Australian MPs Blast Blinken Over Assange
The MPs called the U.S. secretary of state’s remarks that Julian Assange threatened U.S. national security “nonsense” and said the U.S. is only bent on revenge, reports Joe Lauria.
SCHEERPOST, By Joe Lauria / Consortium News August 2, 2023
Three Australian members of Parliament have dismissed U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s strong statement in support of prosecuting imprisoned WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange as “nonsense.”
Independent MP Andrew Wilkie told The Guardian‘s Australian edition that Assange was “not the villain … and if the US wasn’t obsessed with revenge it would drop the extradition charge as soon as possible.”
“Antony Blinken’s allegation that Julian Assange risked very serious harm to US national security is patent nonsense,” Wilkie said.
“Mr Blinken would be well aware of the inquiries in both the US and Australia which found that the relevant WikiLeaks disclosures did not result in harm to anyone,” said Wilkie. “The only deadly behaviour was by US forces … exposed by WikiLeaks, like the Apache crew who gunned down Iraqi civilians and Reuters journalists” in the infamous Collateral Murder video.
Speaking at a press conference with Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong in Brisbane on Saturday, Blinken said he understood Australians’ concerns about their imprisoned citizen, but took a hard line against any move to end his persecution. Blinken said:
“…………………………………………………….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 of physical harm, grave risk of detention…………”
As was shown conclusively by defense witnesses in his September 2020 extradition hearing in London, Assange worked assiduously to redact names of U.S. informants before WikiLeaks publications on Iraq and Afghanistan in 2010. U.S. Gen. Robert Carr testified at the court martial of WikiLeaks‘ source, Chelsea Manning, that no one was harmed by the material’s publication.
Instead, Assange faces 175 years in a U.S. dungeon on charges of violating the Espionage Act, not for stealing U.S. classified material, but for the First Amendment-protected publication of it.
The Meaning of ‘National Security’
WikiLeaks has indeed threatened “national security” if the “nation” is defined as merely its rulers. If “national security” however is meant to be the security of the entire nation, then Blinken’s obsession with continuing the war in Ukraine with the risk of nuclear conflict is truly a threat to the nation’s security.
Liberal MP Bridget Archer, another co-chair of the pro-Assange parliamentary group, said: “He continues to suffer mentally and physically, as does his family, and the government should redouble their efforts to secure his release and return to Australia.”
………………………..Labor MP Julian Hill, also part of the Bring Julian Assange Home Parliamentary Group last week called on Assange to take a plea deal, which should not reflect badly on him. In the meantime, Hill said improving prison conditions “should not be difficult to do even while argument continues about resolution of this matter.”
A recent opinion poll shows that 79 percent of Australians want Assange released and bought home. https://scheerpost.com/2023/08/02/australian-mps-blast-blinken-over-assange/—
The Day Australian Sovereignty Died
Australian Independent Media, August 2, 2023, by: Dr Binoy Kampmark
If a date might be found when Australian sovereignty was extinguished by the emissaries of the US imperium, July 29, 2023 will be as good as any. Not that they aren’t other candidates, foremost among them being the announcement of the AUKUS agreement between Australia, UK and the US in September 2021. They all point to a surrender, a handing over, of a territory to another’s military and intelligence community, an abject, oily capitulation that would normally qualify as treasonous.
The treason becomes all the more indigestible for its inevitable result: Australian territory is being shaped, readied, and purposed for war under the auspices of closer defence ties with an old ally. The security rentiers, the servitors, the paid-up pundits all see this as a splendid thing. War, or at least its preparations, can offer wonderful returns.
The US Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin III, was particularly delighted, though watchful of his hosts. His remit was clear: detect any wobbliness, call out any indecision. But there was nothing to be worried about. His Australian hosts, for instance, proved accommodating and crawling.
Australian Defence Minister Richard Marles, for instance, standing alongside Austin, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Australian Foreign Minister, Penny Wong, declared that there was “a commitment to increase American force posture in respect of our northern bases, in respect to our maritime patrols and our reconnaissance aircraft; further force posture initiatives involving US Army watercraft; and in respect of logistics and stores, which have been very central to Exercise Talisman Sabre.” To the untutored eye, Marles might have simply been another Pentagon spokesman of middle-rank…………….
Australian real estate would be given over to greater “space cooperation”, alongside creating “a guided weapons and explosive ordnance enterprise in this country, and doing so in a way where we hope to see manufacturing of missiles commence in Australia in two years’ time as part of a collective industrial base between the two countries.” Chillingly, Marles went on to reiterate what has become something of a favourite in his middle-management lexicon. The efforts to fiddle the export-defense export control legislation by the Biden administration would create “a more seamless defence industrial base between our countries.” Seamless, here, is the thick nail in the coffin of sovereignty.
Moves are also underway to engage in redevelopment of bases in northern Australia, in anticipation of the increased, ongoing US military presence. The RAAF Base Tindal, located 320km south-east of Darwin in the Northern Territory, is the subject of considerable investment “to address functional deficiencies and capacity constraints in existing facilities and infrastructure.” The AUSMIN talks further revealed that scoping upgrades would take place at two new locations: RAAF Bases Scherger and RAAF Curtin.
Australia’s Defence Intelligence Organisation will also be colonised by what is being termed a “Combined Intelligence Centre – Australia” by 2024. This is purportedly intended to “enhance long-standing intelligence cooperation” while essentially subordinating Australian intelligence operations to their US overlords. Marles saw the arrangement as part of a drive towards “seamless” (that hideous word again) intelligence ties between Canberra and Washington. “This is a unit which is going to produce intelligence for both of our defence forces … and I think that’s important.”
……….. Under the Albanese government we have reverted completely to our worst selves on defence. We’re going to do almost nothing consequential over the next 10 years other than get the Americans to do more on our land.” ……… Australia might be at war with China under US-direction before a decade is up, vassalized warriors eager to kill and be killed. https://theaimn.com/the-day-australian-sovereignty-died/
A Client State
Mary Kostakidis on Twitter 2 Aug 23
Our leadership has handed over stewardship of Australia to a war machine. The US now decides how our budget is to be spent, what we will manufacture and what equipment we will purchase and in whose interests Australian lives and Australian national security will be risked.
We are to become a financial sponsor of the American hegemony’s forever wars and producer of weapons that will be aimed at our own destruction – we are to be used much like Ukraine and Europe.
The cherry on top was to be lectured, on Australian soil, of the primacy of US interests over the wishes of Australians to save the life of an Australian citizen. While no one has been punished for the lies and crimes, evidently he has not been punished enough for publishing the truth.
Can you think of anything that matters to our leadership more than ensuring nothing stands in the way of their being walked all over? Among other things, they are a disgraceful example for Australia’s children – whose safety should be at the fore of their minds. That, would be national security.
Why is Australia so intimidated by the American war hawks.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is reiterating his call for the case against Julian Assange to be dropped
John Pilger @johnpilger comments:
What game is Albanese playing? The Aust. PM says he working to free Julian Assange, then it’s too hard, now it’s game on again. What is the truth? Are you ‘standing up’ or not? Or are you colluding?
- Anthony Albanese throws support behind Julian Assange
- PM has reiterated his call for case against him to be dropped
By MAEVE BANNISTER FOR AUSTRALIAN ASSOCIATED PRESS 1 August 2023
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is reiterating his call for the case against Julian Assange to be dropped, brushing off suggestions the United States won’t be swayed on the matter.
Since winning office in 2022, the Albanese government has been advocating for the US pursuit of Assange to end.
But during a visit to Australia last week, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken pushed back against the demands and said Assange was accused of ‘very serious criminal conduct’.
Assange, an Australian citizen, published a trove of classified documents more than a decade ago………………………………….
The prime minister will continue to reiterate to his US counterparts that the matter has gone on for too long, and said ‘enough is enough’. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12358859/Prime-Minister-Anthony-Albanese-reiterating-call-case-against-Julian-Assange-dropped.html?fbclid=IwAR3xlP8LNIfTykAyyqrOHlUI6uRALJVpqDiMQ0b8RGbNiKDyiAZzDfIkFQk—
The right’s nuclear stupidity is enough to make us cough up Phlegm Orville
From National Times Facebook page 2 Sept
The right’s nuclear stupidity is enough to make us cough up Phlegm Orville ( Bernard Keane and Crikey )
President Macron has reversed France’s original plan to reduce its nuclear energy from 70% to 50%, indeed as part of a nuclear renaissance, France will build six new large reactors and shortly commence testing on a nuclear power plant in Phlegm Orville, which is set to open early next year.
Er, what? Phlegm Orville in France? Sounds like a haute cuisine serving of mucus. Presumably the IPA scribe misheard when Dutton referred to Flamanville Nuclear Power Plant (thank God he didn’t refer to Finland’s Olkiluoto). Or perhaps they couldn’t believe Dutton was seriously invoking Flamanville as an advertisement for the wisdom of nuclear power.
Crikey first mentioned the new reactor being built at Flamanville in 2009, when it was due to open in 2013 and was already one-third over budget. By 2016 it was 200% over budget and scheduled to start in 2018. By 2018, the builder EDF discovered serious construction problems that delayed the start until 2020, and blew the budget out again. In 2020, the French government labelled Flamanville a “mess”. Early in 2022, when it was going to open at the end of the year, there was another delay and the budget rose to €12.7 billion (A$21.3 billion). At the end of last year, there was another delay into 2024 and the budget went over €13 billion.
So, all up, a decade overdue, and a final cost triple the initial estimate — if it starts next year. And it’s what Dutton thinks is an advertisement for nuclear power. Perhaps he should have mentioned Olkiluoto instead. It finally commenced in April this year… 14 years overdue.
Such criticisms, however, are now airily dismissed by nuclear power advocates. The future is small modular reactors (SMRs), which take much less time to build and are far cheaper — even if there are none actually operating outside Russia or China yet. “A single SMR can power some 300,000 homes. A microreactor could power a regional hospital, a factory, a mining site or a military base,” Dutton told the IPA.
At the same time as Dutton is spruiking SMRs, the Financial Review is as well. It’s run a three-part series on plans in Canada, Japan and the United Kingdom for SMRs (as one AFR reader acerbically noted, the keyword is “plans”).
The AFR also editorialised about the glories of SMRs. Conveniently absent, however, was the fact that even the new wonder technology needs massive taxpayer subsidies. The SMR that gets advocates most excited is the small prototype that US firm NuScale received regulatory approval to build in Idaho earlier this year — celebrated as a major milestone for the technology. Except it won’t commence operation until 2030 at the earliest and has already received US$1.4 billion in subsidies. That hasn’t stopped the proposed facility’s cost per MW-hour already increasing by more than 50% — three times the current cost of large-scale nuclear power in the US.
Why has the cost gone up for this SMR? Because, erm… cough cough… there’s been a massive blowout in the construction cost: 75%, to more than US$9 billion. Sure, it’s not a Phlegm Orville 300% blowout, but it is only a small reactor. And who will insure SMRs? In the United States, the government provides that insurance, with nuclear power plant owners paying hundreds of millions of dollars a year in premiums, further adding to the cost.
Another issue not mentioned by either the AFR or Dutton — both of whom like to whine about too much government spending — is what to do with the waste produced by SMRs. See, while they may be small, SMRs produce much more waste per unit of energy produced — and waste with higher radioactivity levels — than normal reactors. Good luck finding somewhere to store that for 10,000 years. You can bet no company will be doing that — it will fall to taxpayers, yet again.
So, apart from taking a long time to build, blowing out costs, requiring a massive infrastructure solution in terms of waste disposal and requiring colossal taxpayer support, the SMRs championed by Dutton and the AFR are completely different to traditional nuclear power.
What’s driving all this? Why does the right think SMRs are the solution? The delays that are typical of nuclear power, and which would be typical of SMRs as well, aren’t the problem — they’re the point. Switching focus to nuclear power and away from renewables and storage would delay decarbonisation and give fossil fuel industries extra years — indeed, extra decades — to keep operating while a nuclear “solution” was prepared. Like carbon capture, like gas, it’s another scam used by fossil fuel interests to try to delay meaningful climate action.
It’s enough to make you cough your lungs out.
Nuclear news – week to 31 July
Some bits of good news – Syrian refugees in Jordan empowered through heritage restoration work, employed by UNESCO. “A Thousand Colours” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qz4pLmi6tDY This new UNESCO-Khalili Foundation film “A Thousand Colours” aims to humanize the notion of cultural diversity. Why is cultural diversity important? What are some of the current challenges that undermine it? And what can we do to protect and promote cultural diversity? These are some of the questions addressed by the short film, which gathers testimonies from a number of key global actors including UNESCO Goodwill Ambassadors and advocates. Saving the world is cheaper than ruining it.
TOP STORIES
If Albanese’s such a buddy of Biden’s, why is Assange still in jail? Australia Agrees To Build US Missiles; US Dismisses Australian Concerns About Assange.
William Hartung, Cashing in on a Perpetual Nuclear Arms Race.
Why investing in new nuclear plants is bad for the climate. Small Modular Nuclear Reactors (SMRs) are supported by ideology alone.
Aboriginal Australians defeat nuclear dump,
Western media as cheerleaders for war.
Climate. ‘Era of global boiling has arrived,’ says UN chief . ‘Project 2025’: plan to dismantle US climate policy for next Republican president.
Nuclear. Militarism rules – not always nuclear-related, but pretty much so. I am currently feeling overwhelmed by the speed of my own country, Australia, in its hurtling rush to be a servant of the USA’s NUCLEAR-MILITARY-COMPLEX. No voice from the people – just a straightout government sellout.
Christina’s Notes. Jobs! jobs! jobs! – IN THE DEATH INDUSTRY. Aliens in outer space – a little sad on watching earthlings.
CIVIL LIBERTIES. AUSMIN and Assange: The Great Vassal Smackdown
ECONOMICS. Money talks: 109 global institutions restrict investments in nuclear weapons. There’s no such thing as a new nuclear golden age–just old industry hands trying to make a buck. Keeping contentious nuclear plant open could cost Californians $45B: report. As UK’s Hinkley nuclear plants costs rise to £32 billion ($41.5 billion) EDF Sees Higher Risk of Delays. Government must back Rolls-Royce on nuclear, says ex-boss Sir John Rose.
EDUCATION. University of New Mexico Course Expands Understanding of Nuclear Impact.
ENERGY. Oppenheimer and nuclear energy: Is India and the world moving away from this power source? Old Nuclear Weapons Sites Targeted for Clean Energy Projects.
ENVIRONMENT. Failed Fukushima System Should Cancel Wastewater Ocean Dumping.
HISTORY. St. Louis link in ‘Oppenheimer’ is latest reminder of city’s nuclear legacy. Oppenheimer sent ‘chilling message’ to Jawaharlal Nehru about US building a deadly weapon, ‘begged’ him not to give access to raw material available in India.
LEGAL. Key British Assange supporter says Wikileaks founder could cut deal to secure freedom.
MEDIA. Oppenheimer’s Long Shadow- Reads on the atomic bomb and its creator. Nauseating subservience of Australia’s media and politics to American militarism. Readers disgusted with pro militarism report on Australia getting a “missiles industry”. Australian media’s alarm over Chinese spy ship highlights stark double-standard.
NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY. To avoid nuclear instability, a moratorium on integrating AI into nuclear decision-making is urgently needed: The NPT PrepCom can serve as a springboard
OPPOSITION to NUCLEAR . 90 Seconds to Midnight – nuclear weapons are still a threat, not a lesson in history.
POLITICS.
- USA. More Warmongers Elevated In The Biden Administration. Massachusetts rejects Holtec’s request to discharge radioactive water from closed nuclear plant into bay. Past and Future Collide over Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant . No new nuclear facilities along vulnerable coasts, Alaska regulators say. Connecticut governor should veto bill funding unneeded nuclear.
- UK. UK govt to pour another £170million of taxpayers’ cash into planned Sizewell C nuclear plant: is it value for money? UK’s nuclear power ambitions for 2050 lack clear plan, say MPs. UK Government’s infrastructure advisors cast doubt over UK’s biggest energy projects including nuclear clearup. Now, not in 15 years’: Call for public vote on Theddlethorpe nuclear waste dump. Cumbria set for more nuclear reactors as questions are raised over why land isn’t being used for renewable energy.
POLITICS INTERNATIONAL and DIPLOMACY.
- Japan Doesn’t Want to Fight for Taiwan and Neither Do Other US Allies. Will the small states of Oceania be able to maintain their independence in the face of a new Sino-American Cold War?
- Russia prepared to seek diplomatic solution in Ukraine, NATO refuses to talk. The coming Russian-Polish war.
- Iran says ready to settle remaining dispute with IAEA over nuclear program. Rising Global Interest to Join Nuclear Damage Compensation Treaty.
SAFETY. The misguided push to weaken nuclear safety standards is gaining steam. The Global Crisis at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Site Demands Immediate United Nations Intervention. Will this experimental nuclear reactor escape federal scrutiny? Aware people in Suffolk are astonished that very few people or organisations are consulted about changes to Sizewell C Nuclear’s Emergency Plan.
SECRETS and LIES. UPDATE – The Zaporozhiya Nuclear Plant: Zelenskiy’s Next Simulacra? CIA-Linked Security Company Targeted Former Ecuador President Who Granted Assange Asylum.
SPACE. EXPLORATION, WEAPONS. NASA solving climate crisis by facilitating escape to Mars? Funny How The UFO Narrative Coincides With The Race To Weaponize Space. Legal action over dangerous crowding of satellites and debris in space. NASA is planning to use nuclear power for the first human trip to Mars. Military interest in nuclear-powered space travel, but solar-powered is just as good, -and safer.
WASTES. IAEA report on Fukushima waste-water is wrong – nuclear scientist. Not in our backyard: Securing a referendum over Canada’s plan for a nuclear waste dump. AUKUS nuclear dump deal decades in the making by nuclear evangelists with prescience.
WAR and CONFLICT. Overnight drone attack on Moscow injures one and temporarily closes an airport as Russia suffers ‘consequences’. US admits to pushing Ukraine into a fight it can’t win . Discarding Illusions, Ending Wars. Nuclear weapons on the table if Ukraine counteroffensive succeeds: Russia’s Medvedev. Ukrainian drone attack on Moscow is ‘international terrorism’ – Russia’s Foreign Ministry.
70 Years Later, The Korean War Must End. Washington’s looming war against China. The vanishing profession of preventing nuclear war.
WEAPONS and WEAPONS SALES. Trident nuclear project can’t be delivered, says watchdog. Bombs away: Confronting the deployment of nuclear weapons in non-nuclear weapon countries. Following the pattern of weapons to Ukraine, Pentagon to send $1billion of weapons to Taiwan . What would George Washington do? He would have audacity to end nuclear weapons.
TODAY. Pro nuclear spin – the perfect examples of deception in language and logic.
I did find, in the reporting of the finally-in-operation Vogtle nuclear power plant, a fine example of the nuclear lobby’s brilliant, but twisted and irrational, logic.
Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office director, Jigar Shah, was “optimistic and thinks Vogtle is a nuclear turning point, with a pivot toward smaller-scale projects that will be easier and cheaper to replicate.” “I also think it sets up the U.S. nuclear renaissance very well in small modular reactors,” “The beauty of the small modular reactor is it fits within that $2 [billion] to $4 billion price range,” Shah said.
(That’s the suggested price to build one smr). Upon completion, Vogtle Units 3 and 4 are expected to generate 17,200,000 megawatt-hours . The only Small Modular Reactor (SMR) to receive “design certification”, is the NuScale, which generates 77 megawatts electric (MWe). So – you’d need an awful lot of them to match the Vogtle output, – like over 20,000? At $2 – $4billion each – cost would be? NuScale does put 12 together, to make quite a big nuclear plant ( you’d still need quite a lot of these no-longer-small-plants) . I await some nuclear tech genius to enlighten me on how SMRs are going to produce electricity more cheaply.
But no matter – the logic is – large nuclear reactors produce expensive electricity: therefore small nuclear reactors will produce cheap electricity.
So – we don’t need to discuss other forms of electricity generation (like solar, for example)
Which brings me to another clever aspect of pro nuclear spin, – which is – you just ignore the bits that you don’t like, especially where there might be a comparison with non-nuclear technologies. This is done by concentrating on one aspect that might have popular appeal.
For example: the operating nuclear reactor emits almost no carbon emissions. That point, (excluding the total fuel-cycle) is the focus for claiming that nuclear is “clean” and “safe”. The focus on that claim leaves out altogether other aspects, like safety, security, long-lasting radioactive wastes, potential for nuclear/radioactive weapons, terrorism risks.
And then there’s language. The nuclear lobby used to dazzle us with science. And they still do, especially when the subject of ionising radiation comes up- a beaut collection of jargon words and initials- a confusion of “Intermediate Level” “Restricted Solid Wastes” “Class B Wastes” and many radiation terms.
But today – in this fast-changing world – repetitive, fast, meaningless words and phrases are the order of the day – game-changing, climate-change solution, clean, reliable, affordable, good-paying jobs, ………… most often quoted without any facts supplied to support them
The financial catastrophe that has been the Vogtle nuclear power project – is just another challenge/opportunity for the nuclear lobby. Like Fukushima, like Chernobyl, even like “Oppenheimer” – ’twill be another occasion for the nuclear spin-doctors and their loyal media to broadcast the coming success and benefits of new nuclear power.
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.
US rejects Australian plea to drop Assange case
29 July 23, https://www.rt.com/news/580512-blinken-rejects-assange-australia/
Secretary of State Antony Blinken insisted that the WikiLeaks founder caused “serious harm” to US national security
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has confirmed that Australia has raised the case of Julian Assange’s continued prosecution, but declared that Washington will not cease seeking the extradition of the former WikiLeaks boss and intends to try him for espionage.
Speaking alongside Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong in Brisbane on Saturday, Blinken said that while he understands “the concerns and views of Australians,” Assange’s alleged actions “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, and grave risk of detention.”
Assange, he said, was “charged with very serious criminal conduct” and had allegedly taken part in “one of the largest compromises of classified information in the history of our country.”
An Australian citizen, Julian Assange is currently being held in London’s Belmarsh Prison. He is fighting extradition to the US, where he faces 17 charges under the Espionage Act and potentially a 175-year prison sentence. Human-rights and press-freedom activists have demanded his release, citing his deteriorating mental and physical health, while Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in May that he was “working through diplomatic channels” to press the US into dropping the case.
The charges against Assange stem from his publication of classified material obtained by whistleblowers, including Pentagon documents detailing alleged US war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, and more than 250,000 diplomatic cables exposing US efforts to – among other things – spy on its allies and influence foreign elections.
While Assange did not personally steal these documents, he is nevertheless being prosecuted for espionage. He and his supporters argue that WikiLeaks’ publication of this material is protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
“We have made clear our view that Mr Assange’s case has dragged on for too long,” Foreign Minister Wong said on Saturday. “We’ve said that publicly and you would anticipate that that reflects also the position we articulate in private.”
The extradition of Assange from Britain to the US was approved in 2020 by then-UK Home Secretary Priti Patel. The publisher lodged his final appeal against the decision in June, after all eight grounds of a previous appeal were rejected by a British High Court judge.
Responding to Blinken’s comments on Saturday, Assange’s brother, Gabriel Shipton, said that it is now up to Prime Minister Albanese to make a public appeal for Assange’s freedom, during his upcoming visit to the US.
First new US nuclear reactor in 3 decades may well also be its last
“The only reason there’s a nuclear renaissance is because the federal government is throwing tens of billions of dollars at nuclear,” …….. “Investors aren’t interested.”
Opening of Georgia Power’s Vogtle unit 3 comes 7 years late and billions
of dollars over budget.
FT.com Myles McCormick in Houston, 31 July 2023
The US nuclear energy industry has reached a watershed moment. Plant Vogtle unit 3 began delivering commercial electricity to the Georgia power grid, becoming the first nuclear reactor the country has built from scratch in more than three decades.
Unit 3 and a twin reactor to open in the coming months may also be the last. Years of delays and billions of dollars of cost overruns have made the megaproject as much a cautionary tale as a new chapter for atomic investment.
The 1,100-megawatt Vogtle unit 3 was initially supposed to enter service in 2016, however. Its start of operations was delayed once more in June after the company discovered a degraded seal in its main generator.
“It turns out nuclear construction is hard,” said Bob Sherrier, a staff attorney at the Southern Environmental Law Center, which challenged the project in court.
“Along the way the company kept ratcheting up the cost estimates, pushing back the deadlines a bit at a time. Every time it was raised just enough where it was still within the bounds of justification that it made sense to proceed. But they were wildly off in their estimates every single time.”
“The resurgence of America’s nuclear industry starts here in Georgia, where you’ve just got approval, for the first time in three decades, to build new nuclear reactors,” then-US energy secretary Steven Chu said as Vogtle was authorised in 2012.
The Georgia project was supposed to be the first among dozens of new reactors built across the country. But the renaissance floundered amid safety concerns after the 2011 Fukushima disaster in Japan coupled with plunging prices for natural gas, a competing generation fuel. In the end only four reactors moved ahead and two, Vogtle units 3 and 4, have been built. Unit 4 is scheduled to come online by early 2024.
Soaring costs at Vogtle, along with new reactors at the VC Summer nuclear project in South Carolina, forced engineering contractor Westinghouse into bankruptcy in 2017. While South Carolina utilities pulled the plug on their project, Georgia ploughed ahead.
The $14bn original cost of Vogtle units 3 and 4 has now ballooned to more than $30bn. The cost for Georgia Power, with a 45 per cent share of the project, will be about $15bn.
How the company’s costs are shared with its customers will be decided by the commission once unit 4 is operating: the law allows only costs deemed “prudent” to be passed on to ratepayers.
McDonald said the company should not expect an easy ride. “They are guilty until they prove themselves innocent,” he said.
Georgia Power, a division of New York-listed Southern Company, did not respond to multiple requests for an interview.
……………………………………… there are no other traditional large-scale light water reactors under way in the US. Critics say that investors have been turned off.
“The only reason there’s a nuclear renaissance is because the federal government is throwing tens of billions of dollars at nuclear,” said David Schlissel at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. “Investors aren’t interested.”
For Georgians, the more immediate concern is what the project means for utility bills. Georgia Watch, a consumer group, estimates ratepayers have already paid $900 extra since construction began to cover financing costs. Bills are set to rise by another $3.78, or 3 per cent, on average when unit 3 comes online.
But the ultimate impact will not be felt until unit 4 comes online and the PSC decides how much of the burden will be left for ratepayers to shoulder. Georgia Watch estimates the final increase will add anywhere between 10-13 per cent to bills……………… https://www.ft.com/content/5d8e0c6c-59c9-4b40-806f-604889dd5fb6
Military interest in nuclear-powered space travel, but solar-powered is just as good, -and safer.
2 Government, Industry Explore Nuclear, Solar Space Engines
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado — More commercial and military activity is taking place in space, and the Defense Department and industry are investing in emerging propulsion technologies to move systems in orbit faster, farther and more efficiently.
……………………………………..In 2021, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency selected Lockheed Martin as one of three prime contractors — along with General Atomics and Blue Origin — for Phase 1 of its Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations, or DRACO, program to showcase the potential of a nuclear thermal propulsion system in space, a DARPA release said.
This January, NASA announced it had partnered with DARPA on the DRACO program, describing a nuclear thermal rocket engine as “an enabling capability for NASA crewed missions to Mars.” The goal is to demonstrate the system in orbit in fiscal year 2027, with the Space Force providing the launch vehicle for the DRACO mission, a DARPA statement said.
The program is about to enter Phase 2, which “will primarily involve building and testing on the non-nuclear components of the engine” such as valves, pumps, the nozzle and “a representative core without the nuclear materials in it,” DARPA’s program manager for DRACO Tabitha Dodson said during a panel discussion at the Space Foundation’s Space Symposium in April. Dodson said then a Phase 2 decision is “quite close.” However, at press time in mid-July, no contracts have been awarded.
…………………………………“There are no facilities on Earth that we could use for our DRACO reactor’s power test … so we’ve always baselined doing our power test for the reactor in space,” Dodson said. Once in space, DARPA will “very gradually” ramp up the system to “full power thrust,” she said…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Despite DARPA’s commitment to safety, nuclear propulsion systems face an uphill battle getting deployed on spacecraft at scale, said Joel Sercel, founder and CEO of TransAstra, a space technology company.
………………………………………………………………………………..In May, the Space Force awarded TransAstra a Phase One Small Business Innovation Research contract to explore new applications for the company’s propellant-agnostic Omnivore thruster.
The Omnivore thruster uses solar reflectors to focus sunlight onto a solar absorber, which then superheats the system’s propellant to generate thrust “typically six times faster and eight times cheaper than electric systems,” a company release said.
Additionally, TransAstra calculated an Omnivore thruster “using liquid hydrogen propellant … will perform similarly to nuclear rockets, but without nuclear materials, costs or risk.”
Sercel said Omnivore has “80 percent of the performance of nuclear at 1 percent of the cost.” The system is essentially nuclear powered, “but the nuclear reactor in question is the fusion reactor at the center of the solar system called the Sun,” he added.
“The nice thing about nuclear reactors is that you have a small, compact reactor versus large deployable solar reflectors, but the basic performance of solar thermal rockets and nuclear rockets is about the same,” he said. And with Omnivore “you don’t have all these safety concerns and radioactive material and reactor control issues and so on. So, we think it’s a much more practical approach.”
Omnivore could have multiple mission applications for the Defense Department, Sercel said. Using liquid hydrogen propellant, the thruster “can deliver hundreds of kilograms” of spacecraft to geosynchronous orbit “on small launch vehicles, and the Space Force seems to be very excited about this,” he said. The system could also deliver spacecraft weighing more than 100 kilograms to cislunar space, he said.
Additionally, TransAstra has an Omnivore variant that uses water as the propellant, the solar absorber superheating the water vapor and releasing the gas through a nozzle to generate thrust.
The water-based variant can be placed on the company’s Worker Bee small orbital transfer vehicles, about 25 of which can fit on a single Falcon 9 rocket, Sercel said.
“Each [Worker Bee] could deliver up to six small [satellites] to their orbital destinations. So, we can deliver a full constellation of 100 small or micro [satellites] to all different inclinations, and you would get global coverage in one launch.”…………………………………………………………more https://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/2023/7/31/government-industry-explore-nuclear-solar-space-engines
How the “Nuclear Renaissance” Robs and Roasts Our Earth
the average age of an operating U.S. reactor is now around 40. None are insured, despite assurances dating to the 1957 Price-Anderson Act that the reactor fleet would get private liability coverage by 1972.
the dangers escalate as the plants age. Meaningful estimates of the cost of a catastrophic accident are hard to come by, but after Chernobyl and Fukushima, the costs have soared into the trillions.
Nuclear power not only costs twice as much as wind and solar, it’s responsible for superheating our air and waterways.
By Harvey Wasserman , TRUTHOUT, July 31, 2023 https://truthout.org/articles/how-the-nuclear-renaissance-robs-and-roasts-our-earth/
Every day, as they burn with nuclear fission at some 571 degrees Fahrenheit, some 430 nuke reactors roast our Earth. They irradiate and superheat our air, rivers, lakes and oceans.
They also spew radioactive carbon, and emit more greenhouse gasses in the mining, milling, enrichment and fabrication processes that produce their fuel. Still more is emitted as they attempt to store their wastes.
Six big reactors and their fuel pools now threaten an apocalypse in Ukraine. Pleas for United Nations intervention are increasingly desperate.
But “nuclear renaissance” proponents say we need even more reactors to “combat climate change.”
However, these mythical new reactors have real costs — and for at least the next six years, they can produce nothing of positive commercial or ecological significance.
The primary reason there’s likely to be no new reactors in the U.S. until at least 2030 (if ever) is economic — the cost of construction is gargantuan.
Let’s consider eight recent major construction failures in Europe and the U.S.
Atomic plants were first constructed during the Manhattan Project that built the atomic bomb. Heralded as the “too cheap to meter” harbinger of an atomic age, the first commercial reactor came online at Shippingport, Pennsylvania, in 1958.
But in the coming decades, as reactor construction took off through the 1960s, ‘70s and into the ‘80s, the industry demonstrated an epic reverse learning curve, what Forbes called in 1985 “the largest managerial disaster in business history, a disaster on a monumental scale.”
At VC Summer Nuclear Station in South Carolina, after a decade of site work marred by faulty construction, substandard materials, bad planning, labor strife, and more, two reactors were abandoned outright in 2017, wasting $10 billion while bankrupting Westinghouse.
By comparison, the previous largest nuke-related bankruptcy, at the Washington Public Power Supply System in 1982, cost about four times less, at $2.5 billion. The biggest solar failure, at Solyndra in 2011, came with the loss of a $535 million government loan, about 15 times less than VC Summer.
In Georgia, two still-unfinished Vogtle reactors are some seven years late and $20 billion over budget, now at a staggering $35 billion plus.
In Hinkley, United Kingdom, two more reactors are also years late and could surpass $42 billion.
In Flamanville, France, a single reactor project begun in 2007 is still unfinished, years past its original promised completion date, and four times over its original cost estimate — with the price tag now beyond $14 billion.
Finland’s Olkiluoto has opened after 18 years of construction at around $12 billion in costs so far — three times the original promise.
All these reactor projects failed due to overly optimistic industry promises designed to attract investors, followed by poor execution, bad design, substandard components, labor strife, and more. Despite the industry hype, none of these eight reactors can ever compete with renewables, whose prices now range as low as a third to a quarter of nuclear — and are dropping.
With incalculable billions and a decade or more needed to build old-style big nuclear reactors, financial experts have long predicted that the necessary capital won’t be anywhere on the horizon.
Instead, the industry has been gouging state and local governments to keep the old reactors running, a desperate and dangerous toss of the dice.
Six billion dollars was pledged to nuclear energy plants in Biden’s infrastructure bill alone. A billion in federal dollars has been promised to keep California’s Diablo Canyon running, along with another billion from the state.
But the average age of an operating U.S. reactor is now around 40. None are insured, despite assurances dating to the 1957 Price-Anderson Act that the reactor fleet would get private liability coverage by 1972. Despite their immense inherent danger, only nominal company participation in a perfunctory insurance fund has been required for a license. Blanket coverage against a cataclysmic accident has not been a legal requirement to build or operate these reactors.
After six decades, reactor owners are still exempted from the costs of a catastrophic accident, and no nongovernmental insurance corporation has stepped in at an appropriate scale.
Yet the dangers escalate as the plants age. Meaningful estimates of the cost of a catastrophic accident are hard to come by, but after Chernobyl and Fukushima, the costs have soared into the trillions.
The oldest operating U.S. plant, at Nine Mile Point on Lake Huron, opened in 1969. Repeated near-disasters at Davis-Besse in Ohio include a hole eaten through a critical core component by boric acid that was missed because the owners refused to do required inspections. Monticello and Prairie Island in Minnesota threaten the entire Mississippi Valley. Critical intake pipes at South Texas recently froze, as its builders never anticipated the cold weather that hit it unexpectedly in 2021.
French and U.S. rivers are often too hot to cool reactor cores, forcing them to cut output or shut altogether.
Palo Verde in Arizona evaporates some 27,000 gallons of water per minute in a roasting desert. San Onofre in California was shut in 2012 because of leaking generators and now stores its high-level waste 100 feet from the ocean. Perry (Ohio) and North Anna (Virginia) have both been damaged by earthquakes.
Former Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) site inspector Michael Peck has warned that Diablo Canyon in California should be closed because of the danger posed by seismic activity. Just 45 miles from the San Andreas Fault, Diablo was on its way to an orderly shut-down when Gov. Gavin Newsom strong-armed the state legislature and Public Utilities Commission to keep the embrittled, under-maintained reactors open despite their ability to blanket the state in terminal radioactivity. The NRC ignored Peck’s warning and he’s now gone from the Commission.
Diablo’s owner, Pacific Gas & Electric, has a blemished record when it comes to public safety — it has admitted to more than 80 counts of felony manslaughter due to the 2018 wildfires in California.
In Ukraine, of six reactors at Zaporizhzhia, five are in cold shut-down while one lingers on to power the place. But six shaky fuel pools contain apocalyptic quantities of radiation. Power supplies are in doubt, vital cooling water is threatened by a sabotaged dam, military attacks are possible, and site workers maintain the plant in a state of terror.
Like Zaporizhzhya, any operating reactor or fuel pool would be devastating targets for military or non-state terrorist attacks. The 9/11 masterminds reportedly toyed with hitting the Indian Point power plant north of New York City, irradiating the northeast. Any of the 90-plus decayed uninsured U.S. nukes are potential Chernobyls or Fukushimas. Deep concerns have been expressed by United Nations inspectors and many others. A public petition now asks that UN peacekeepers take over the Zaporizhzhya site.
So, taken in sum, “nuclear power” to date is defined by catastrophic fiscal failure and public risk. No new plants are under construction and efforts to keep the current fleet operating are fraught with uninsured danger.
In straight-up financial terms, the peaceful atom’s “too cheap to meter” promises can never compete in real terms with renewables, which won’t melt, explode, release mass quantities of radiation or create atomic wastes.
Projections for thorium, fusion, and other futuristic reactors also remain technically and fiscally vaporous. The fusion facility at ITTR in France has already burned through $65 billion.
And a reactor burning at 100 million degrees is as likely to cool the planet as Edward Teller’s fusion superbombs.
Which leaves us with the much-hyped small modular reactors (SMRs), now wallowing in deep delay and soaring prices. SMRs are theoretical nukes designed to be far smaller than today’s 1,000+ megawatt reactors, to be mass produced and buried throughout the country. Only one SMR developer, NuScale, has gotten significant preliminary licensing approval. Cost and delivery projections from Bill Gates’s TerraPower, X-Energy, and other prospective manufacturers are theoretical, with little concrete data to back up when they might be deployed and at what prices.
Projected prices at NuScale have soared from $58/megawatt-hour in 2017 to $89 now, nearly double the range of wind and solar. By 2030, SMR prices are likely to be triple or more. A recent piece by former NRC Chair Allison MacFarlane eviscerated the technology’s potential with a devastating analysis, referring to it primarily as a means of attracting government hand-outs and “stupid money.”
But with no big U.S. reactors being built while SMRs drown in red ink and tape, the industry still burns and irradiates the planet with about 430 aging reactors worldwide and 92 ancient ones here in the U.S. And the odds of an apocalypse at one or more of those old reactors grow with each day they age.
The pitfalls include unsolved problems of reactor waste, deteriorating infrastructure, a fast-retiring workforce, a diminishing ability of the industry to deliver on its promises, a minimum five-year gap before any small reactors could come into significant commercial production, the forever threats of war and terrorism, the killing power of radiation, and much more.
Meanwhile, renewables have long since blown past both nukes and coal in jobs, price, safety, efficiency, reliability, speed to build, and more.
As nuclear investments dry up, offshore wind, rooftop solar, “agri-voltaic” farmland and advanced efficiency are booming.
A pending transition from lithium to sodium may soon transform the battery industry. For reasons of cost, ecological impacts and resistance to mines on Indigenous lands, lithium-based batteries face serious challenges.
But with cheaper, more widely available sodium at their core, battery technologies are poised for a near-term Great Leap. Should that happen soon, the current storage challenges of the green power revolution could all but disappear.
Thus, we face the ultimate test: Can our species replace these failed, lethal nukes with safe and just forms of green power — or will we let this latest atomic con fry us all?
UK has no coherent plan to develop nuclear energy
In a major report, the Science, Innovation and Technology Committee calls
on the Government to develop and publish a Nuclear Strategic Plan to turn
high level aspirations into concrete steps to deliver new nuclear. The
Committee says that the Government is right to look to nuclear power to
meet our future electricity needs and that this requires a substantial
programme of nuclear new build.
But the Report warns that the Government
target of 24 GW of nuclear generating capacity by 2050 and the aspiration
to deploy a new nuclear reactor every year are more of a ‘wish list’
than the comprehensive detailed and specific strategy that is required to
ensure such capacity is built.
The Government’s stated aim of 24 GW of
nuclear capacity is ambitious: it is almost double the highest installed
nuclear capacity the UK has ever achieved. It could involve new
gigawatt-scale nuclear power, small modular reactors (SMRs) and advanced
modular reactors (AMRs), and further development of nuclear fusion. It
would require substantial progress on technologies, financing, skills,
regulation, decommissioning and waste management.
Science, Innovation, Technology Committee 31st July 2023
Australian National Sovereignty and Economic Welfare in Peril? Feedback from the AUSMIN Meeting in Brisbane
Behind the scenes intrigues by defence chiefs and intel services through their media releases are a quite inadequate substitute for these democratic consultations.
Hopes of US co-operation in releasing Julian Assange who is languishing in Belmarsh Prison in London while awaiting extradition to the USA to face charges for breaches of the US Espionage Act were dashed at the recent AUSMIN Meeting.
July 30, 2023. by: The AIM Network, By Denis Bright
Decades ago – in 1951 – the ANZUS Pact promised ongoing consultations about strategic policies within the US Global Alliance. Now, from the elite surroundings of Queensland’s Government House in Brisbane, media statements from AUSMIN have taken everyone back to school days. Our elected leaders are now the principals in a frightening new age in which preparation for war is a key element in foreign and strategic policies (Joint Statement from AUSMIN 29 July 2023):
Minister for Foreign Affairs Penny Wong and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence Richard Marles hosted the U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III on 29 July in Brisbane to advance the Australia-U.S. Alliance and their cooperation in the Indo-Pacific and globally. Building on the high tempo of engagement between leaders and ministers, including the meeting between Prime Minister Albanese and President Biden in May 2023, the Ministers and Secretaries (the principals) determined that the Alliance has never been stronger. Based on a bond of shared values, it remains a partnership of strategic interest – premised on a common determination to preserve stability, prosperity, and peace.
For our visiting US Principals, it seems that peace will be delivered by exporting cluster bombs to extend the war in Europe.
National sovereignty is always imperiled by unnecessary secrecy like the Treaty of London (1915) which moved Italy from neutrality to becoming a participant in the Great War (1914-18) at the instigation of the British Government.
Extracts from the Treaty of London 1915
ARTICLE 2. On her part, Italy undertakes to use her entire resources for the purpose of waging war jointly with France, Great Britain, and Russia against all their enemies…………………………….
ARTICLE 16. The present arrangement shall be held secret.
It would have been better for Italy if a brave Julian Assange from the era told the Italian people about the secret strategic deals with Britain in 1915. Italy’s involvement in the Great War brought family tragedies, mass immigration, financial ruin and the rise of fascism in its wake.
The current militarization of the global economy by potential friend and foe alike will ultimately be ended by accidental conflict or economic recession from burnt out commitments and distortion of investment flows globally. Going too far by Australian leaders risks schism in the Labor Movement as in the Great War or tensions within the Labor Party during the Cold War in the 1950s and more recently when New Zealand withdrew from the ANZUS Pact over visits by naval vessels that were either nuclear powered or carrying nuclear weapons or both in the 1980s.
If there is a chink in the armour of public support for Australia’s defence commitments to the US Global Alliance, it lies in medium and long-term concerns about the costs of the AUKUS defence commitments which are apparent in the Lowy Institute’s 2023 Polling.
It would have been better for Italy if a brave Julian Assange from the era told the Italian people about the secret strategic deals with Britain in 1915. Italy’s involvement in the Great War brought family tragedies, mass immigration, financial ruin and the rise of fascism in its wake.
The current militarization of the global economy by potential friend and foe alike will ultimately be ended by accidental conflict or economic recession from burnt out commitments and distortion of investment flows globally. Going too far by Australian leaders risks schism in the Labor Movement as in the Great War or tensions within the Labor Party during the Cold War in the 1950s and more recently when New Zealand withdrew from the ANZUS Pact over visits by naval vessels that were either nuclear powered or carrying nuclear weapons or both in the 1980s.
If there is a chink in the armour of public support for Australia’s defence commitments to the US Global Alliance, it lies in medium and long-term concerns about the costs of the AUKUS defence commitments which are apparent in the Lowy Institute’s 2023 Polling.
The financial costs of the submarine deal is the real chink in favourable Australian public opinion towards more participation in the US Global Alliance.
Despite the outpouring of patriotic rhetoric at the launching event in Mobile, Alabama, Austal Limited Australia had not finalized its Australian taxation commitments from an annual revenue of $579.4 million in 2020-21 by 2 November 2022. The tax owing under review by the ATO was a paltry $28 million due to legalized tax minimization by the company’s accountants. Austal’s explanation of these processes is well covered in the 2022 Annual Report from Austal Australia which can easily be perused by interested readers.
Orders for AUKUS vessels and commitments to the QUAD Defence Arrangements will provide windfall revenue for the military and industrial complexes of Britain and the USA for a generation ahead until 2050. In the traditions of the original ANZUS Defence Alliance of 1951, our bipartisan strategic commitments were always consistent with adherence to the UN Charter and to open discussion of defence arrangements.
Behind the scenes intrigues by defence chiefs and intel services through their media releases are a quite inadequate substitute for these democratic consultations.
Hopes of US co-operation in releasing Julian Assange who is languishing in Belmarsh Prison in London while awaiting extradition to the USA to face charges for breaches of the US Espionage Act were dashed at the recent AUSMIN Meeting. Defence analyst Chelsea Manning who actually released the Pentagon documents to Julian Assange for publication had his charges commuted by President Obama in 2017.
These documents are largely in the public domain through sites like ChatGPT which can retrieve the gist of most items released but without adequate referencing by the AI robots at Opensystems in San Francisco. Readers can avail themselves of the resources of ChatGPT in the absence of full and frank media releases from Australian government strategic agencies.
Environmental risks of nuclear-powered ship visits to Australian ports also add to the policy dilemmas facing Australians.
It was the Morrison Government which welcomed the ageing French nuclear powered submarine to HMAS Sterling near Perth in late 2020 en route to naval manoeuvres near Guam and likely stealth operations in the South China Sea to test China’s maritime intelligence. Such manoeuvres in troubled waters are hazardous operations. This epic seven-month voyage to the Indo-Pacific Basin was well covered in this YouTube video.
The New York Times (31 March 1994) and other global media outlets of the nuclear accident involving the nuclear-powered submarine off Toulon. ChatGPT has a blind spot about the reporting of this incident from media monitoring:
Ten sailors died today in an accident aboard a French nuclear-propelled submarine that was taking part in naval exercises in the Mediterranean off Toulon, the Defense Ministry announced.
A ministry spokesman said that the Émeraude, a 2,400-ton Rubis-class attack submarine, did not carry nuclear missiles and that its 48-megawatt nuclear reactor was not damaged in the accident, which occurred when a burst pipe released high pressure steam into a turbine compartment.
“The steam is certainly not radioactive,” Rear Adm. Philippe Roy said at a news conference in the southern port city of Toulon this evening.
Hours after the accident, the navy recalled three other nuclear-propelled submarines — two from the Mediterranean and one from the Atlantic — pending an investigation. “We are recalling them because we are asking questions about what happened,” Admiral Roy said.
Since I covered this topic the WA State Police Minister’s Office has kindly provided details of protocols operating for the containment of accidents involving nuclear powered ship visits which possibly carry nuclear weapons under Don’t Ask Won’t Tell Protocols operating within the US Global Alliance……………………………………………………………………………….
Nuclear powered vessels from countries in the US Global Alliance have been visiting Australian ports since 1960. The details of these visits can be monitored on the web sites of the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency and the Departments of Defence itself in both Australian and the USA.
Specialist staff within DFAT will of course have access to some classified documents generated by the US Department of Defense and its related intel networks. To guard against the emergence of any new generation of Australians wishing to follow in the traditions of Chelsea Manning of Oklahoma, it is my understanding from personal communications from just one staff member on my reporting rounds for AIM Network that personal phones and communication systems are all monitored by local intel services and probably by overseas agencies as well.
Whilst ChatGPT is tightening up on the topics on which it is able to release information, it can still provide a wealth of anecdotal information to assist in the reporting of hearsay on strategic and intelligence matters. Reporters can work on this anecdotal information by perusing reliable documents in the public domain such as annual reports of companies within the global military industrial complexes.
Like the manufacturers of lethal weapons during the Great War, not all corporate data can be withheld from potential investors and curious members of the general public. Corporations here and overseas will make windfall profits from defence contracts. ChatGPT could offer these details of key defence companies operating in Australia:
- Thales Australia: Thales is a major defense contractor with operations in various sectors, including aerospace, defense, security, and transportation. They have a significant presence in Australia and are involved in projects such as armoured vehicles, naval systems, and communications.
- Austal: Austal is an Australian shipbuilding company known for designing and manufacturing high-speed aluminum vessels for defense and commercial purposes.
- BAE Systems Australia: BAE Systems is a global defense company with a significant presence in Australia, involved in areas such as maritime, aerospace, and land systems.
- Rheinmetall Defence Australia: Rheinmetall is a German defense company with operations in Australia, focusing on armored vehicles and defense technology.
- ASC (Australian Submarine Corporation): ASC is a government-owned company that specializes in submarine maintenance, sustainment, and upgrades.
US Companies operating in Australia who are likely to gain from international strategic tensions include:
- Lockheed Martin Australia: Lockheed Martin is a prominent U.S. defense contractor, and its Australian subsidiary, Lockheed Martin Australia, operates in the country. They are involved in various defense projects, including aerospace, cybersecurity, and naval systems.
- Boeing Defence Australia (BDA): Boeing, a major U.S. defense and aerospace company, has a subsidiary known as Boeing Defence Australia. BDA is actively engaged in providing defense products, services, and solutions in Australia, including aviation and intelligence systems.
- Northrop Grumman Australia: Northrop Grumman, another U.S. defense company, has a presence in Australia through its subsidiary Northrop Grumman Australia. They focus on delivering advanced defense and security technologies and systems.
- General Dynamics Land Systems – Australia (GDLS-A): General Dynamics is a U.S. defense contractor, and its Australian subsidiary GDLS-A is involved in the design, engineering, and support of military land systems.
- Raytheon Australia: Raytheon, a major U.S. defense and technology company, has a presence in Australia through its subsidiary Raytheon Australia. They are active in areas such as defense systems, cybersecurity, and intelligence.
Inquisitive readers can easily check which prominent Australian family is a big shareholder in Austal Limited which manufactured the USS Canberra in Mobile, Alabama prior to its commissioning in Sydney on 22 July 2023. With so many millions to spare, this family is a prominent investor in the Ukrainian Development Fund with just a small holding of US $500 million.
More than a century ago during the Great War (1914-18) peace initiatives were by-passed because both sides of the conflict in Europe hope for strategic advantages from continuing the fighting. These peace initiatives involved the Vatican under Pope Benedict XV and ultimately diplomatic engagement between the warring parties in 1916-17.
More than a century later, Pope Francis has authorized his peace envoy in Cardinal Matteo Zuppi of Bologna to visit Washington, Kiev, Moscow and Beijing to sound out the possibilities for an end to the current conflicts with colleagues from the Vatican secretariat of state. As in the Great War, initial efforts are on behalf of the civilian victims of warfare. These efforts became mainstream in the Great War as noted by Philip Zelikow in his book for the US Woodrow Wilson Institute.
he Road Less Travelled: The Secret Battle to End the Great War, 1916-1917
For more than five months, from August 1916 to the end of January 1917, leaders from the United States, Britain, and Germany held secret peace negotiations in an attempt to end the Great War. They did so far out of public sight – one reason why their effort, which came astonishingly close to ending the war and saving millions of lives, is little understood today. In The Road Less Travelled.
As Australia is not a current non-permanent member of the UN Security Council, our immediate efforts for some token welfare support for the victims of war can be made through the efforts of NZ’s UN Ambassador Carolyn Schwalger (NZ Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade). NZ is still officially outside the US Global Alliance but is kept well in the loop by the Australian Government.
Supporting governments which are involved in the use of cluster bombs to counter Russian aggression against Ukraine is dramatically at odds with the values of the broader Labor Movement and this opposition should be taken up by delegates from the progressive wings of the Labor Party within the National Conference. Supporters of lobbyists from the commercial military industrial complexes across the US Global Alliance have no affinity with Labor Values and should be exposed by committed delegates who believe in peace and disarmament.
https://theaimn.com/australian-national-sovereignty-and-economic-welfare-in-peril-feedback-from-the-ausmin-meeting-in-brisbane/more https://theaimn.com/australian-national-sovereignty-and-economic-welfare-in-peril-feedback-from-the-ausmin-meeting-in-brisbane/
US military presence in Australia unprecedented since WWII
The central question now is whether the US build-up is transforming Australia into a base for offensive US operations into Asia.
James Curran, Finsncial Review, International Editor, Jul 30, 2023
The AUSMIN talks over the weekend continued a trend since the late 1990s of tying Australia more tightly into both American grand strategy and war planning in Asia.
The permanent American military presence on Australian soil is now at a scale unprecedented since the Second World War………… (Subscribers only) https://www.afr.com//policy/foreign-affairs/us-military-presence-in-australia-unprecedented-since-wwii-20230730-p5dse8?btis
1 This month
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/235274195556
20 May – Webinar – The dangerous world of AUKUS, US, military occupation and suppression of dissent
National Webinar, 20th May, 2026, 6.30pm AEST. Confronting laws restricting/suppressing protest speech and action
Speakers: Former Sen. Rex Patrick, Lawyer Nick Hanna ,Arthur Rorris ,Jorgen Doyle, Sen David Shoebbridge,
Facilitator Kelley Tranter.
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 