“Should Russia or China want to send a signal to Washington that it means business and ‘don’t push us any further’, a one-off nuclear strike on Pine Gap would do that very effectively, without triggering retaliation from the US since it doesn’t take out a US mainland installation or city,” says Dr Tanter.
Premiere to be held in Melbourne 6.30pm, March 22 at the Cinema Nova, Carlton.
Source: “Road to War” – » The Australian Independent Media Network
Trivia Time: who said ‘All the way with LBJ’ regarding Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam War?
Harold Holt, who succeeded Menzies as PM, in the completion of a flip from Austral-British to Austral-American focus for our national defence. It was contentious at the time, widely protested by Australian society, and of course (as time has played out), another contemptible waste of Australian lives and resources for no useful purpose. Another compromised commitment to Australia due to political ambition.
Source: Pernicious paradox: outsourcing our national security to the United States – Pearls and Irritations
There’s a recession coming America’s way
‘My gut tells me we will fight in 2025,’ writes General Mike Minahan, head of the United States Air Force’s (USAF) Air Mobility Command.
Source: U.S. prediction of war ‘in 2025’ with China imperils global security
The macro view of US military global involvement is not a major topic in Western Media, why?
The American republic morphed well over a century ago into an empire of many endless wars. With U.S. troops still in Syria, Iraq, Somalia and numerous African countries, with over 800 military bases in more than 70 countries and a war budget of roughly one trillion dollars a year, it’s no surprise that one of our main exports is weapons and that arms merchants call the shots in Washington. Presidents come and go, but the wars don’t: they drag on. And when a president does manage to extract the country from one of these military quagmires, as Biden did in Afghanistan, he gets nothing but grief.
Source: Wars and more wars: the sorry U.S. history in the Middle East – Pearls and Irritations
I am sure some or all of these following conclusions will come over bitterly among some readers, but here are mine. I do not want those waging war by rhetoric and display to win. I do not want the war waged by fanatical neoconservative ideologues to win. I do not want the imperium to win. I do not want the West to win so long as it insists intolerantly that the rest of the world observe its diktats.
Source: Patrick Lawrence: A War of Rhetoric & Reality – scheerpost.com
Gross National Happiness vs Gross National Product,
The senate hearing on War Powers Reform starts today. Of the over 100 submissions made to the government’s “Inquiry into international armed conflict decision making”, the most compelling come from Australian veterans themselves. Zacharias Szumer reports.
Source: Reform, say vets who know the horrors of war, yet most politicians say status quo
Whose decision is it and how is it to be made when governments like our LNP was hell-bent on making us a world-class top-10 arms dealer??
The Senate hearing on War Powers reform is scheduled for early December, but reform advocates may be less enthused by the composition of the committee that is handling the inquiry. Zacharias Szumer has talked to many of those involved.
Source: They represent us in parliament, but MPs say declaring war is above their pay grade – Michael West
Solving Climate, Cost of Living, reducing the threat of war, Australia has it all. Why be held to ransom by fossil fuel?
Euronews observes that with regard to solar-generated electricity, “the Netherlands, Germany and Spain come out on top, with 23 per cent, 19 per cent and 17 per cent respectively during summer 2022.” Imagine how many billions of euros they would save on energy bills if those numbers were doubled, and were common in the rest of Europe. Moreover, moving quickly to wind, solar, hydro and battery would deeply weaken the Russian Federation and deprive it of a key lever of power and source of income.
Source: Did the Ukraine War kill ‘Natural Gas?’ Solar Power is 10 times Cheaper over the long Term
The US continues to fan the flames of nuclear conflict with massive investments in the war department. How long can this last?
Source: Will Our War-for-Profit System Lead to Nuclear Annihilation? – scheerpost.com
Western media tells us Putin is desperate
The screeching sounds of pilotless, bomb-carrying drones are now becoming a familiar daily routine in heart-stopping terror for everyone beneath them in Ukraine.
In the warped world of military industrial planners and arms dealers, automated, stand-off and drone weapon technology has long been viewed as the holy grail for future forms of “networked” warfare and their potential unethical use has been endlessly explored in movies and books.
Only now, in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, does the world seem to recognise the real-life quandary they present when used in heavily built-up urban areas occupied by civilians.
When our governments let slip the dogs of war, there will be benefits for a bunch of extremely well-connected brothers (and sisters) in armaments. Callum Foote reports from as close as possible on the networking opportunities being taken by Australia’s weapons merchants.
“They use our fear, and at the moment fear from the conflict in Ukraine and fear of conflict with China, to make their fortunes. The whole purpose of this industry is to win multibillion-dollar government contracts from increasingly sophisticated ways of killing people — it’s a twisted, brutal business model on display, and it’s time more politicians stood with peace activists to call it out”.
Source: Banned: MWM too ‘aggressive’ for the merchants of death but we won’t shut up – Michael West
True to its word, the Albanese government has announced an inquiry into War Powers. Dr Alison Broinowski looks at the politics and the players, and the chances of reform so the decision to take Australians to war requires a vote of Parliament, rather than a one-man-call.
Source: War Powers Reform: those in favour say aye … or maybe “no comment” – Michael West
One man makes the decision to send Australian troops off to war; no matter how futile, how distant, or how relevant the war. That man is now Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. Earlier this year it was Scott Morrison. In the US and the UK, it is Congress and Parliament respectively which make this fateful decision.
Source: Should one man decide on war? Labor declares inquiry into War Powers reform – Michael West
We can hope that history will judge them harshly.
By the standards now rightly being applied to Vladimir Putin, the American and Australian leaders who brought devastation to Iraq and Afghanistan, George W Bush, Tony Blair and John Howard should arguably appear in the dock, subject to the presumption of innocence. Justice also demands a reasonable effort be made to bring them before a court. That hasn’t happened and won’t until the public demand justice.
The significance of Ukraine’s struggle certainly doesn’t lie in educating Americans, but perhaps it is finally making us reckon with the costs of war, as we’ve needed to do for so long. As the blood and dread and filth of war are made vivid to Americans through relentless reporting and imagery, is it possible that we will become at least somewhat more mindful of going to war? Might it even lead us — and yes, I know it’s unlikely — to reexamine this country’s militarism in this century and its role in other wars in places we’ve done our best never to see from the inside?
Source: Our Compassion for Ukrainian Victims of War was not on Offer to Iraqis or Afghans when We Invaded
What’s worse Morrison and Dutton who have proved to be clowns in preparing Australia for war want us to become one of the world’s top arms manufacturers. Dealers in weapons of mass death and destruction while sponsoring ANZAC Day as a National Day of Remembrance.
What is wrong with this picture? Discuss … This week Guardian Australia revealed the memorial had sought a new funding deal from Lockheed Martin despite being inundated with opposition from many veterans, historians and retired memorial staff. So, on what should be a day of quiet reflection – one far removed from the politicians who send young people to die in their wars but never go themselves, far removed from the companies that obscenely profit from combat and from those who’d obscure its callous truths – it pays to think about whether the war memorial remains the appropriate place for national Anzac commemorations. I’m not alone in thinking that the money of weapons manufacturers has sullied the place as a stage for official commemoration of Australian war dead.
But the stalemate shows how differently the Putin and Biden administrations interpret the security situation on Europe’s periphery. For the US, Russia’s determination to act as a spoiler stems from a petulant unhappiness with the post-Soviet geopolitical status quo. Get news curated by experts, not algorithms. For Russia, the US is the chief instigator of instability in Europe, pushing Western-dominated political and security institutions, like NATO and the European Union, ever closer to its borders. These contrasting viewpoints give both protagonists entirely different objectives for the outcome of the talks – one wants to build walls, the other seeks to break them down.
Source: Russia and the West are at a stalemate over Ukraine. Is Putin’s endgame now war?
What can they do to Australia’s Tanks
Here’s a scenario to consider: a military force has purchased a million cheap, disposable flying drones each the size of a deck of cards, each capable of carrying three grams of explosives—enough to kill a single person or, in a “shaped charge,” pierce a steel wall. They’ve been programmed to seek out and “engage” (kill) certain human beings, based on specific “signature” characteristics like carrying a weapon, say, or having a particular skin color. They fit in a single shipping container and can be deployed remotely. Once launched, they will fly and kill autonomously without any further human action.
Source: Killer Robots and the Laws We Need to Stop Them | The Smirking Chimp
Three retired U.S. generals warned in a chilling column Friday that another coup attempt in America in 2024 could divide the military and plunge an unprepared nation into civil war.
Israel sees killing as its most effective strategy to peace and stable government. Simply make 20% of its citizens second class and brutalize the rest. What lessons have the learned?
Yet killing, the application of lethal force, remained the central strategy in America’s 20-year campaign to create a stable government in Afghanistan. Why?
Source: “If Killing People Would Win This, We’d Have Won a Long Time Ago” | Washington Monthly
in November 2020 found over 83% of Australians want Parliament to vote on this issue. Michael West Media decided to flip the same question back to our politicians to see what they had to say. We’ve contacted over 50 so far, with an aim to eventually seek out responses from all Senators and Members of Parliament. Some have been outspoken on the issue, some prosaic, and some so timid so as not to even venture a “no comment.” For this latter group we had to create a new category for politicians “in hiding, refusing to answer us”. Some responses have surprised us, but others, as one of our Twitter followers put it, “responded exactly how you would have expected them to respond.” Politics, like fashion, sees trends emerge.
Parliament does not need to be consulted before Australian troops are sent to war. What do the politicians who have donned the uniform have to say? Tasha May asks Rex Patrick, Andrew Wilkie, Jim Molan and Bob Katter.
Source: War Powers: four perspectives from politicians who have served – Michael West
The forever wars that the US launched after 9/11 led to a surge in military suicides, a new study claims, with traumatized soldiers taking their own lives as they are repeatedly deployed in conflicts that have no public support.
Yet again, both Republican and Democratic party leaders are attacking Rep. Ilhan Omar for telling the truth about American and Israeli war crimes. And yet again, Omar has nothing to apologize for.
On Monday, Omar posted on Twitter her exchange with Secretary of State Antony Blinken. There she raised what should be a fairly tame question: What mechanisms exist to investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity in Palestine and Afghanistan?
The United States government opposes the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) jurisdiction to hear alleged cases of human rights abuses by both Israel and Hamas, the United States and the Taliban. If domestic courts won’t investigate war crimes, and if the United States opposes the ICC’s ability to do so, where can victims of war crimes go for justice?
Bait poisonings of household pets and working animals have also been recorded. Peter Best, a veterinarian based in South Tamworth, estimated that one in 15 admissions to his practice had involved poisoned animals. Such facts could only make another researcher at the CSIRO sigh. “If it’s used properly,” observed Steve Henry, “it should be a very, very low risk that a bird should find one of those grains of zinc phosphide and eat it.” The bait was sound. The same could not be said for those using it. “Why birds start falling out of the sky is [that] people do inappropriate things.” Such people used the bait in ways “not described on the label, or people make up their own baits.” When asked about her attitude to the problem, Healthy Rivers Dubbo convenor Melissa Gray suggested, with no detectable irony, that everybody wanted “the mouse plague gone, but there’s no silver bullet.” No silver bullets, maybe, but virtually everything else in the armoury of extermination. For the president of the NSW Farmers Association, the mayhem caused by such a poison as bromadiolone was worth the effort. Showing the somewhat patchy wisdom of his forebears, he accepted the lethal calculus. “It will ca
Source: Of Plagues and Rodents: Australia’s War Against Mice – » The Australian Independent Media Network
Paul Taucher and Dr Dean Aszkielowicz argue that war crimes justice does not work the way commentators generally suggest it does. AFTER THE SECOND World War, the victorious Allies prosecuted German and Japanese civilian leaders and military personnel for war crimes. The decision to hold these trials was based partly on a belief that the decades prior to the war had seen a genuine awakening among nations that some rules should apply to the conduct of wars and that efforts must be made to avoid devastating conflicts.
Source: The problem with war crimes law and what needs to be done
For the journalists who report this violence on our behalf, there is nowhere to hide. There is no neutral, objective mode. Your choice is to stand so far back from the “conflict” that you obscure its brutal irrationality and, in so doing, unwittingly or otherwise, put your support behind the most powerful belligerents. Or you can come in close and show mutilated and traumatised children, and suffer the journalistic ignominy of “biased” reporting.
The power to send Australian troops to fight in foreign wars rests in effect with the Prime Minister alone, yet a huge majority of Australians think parliamentary approval should be required. Alison Broinowski reports.
While the USA moves towards war, anti-China rhetoric grows on a daily basis and the idea of war is being sold as the ‘right’ thing.
Source: Not sleepwalking but marching with eyes wide open to war
This raid appears to be the worse case of mass rape committed by a U.S. ally in Africa in recent years. Over the last decade, the United States aided Cameroon’s security forces to the tune of almost $224 million, according to Security Assistance Monitor, which tracks U.S. security aid and arms sales. Over that same span, U.S. troops trained elite Cameroonian forces and even saw combat alongside them. The U.S. military also built up a network of outposts integral to drone operations in the region.
Soldiers in Cameroon, a Close U.S Ally, Commit Mass Rape
‘Counter-Terrorism’?: Two Decades After 9/11, New Interactive Map Details Footprint of US War Machine in 85 Countries | Common Dreams News
“The map raises a number of questions. Why is the United States militarily active in so many countries? Are these operations meeting the stated U.S. goals of reducing violence against Americans?”
‘Counter-Terrorism’?: Two Decades After 9/11, New Interactive Map Details Footprint of US War Machine in 85 Countries | Common Dreams News
Not just a US Domestic Threat: Beating Back the Far Right Globally
After four years of shock, confusion, and paralysis, the United States is finally taking action against the far right. Perhaps most dramatic has been the deplatforming of Donald Trump: the suspension of his Twitter and Facebook accounts and the targeting of his prominent followers across social media platforms. Even a few months ago, such a radically sensible action would have been inconceivable. Kick a president off of social media?
Not just a US Domestic Threat: Beating Back the Far Right Globally
The US Senate, long the lap dog of the man who would be king, President Donald Trump, appears to have finally remembered its proper constitutional role.
Last week, the Senate voted 55/45 for a new bipartisan War Powers Act to constrain military action against Iran. The Congress voted a similar act. Both are designed to start returning the right to make war to Congress, as the Constitution clearly intended. The president is not the Warlord-in-chief in spite of what he thinks.
Here’s a word of advice to Prime Minister Scott Morrison. Unless he wants to risk a smudge on his reputation of the sort that accompanies John Howard to this day: don’t get involved in conflict with Iran beyond limited naval engagement in a Gulf peace-keeping role.
via Acting on Iran has painful shades of joining the US in Iraq
“John Bolton and the Trump administration are turning us away from international accountability and cooperation and towards war and unilateral aggression,” concluded Win Without War.
In a rush to create heroes where there are only victims (ODT)
Ben Roberts-Smith: Beneath the bravery of Australia’s most decorated soldier
Notorious billionaire and war profiteer Erik Prince, who founded the disgraced mercenary firm Blackwater, is once again appealing to President Donald Trump to privatize the 17-year-old war in Afghanistan. Notorious War Profiteer Erik Prince Refuses To Give Up Dream of Mercenary Takeover of Afghan War
The story didn’t say whether any of the reporters listening to General Dunford asked why it had taken more than 16 years for the world’s leading military power to come up with the “fundamentally different approach” that the general believes has put U.S. and Afghan forces on the path to success. (None of the changes he mentioned really sounded fundamental, either.) Still, it’s a question worth asking: If Americans are right in ceaselessly telling themselves that theirs is the most powerful country the world has ever seen and that their military is the “greatest fighting force ever,” as President Trump calls it, should it have been this hard and taken this long to find a way — if they really have — to defeat enemies whose war-making resources are a tiny fraction of ours?
via “Infinity War?” After 17 fruitless years in Afghanistan & elsewhere the US Military needs to Rethink
According to the report, military spending across the world has increased by 1.1 percent in 2017 compared to the previous year to reach $1739 trillion.
The United States continues to top the world’s list of military expenditure with $610 billion, followed by China, which increased its military expenditure by 5.6 percent over 2016, or $228 billion.
The report explained that Middle Eastern countries increased their military spending by 6.2 percent in 2017 where they spent 5.2 percent of their GDP on armaments; the highest in the world.
via Saudi Arabia world’s 3rd highest military spender but 41st in World Population
The states pursuing this kind of offensive war see three advantages, two military and one political:
* Their own forces take minimal casualties, meaning fewer bodybags and funeral corteges
* They believe that the tactic works in practice
* There is very little media coverage of this type of war, and in the case of some countries, most notably Britain, there has been a long-term political convention that the role of special Forces should not be subject to public debate or even scrutiny.
The U.S. Air Force is on track to triple the number of bombs dropped in Afghanistan this year compared with last year.
Ominously, the former head of the IAEA, Mohammed Albaradei, who pointed out in spring of 2003 that the George W. Bush administration’s case for going to war against Iraq was bogus has weighed in on this new warmongering ploy:
Source: Elbaradei: Trump Propaganda on Iran Nuclear Deal like Run-up to Iraq War | Informed Comment
Not only are our two publicly owned television channels spewing pro US rhetoric, our so called “left-wing” party, Labor have once again bent over for Uncle Sam. Why do both parties constantly shill for US wars? The answer is that our rich and powerful elite need the US. This is all about money and both parties are very much protecting the parasitism and immorality of the very wealthy.
Source: “War Pigs” – » The Australian Independent Media Network
In case you haven’t noticed, the US is about to start another war. Remember George W. Bush and the lead up to the US invasion of Iraq in 2003? On that occasion it was a carefully calculated move, complete with lies about Saddam Hussein’s arsenal, fabricated intelligence delivered to the United Nations by then Secretary…
Source: It’s all happening again. – » The Australian Independent Media Network
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