World
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Australia’s national security strategy: no room for peace, arms control?
In contrast to Labor politicians such as Paul Keating, Bill Hayden, Gareth Evans and Gough Whitlam, the four part series recently published by Keating and Stanford on Australian national security sees no place for arms control measures and peace initiatives. Continue reading »
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From cold war precipice to non-alignment and peace
It is time Australia made a big, if bold, shift in its foreign policy and put up its hand to be a part of the Non-aligned movement. Continue reading »
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The Frontier Thesis and the middle kingdom
It goes without saying, and even better with saying, that America’s destiny is now tied up with China, which means so too is Australia’s. Continue reading »
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An economy that shrinks quantity and grows quality
Recent debate on this site about economic growth and environmental protection highlights the very narrow and limiting framing of mainstream economics, and points to the far more positive prospect that is available to us if we can broaden our vision. Continue reading »
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My sources corroborate Hersh’s Nord Stream Report: notes from The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix
My sources corroborate Seymour Hersh’s report that the US was behind the Nord Stream pipeline sabotage. (My sources are logic, common sense, and public statements by US government officials.) Continue reading »
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Far from dying, a new globalisation is emerging – driven by China and the digital economy
An important feature of the new globalisation is China’s Global Development Initiative and a renewed, non-exploitative focus on the Global South. The other is the growth of the digital economy and non-dollar-denominated digital currencies that enable cross-border trade. Continue reading »
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The US sees China through the dark mirror of its own unbridled aggression
As China grows and prospers many in the US want us to believe that China will follow the same path that the US itself pursued- global military aggression, the overthrow of numerous governments around the world and persecution of minorities at home. Continue reading »
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China containment line buttressed: Asian Media report
In Asian media this week – Taiwan key to first island chain control. Plus: US fosters belief war is inevitable; why the West thinks it speaks for the world; independence anniversary but nothing to celebrate; balloon saga shows why US must act tough; nothing can live in Manila Bay. Continue reading »
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How much blood are we prepared to let extremists spill?
JK Rowling recently tweeted a defence of her bigotry, conflating trans people with, in her words, “violent, duplicitous rapists”. Continue reading »
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A sovereign SSN capability and Australia’s national security strategy
There is no way that the UK or the US would ever contemplate surrendering sovereignty over the control of its military operations to any other power. Australia should not either. If Australia is to acquire a fleet of SSNs, the government needs to negotiate an agreement that avoids counter-productive short cuts and ensures sovereign control Continue reading »
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Lessons from the earthquake disasters in Turkey and Syria
At personal, national and international levels, crises provide learning opportunities. How to adapt to loss by seeking change, how to think differently about family, community and nation by, among other things, pondering the meaning of security and sovereignty. Continue reading »
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Nuclear submarines: from “optimal” to “the best they can get”
The announcement of the Australian Government’s decision on the purchase of nuclear powered submarines is looming and it is timely to take a cold hard look at the “facts” rather than the inevitable spin. The more Prime Minister Albanese maintains this will be a momentous decision for Australia the more it should have been the Continue reading »
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The role of alliances in Australia’s national security strategy
While alliances and treaties offer some protection against an aggressor, they cannot be counted upon. Australia needs to maintain an independent military capability to deter possible future threats to our independence – not least because we cannot rely on the US in all possible future circumstances. Continue reading »
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Environmental apocalypse? Don’t blame us
Like the environment itself, discussions of our collective future are becoming heated. They are also contradictory, polarised and – in my case, at least – increasingly pessimistic. Continue reading »
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Australia’s National Security Strategy
To paraphrase former US President, Theodore Roosevelt, Australia’s national security is best achieved by talking softly while carrying a formidable stick as a deterrent. Continue reading »
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Australia’s future in Asia: bridge or spear?
The perceptive Singaporian diplomat Kishore Mahbubani remarked recently that: ‘Australia’s strategic dilemma in the twenty-first century is simple: it can choose to be a bridge between East and West in the Asian Century—or the tip of the spear projecting Western power into Asia.’ He clearly believed that it was a matter of deliberate choice, a Continue reading »
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An AUKUS ménage à trois
As the government offers new hints at the ‘optimal path’ for the AUKUS nuclear-powered submarines, the questions about the viability of the project mount. The political pressure to out-muscle the Coalition on ‘national security’, if that’s what is driving the Labor government’s enthusiasm for this impending car-crash, should not be allowed to undermine the national Continue reading »
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Towards an Australian Centre for Disease Control
Three years into the Covid -19 pandemic the many weaknesses and disconnections within the jurisdictional decision-making arrangements are clear. These fault lines significantly impair our national capacity to reliably detect and respond to this ongoing outbreak in a timely, effective and efficient manner. We urgently need to develop integrated national and international responses to disease Continue reading »
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More evidence that the West sabotaged peace In Ukraine
Days after the war in Ukraine began it was reported by The New York Times that “President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine has asked the Israeli prime minister, Naftali Bennett, to mediate negotiations in Jerusalem between Ukraine and Russia.” In a recent interview, Bennett made some very interesting comments about what happened during those negotiations in Continue reading »
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The US drive to war against China just got worse
General Mike Minahan, head of the United States Air Force’s Air Mobility Command has sent a message to the world. It is blunt, threatening and sinister. ‘My gut tells me we will fight in 2025.’ The General sent his message as a memorandum to the leadership of the 110,000 strong USAF, with the unambiguous title, Continue reading »
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Drastic economic reform needed to address climate change
Realisation is dawning that the climate and environmental crises will not be solved by current national policies. The reason is that the current market economy based on everlasting growth is the prime cause of these crises. Continue reading »
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Twisting in the wind: A view from Hong Kong
The year of the Rabbit has arrived, and Hong Kong is bouncing back with a vengeance. Continue reading »
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Netanyahu’s collective punishment of Palestinians
Benjamin Netanyahu’s ultra-right government’s reported response to the “terrorism” of the Palestinian who killed seven people at a synagogue in east Jerusalem on 27 January 2023 includes the likely collective punishment of the family of the attacker, such as loss of citizenship, house demolition and deportation. Continue reading »
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Is it really about international religious freedom?
Many well meaning participants genuinely opposed to religious oppression at the International Religious Freedom (IRF) Summit this week in Washington will not realise that they are pawns in a US State Department geopolitical game. Continue reading »
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The new geopolitics
There is universal assent that we are in a period of geopolitical tension and flux. In a rough chronology, 1815-1914 was the era of British hegemony, the not-so-peaceful Pax Britannica. Continue reading »
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The global climate change suicide pact
There was a time when leaders fell on their sword when they were defeated in battle or lost their core beliefs, nowadays most do not even resign their privileged positions to resist the existential danger posed to advanced life, including human civilisation. It is long past time to declare a global climate and nuclear emergency. Continue reading »
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RAND: Ukraine procrastination unwise for American imperialism – Biden must negotiate
The unravelling military situation in Ukraine means that Biden’s best option is to negotiate, a new RAND report argues. The sooner the better. There is the awful danger that continued procrastination will propel the hapless Biden administration into precipitating nuclear war. Continue reading »
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Lessons for UK Labour from Australia
Anthony Albanese’s electoral success and the quiet competence of Labor’s administration has not gone unnoticed by the commentariat and political analysts here in the UK. A sea change from the noisy and brash Morrison days. Continue reading »
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2023: a make-or-break year for the global order
Many of the accounts we hear of the current Russia-NATO conflict are deeply flawed. and risk degenerating into pure farce – a crude melodrama, in which an upright, democratic Ukrainian government headed by hero Zelensky is pitted against a corrupt and brutal autocracy led by the deluded ogre, Putin. What is really in question, is Continue reading »
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White man’s brutality and the educated middle-class
In Ukraine and in other parts of the world, Western violence and supremacy has been abetted by its educated more than any other group. Continue reading »
