Writer
Richard Broinowski
Richard Broinowski is a former diplomat. He was also manager of Radio Australia. After retirement he was an adjunct professor at University of Sydney in media studies. He has written four books, and is bringing a fifth out this year (2020), on the life and times of Melbourne book seller Edward William Cole.
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RICHARD BROINOWSKI. Matching Colonial Wars
The record of British colonial history proves that what occurred to Aboriginal Australian communities at the hands of white settlers and British military forces was not a unique event. The same thing occurred with as much inhumanity and ferocity in other parts of the Empire, notably in South Africa against the Khoi, the Xhosa and Continue reading »
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RICHARD BROINOWSKI. Still demonizing North Korea
Following recent North Korean missile tests and American declarations that they have run out of ‘strategic patience’, the Western media and the governments they serve, are busily repeating time-honoured myths about North Korea.  Continue reading »
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RICHARD BROINOWSKI. Series. We can say ‘no’ to the Americans
How Bill Hayden stood up to the Americans on Vietnam. Continue reading »
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RICHARD BROINOWSKI. The Battle of Long Tan turns Fifty
Some excitement was generated in the Australian press around 15 August when it was reported that the 50th anniversary of the Battle of Long Tan would be commemorated by Australians at the site of the battle at a rubber plantation in Phuoc Tuy Province. So it was – by a small and subdued Continue reading »
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RICHARD BROINOWSKI. Merchants of Death – the Weapons Trade
According to Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick in The Untold History of the United States (2012), North Dakota Senator Gerald Nye persuaded the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 1934 to investigate the enormous profits made by American weapons makers during the Great War. Amplifying public indignation, Fortune magazine ran an article in March of Continue reading »
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Richard Broinowski. French submarines for RAN – Why?
The 2016 Defence White paper asserts that Australia’s future acquisition of 12 French submarines costing around $50 billion is the largest defence procurement program in Australia’s history. The first vessel is to be delivered ‘in the early 2030s’, the twelfth in ‘the 2040s or 2050s’. They are said to be for intelligence, surveillance and Continue reading »
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Richard Broinowski. Australia’s maritime espionage
According to The Australian’s defence editor Brendan Nicholson, an Australian submarine twice penetrated the Cam Ranh Bay naval base in Vietnam in 1985. Nicholson’s claim appeared in an article in the newspaper on 27 April 2016 analysing Canberra’s decision to build French Barracuda submarines in Adelaide. HMAS Orion’s first intrusion resulted in ‘brilliantly clear’ footage Continue reading »
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Richard Broinowski. Australia and the South China Sea
A tangled web of territorial claims threatens stability in the South China Sea. The figures appear rubbery, but a consensus is that Philippines occupies seven islands and reefs, Malaysia five, China eight and Taiwan one. Vietnam occupies twenty seven. There is also conflict over fishing grounds. Meanwhile, there seems little or no room for compromise, Continue reading »
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US complicity in chemical weapons. Guest blogger; Richard Broinowski
In recent days, President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry have made much of their moral repugnance at alleged chemical warfare attacks by the Syrian regime against rebel groups. Their retaliatory missile strikes, if made, would demonstrate that the use of chemical weapons by any force against any foe, is completely unacceptable to the world’s community. It was Continue reading »
