Writer
Alison Broinowski
Dr Alison Broinowski AM is a former diplomat, author and academic. She is President of Australians for War Powers Reform.
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Pearls and Irritations is required reading for all who mistrust the party line.
But it needs your financial support to survive and grow. With the mainstream media handcuffed to the firewall, our governments self-censored by ‘freedom’ of information, and the national interest ignoring the public interest, Australians need an online opinion site that’s free, accessible, informative, uninhibited, and quick to read. Continue reading »
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Why is Australia so scared?
The world has just spent two decades paralysed by fear. Ever since 11 September 2001, the ‘war on terror’ has changed the lives of most people for the worse. Millions have been killed, either by terrorists or by militarists fighting them. Fearing violence, many people have fled their homelands as refugees. Others have absorbed repeated Continue reading »
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A long war against China?
The recent visit to China by US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken seemed promising, until we learned what he really had in mind: a long war with no finish line. Continue reading »
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AUKUS and the division of Labor
Delegates at Labor’s National Conference in August will have to pay more attention than usual to foreign and defence policy. Dissent on AUKUS is spreading, while Palestine is a promise to keep. Continue reading »
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War crimes? Don’t forget Jeju
Admitting guilt for war crimes doesn’t come easily to many nations, as Australia knows from our extended investigations of the activities of some ADF soldiers in Afghanistan more than a decade ago. Continue reading »
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Australia catching up with the Asian century at last?
Every word of Anthony Albanese’s address to the Shangri-La dialogue on 2 June was chosen with care. It was a balancing act, with the Prime Minister poised between peace and war, defence and diplomacy, the US and China, in a high-wire performance his Coalition predecessors wouldn’t have attempted. Continue reading »
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Shirtfronting Australia
Australians are more used to pointing the accusing finger at other countries than having it pointed at us. Continue reading »
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Limits, damned lies, and perception management
At a reconstruction site in Mariupol during President Putin’s visit in March, a woman cried from the back of the crowd, ‘It’s all lies’. Her comment was later taken down from social media, though it wasn’t clear who did that, nor whose lies she meant. Continue reading »
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Safe travels in no-go zones
The countries where it’s not safe for Australians to travel have multiplied, but not because of COVID. They include the places where we fought the war on terror. Continue reading »
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Australia prepares legal case for war over ‘non-sovereign nation’ Taiwan
Australia is inventing an unheard-of way to go to war at the invitation of a ‘non-sovereign nation’ – an obvious reference to Taiwan. The Government’s intent seems to be to have it ready for the conflict with China that US Generals keep telling us is coming. Continue reading »
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A boom-gate falls across the highway to reform
Reform has its limits. Even as the Labor Government makes good several of its promised changes in economic and social policy, the boom-gate has dropped on defence and foreign affairs. Continue reading »
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Out of touch, out of date, or out of their minds?
Our foremost practitioner of the quick and deadly put-down, Paul Keating, copped plenty of blowback after his National Press Club performance on 15 March. Continue reading »
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Here we stand: Twenty years after our first war of aggression
HERE WE STAND: We are standing here, as people were in Melbourne yesterday, to recall one of Australia’s worst days: the start of our first war of aggression. Continue reading »
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What our media don’t tell us: Has the D-Notice returned?
Many Australians have turned to non-mainstream sources of news. They are often more reliable, and cheaper. Without them, the Nordstream pipeline sabotage of September 2022 would still be unexplained. Continue reading »
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Don’t ask the government about the next war
This is war protest month, with more to follow. Will efforts against the Iraq war, that failed twenty years ago this week, succeed in heading off the next one? Continue reading »
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Wong surrenders to Canberra hawks, rejects war powers reform
Australia’s Foreign Minister, who advocates international law and better relations with Asian countries, has surrendered to the hawks in Canberra. Continue reading »
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Australia’s ‘optimal pathway’ on AUKUS
Just in time, the fundamental faults of AUKUS are being exposed in Canberra and Washington. Continue reading »
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Expect epiphanies on Australian defence policy this March
In 2023, announcements from Canberra on foreign affairs, defence, and trade will come thick and fast. They can be expected to be regressive, in contrast to the Albanese government’s positive domestic agenda. Continue reading »
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Enough is enough for Albanese on Assange: our allies may respect us if we say this more
The Prime Minister’s surprise revelation that he has raised the case against Julian Assange with US officials and urged that charges of espionage and conspiracy be dropped opens up many questions. Continue reading »
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2022: Democracy takes a gap year, US hegemony is over
Nations holding their breath for democracy may suffocate. If the US is still the leader of the free world, its followers are dwindling, as several summits in November will show. Continue reading »
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Familiar and surreptitious ways to war
We have recently learned that Scott Morrison and Peter Dutton secretly installed senior US military officers in Australia’s Defence Department, at taxpayers’ vast expense, and it appears that the present Government is complicit in perpetuating this arrangement. Continue reading »
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Ukraine military instructor decision echoes the lead up to Australia’s deployment in Vietnam
It would be no great surprise if Australians were to join British military instructors in training Ukrainians to fight. Defence Minister Richard Marles hinted at that when he visited the UK in September. The Australian personnel would join others from New Zealand, Sweden, the Netherlands and elsewhere who have been supporting Ukraine’s side in the Continue reading »
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A decade in the making, an inquiry into how Australia goes to war
After years of public efforts to get politicians to concentrate on changing how Australia goes to war, the Albanese government has now responded by taking the first step. Continue reading »
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The Defence Strategic Review: National strategy or weapons shopping list?
Governments don’t hold inquiries to get unwelcome answers. The Defence Strategic Review is no exception. So what does the Albanese government want it to achieve? Continue reading »
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Trust in the powers that be
Remember the Cold War I years, when Capital Hill in Canberra became a huge hole, at the bottom of which was a space designated as a bomb shelter? Continue reading »
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Truth, lies, and pandemics
Are we being lied to about the origins of the pandemic? Continue reading »
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Independence day postponed, again
If Australians thought a new government would independently seek better relations with our regional neighbours, the Albanese team is already giving us reasons to be disappointed. Continue reading »
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Subcontracting war
In the year since last July, the Morrison Government spent almost $3.8 billion on consultancies. This paid to the big end of consulting town for more than 8400 contracts with Accenture, Deloitte, Ernst & Young, KPMG and PwC. Other consultancies are small but aspirational, often run by recently retired public servants. Where is the accountability, Continue reading »
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The US / China blame-game
All wars are avoidable, not just the war in Ukraine, but a future war with China too. Most of Australia’s wars have been unnecessary, as historian Henry Reynolds has shown. A war with China would be both: avoidable and unnecessary. It would be more catastrophic for Australia than any we have fought. Continue reading »
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New voices for a new parliament
At first, the 2022 election looked like being another fake contest between two major parties which offered voters little new, and little choice, particularly on foreign affairs and defence. Continue reading »
