The ‘your atrocity is worse than my atrocity’ argument at the core of Richard Cribb’s response to Richard Culllen over Japan needs to be handled with care. Japan’s apologists can and do point to the very civilised treatment of Russian and German prisoners in the China wars at the beginning of the last century. They Continue reading »
Defence and Security
The Force Posture Agreement (FPA) clearly removes Australian sovereignty over what weapons may be launched or fired from this country by US Armed Forces. Even though the fiction is being peddled that this will occur at “Australian facilities”, the stark reality is that they are US bases under US control. Following the timely open letter Continue reading »
I hope this article will turn out to be a short communication because my hand trembles with indignation as I write. I refer to the article “Why history does not disqualify Japan as an ally: a reply to Richard Cullen” by Robert Cribb Feb 21, 2023. In his refutation of Richard Cullen’s contribution, he made the Continue reading »
The world was a very dangerous place in the late 1960s. It is again. This time the danger is in Asia as well as Europe, as highlighted by John Lyons’s recent two-part series on the ABC. The difference is key leaders in the late 1960’s acted to reduce the risks. The US and the USSR Continue reading »
Greg Sheridan, in his opinion piece of Tuesday 21 February, provides yet another display of his spiteful, vacuous journalism – his erroneous claims that I am not the progenitor of the APEC Leaders’ Meeting, and that my views on Australian strategic policy are eccentric and at odds with the US alliance. PJ Keating reply to Continue reading »
Many government reviews or reports are leaked in part for reasons of bureaucratic politics and the Defence Strategic Review (DSR) is no exception. Given the probability that these emanations are accurate, two reactions are also highly likely. The first is that knowledgeable and engaged citizens are likely to suffer from hypoxia in the realisation that Continue reading »
Reacting to China’s announcement that it will be putting forward a proposal for a political settlement to end the war in Ukraine, the US ambassador to the United Nations said that if China begins arming Russia in that conflict this will be a “red line” for the United States. “We welcome the Chinese announcement that they Continue reading »
It is absolutely essential that society inquiries into the fate of Australia’s war veterans. There are many reasons for our failure to rehabilitate veterans successfully, but unless we confront the nature of military activity, such investigations will remain superficial. There are several problems about repatriation and rehabilitation of military personnel. The first is that Australia Continue reading »
Prudent nations would do well to prepare for peace even in the midst of an armed conflict. As we approach the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion this month, the Ukraine war remains the world’s dominant geopolitical conflict. The big-picture structural issue is the post-Cold War order in Europe and the place of a shrunken and Continue reading »
Australians could wake up one morning to the news that we are at war with China. Confronting as that would be, perhaps more confronting is something many people do not realise: such a decision would not require any consultation in parliament. The decision to go to war would not require a public discussion. It would Continue reading »