Australia is no longer a middle, nor moral, power although its political leaders think Australia is both. When did Australia lose its morality, and along with that loss, its status as a respected middle power? Continue reading »
AUKUS
Grassroots anti-AUKUS campaign, Labor Against War, has called on the federal Labor government to reveal the secret political undertakings it has said it has made to the US government as a condition for the continued pursuit of nuclear-powered submarines. Labor Against War national convenor Marcus Strom said: “ALP members are horrified that the Albanese government has made Continue reading »
The significance of US strategic bomber deployments:Defence Minister Richard Marles played down revelations in late 2022 that up to six US B-52 strategic bombers are to be forward-deployed to Tindal Air Force Base, telling reporters at the time that ‘everyone needs to take a deep breath here.’ Marles implied that there was nothing new about Continue reading »
A monumental transformation: There has been a great deal of public criticism of Australia’s decision to acquire a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines (SSNs) via the AUKUS security partnership. The criticism has been both broad and deep, spanning political and industrial challenges, budgetary consequences, safety and environmental concerns, strategic risks, and the erosion of national sovereignty. Continue reading »
In a world of simultaneous military and environmental crises our capacity to finance both has become unsustainable. Globally, military expenditure over the past decade has been rising at double that of GDP reaching an all-time high of $2.4 trillion in 2023. Continue reading »
The AUKUS agreement is controversial. It covers advanced military technologies whose future is contested by experts. There is also a vigorous discussion over whether the agreement has compromised Australia’s autonomy on strategic policy making and implementation. Yet this latter debate completely misses why AUKUS is at risk of failure. AUKUS’ “Tier One” objective is to Continue reading »
Successive Australian governments have allowed the United States to carry out a program of militarisation in Western Australia which has made it a vital U.S war-fighting base and thus an inevitable target for retaliatory strikes should hostilities commence, for example between the U.S and China. Continue reading »
Look at how favourably situated Australia is in the world. As the foundations were put in place for the Asian Century, most profoundly by China, Australia was in the right place at the right time and it benefitted inordinately. Looking forward, as the rise of China continues and a range of Asian countries, including India, Continue reading »
Richard Marles and his mate, the US defence secretary, are beginning to wilt under the weight of sustained comment in Australia critical of the AUKUS arrangement. Marles, unable to sustain a cogent argument himself, has his US friend propping him up in London to throw a 10,000-mile punch at me – and as usual, failing Continue reading »
Could the Alexander Downer who accuses me and Paul Keating of appeasement possibly be the same Alexander Downer who recently wrote in The Australian that if he had a vote in the US Presidential election it would be for Donald Trump? The same Donald Trump whose willingness to accommodate Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine makes Continue reading »