Military buildup in Australia stirs fears

Greg Sheridan, foreign editor of the right-wing, Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper The Australian, wrote in a commentary on Nov 1 that the reports of the B-52 deployment heralded a “growing ‘prewar’ environment”.

https://global.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202211/09/WS636b0813a3105ca1f2274e75.html By KARL WILSON in Sydney | China Daily Global , 2022-11-09,

Reports of nuke-equipped US aircraft for base fit with secretive tradition

The pandemic and rising household bills have left most Australians blissfully blind to a military buildup that has been taking place in the country’s north.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s flagship current affairs program Four Corners aired on Oct 31 a report outlining how the United States is upgrading a major Australian air force base near Darwin in the Northern Territory that will house at least six nuclear-capable B-52 bombers.

The initiative will also involve major infrastructure upgrades at the Tindal Royal Australian Air Force base and a massive fuel storage depot near Darwin.

In addition, the report exposed a major upgrade to the highly secretive Pine Gap intelligence-gathering facility near Alice Springs in Central Australia. So secretive is this facility that only a few Australians have clearance to enter it. During the Cold War, the former Soviet Union had the facility marked as a “must “target in the event of a nuclear war.

Greg Sheridan, foreign editor of the right-wing, Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper The Australian, wrote in a commentary on Nov 1 that the reports of the B-52 deployment heralded a “growing ‘prewar’ environment”.

Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles, in a media conference on Nov 2, tried to play down the significance of the military buildup, saying that nuclear-capable US bombers had been visiting Australia since the 1980s.

In a media briefing on Oct 31, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian, when asked to comment on the reports, said the move by the US and Australia “escalates regional tensions, gravely undermines regional peace and stability, and may trigger an arms race in the region”.

“China urges parties concerned to abandon the outdated Cold War zero-sum mentality and narrow geopolitical mindset, and do more things that are good for regional peace and stability and mutual trust among all parties,” he said.

Zhao said that any defense and security cooperation between countries must “contribute to regional peace and stability and must not target any third party or undermine their interests”.

But Marles said that those against the buildup should “take a deep breath”.

“What we’re talking about is a US investment in the infrastructure at Tindal, which will help make that infrastructure more capable for Australia as well,” the minister said.

Objection voiced

David Shoebridge, an Australian Greens senator and the group’s defense spokesman, objected to the B-52 deployment, saying in a tweet: “This is a dangerous escalation. It makes Australia an even bigger part of the global nuclear weapons threat to humanity’s very existence — and by rising military tensions it further destabilizes our region.”

Indonesia has, in the past, voiced its concern over Australia’s nuclear direction, especially following the formation of the AUKUS security pact for military cooperation with the United Kingdom and the US.

Jim Green, national nuclear campaigner with environmental and social justice organization Friends of the Earth Australia, said: “The plan to base nuclear-capable B-52 bombers at RAAF Tindal escalates and worsens a pattern of Australia providing practical and political support for the US nuclear weapons program.”

In an email to China Daily, Green said: “Australia should refuse to allow US nuclear weapons to be located on Australian territory under any circumstances. The federal Labor government has committed to signing and ratifying the UN’s Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. The stationing of nuclear weapons on Australian soil flies in the face of the government’s commitment to the UN Treaty.”

Reports of the impending deployment came days after the administration of US President Joe Biden released a Nuclear Posture Review that nonproliferation advocates said makes catastrophe more, rather than less, likely.

When it comes to the US’ deployment of weapons of mass destruction in the region, Australia is not alone.

The Saipan Tribune noted in a report in January that during the Cold War, Guam was a target of the Soviet military in part because it was home to US Navy submarines that carried intercontinental ballistic missiles containing nuclear warheads. “The United States has not spent … money to fully protect Guam and the Chamorro people from military attack,” the report said, referring to the Indigenous people in Guam.

And the same holds true for Australia.

November 10, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Australia is addicted to fighting other people’s wars

The legal status of the island [Taiwan] as a province of China is clearly little understood; or that military involvement, as far as international law is concerned, would be an illegal invasion of China and would be seen in that way in many parts of the world.

This brings us back to the question of war with China over the future of Taiwan. So many decisions and commitments have already been made in secret that going to war will be easy. The only question left to us now is can involvement in a likely catastrophe be avoided? Or will our addiction to war and our insouciance about its consequences finally catch up with us?

https://johnmenadue.com/australia-is-addicted-to-warfare/ By Henry ReynoldsNov 6, 2022,

How do we explain that half the Australian community thinks we should go to war with China? After twenty years of conflict in the Middle East, will our addiction to war and our insouciance about its consequences finally catch up with us in an American war over Taiwan?

‘Paddy the Irishman’ was one of the stock characters who appeared in the cartoons in the Sydney Bulletin in the early C20th. In one of the cartoons Paddy addressed the readers but behind him was a sketch of what appeared to be a brawl. He asked:’ Is this a private fight or can anyone join in’? I was reminded of the cartoon after reading two news items published last week.

The first was a report of the results of a YouGov survey into public opinion about attitudes to a possible future war over the fate of Taiwan. I found the results both surprising and troubling. As the Guardian reported, almost half of Australians (46%) believe the country should send troops to help defend Taiwan against China if required. More surprising was that it was a much higher percentage than in the U.S with(33%) or Japan with (35%).

Two days later the government announced that it was setting aside $475 million for assistance to Ukraine and dispatching 70 ADF personnel to Britain to help train their soldiers. No matter how sympathetic we might be about the beleaguered nation, Australian involvement is quite strange. Ukraine has the strong support of the thirty members of NATO, many with much larger armies and defence budgets than Australia. Are we just making a declaration that we wish to now tag along as NATO’s camp followers? And if our Department of Defence has a lazy half billion dollars it would have been more appropriate to spend it as a gesture of reparation for the destruction and devastated families we left behind after twenty years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. We might then be able to convince observers all over the world that our empathy is not colour coded.

How do we explain that half the community thinks we should go to war with China? We might well have thought that twenty years of conflict in the Middle East with little to show for it had mollified our addiction to warfare. What is outstanding here is the combination of belligerence and insouciance. Little thought seems to have been given to the possibility of landing troops on Taiwan and of ever getting them back again. The legal status of the island as a province of China is clearly little understood; or that military involvement, as far as international law is concerned, would be an illegal invasion of China and would be seen in that way in many parts of the world.

But the government’s slapdash preparation for war is far more consequential. There are innumerable military exercises on land, sea and in the air. Weapons and tactics are methodically tested. We have an ongoing enquiry into strategic objectives. But is anyone calculating the cost of war with China? Is there any serious assessment of the impact on the national economy which might well be devastated? Do we have any precedents for a country that decided to go to war with its major trading partner? Has anyone considered what would happen to large segments of the mining industry? And what would happen to shipping to and from Australia? 

 Access to Japan and South Korea would be seriously inhibited. And regardless of outcomes we would have to assume that we would have hostile relations with China for a generation and more. Then there is the question of our large Chinese community. Do our war mongers give them any consideration? Would they just be treated with restless suspicion or would a government under pressure consider the detention which was imposed on Germans and Italians during the Second World War? All this and more for Taiwan which many Australians could not mark on a map? How much suffering does our defence establishment estimate they will subject us to? Have they any idea? Do they actually want to know?

All of these questions remind us of outstanding features of Australia’s distinctive history of engagement in wars in far- away places against enemies who presented no threat to the homeland. The British inducted us into a tradition of engagement in Imperial adventurism. They were incessantly at war somewhere in the world for most of the C19th. As the great liberal Prime Minister William Gladstone observed: ‘The English piously believe themselves to be a peaceful people. Nobody else is of the same belief.’ At the time of federation the Australian colonies followed the British into conflict in both South Africa and China. It was the start of a long tradition.

The Empire made it easy for the Australians to go to war. Enemies were chosen for them. The decisions about where, when and how to fight were presented ready- made. Debate about strategy, legality or morality was left to Britain. Loyalty to Crown and Empire was sufficient motivation for the majority and was used as a gag to smother dissent. So going to war could proceed without serious debate about Australia’s obligations or responsibilities as a nascent nation state or the wider ramifications of its geographical location. Return from wars was also easy. If things did not turn out as expected there was no need for introspection because Australia had been there merely to lend a hand. The Australians showed themselves to be proficient and resourceful warriors. And that was enough. There was no need to give serious thought to warfare itself. Ultimate responsibility, reassessment and soul searching could be left to the British. This was graphically illustrated in the case of the South African War of 1899-1902. There was far more dissent in Britain than in Australia and there was almost nothing like the profound reassessment which resulted in the war being seen as disgraceful descent into ‘methods of barbarism’.

How the patterns are replicated! Our behaviour in our ‘American wars’ in Iraq and Afghanistan is similar to that of earlier ’British’ ones. Going to war was easy. Using our legal inheritance from the common law which determined that war and treaty making are the preserve of the Crown or more correctly the Prime Minister. As many people now understand it can all be done without reference to the parliament. Our enemies were chosen for us. The fact that we knew comparatively little about the location didn’t matter. The legality and morality of the conflict was defined in Washington. Even the rhetoric was borrowed including repeated reference to the non- existent ‘weapons of mass destruction.’ Return from war was just as easy. There was no public scrutiny about whether the wars were a good idea, whether the cost in lives and billions of dollars was worth it. War seems to be the only aspect of government which escapes any serious cost/benefit analysis. There was little of the soul searching which followed the Iraq war in Britain and America.

This brings us back to the question of war with China over the future of Taiwan. So many decisions and commitments have already been made in secret that going to war will be easy. The only question left to us now is can involvement in a likely catastrophe be avoided? Or will our addiction to war and our insouciance about its consequences finally catch up with us?

November 7, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, weapons and war | Leave a comment

B52’s mark the demise of Australia as a self-reliant nation

Australia has become a base for the possible use of US nuclear weapons against China………………..

And all this has happened without the Parliament being consulted

 https://johnmenadue.com/b52s-mark-the-demise-of-australia-as-a-self-reliant-nation/
By Bruce Haigh, Nov 5, 2022

News that the US plans to base six B52’s at RAAF, Tindal, will likely change the dynamic, in what has admittedly been a half-hearted attempt by Australia, at improving relations with China.

The Foreign Minister, Penny Wong, got off to a good start, but the momentum was slowed by Prime Minister Albanese’s remarks that China constituted a threat, his rushed attendance at an anti-China NATO Summit meeting, the QUAD meeting and the Abe funeral. Abe like his grand farther Kishi was very anti-Chinese.

Albanese’s remarks echo those of Biden, who has chosen on a number of occasions to say that the US would ‘defend’ Taiwan. These guarantees have each time been denied by White House spokes persons but have been reiterated often enough by Biden to indicate where he stands on the question of the ‘reintegration’ of Taiwan with China.

Biden in his confusing way did nothing to stop the ill-conceived Pelosi visit to Taiwan. Biden has refused, indeed prevented, diplomatic negotiations toward ending the war in the Ukraine. He sees the war, mistakenly and naively, as an opportunity to break Russia. Albanese has gone along with this, recently sending 70 Australian soldiers to the UK to train Ukrainian troops. His thinking, and that of Biden, appear in lockstep over the major foreign policy and defence issues confronting Asia and Europe, mainly created and fanned by the US.

An almost frenzied pace is building in the US for confrontation of China. Why? John Menadue, Richard Tanter, Mike Scrafton and Jeffrey Sachs have all recently written in Pearls & Irritations on this unfolding madness.

The basing of B52’s in the Northern Territory changes the nature of Australia’s defence relationship with the USA and our diplomatic relationship with China. Australia has become a base for the possible use of US nuclear weapons against China. Tentative and overly cautious moves to re-establish a sound and workable relationship with China will have been set back, if not put on ice. Moves that Morrison was a party to, or patsy to, have proceeded apace without the brakes being applied by Marles or Albanese. The horse has bolted. And all this has happened without the Parliament being consulted. So much for Australian democracy. All this talk about Western Democracies standing up to totalitarian regimes is so much cant.

China is unlikely to regard Australia as having acted in good faith and nor is the region and the Pacific. Overnight the US and Australia changed the nature of the game with no prior warning and no special briefings. It is a unilateral and hostile upping of the anti.

It is also unlikely that Australia will be advised if the aircraft are carrying nuclear weapons on planned patrols. The line that can be expected is that for operational and security reasons information relating to carriage of nuclear weapons is classified and can neither be confirmed or denied.

No doubt the Chinese are seriously thinking of writing Australia off as being incapable of independent decision making- a vassal state, a follower, lacking the capacity and courage to shape its regional destiny. The chances of Xi Jinping meeting with Albanese at the G20 have receded, if not evaporated.

Perhaps it is symbolic that the ubiquitous B52 marks the demise of Australia as a self-reliant nation.

The B52 is the symbol of US foreign policy failure in Asia. Not satisfied with the terms of the Paris peace settlement, Nixon and Kissinger decided to bomb the Accord, as it was termed, out of existence. Over a ten-day period beginning on 18 December 1972, B52’s bombed Hanoi and surrounding areas. It was a disaster anywhere from 15 to 30 aircraft were shot down, depending on whether you believe the Americans or Vietnamese. The US was forced back to the negotiating table and agreed to the original terms.

B52’s bombed Laos and Cambodia during the same undeclared war with a greater tonnage of bombs than the US used over Europe in WWII. Fields are still being cleared of unexploded armaments and men, women and children are still being maimed.

The basing of the B52’s blind sides the Defence Review called by Albanese and Marles and gives a great deal of weight to AUKUS, details of which are yet to be put to the Australian Parliament. It is unconscionable that AUKUS is bandied about as a joint defence arrangement when little is known about it.

It is presumed that all that is currently taking place and has taken place between the US and Australia, such as the embedding of US personnel in the ADF, base upgrades and proposed and past purchases of defence equipment, such as the Mark II Abrams tank, were all done under AUKUS, except that the UK seems to have been notably absent. So, is it AUUS? Or against the wishes of the Japanese people will it become JAPAUUS? Or AUJAPUS? OR AUJAPUKUS?

Whatever the Monty Python outcome, it needs to go before the Australian Parliament. It has been a big mistake for Prime Minister, Albanese, to take on and run with Morrison’s dirty and deceitful deal. Australia needs to be aware of the immediate and long-term consequences of the US military and industrial China folly of which once again we have been railroaded into. No debate, no consideration and no brains.

November 5, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Australia’s $multibillion submarine madness and the phoney China threat

According to the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, the cost of eight would be $171 billion after inflation. More recent estimates are over $200 billion.

 https://johnmenadue.com/australian-submarine-madness/ By Brian Toohey, Nov 4, 2022

Nobody knows what military threats to Australia from China or anyone else will exist in 2050. In these circumstances, it is folly to commit to spending over $200 billion on acquiring eight US designed nuclear attack submarines to deploy in support of the US on the China coast.

This is particularly extravagant when modern conventionally powered submarines are much cheaper and far harder to detect. Nuclear submarines are noisy because they rely on a reactor to power a steam engine with cooling pumps, turbines, reduction gears and steam in the pipes. They also expel hot water that can be detected, as can the wake on the surface when travelling at high speeds.

Modern battery powered submarines, which Australia perversely has no plans to get, maintain near silent operation with what’s called air independent propulsion (AIP) supplied by a hydrogen fuel cell in Singapore’s German submarines, a Sterling engine favoured by the Swedes or in the case of the latest Japanese submarines, by advanced batteries with long endurance.

These submarines have the great advantage of making the crew far safer than noisy nuclear ones while leaving funds over for much needed improvements in Australian’s health, education, and social security systems as well as for tackling climate change.

Yet the Albanese government has a 350 strong task force in Defence planning the big changes needed to build nuclear powered submarines in Adelaide. In contrast, a prize-winning essay published in the US Naval Institute’s magazine Proceedings in June 2018 said the US Navy would do well to consider acquiring “some quiet, inexpensive and highly capable diesel-electric submarines. It said, “The ability of AIP was demonstrated in 2005, when HMS Gotland, a Swedish AIP submarine, ‘sank’ many U.S nuclear fast-attack subs, destroyers, frigates, cruisers, and even the USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier in joint exercises”. However, the Australian Navy somehow sees a great advantage in getting US nuclear attack subs such as the Virginia Class that were sunk in the exercise.

One of the US’s most highly regarded defence analysts, Winslow Wheeler, recently pointed out that these subs have been available only 15 times in 33 years for their six-monthly deployments. This suggests fewer than two of Australia’s eight nuclear submarines would be operationally available, on average, each year. According to the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, the cost of eight would be $171 billion after inflation. More recent estimates are over $200 billion.

Australia could build ten of the latest German submarines operated by Singapore for about $10 billion. They also have an outstanding maintenance record, as well as being well suited to the shallow waters in Australia’s region. A similar figure could apply to the latest Swedish ones, but they may not be so readily available. Japan’s new Taigei class would cost roughly the same to buy, but more to operate its bigger crew. The Japanese government would be reluctant to build it in other than in its own shipyards.

These figures suggest that the job of defending Australia could be performed for a reasonable cost, particularly if greater use were made of modern, low-cost, drones. The trend for low-cost drones to become more useful is only likely to grow by 2050 when Australia might be getting its first operational nuclear submarine.

At some stage, a reality check needs to apply to the barrage of claims about increased Chinese aggression or the China threat. The last major war involving China was in Korea in 1950. China argues its rapid arms build-up reflects how it’s surrounded by potential enemies, including the US, which has been in many more aggressive wars and spends much more on its military.

The Pentagon 2021 annual report to Congress on China acknowledged it had withdrawn six land claims to settle border disputes with neighbours. Contrary to the common assumption that it is ready to invade Taiwan, the Pentagon said “There is no indication it is significantly expanding its force of tank landing ships and landing craft – suggesting a traditional large-scale direct beach assault operation requiring extensive lift remains aspirational”.

China could settle some of the extreme territorial sea claims that were originally made by the Communist Party’s political opponent, the Nationalist Party, before 1949. Taiwan also makes these claims. Although abrasive, nobody has been killed. By 2050 the US, with Australia tagging along, may have extended its well-established history of killing people by engaging in international aggression in violation of the rules. Alternatively, in 2050 China could engage in its first major war since 1950 by attempting to invade Australia, except no one no one has suggested any plausible motive.

Although Australian nuclear submarines will not be available, many Australian pundits see a need to go to Taiwan’s aid if secret intelligence analysis says China is about to attack it. Following the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003 based on concocted intelligence, the Challis chair of international law at Sydney University, Ben Saul, said it’s important to ask if a war over Taiwan would be legal. He wrote in the Lowy Institute’s The Interpreter, “The conventional legal answer favours China. Only a state has the right to use military force in self-defence against an armed attack by another state – and to ask other states to help it to defend itself.”

The Australian Foreign Affairs department says Taiwan is not a state. Saul adds, “In a world with a plurality of different political systems, states are not permitted to use force simply to protect democracy or ‘freedom’ abroad. The US backed Taiwan even when it was a military dictatorship until the 1990s; its defence has never really been about freedom.”

November 5, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, weapons and war | Leave a comment

‘Target Oz’: Defence Strategic Review must address nuclear risks

Pine Gap near Alice Springs, RAAF Base Tindal for US B-52’s near Katherine, Darwin Harbour, North-West Cape near Exmouth, and the Stirling submarine base near Fremantle are all potential targets for a strike by China in a conflict with the US over Taiwan or the South China Sea

Pearls and Irritations, By David Noonan, Nov 3, 2022

The Defence Strategic Review must act in accordance with Australia’s commitment to sign the UN “Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons” (the ‘Ban Treaty’) and not seek to compromise that path by supporting roles in nuclear warfare alongside the US.

Anthony Albanese made a commitment in his “Changing the World” Speech (ALP National Conference, 18 Dec 2018), stating:

“We have on our side the overwhelming support of the Australian people. …

Our commitment to sign and ratify the nuclear weapons ban treaty in government is Labor at our best”

The ALP National Platform (2021, p.117) commits “to sign and ratify the Ban Treaty” and Australia must do so in this term of the ALP in federal office.

The Ban Treaty Article 1 Prohibitions require nations to never under any circumstance use or threaten to use nuclear weapons, OR to assist or encourage, in any way, anyone to do so.

To come into compliance with the Ban Treaty, the Defence Review must evolve our Alliance with the US to put an end to defence reliance on US ‘nuclear deterrence’.

The US ‘nuclear weapons umbrella’ is a threat to use nuclear weapons in Australia’s defence policy – a threat that has long been contrary to International Humanitarian Law and is now illegal since the Ban Treaty came into force as a permanent part of International Law from 22 January 2021.

The roles of Pine Gap and the North-West Cape communications base must evolve to exclude military operations related to the use, or threat to use, nuclear weapons.

The ICAN Report “Choosing Humanity” (July 2019) best sets out the case for Australia to sign the Ban Treaty. Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong should now refer the Ban Treaty to an Inquiry by the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties as a proposed treaty action.

 Australians have a right to know the risk exposure we face in peace time and in war:

While preparing for war, a second lead task for the Defence Review is to provide transparency on the consequences for Australia as a target in an escalating conflict between the US and China.

The Review must report on the scenarios, risks, and consequences of a nuclear or conventional attack by China on bases in Australia and on the potential resultant health calamity.

Both China and Russia’s priority and capacity to attack US bases in Australia has long been recognised. An ASPI Report (Sept 2022) states Pine Gap is a high-level nuclear target, noting:

“We need to understand what the implications would be for Alice Springs, which is a town of 32,000 people only 18 kilometres from the base.”

The lead author of the report, Paul Dibb has stated: “The risk of nuclear war is now higher than at any time since the Cold War. … Australia should not feel its geographic distance from the epicentre of conflict affords it any significant protection. … We need to plan on the basis that Pine Gap continues to be a nuclear target, If China attacks Taiwan, Pine Gap is likely to be heavily involved.”

A Lowy paper (09 August 2021) also cites Darwin as a potential target in a US-China conflict:

“The arena of hostilities for any such conflict would be mostly confined to East Asia, with the possible exception of strikes against US forces using Darwin as a rear-area staging base.”

No doubt Australia acquiring nuclear powered attack submarines and visits or basing US or UK nuclear subs at Stirling naval base near Fremantle escalates the risk profile we face.

Beijing’s Global Times “China needs to make a plan to deter extreme forces of Australia” (07 May 2021) threatened “retaliatory punishment” with missile strikes “on the military facilities and relevant key facilities on Australian soil” if Australia coordinates with the US in a war over Taiwan:

“China has a strong production capability, including producing additional long-range missiles with conventional warheads that target military objectives in Australia when the situation becomes highly tense.”

Pine Gap near Alice Springs, RAAF Base Tindal for US B-52’s near Katherine, Darwin Harbour, North-West Cape near Exmouth, and the Stirling submarine base near Fremantle are all potential targets for a strike by China in a conflict with the US over Taiwan or the South China Sea……………………more

David Noonan B.Sc., M.Env.St., is an Independent Environment Campaigner and was a long-term campaigner for Australian Conservation Foundation.

See the public submission to the Defence Review by David Noonan (29 Oct 2022).

 https://johnmenadue.com/target-oz-the-defence-strategic-review-and-our-risk-exposure-with-the-us-and-china/

November 3, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, weapons and war | Leave a comment

As Australia gets American nuclear-capable bombers, it risks becoming a dangerous military mess and target – like Guam

China’s furious reaction as Australia gets US nuclear-capable bombers A furious Beijing has blasted reports of the US gifting Australia nuclear-capable bombers, prompting a concerning warning from China.

 https://www.news.com.au/technology/innovation/military/chinas-ominous-threat-to-australia-over-us-nuclearcapable-bombers/news-story/ca67d55d29ef716883078e4fb8e2101f Ally Foster and Frank Chung, November 1, 2022 –

Australia has been issued an ominous threat, after China lashed out at reports of the US sending nuclear-capable bombers to the Northern Territory.

According to an investigation by the ABC’s Four Cornersthat aired on Monday, Washington has drawn up plans to build a dedicated a “squadron operations facility” at the Tindal air base south of Darwin that will house “six B-52s”.

These aircraft are capable of delivering both nuclear and conventional weapons, with a combat range of more than 14,000km.

The news has prompted a furious response from Beijing, with the former editor-in-chief of the CCP-run Global Times issuing an ominous warning to Australia.military

Commentator Hu Xijin said Australia would need to “bear the risks” of this move.

“The PLA’s Dongfeng missiles definitely fly faster than the B-52 bombers,” he wrote on Twitter.

“If Australia wants to become a “big Guam,” then it must bear the corresponding strategic risks.”

There have even been warnings that accepting these bombers could “trigger a regional arms race”.

Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Zhao Lijian said by sending the bombers to Australia, the US had “increased regional tensions, seriously undermined regional peace and stability, and may trigger a regional arms race”.

“Defence and security co-operation between any countries should be conducive to regional peace and stability and not target or harm the interests of third parties,” he told reporters in Beijing.

Mr Zhao said Beijing was urging all the countries concerned to “abandon the old Cold War zero-sum thinking and narrow geopolitical concepts”.

The focus should instead be on contributing more to regional peace and stability and enhancing “mutual trust”, he said.

November 1, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, weapons and war | Leave a comment

US Air Force to deploy nuclear-capable B-52 bombers to Australia

The US Air Force is preparing to deploy up to six nuclear-capable B-52 bombers to northern Australia in a show of “nuclear deterrence” to China.

news.com.au Frank Chung @franks_chung, October 31, 2022 ,

The US Air Force is preparing to deploy up to six nuclear-capable B-52 bombers to northern Australia in a show of “nuclear deterrence” to China, amid growing fears of an invasion of Taiwan.

According to an investigation by the ABC’s Four Corners airing on Monday, Washington has drawn up plans to build a dedicated a “squadron operations facility” at the Tindal air base south of Darwin that will house “six B-52s”.

The giant aircraft, with wingspan of 56 metres, have a combat range of more than 14,000 kilometres and are capable of delivering both nuclear and conventional weapons.

Documents obtained by Four Corners show the planned facilities, which will include a parking area and adjoining maintenance centre, will be used for “deployed B-52 squadrons”.

“The ability to deploy US Air Force bombers to Australia sends a strong message to adversaries about our ability to project lethal air power,” the US Air Force told the program.

The Defence Department has been contacted for comment.

According to the program, the Tindal air base plan — expected to cost up to $US100 million and be completed by 2026 — is part of a much larger upgrade of defence assets across northern Australia, including the Pine Gap spy base.

Anti-nuclear activist Richard Tanter from the Nautilus Institute told Four Corners the move greatly expanded Australia’s commitment to any US war with China.

“It’s a sign to the Chinese that we are willing to be the tip of the spear,” he said.

“It’s very hard to think of a more open commitment that we could make. A more open signal to the Chinese that we are going along with American planning for a war with China.”

The plans were hinted at in last year’s annual Australia-United States Ministerial (AUSMIN) meetings, which agreed for “enhanced air co-operation” which would see “rotational deployment of US aircraft of all types in Australia”, although B-52s were not explicitly mentioned……………………..

NSW Greens Senator David Shoebridge slammed the “dangerous escalation”.

“It makes Australia an even bigger part of the global nuclear weapons threat to humanity’s very existence — and by rising military tensions it further destabilises our region,” he said……………………………………………………. more https://www.news.com.au/technology/innovation/military/us-air-force-to-deploy-nuclearcapable-b52-bombers-to-australia/news-story/dd7cc13dc270dbabb332cc200e279b7c

October 31, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA - NATIONAL, weapons and war | Leave a comment