For the last few Februaries the Director-General of the ASIO, Mr Mike Burgess, has delivered an “annual threat assessment” by way of a speech to as many worthies as he can gather before him. He’s no doubt got the 2024 edition well in the works and invitations to the event in the post. Potential invitees should brace themselves by building up their reserves of patience because if he’s true to form Burgess will test them to their limit. (more…)
Category: Defence
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‘A frightening precedent’: New Zealand to send military personnel to target Houthis
Bombing one of the most impoverished nations on Earth over its sea blockade to stop genocide in Gaza reflects Kiwi values, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says. (more…)
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We’re being sold a false choice on war
Australia has just taken another step, as part of the AUKUS agreement with the US and the UK, that is leading us towards an event that should be unthinkable – involvement in a major war against China. (more…)
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Russia-Ukraine and a Chinese fear of aggressive Western containment
Ukraine is now being urged to make 2024 a year of consolidation of abilities before launching a new offensive in 2025. But the reality is that Ukraine will NOT force Russia out of its territory, and its time to draw some lessons in regard to the West’s aggressive policies toward China. (more…)
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US military pays $300M to divert Australian communication cable through Diego-Garcia
The US military paid $300 million to divert an Australian undersea communication cable to Oman through Diego-Garcia, writes Phil Miller, as facilities at a UK GCHQ surveillance station in the Middle Eastern country have been upgraded ahead of a potentially devastating new war with Iran over Israel. (more…)
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The Biden administration’s absurd justification for its Yemen war
On Monday the US launched its eighth wave of airstrikes in its new war against Yemeni forces, which it has now formally titled “Operation Poseidon Archer”. The strikes are aimed at breaking a Red Sea shipping blockade which the de facto authorities in Yemen have implemented to pressure Israel and its allies into ceasing the genocidal onslaught in Gaza. (more…)
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The Western club- with its own morals, rules and rewards
Last week the French government joined the German government in claiming that the Genocide Convention does not apply to Israel. Because the convention was created in response to the Shoah, Israel should have legal immunity for any war crimes it commits, including the genocide which it is currently conducting against Palestinians in Gaza. (more…)
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The four horsemen of Gaza’s apocalypse
Joe Biden relies on advisors who view the world through the prism of the West’s civilising mission to the “lesser breeds” of the earth to formulate his policies towards Israel and the Middle East. (more…)
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Australians at risk if they serve in the IDF
Australian citizens are at risk of being prosecuted under Australian law if they commit, or are complicit in crimes being perpetrated by the Israeli Defence Forces in Gaza. (more…)
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Australia: A ‘rogue state’?
To initiate a war of aggression has been described as the supreme international crime. If a regional war breaks out in the Middle East, triggered by the illegal recent strikes by the USA and UK against the Houthis, Australia could well be complicit in the commission of the supreme international crime. (more…)
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Will 2024 be the year to rein in the military-industrial complex, the biggest threat to global peace?
The complex, a key part of US political economy, fuels geopolitical tensions and enables countries and private actors to push for and capitalise on conflict. It’s time for societies to make concerted efforts to rein it in and build a movement to educate the world about the grave threat it poses to civilisation. (more…)
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We are being groomed for war with China
Orchestrated components are coming together to enable the US to recruit Australia in future wars of choice. Our media must begin to ask questions about the crude but successful ways the Australian people are being groomed to provide passive or enthusiastic consent. (more…)
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Malcolm Fraser would have agreed with Paul Keating on AUKUS
Like so many Australians, I am very worried by our commitment to AUKUS. I agree strongly with many other critics that we have been placed in peril by our government’s submarine agreement with the US and the UK. (more…)
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The future will be decided by economic influence, not military dominance
America is falling into a trap. It thinks the future will be decided by military dominance, despite losing one war after another. China, on the other hand, recognises that the future will be decided by economics. (A repost from October 2023). (more…)
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AUKUS and US militarisation a concern for NZ sovereignty
As the New Zealand coalition government backs closer alignment with US geo-strategic interests, critics warn of instability and loss of sovereignty in a region militarisation is dividing. (more…)
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Dutton’s border protection rhetoric is nothing like his border protection record
Peter Dutton’s border protection rhetoric has contributed to a remarkable improvement in the Coalition’s public polling. He will ride that rhetoric to the next Election. (more…)
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The musician and the soldier: Two revolutionary lives
A frontline medic writes of two individuals she met in Kayah State, whose stories exemplify the diverse ways Myanmar’s youth are contributing to, and sacrificing for, the revolution. (more…)
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The Sheraton incident and John Ryan: ASIS Cold War Warrior
John Edmund Ryan, OBE was a former soldier, career diplomat and acting director of the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS). He entered Australian folklore on 30 November 1983 when an ASIS team raided Melbourne’s Sheraton Hotel, during a training exercise. The subsequent political controversy engulfed the federal labor government and it claimed Ryan’s career, with his early retirement. This is an extracted related obituary, forty years after the raid. (more…)
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Colonies of the US empire: Will the Cocos Islands become the new Diego Garcia?
The 2000 residents of Diego Garcia were forcibly removed to make way for a giant US military base. Will the same happen to the Australian residents on the Cocos Islands that lies south of Sumatra in the Indian ocean? (more…)
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AUKUS submarine revelations compel a rethink
US Congressional report argues that Australia’s acquisition of nuclear submarines would actually undercut deterrence of China by depleting the US submarine fleet. With the promise of nuclear submarines becoming ever distant, it may be time to reconsider other options. (more…)
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War with China: Babbling incoherence and missing evidence
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 is the product.
Whatever China does, regardless of its context, is automatically rendered an indication of a currently hostile mindset and, quite likely, future aggression.
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Australia’s role in the bombing of Gaza
Being part of the global supply network that supplies parts for the Israeli F-35 jet fighters used over Gaza implicates Australia in their alleged war crimes. (more…)
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The right to violent resistance and a false Western morality
If I had lived under a siege all my life in a tiny open air prison camp – if I had no hope for the future – I too might be tempted to violently resist a brutal, unrelenting and illegal occupation, which is my right under international law. (more…)
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When is genocide ever balanced?
‘Balance’ between supporters of Israel and of the Palestinians is what most police and State governments in Australia say they seek. So does the ABC. But what’s happening in Gaza isn’t balanced: it is asymmetric warfare. (more…)
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The most successful military raid of this century: the October 7 Hamas assault on Israel
There is a truism that I often cite when discussing the various analytical approaches to assessing the wide variety of geopolitical problems facing the world today—you can’t solve a problem unless you first properly define it. The gist of the argument is quite simple—any solution which has nothing to do with the problem involved is, literally, no solution at all. (more…)
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McBride Trial: Defeat — ‘It looks like I’m going to jail’
Judge rules that he will instruct the jury that there is no aspect of duty that allows the accused to act in the public interest contrary to a lawful military order, reports Joe Lauria. (more…)
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Remembrance Day through the lens of Gaza and Ukraine
This Remembrance Day, the great juggernaut of war is crushing thousands. In Gaza and the Ukraine. In that context, we may reflect today on Australia’s role in the Great War. (more…)
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Albanese, Xi meet in the shadow of the Australia-China-US triangle
As Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visited Beijing in an attempt to improve relations, Elena Collinson warned that untangling Australia- China relations from China- U.S. relations would be difficult. Indeed, Australia–China relations remain deeply troubled. Because the dynamics and dangers in the relationship are still the same, it is worth revisiting a piece I wrote last year for Pearls and Irritations. (more…)
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Stress testing the US alliance: Whitlam and the secrets of Pine Gap. Part 2
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”. (more…)
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Israel does not have the right to ‘defend itself’
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 Minister and our Foreign Minister apparently assume. (more…)