear weapons off hair‐trigger alert; and, third, urge all states involved in current conflicts to pledge publicly and unequivocally that they will not use nuclear weapons in these conflicts. We further ask them to work for a definitive end to the nuclear threat by supporting the urgent commencement of negotiations among the nuclear‐armed states for a verifiable, timebound agreement to eliminate their nuclear weapons in accordance with commitments in the NPT, opening the way for all nations to join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons…………….. more https://www.mja.com.au/journal/2023/219/5/reducing-risks-nuclear-war-role-health-professionals
Building for War: The US Imperium’s Top End Spend
August 5, 2023, Dr Binoy Kampmark, https://theaimn.com/building-for-war-the-us-imperiums-top-end-spend/
The AUSMIN 2023 talks held between the US Secretaries of State and Defense and their Australian counterparts, confirmed the increasing, unaccountable militarisation of the Australian north and its preparation for a future conflict with Beijing. Details were skimpy, the rhetoric aspirational. But the Australian performance from Defence Minister Richard Marles, and Foreign Minister Penny Wong, was crawling, lamentable, even outrageous. State Secretary Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin III could only look on with sheer wonder at their prostrate hosts.
Money, much of it from the US military budget, is being poured into upgrading, expanding and redeveloping Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) bases in the Northern Territory city of Darwin, and Tindal, situated 320km south-east of Darwin, the intended to “address functional deficiencies and capacity constraints in existing facilities and infrastructure.” Two new locations are also being proposed at RAAF Bases Scherger and RAAF Curtin, aided by site surveys.
The AUSMIN joint statement, while revealing nothing in terms of operational details or costs, proved heavy with talk about “the ambitious trajectory of Enhanced Force Posture Cooperation across land, maritime, and air domains, as well as Combined Logistics, Sustainment and Maintenance Enterprise (CoLSME).” Additionally, there would be “Enhanced Air Cooperation” with a rotating “US Navy Maritime Patrol and Reconnaissance Aircraft in Australia to enhance regional maritime domain awareness, with an ambition of inviting likeminded partners to participate in the future.”
Further details have come to light about the money being spent by the Pentagon on facilities in Darwin. The unromantically titled FY22 MCAF Project PAF160700 Squadron Operations Facility at the RAAF Darwin base “includes the construction (design-bid-build) of a United States Air Force squadron facility at the … (RAAF) in Darwin, Australia.” The project is deemed necessary to add space “for aircrew flight equipment, maintenance and care, mission planning, intelligence, crew briefings, crew readiness, and incidental related work.” Some of the systems are mundane but deemed important for an expanded facility, including ventilating and air conditioning, water heating, plumbing, utility energy meters and sub-meters and a building automation system (HVAC Control system).
Correspondents from the Australian Broadcasting have gone further into the squadron operations facility, consulting US budget filings and tender documents to reveal cost assessments of $26 million (A$40 million). A further parking apron at RAAF Darwin is also featured in the planning, estimated to cost somewhere in the order of $258 billion. This will further supplement plans to establish the East Arm fuel storage facility for the US Air Force located 15 kilometres from Darwin that should be able to, on completion by September this year, store 300 million litres of military jet fuel intended to support US military activity in the Northern Territory and Indo-Pacific region.
According to the tender documents, the squadron operations facility also had a broader, more strategic significance: “to support strategic operations and to run multiple 15-day training exercises during the NT dry season for deployed B-52 squadrons.” The RAAF Tindal facility’s redevelopment, slated to conclude in 2026, is also intended to accommodate six B-52 bombers. Given their nuclear capability, residents in the NT should feel a suitable degree of terror.
Michael Shoebridge, founder and director of Strategic Analysis Australia, is none too pleased by this state of affairs. He is unhappy by Canberra’s reticence on US-Australian military arrangements, and none too keen on a debate that is only being informed by US-based sources. “A public debate needs to be enabled by information and you can’t have a complete picture without knowing where the money is being spent.”
While it is hard to disagree with that tack, Shoebridge’s outfit, in line with such think tanks as the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, is not against turning Australia into a frontline fortress state ready for war. What he, and his colleagues take issue with, is the overwhelmingly dominant role the US is playing in the venture. Those in Washington, Shoebridge argues, seem to “understand the urgency we don’t seem to.” Rather than questioning Australia’s need for a larger, more threatening military capability to fight phantoms and confected foreign adversaries, he accepts the premise, wholeheartedly. Canberra, in short, should muck in more, pull its weight, and drum up Australian personnel for the killing.
Anthony Bergin, a senior fellow of Strategic Analysis Australia, teases out the idea of such mucking in, suggesting a familiar formula. He insists that, in order to improve “our national security, we should be looking at options short of conscription which wouldn’t be as hard to sell to the Australian people.” He thought the timing perfect for such a move. “There’s now a latent appetite for our political leaders to introduce measures to bolster national resilience.”
This silly reading only makes sense on the assumption that the Australian public has been softened sufficiently by such hysterical affronts to sensibility as the Red Alert campaign waged in the Fairfax Press.
Options to add padding to Australia’s military preparedness include doubling or tripling school cadets and cadet programs of the “outdoor bound” type based in the regions. But more important would be the creation of a “national militia training scheme”. Bergin is, however, displeased by the difficulty of finding “volunteers of any kind”, a strange comment given the huge, unpaid volunteer army that governs the delivery of numerous services in Australia, from charities to firefighting.
Alison Broinowski, herself formerly of the Australian diplomatic corps, safely concludes that the current moves constitute “another step in the same direction – a step that the government has been taking a series of for years; accepting whatever the United States government wants to place on Australian soil.” More’s the pity that most details are to come from Washington sources, indicating, with irrefutable finality, Canberra’s abject subordination to the US imperium and its refusal to admit that fact.
USA flexes its belligerent muscles in Western Australia, showing off its nuclear submarines
US military shows off nuclear capable submarine in Western Australia By 9News Staff Aug 4, 2023 https://www.9news.com.au/national/us-military-shows-off-nuclear-capable-submarine-in-western-australia/9b152141-2e3f-4a2a-a73f-37b7a02738cb
The United States military is flexing its nuclear fleet of submarines in Western Australia.
The arrival of the USS North Carolina is the first visit since a landmark defence deal was signed earlier this year.
Australia is buying eight of the nuclear-powered Virginia class submarines in a deal costing $368 billion.
Australia’s Ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd was on Garden Island touring the 110-metre vessel which can go three months underwater.
WA will permanently house nuclear subs from next decade.
HMAS Stirling is set for an upgrade as thousands more submariners file through Perth.
The public is not allowed to know how long the North Carolina will be docked in Perth – that information is classified even from Australia’s defence minister.
However, there have been reassurances the AUKUS deal is watertight regardless of who is in the White House.
Advisor to the US secretary of defence Abe Denmark said there has been broad bipartisan support.
Rudd described the move as an opportunity to step up the capabilities of the Royal Australian Navy and the sovereign capabilities of Australia “in a highly uncertain period strategically”.
Veterans, descendants of nuclear testing era urged to apply for British medal
Sapeer Mayron, Stuuf NZ, Aug 05 2023
When 85-year-old Gerald ‘Gerry’ Wright was 19, he saw his own skeleton through his momentarily transparent skin.
He was standing on board a Royal New Zealand Navy frigate, hands over his eyes, 130 kilometres away from the spot a nuclear bomb was tested off Kiribati, then called Christmas Island.
As the bomb, Grapple Y, went off with the force of 3 mega tonnes of TNT it caused such intense radiation that Wright and his company saw the bones in their hands – even if only for a moment.
Wright was deployed to Operation Grapple: a British mission of nine nuclear tests all told between March 1957 and September 1958. Grapple Y was the largest nuclear weapon the British ever tested.
He joined in 1958, and witnessed five of the nine hydrogen bomb tests. His job: send a balloon skyward and monitor the weather, ensuring calm skies for the nuclear tests.
Along with some 500 other New Zealanders on Operation Grapple, Wright was exposed to dangerous levels of radiation, not only during the tests but afterwards when the nuclear cloud remained overhead.
If it rained – even through the bomb’s cloud – the Navy sailors were told to shower outside on the frigate deck to save on fresh water, he said.
In 2005, The New Zealand Nuclear Test Veterans’ Association commissioned Dr Al Rowland from Massey University to study 50 Operation Grapple veterans’ chromosomes.
His study “unequivocally” proved the effects of the radiation had long term effects on the veterans and their families.
Wright counts himself lucky he doesn’t face the cancers and health problems of so many of his peers, and doesn’t waste energy being angry about the exposure. “It’s a fact of life,” he said.
“It was quite spectacular. And at the time I personally was very pleased that here I was at the cutting edge of modern technology and very glad of what was going on.
“It was only later on we found there were lots of side effects.”
Now, 65 years after his deployment he’ll finally have a medal honouring his service.
In November 2022, the government of the United Kingdom announced it would be awarding medals to anyone – or anyone’s kin – involved in the United Kingdom’s Nuclear Test Programme between 1952 and 1967.
The medal itself is the result of a hard-fought campaign by non-government organisation Labrats International (which stands for Legacy of the Atomic Bomb. Recognition for Atomic Test Survivors).
Speaking from Wales, co-founder Alan Owen said they have been campaigning since 2020 for this medal………………………………………………..
Owen said whether nuclear weapons should even be used is a separate issue – honouring the people who served their country’s orders should be non-negotiable.
“A lot of them are suffering ill health. The few thousand that are left feel that they’re the lucky ones.”
But the work doesn’t end with the medal. Labrats are working to integrate the stories of nuclear veterans and the weapons testing era into the UK’s school curriculum and public education like in museums and libraries.
They also want compensation for veterans and their families, as well as the indigenous tribes of Pacific islands, New Zealand and Australia who were displaced or wrongfully treated during the tests.
“These indigenous tribes, especially in Australia that were just treated as third class citizens, and they were affected… they’ve received nothing.
“There needs to be a big plan and push for compensation across the communities affected by UK testing, definitely.”
It’s hoped the first medals will be delivered ahead of Remembrance Sunday 2023, November 12.
To apply for a medal, visit the UK Ministry of Defence website. https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/132583004/veterans-descendants-of-nuclear-testing-era-urged-to-apply-for-british-medal
AUKUS, Australia and the drive to war
By John Minns, Aug 2, 2023 https://johnmenadue.com/aukus-australia-and-the-drive-to-war/
My fear is not that AUKUS SSNs, if they arrive, will be late, ineffective, and obsolete. My fear is that they will arrive and will be effective and even lethal. Because, if that is the case, they will play a part in the drive to a potentially devastating war with China that would be a disaster for the entire world.
This was a speech given at an anti-AUKUS protest at the ANU on 28 July 2023
Friends, I have been proud to have been part of a number of protests against the AUKUS alliance and the nuclear submarine deal that is part of it. However, to be truthful, I haven’t always completely agreed with everything that has been said at them.
I heard at one of the protests a speaker opposing the subs deal because they might never arrive, or might be delivered very late, or that, by then, they would be ineffective and obsolete. Apart from the enormous cost, my concern is not that they will be late or obsolete. My fear is that they will arrive and will be effective and even lethal. Because, if that is the case, they will play a part in the drive to a potentially devastating war with China that would be a disaster for the entire world.
In a war with China – what would victory look like? It would certainly not end, like the Second World War, with allied troops occupying Germany and Japan. Even to imagine Australian, British and US troops patrolling the streets of Shanghai is to realise what a ludicrous prospect that is. China – a vast and nuclear-armed country – is not going to be physically occupied.
Would victory mean that China’s dynamic economy would no longer stock the shelves of Kmart and the like around the world and that it would revert to a poor semi-agricultural country. Hardly – unless it is turned into a nuclear wasteland – it will clearly go on to be the largest economy in the world.
Would victory be the successful defence of Taiwan. Well, China has claimed Taiwan since 1949. But it has made no attempt to invade it. In any case, are we prepared to go to war to defend the independence of a place whose independence we don’t recognise and don’t support. It makes no sense.
Would victory mean that China is prevented from interfering in the affairs of other countries – something which every large or wealthy power does – including Australia in the Asia-Pacific. I study Latin America and, when US politicians talk about China’s interference in the domestic affairs of others, I hear, somewhere in my head, roars of bitterly ironic laughter from all over Latin America. Because the US has interfered in the affairs of every country in Latin America and the Caribbean – instigating coups, supporting military dictatorships, blockading harbours, embargoing trade and even military invasion. And it has done so for the last two hundred years – ever since President James Munro in 1823 proclaimed the doctrine that only the US had the right to interfere in the region.
Would victory mean that so-called Chinese military expansionism is halted. Well, it’s true that China has set up military bases on a number of artificial islands. But the US has around 750 foreign military bases in more than 80 countries. To my knowledge, China has one – in Djibouti. If bases and the ability to project military force is the problem, then China is not the main culprit.
Also, the US spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined and most of them are US allies.
The chances of being killed by the US military are enormously higher than by any other country. A recent research project from Brown University in the US showed that, since 2001, about 900,000 people have been killed directly by the US military – nearly half of those were civilians. On top of that, what the project calls “the reverberating effects” of US military action – such as famine, destruction of sanitation, health care and other infrastructure has led to several times as many civilian deaths as caused directly.
Would victory in a war with China mean the successful defence of our trade routes and shipping lanes. Where do our trade routes and shipping lanes lead? Largely to China! So, would we fight China to defend our trade with China?
Another thing I’ve heard said that I disagree with is that the AUKUS deal might drag Australia into a war with China. Australia is not being dragged anywhere. The Australian government is eagerly jumping into this alliance – with eyes wide open – rather than being forced into something not of its own making.
There has never been a war conducted by our great and powerful friends that Australia has not been eager to join – whether to the Maori Wars in New Zealand, to Sudan and to South Africa in the 19th century, to the First and Second World Wars, to Korea, Malaysia, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq – twice. We should not be protesting calling for Australia’s independence – it is independent – we should be calling for it to use that independence to help halt the drive to war – rather than to enthusiastically join it.
I’ve heard some on the other side of this argument repeat the old cliché – “if you want peace, prepare for war”. It sounds good – a nice juxtaposition of opposites etc. But it is logical and historical rubbish. It is essentially the argument of the National Rifle Association of America. The NRA says that to be safe, we need to have everyone armed. Security comes from allowing all to buy AR-15 assault rifles. We know how that has worked out in practice. Preparing for war to ensure peace is the same argument on an international scale.
When we look at the great periods of arms build-up, we see that they led to war rather than peace. It was the case with the arms build-up – especially the naval build-up – before World War One, with rearmament in the 1930s, with the Cold War arms economy which was accompanied by very hot and devastating wars – in Vietnam and Korea for example – which were among the most destructive on a per capita basis in modern history..
The world today contains great possibilities. We have the resources and the human ingenuity to deal with some of our real problems – like housing, poverty, health, education, climate. Some of that ingenuity is right here at the ANU. Let us set that ingenuity to the task of solving the real problems which affect our lives and our society rather than to the exacting but grisly science of blowing human bodies apart.
Military Initiative by Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States (AUKUS) is Another Major Step in Prospective War on China
Covert Action Magazine, By Murray Horton, June 29, 2023
Peace groups in all three nations need to rally against provocative alliance that is a pivotal component of war planning.
The AUKUS pact (military initiative among Australia, the UK and U.S.) came out of nowhere in 2021 when Australia broke a $A90 billion contract to buy French submarines.
Instead, it signed up with the U.S and UK to form AUKUS, which will build eight nuclear-powered (but not nuclear-armed) submarines for Australia.
The first get-together of AUKUS leaders did not go well for Australia, when President Biden could not remember the name of its then-Prime Minister, Scott Morrison.
Morrison went behind the backs of the French in order to do a deal, instead, with the U.S. and UK. It led to the most extraordinary diplomatic bust up between those countries—France recalled its ambassadors from both Australia and the U.S. (it is America’s oldest ally, dating back to the American Revolution); President Macron called Morrison a “liar.” When Morrison was voted out a few months later, France’s outgoing foreign minister said: “I can’t stop myself from saying that the defeat of Morrison suits me very well.”…………………………………………………
In May 2022 Scott Morrison’s government was resoundingly voted out of office, but Anthony Albanese’s Labor government wholeheartedly carried on with his Tory predecessor’s foreign policy, including being committed to AUKUS. The last time that an Australian Labor government offered a markedly different foreign policy was the 1972-75 government led by Gough Whitlam, which was overthrown in a CIA-backed coup.[1]
Both Whitlam and Albanese had themselves sworn in as Prime Minister immediately after their respective election wins, but the contrast could not be starker. Whitlam wanted to get go forward with his radically different foreign policy; Albanese wanted to immediately scurry off to Tokyo to meet Joe Biden and reassure him of Australia’s continued loyalty as a good and obedient servant.
The Australian Labor Party has not questioned the American alliance since Whitlam.
The year 2022 came and went but two of the original three AUKUS leaders—Scott Morrison and Boris Johnson—were kicked out of office and AUKUS carried on, building up to its big launch in March 2023, which was hosted by President Biden, alongside Prime Ministers Sunak and Albanese, in front of a massive U.S. nuclear submarine at a San Diego Navy base. Australia will build eight nuclear-powered subs in Adelaide; they will have a British design but American technology.
Eyewatering Cost
The cost is truly eye-watering—anywhere between $A268 billion and $A368b, by 2055. Yes, that’s right—those eight subs will not be ready for more than 30 years.
The first of these eight subs is unlikely to be ready until the 2040s so, to fill that gap, Australia will buy three existing U.S. subs from the early 2030s, at a cost of up to $A58b, with an option to buy two more. There has been zero official discussion about the multitude of things that are likely to change over the next 30 years, militarily, let alone in the wider global society. Think about what has changed in the last 30 years. I would put money on these monstrosities being obsolete long before they are built.
But the politicians and military leaders who commissioned them will be long gone, leaving future taxpayers to shoulder the costs—and the highly likely adverse consequences of such a major push toward war with China. Because that is what AUKUS and its nuclear submarines, and all others, following military technology developments, are aimed at. It has nothing to do with defending Australia, and everything to do with projecting power far from home. That is the point of nuclear-powered subs—they do not need to return to home port to refuel……………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Breakneck Militarization
AUKUS is only part, albeit a very big part, of Australia’s breakneck militarization. “Flying under the radar of last week’s AUKUS submarine announcement was the revelation that the United States had agreed to sell Australia up to 220 Tomahawk cruise missiles.”
“This follows Australia’s purchase in January [2023] of ‘high mobility artillery rocket systems,’ known as HIMARS, which have been used by Ukraine on the battlefield in response to Russia’s invasion. And in 2020, the US approved the sale of up to 200 long-range anti-shipping missiles (LRASM) to Australia.”…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Shortly after Albanese was elected as prime minister in May 2022, he initiated the Defence Strategic Review. It was classified but a redacted version was publicly released in April 2023. It was billed as Australia’s biggest defence overhaul since World War II. “Australia has said the acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines, long-range strike capabilities and its northern bases will be among the country’s six priority areas after a major review of its defence strategy found the armed forces were not ‘fully fit for purpose.’”………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. more https://covertactionmagazine.com/2023/06/29/military-initiative-by-australia-the-united-kingdom-and-the-united-states-aukus-is-another-major-step-in-prospective-war-on-china/?mc_cid=f5762ce44c&mc_eid=65917fb94b
U.S. aggression against China ignores lessons of Hiroshima
The USA and Australia as its right-hand man in the region has worked to make the idea of war a realistic option. The truth has been distorted in order to sell the idea that it is necessary to stop China. Stop it from doing what? No rational argument has yet been made that can convince any thinking person that China is a threat. The U.S. sees things differently.
And yet China threatens no one. It has no history of expansionism or incursionary activity, effectively has no overseas bases, and its fleet and army are China-based. At the same time, we have the USA and its 800-plus bases, its ring of missiles off China’s shores and its history of blatant aggression, meddling in the affairs of states and regime change.
By William Briggs | 3 August 2023, https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/us-aggression-against-china-ignores-lessons-of-hiroshima,17773
In its determination to become the superior military power, the U.S. is ignoring historical actions that many consider war crimes, writes Dr William Briggs.
SEVENTY-EIGHT years ago, the United States chose to destroy the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It was and remains unjustifiable and ought to be regarded as a war crime. The war was all but over. The targets were almost exclusively civilian.
The purpose of the atomic devastation was to signal to the world that a new order was being born. We now know that order as the international rules-based order. We know who sets the rules and what happens if those rules are not obeyed.
Since establishing its new order, the USA and its allies have made the world an intensely more dangerous place to live. War with China is openly discussed. Today, the doomsday clock has its hands set at just 90 seconds to midnight. Never, since the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists put the clock in place, has the world been so close to destruction.
The sword that hangs over us has a double-edged blade. We face both the threat of nuclear destruction and a devastating climate crisis. The two – war and climate – cannot be separated. War, be it conventional or nuclear, will only make the climate crisis immeasurably worse. We are facing an existential crisis on two fronts.
While the planet burns, governments talk about reducing emissions, but emissions from the military are simply not included in the figures. The U.S. military is the single biggest emitter in America. If the U.S. military was a separate country, then it would be among the worst polluters on the planet. The link between the death of the planet by climate change and by military adventures is clear for all to see. The fault lies with those who profit from war and climate destruction and those who allegedly govern us.
Governments of whatever shade have, generation after generation, driven us to war. Lives of soldiers and civilians have been sacrificed, infrastructure wantonly destroyed and vast sums of money that could solve all of humanity’s problems have been wasted. They have been getting away with murder for an awfully long time.
Millions have died in conflict since the end of the war and millions more have been displaced by wars and now by climate destruction.
Today, people ask if war with China is inevitable and whether such a war might involve nuclear weapons. In 2020, the International Committee of the Red Cross polled millennials across 16 countries. Eighty per cent saw a real possibility of a catastrophic war in their lifetime. Fifty-four per cent believe that it will be a nuclear war.
How can this be?
Wars can only be imagined, let alone fought, if they have a degree of “popular” support. Support gives legitimacy. Support is built using a propagandised media that acts in the service of the state that has determined that war is an acceptable option. The motivation for war is almost always economic. It can include a desire to maintain and to secure hegemony, to win political outcomes and to maintain power and prestige. For all these reasons, the U.S. has determined that China is the enemy.
Our leaders accept the U.S. argument without question. Critical thought is made more difficult when enormously influential groups like the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) come into play. ASPI receives about a third of its funding from the Government and the rest from the international arms industry. ASPI’s job is to advise the Government about military threats and miraculously, China is confirmed to be the enemy.
And yet China threatens no one. It has no history of expansionism or incursionary activity, effectively has no overseas bases, and its fleet and army are China-based. At the same time, we have the USA and its 800-plus bases, its ring of missiles off China’s shores and its history of blatant aggression, meddling in the affairs of states and regime change.
The road to war with China is not all that new. Since President Obama, there has been a push from the U.S. to “contain” China. This containment was designed to be both economic and military. For every action, however, there has been a reaction. Each push has been met with a reciprocal pushback and gives license for America and its allies to respond to an “assertive” China.
It is in this light that AUKUS assumes special importance. So, too, do declarations of missile production in Australia and a move to what is becoming a war economy. Few can now doubt that there is a push, a drive to war. War plans are openly discussed. It is all on show and the thinking of the Pentagon is there for all to see. U.S. generals make insane and obscene statements but are neither relieved of duty, much less locked away.
To illustrate this point, we have General Mike Minahan, head of the United States Air Force’s Air Mobility Command who recently sent a message to the world. It is blunt, threatening and sinister: ‘My gut tells me we will fight in 2025.’
The General sent his message as a memorandum to the leadership of the 110,000-strong USAF, with the unambiguous title, ‘February 2023 Orders in Preparation for — The Next Fight’.
The chief of the U.S. Marine Corps, Commandant David Berger, was in Australia a few months back. His take on things is that “we can’t slow down, we can’t back off, we can’t get comfortable with where we are”. The message is clear.
If there is a war against China, then it will be the U.S. who will start it. It will push until it gets what it wants. That wish is to hold back, contain or seriously weaken its designated rival and adversary by whatever means it feels appropriate. That includes the use of force. If it is war and it becomes a nuclear conflict, which it might well, then it will be the USA who will be the initiator. This is not being fanciful. China, just as the Soviet Union in the Cold War, has pledged a no-first-use doctrine. The USA refuses to do the same.
The USA and Australia as its right-hand man in the region has worked to make the idea of war a realistic option. The truth has been distorted in order to sell the idea that it is necessary to stop China. Stop it from doing what? No rational argument has yet been made that can convince any thinking person that China is a threat. The U.S. sees things differently.
For America, the threat is about either China as an economic power that will displace it, that China is a socialist threat, or that China is a powerful economy that is possibly moving towards establishing a socialist economy and social system. Any of these scenarios is enough to make the Americans reach for their guns.
What would the world look like if war comes and if it ends up as a nuclear conflict? This does not necessarily mean a repeat of the imagery of mushroom clouds and Hiroshima silhouettes, although that may well be the case. The war would more likely be fought with tactical and “low-yield” nuclear weapons. These are already being produced in industrial numbers and being fitted to U.S. ships and missiles, including Tomahawk cruise missiles.
Significantly, Australia has placed an order for 220 of these missiles. They will fit snugly on the AUKUS submarines and any other ordinance that our masters see fit and can be fitted with nuclear warheads at a moment’s notice.
Missile installations have been strengthened across the region. Nuclear capable missiles are within a few minutes flying time of major Chinese cities. Japan, South Korea, Guam, the Philippines, Australia and importantly Taiwan are all part of the encirclement. Then there is the permanent deployment of 60% of the total U.S. Navy and Air Force, in close proximity to China.
It’s an obvious point but China simply does not threaten mainland USA. New York or San Francisco are not in danger from imminent missile attacks from Chinese offshore bases and installations. Could there be a scenario that might see the U.S. use these missiles to destroy civilian targets in China? Ask the citizens of Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
Australia Agrees To Build US Missiles; US Dismisses Australian Concerns About Assange
The reason Blinken keeps repeating the word “risk” here is because the Pentagon already publicly acknowledged in 2013 that nobody was actually harmed by the 2010 Manning leaks that Assange is being charged with publishing, so all US officials can do is make the unfalsifiable assertion that they could have potentially been harmed had things happened completely differently in some hypothetical alternate timeline.
CAITLIN JOHNSTONE, JUL 30, 2023, https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/australia-agrees-to-build-us-missiles?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=135542172&isFreemail=true&utm_medium=email
Two different news stories about US-Australian relations have broken at around the same time, and together they sum up the story of US-Australian relations as a whole. In one we learn that Australia has agreed to manufacture missiles for the United States, and in the other we learn that Washington has told Australia to go suck eggs about its concerns regarding the US persecution of Australian journalist Julian Assange.
The relationship between Australia and the United States is all the more clearly illustrated by the way they are being reported by Australia’s embarrassingly sycophantic mainstream press.
In a Sydney Morning Herald article published Friday titled “‘Hugely significant’: Australia to manufacture and export missiles to US,” the US-educated war propagandist Matthew Knott exuberantly reports on the latest development on Australia’s total absorption into the American war machine.
“Australia is set to begin manufacturing its own missiles within two years under an ambitious plan that will allow the country to supply guided weapons to the United States and possibly export them to other nations,” Knott reports,” adding that the “joint missile manufacturing effort is being driven by the war in Ukraine, which has highlighted a troubling lack of ammunition stocks in Western nations including the US.”
Knott — perhaps best-known for being publicly told to “hang your head in shame” and “drum yourself out of Australian journalism” by former prime minister Paul Keating over his virulent war propaganda on China — gushes enthusiastically about the wonderful opportunities this southward expansion of the military-industrial complex will offer Australians.
“As well as creating local jobs, a domestic missile manufacturing industry will make Australia less reliant on imports and provide a trusted additional source of munitions for the US,” Knott writes ecstatically in what has somehow been presented by The Sydney Morning Herald as a hard news story and not an opinion piece.
An article published the next day, also in The Sydney Morning Herald and also by Matthew Knott, is titled “Assange ‘endangered lives’: Top official urges Australia to understand US concerns”.
It’s not unusual to see this type of propagandistic headline designed to convey a specific message above Knott’s reporting on this subject; in 2019 he authored a piece which was given the bogus title “‘A monster not a journalist’: Mueller report shows Assange lied about Russian hacking”.
“The United States’ top foreign policy official has urged Australians to understand American concerns about Julian Assange’s publishing of leaked classified information, saying the WikiLeaks founder is alleged to have endangered lives and put US national security at risk,” Knott writes. “In the sharpest and most detailed remarks from a Biden administration official about the matter, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Assange had been involved in one of the largest breaches of classified information in American history and had been charged with serious criminal conduct in the US.”
Blinken’s remarks came during a press conference for the Australia–US Ministerial Consultations (AUSMIN) forum on Saturday, in response to a question asked by Knott himself.
Here are Blinken’s comments in full:
“Look, as a general matter policy, we don’t really comment on extradition matters, extradition proceedings. And so, I really would refer you to our Department of Justice for any questions about the status of the criminal case, whether it’s with regard to Mr Assange or the other person in question. And I really do understand and can certainly confirm what Penny said about the fact that this matter was raised with us as it has been in the past. And I understand the sensitivities, I understand the concerns and views of Australians. I think it’s very important that our friends here understand our concerns about this matter. And what our Department of Justice has already said repeatedly, publicly, is this, Mr Assange was charged with very serious criminal conduct in the United States in connection with his alleged role in one of the largest compromises of classified information in the history of our country. The actions that he is alleged to have committed risked very serious harm to our national security, to the benefit of our adversaries and put named human sources at grave risk, grave risk of physical harm, grave risk of detention. So, I say that only because, just as we understand sensitivities here, it’s important that our friends understand sensitivities in the United States.”
The reason Blinken keeps repeating the word “risk” here is because the Pentagon already publicly acknowledged in 2013 that nobody was actually harmed by the 2010 Manning leaks that Assange is being charged with publishing, so all US officials can do is make the unfalsifiable assertion that they could have potentially been harmed had things happened completely differently in some hypothetical alternate timeline.
In reality, Assange is being persecuted by the United States for no other reason than the crime of good journalism. His reporting exposed US war crimes, and the US wishes to set a legal precedent that allows for anyone who reveals such criminality to be imprisoned in the United States — not just the whistleblowers who bring forth that information, but publishers who circulate it. This is why even mainstream press outlets and human rights organizations unequivocally oppose his extradition; because it would be a devastating blow to worldwide press freedoms on what is arguably the single most important issue that journalists can possibly report on.
So here is Australia signing up to become the Pentagon’s weapons supplier to the south — on top of already functioning as a total US military/intelligence asset which is preparing to back Washington in a war with China, and on top of being so fully prostrated before the empire that we’re not even allowed to know if American nuclear weapons are in our own country — being publicly hand-waved away by Washington’s top diplomat for expressing concern about a historic legal case in which an Australian citizen is being persecuted by the world’s most powerful government for being a good journalist.
You could not ask for a clearer illustration of the so-called “alliance” between Australia and the United States. It’s easy to see that this is not an equal partnership between two sovereign nations, but a relationship of total domination and subservience. I was only half-joking when I wrote the other day that our national symbol should be the star-spangled kangaroo.
Australia is not a real country. It’s a US military base with marsupials.
1 This month
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