World
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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 »
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The US is preparing Australia to fight its war against China
The United States is not preparing to go to war against China. The United States is preparing Australia to go to war against China. Continue reading »
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Japan – failed peace state?
A little over 75 years ago, a Japan-designed Asia-Pacific community collapsed, leaving not only Japan itself but much of the region in chaos, millions dead, cities in ruins. Continue reading »
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Efforts to combat climate change and biodiversity loss are inseparable as new mass extinction looms
Recently, I had a catch-up conversation on climate change and November’s UN climate change conference (COP27) in Sharm el-Sheikh with one of Hong Kong’s most conscientious students of the subject. Continue reading »
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Ukraine: the war that went wrong
NATO support for the war in Ukraine, designed to degrade the Russian military and drive Vladimir Putin from power, is not going according to plan. The new sophisticated military hardware won’t help. Continue reading »
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Our planet is on the cusp of the third world war
A re-energised peace movement is urgently required. To date, at least $100 billion dollars in armaments has been committed by the US and its NATO allies to press for the continuation of the war in Ukraine. Continue reading »
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Pride, power and exorbitant privilege: There’s more to US decline than loss of face
It is not just pride which motivates the US elite’s fear of China and of multipolarity. Their ‘exorbitant privilege’ rests on power conferred by hegemony. The struggle of Australia, and countries around the world, to reclaim sovereignty in resistance to that power will be difficult because so much hinges on it. Continue reading »
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Democracy and the winning formula
The rallying call of the Western democracies to form a united front against those who dare to challenge their supremacy has always been “common values”. Our hearts burst with pride and gratitude to think that we have the freedom of speech, of assembly, of dissent and other such privileges that those in other systems do Continue reading »
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National security after Russia’s “special military operation”: Kazakhstan and China
In the wake of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s announcement of a “special military operation” in Ukraine, Central Asian countries, including Kazakhstan, have been reevaluating their foreign policy. These nations are seeking to strike a balance between their relationship with Russia and their engagement with other countries and international organisations. Continue reading »
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2023 will be make-or-break year for Russia
As the West throws the whole shebang at Moscow, the world’s largest country faces a moment of truth. Continue reading »
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Now is the time for nonalignment and peace
War is an ugly part of the human experience. Everything about it is hideous. War is most obviously the act of invasion and the brutality that goes along with its operations. No war is precise; every war hurts civilians. Each act of bombardment sends a neurological shudder through society. Continue reading »
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Ukraine: can we make sense of the war situation?
There is hectic media attention to the pressure on Germany to allow a few of its Leopard 2 tanks to be given to Ukraine by countries that have bought them from Germany. The words “self-deception and fantasy” come to mind. But it does make clear Ukraine’s underlying logistical problem. Continue reading »
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America’s strategy of failure comes to Ukraine
US mission creep in Ukraine follows in the fatal footsteps of ultimately failed war campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq. Continue reading »
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We are at war, with no strategy adequate to the challenge
Unlike the Ukraine war, the war I am referring to is not a military war; it’s our battle for planetary health, and we have no strategy adequate to the challenge. Continue reading »
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Japan is not the most warlike nation in history
Jimmy Carter called the US ‘the most warlike nation in the history of the world,’ and said that ‘peaceful’ China is ‘ahead of us in almost every way’. Continue reading »
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The eerie parallels between Vietnam and Ukraine
Ukrainians have become cannon fodder for the US geopolitical goals, just as the South Vietnamese were. Continue reading »
