When Marshall Green, a very senior official in the State Department, was appointed as Ambassador to Australia in early 1973, President Nixon’s briefing regarding the relationship with Whitlam was succinct and on point: “Marshall, I can’t stand that cunt”. Green later reflected this was “a strange kind of parting instruction to get from your president”. Continue reading »
Defence and Security
Over the last few weeks we have been bombarded with a number of assertions, advanced firstly as mere mantra, but then appearing as axioms, or self-evident truths. Israel has a right to defend itself; and Israel has a right to exist. I wish to question whether these two statements are as axiomatic as our Prime Continue reading »
The Independent and Peaceful Australia Network (IPAN) has produced a petition opposing the Force Posture Agreement which is enabling US militarisation of Australia in preparation for the US to support/launch war from the Australian continent against China. The e-petition to parliament is an instrument for peace calling for the termination of the Force Posture Agreement. Continue reading »
Australian sovereignty should have been something of a pub joke prior to AUKUS. After it, it has become a dead letter. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s sole purpose during his visit to Washington is to be the country’s uncritical undertaker, ensuring that remains of independence are buried, even as the minerals are extracted. Visiting a Continue reading »
Prime Minister: You may wish to draw on the following in your meetings with President Biden, Vice-President Harris, Secretary of State Blinken, and Secretary of Defence Austin. Remind the President of your name, and how to pronounce it, and remind him again before the State Dinner. Find out if the US remains committed to AUKUS, Continue reading »
Our human world is becoming an increasingly dangerous place. Quite apart from what is happening between Gaza and Israel, and in the war between Russia and Ukraine, we are currently living with a series of human-made catastrophic threats that are coming together to threaten the very existence of our own human species. All of these Continue reading »
The news that Ukraine has begun to use US-supplied long range ATACMS missiles against Russian forces has been overshadowed by the Palestine-Israel crisis, but it is an escalation that has profoundly dangerous implications. To understand why this is so we must situate it within the historical development of US strategy since the collapse of the Continue reading »
Behind all this lies Israeli arrogance; the idea that we can do whatever we like, that we’ll never pay the price and be punished for it. We’ll carry on undisturbed. We’ll arrest, kill, harass, dispossess and protect the settlers busy with their pogroms. We’ll visit Joseph’s Tomb, Othniel’s Tomb and Joshua’s Altar in the Palestinian Continue reading »
“Where is the outrage we saw when Israeli children were killed?” asked a co-founder of IfNotNow. Israel’s retaliatory airstrikes across the Gaza Strip after Hamas’ weekend attack have killed at least 1,100 people in the besieged enclave, including 326 children, the Palestinian Ministry of Health said Wednesday. Gaza-based Hamas launched a major surprise attack against Israel on Continue reading »
Palestinians have long warned that Israel’s blockade and repeated aggressions would eventually lead to an explosion. But few of us in Gaza expected this. More than five days have passed since Hamas broke out of its Gaza cage, launching an unprecedented attack that caught the Israeli army completely off guard. The infiltration of Palestinian militants Continue reading »