Henry Kissinger’s death draws to a close the epoch of intellectualism in foreign policy to which he was committed following his early study of and belief in a system of organised strategic balance and restraint of the kind that emerged from the Treaty of Westphalia in the 17th century. I first met Henry Kissinger in Continue reading »
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In a lead article last week in The Sydney Morning Herald the political and international editor Peter Hartcher declared that Australia was ’connected to three wars’, but only one of them would be measured in decades. He was referring to the conflict in Gaza and the war in Ukraine both of which ‘affect Australia’s security’. Continue reading »
With the expansion of all services of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) – no matter that it is consistent with a defensive posture – China’s every strategic move now is rendered totally unacceptable after passing through a prism designed and issued on a complementary basis by the US. Hyper-suspicion is the attitude and threat inflation Continue reading »
After a succession of record-breaking months of record heat including 1.8°C in September, global warming for 2023 as a whole will likely tip 1.5°C, with 2024 even hotter as the effect of the building El Nino is felt more fully. Already hundreds of thousands have died and millions displaced, primarily in countries least responsible for Continue reading »
What a feast of anti-China stories we have had again from the Coalition and our media over the incident between HMAS Toowoomba and a Chinese PLA-N destroyer. The whole issue really looks to be overblown – and seeded by some in the Sinophobia school who are worried about where Prime Minister Albanese and Foreign Minister Penny Continue reading »
Israel’s membership of the United Nations was approved in 1949. Unlike other states, it was approved conditionally upon Israel complying with Partition Resolution 181 as to the limits of the Israeli State, and UN Resolution 194, allowing the return of refugees. Israel has complied with neither condition. It refuses to define its borders and is Continue reading »
At the very bottom of a new index ranking 74 countries adhering to the UN Charter is the United States, with Israel being the second from the bottom. Both countries are frequently at odds with the UN multilateral system. The US needs to recognise that the UN system, operating under the UN Charter, is the Continue reading »
I was wondering what was taking prominent Christian Zionists so long to visit Israel. And then I saw him…Scott Morrison landing with the arrogance of someone totally convinced he’s betting on the winning horse. Morrison has never shied away from his Christian Zionist beliefs, and nor should he…in private. But when he had the power…in Continue reading »
Mandatory immigration detention is a policy that has caused indiscriminate harm, including death, and permanent incapacity. It has been rightly described as our national shame. On Wednesday November 8, the High Court of Australia found indefinite immigration detention constitutes punishment, making the relevant legislation unconstitutional. Led by Chief Justice Gageler, with freshly invested Justice Beech Continue reading »
At the core of the cycle of violence in Israel and Palestine is “the studied blindness of two people to see the other, to accept that they have a legitimate place on the landscape”. Without such acceptance, this horrific war in Gaza will not be the last. We cannot know when and how the Israeli-Hamas Continue reading »