Interoperability comes at a cost

 Written by: Nick G. on 19 October 2021

The Australian Navy is set to dump six European-made helicopters for twelve made in the US. 

Following on from the decision to scrap French-made submarines for the nuclear-powered US submarines, it looks to be part of a trend to replace European-sourced military hardware with that from the US so that “interoperability” is further enhanced. 

The MRH 90 Taipan helicopters, manufactured by France’s Airbus, were purchased in 2006 at a cost of $3.7 billion. It is alleged that the MRH 90s have “suffered from poor availability since entering service”.  Specifically, it is claimed that door on the MRH-90 was too narrow to allow its gun to fire while troops were descending, and that three rounds of remedial work have had to be carried out on the fleet.

 

The plan is to replace the six MRH 90s with 12 Sikorsky Romeo Seahawk helicopters in a deal worth around $1.3 billion. Sikorsky is a US Lockheed Martin company.

 

Australia's navy already operates 24 MH-60R Seahawks based at HMAS Albatross, near Nowra, and this next purchase would mean a common fleet of 36 aircraft.

 

The ditching of a MH-60R Seahawk helicopter in the Philippine Sea during a routine flight last week has, meanwhile, been kept relatively quiet. No-one wants questions raised about the Seahawks at such a sensitive time. The cause of the incident, in which the crew conducted an emergency landing in the water, is still being investigated. 

 

The decision on the Seahawk purchase follows one earlier this year when Minister for Defense Linda Reynolds announced that the government would replace the French Airbus Tiger with 29 AH-64E Apache gunships to the tune of $3.5 billion as its new Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter (ARH). 

 

The U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency, which approved the sale of the Apaches, manufactured by Lockheed Martin and Boeing, said “The proposed sale will improve Australia’s capability to meet current and future threats, and will enhance interoperability with U.S. forces and other allied forces.”

 

Australia is being required by its US masters to engage in massive spending as a military outpost of the US empire. 

 

The billions spent on further embedding us into the US military-industrial complex are billions that will not be spent on:

 

• Ambulance ramping - a chronic problem in all states

• Filtered air-conditioning for classrooms - a major worry of epidemiologists as states open up after lock-downs

• School nurses – common in some countries but mostly unavailable for Australian public schools

• Improvements to country roads

• Low-cost housing

 

These are just the tip of a social iceberg of the Australian people’s needs that are being ignored as we are forced into gearing up for war with China.

 

Our subservience to US imperialism directly undermines our ability to survive under capitalism.

 

We must strengthen our resolve to develop the fight for anti-imperialist independence and socialism.

Nuclear-powered sub accident a reason to reconsider AUKUS.

 Written by: Nick G. on 11 October 2021

Just as the French Ambassador to Australia

 returns to Canberra in the wake of the

 controversy over the tearing up of its contract to

 build submarines for Australia, news has come

 through of an accident involving a US nuclear

 submarine in the crowded South China Seas.

The USS Connecticut (pictured) hit an unidentified

 object while prowling through the seas to the south of China last Saturday, injuring a number of sailors in the vessel. The collision was not announced by the US Navy until Thursday.

US authorities quickly denied that any damage had been done to the submarine’s nuclear propulsion plant.

US news media generally dismissed the reports in one or two opening paragraphs of articles that instead focused on China’s “provocative and aggressive” flying of fighter jets over its own territory, Taiwan Province.

The US nuclear submarines are part of a “major multinational show of force in the region led by the United Kingdom's Carrier Strike Group 21. The ongoing operations saw exercises with ships from the US, UK, Japan, Australia, Canada, and the Netherlands, including three aircraft carriers, training in and around the South China Sea”, according to CNN two days ago.

Imagine if a multinational force of China, Russia and Iran were to conduct a “show of force” in international waters off Long Island, the Florida Keys, or in the Gulf of Mexico. 

China expressed “grave concern” over the incident and called on the US to release more information. The Chinese said that while the submarine may have collided with another submarine, or hot an underwear reef, the most likely cause of the collision was an unmanned underwater detection vehicle, as such vehicles are small in size and would not pose much damages to the vessel. 

According to the Chinese, the US navy has put a significant number of such devices in the area to detect the hydrological characteristics of the South China Sea and China's submarine operations, so it could be that "the US shot itself in the foot."

The last time a U.S. Navy submarine is known to have had a serious collision was in 2005, when the USS San Francisco hit an undersea mountain at full speed. That crash left one sailor dead and most crew members injured. The captain and several other senior officers were relieved of their duty, as it emerged that they had been using outdated seafloor charts, despite having up-to-date maps available. That incident occurred near the U.S. territory of Guam, thousands of miles east of the contentious waters off China's coast.

In 2001, the US "Los Angeles" class "Greenville" attack nuclear submarine rose from a 120-meter underwater drill, and as a result, it collided with the 700-ton Japanese trawler "Ehime", causing 9 people on board the ship to be missing. 

Australia’s decision to switch to a nuclear-powered submarine fleet through AUKUS arrangements is contributing to regional tensions based on assumptions about who those submarines are designed to intimidate and target, and under whose direction. They are intended to raise the level of Australian “interoperability with US imperialism, which at the same time will lower our capacity for independent decision-making. 

We are not apologists for Chinese social-imperialism (China still proclaims it is socialist, but has its own imperialist ambitions).  However, it is clear who is responsible for keeping regional tensions on the boil, and who is making serious preparations for war against a regional neighbour.

Election Speculation – What value for people?

Written by: John G. on 16 October 2021 

Election speculation took a feverish turn in recent

weeks. 

Canberra Journalists have been on tenterhooks.

Would Morrison head off to see the Governor? Will

he, won’t he, has trickled down to the provinces. 

Local ALP and Greens branches have been put on

a ‘war footing’, prepared for a Federal Election at

short notice. The ACTU has launched its “Secure

jobs. Worth Fighting For” marginal seats

campaign. 

Commentators read the tea leaves in opinion surveys for guidance but who knows when an election will be held. According to law it has to be held by May next year. The speculation on a pre-Christmas election is easing as COP 21, the UN Sustainable Development Conference, and the G20 meeting loom. Morrison flirts with attending. 

What is clear is that an election won’t be held over the Christmas holiday season. At least we have them scared enough to leave us alone during our summer break. 

But the threat of shoving the Canberra circus even further into our lives brings up just what use that circus is. 

One way of looking into it is to ask some basic questions. 

Are politicians our servants or does government act as our master? Just think of a few issues where people want things done. 

Climate change. Public opinion has three quarters of us wanting serious action to provide avenues out of coal, oil and gas extraction and burning, support for the workers in those industries to transition to other industries, support for applying sustainable technologies and new industries 

What happens? Political leaders of both major parties have wilted into confusion and inaction when the top capitalists from the fossil fuel industries and bankers have complained against action. Loudmouth political cretins take up station as fossil fuel megaphones and lobbyists. People don’t get action. We get left slowly stewing as capitalists in fossil fuel corporations are left to prosper. 

Government acts as masters of society, not servants of the people.  And its masters for the big money, big multinationals over the vast majority, the rest of us.    
Covid crisis early days. People want protection from the deadly virus. Government orders industries to close down, people to stay home. Millions literally, 5 million, found themselves a payday away from poverty, not able to pay mortgages, put food on the table, out of work. The Government offered the starvation New Start Allowance, when people could register for it. 

For a week they stood by crying poor-mouth. Government wasn’t there to look after people but held firm with their policy of making unemployment so unpalatable that people would scramble over each other to get what work was available, even at near starvation wages. But then there were no jobs to scramble for. 

People’s servants relieving people’s difficulties or masters ordering people to be grateful for what they got, if they could get on the website to get it? Again, barring people at the door not seating them at the table. No service just mastery. 

That approach fell apart as people in their tens of thousands haunted the footpaths outside Centrelink offices and their website collapsed under the tsunami of applications. Millions of the desperate, newly without wages, posed a threat of anarchy on the streets. Only after nearly a week when the level of disruption and desperation was hammered into their brains with the prospect of society revolting against its government, did the masters turn towards service, with the clear motive of sustaining their position. 

With the Covid lockdowns, people’s unhappiness with insecure casual and contract jobs grew into a burning hatred. Corporate bosses and government love of them just grew. Government outsourcing to casual employers has become a trademark. Qantas, despite the hundreds of millions of government support, wrangled ways of outsourcing more of its work to companies employing people on contracts or as casuals. People want secure jobs. Government and corporate bosses manoeuvre to push more and more into casual and contract jobs. Government serving the people or masters over them? 

Back to the coming election. 

Dreamers and charlatans carry on about elections and parliamentary government being a way for the majority to run society, for the common interests to prevail, a real commonwealth. That may have been the idea and to an extent the fact in ages past but its miles from that today. 

In Australia today, democratic government has become a means for government to rule over the people. The corporate world is in charge. Government jumps to their tune. Corporate bosses have the Prime Minister’s phone number on speed dial. He takes their calls. The needs of the core of Australian corporate world are at the core of government and Labour leaders’ actions. 

Apart from the corporate core of parliamentary policies, top politicians act ruthlessly to look after their own special interests. They wriggle and squirm to stay in charge within their parties, hand out favours, do deals, curry favour with corporate and sectional interests. Government leaders flagrantly use the public purse to shore up their support within the party and to curry favour with groups of voters. Accountability is nowhere to be seen. Even the prospect of an ICAC with few teeth makes them faint. Everything is on the table to secure re-election and get hold of government office.

Sometimes there are concessions to people when they are aroused and firing. Jack Lang’s NSW government in the Depression and the 1970s Whitlam Government were the epitome of concessions to the people. 

No stone was left unturned to get rid of them as quickly as possible. The Commonwealth Government moved to seize the Lang government funds and was tossed out by the governor when he withdrew a million dollars from the reach of the Commonwealth. Whitlam saw appointment of a Senator against all precedent followed by the Senate stopping funds to the government, again unheard of in a Westminster style parliamentary democracy. 

Neither government set out to pose a threat to corporate Australia but did make significant concessions to the people. Even those enormously popular governments were wrangled from office quick smart. Governments looking after people were out and normal mastery over the people resumed.     

The idea of politicians being at the service of the people is a wonderful ideal, but it has little to do with the reality of parliamentary government in Australia. Government operates as master over the people, a master for the corporate world. 

The coming election, whenever it might be, isn’t offering serious concessions. It will consist of deciding which group of political careerists will be put in office to exercise mastery over us for the next few years. 

Japan’s new Prime Minister – where will he take the country?

 

Written by: (Contributed) on 4 October 2021

The election of Fumio Kishida as leader of Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LTD) is one further step toward likely 'real war scenarios' in the Indo-Pacific region. The former Foreign Minister is a well-known China hawk, with a defence background.

The decision by the US to establish a network of precision-strike missiles in the region is a worrying sign of escalating diplomatic tensions eventually spilling over into armed conflict with certain implications for Australia.

In late September the ruling Japanese LDP found a successor to outgoing Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga who stood down following a number of problems and declining popularity. Fumio Kishida, a former Foreign and Defence Minister, stated on a number of occasions during his election campaign the country should adopt missile-strike capacity and a more aggressive stance toward China. He was taken very seriously.

Fumio Kishida is known to have wide-spread support amongst senior figures and elders in the LDP and has followed the traditional approach by seeking to strengthen the US-Japan alliance. (1) In forthcoming national elections scheduled for next month the LDP appear likely to triumph, once again. They have ruled the country for most of the past 65 years.

Japan now, however, is faced with new dilemmas; the traditional US-Japan alliance is under new challenges. The days when Japan was content to hide behind their pacifist constitution has given way to a re-evaluation of Clause Nine, whereby the country has joined US-led regional military exercises and undertaken responsibility for defending 'US interests' if challenged.

The rapid rise of China as a regional and global power has seriously altered the traditional balance of forces, threatening US-led hegemonic positions. The US has, therefore, expected allies such as Japan and Australia to take more responsibility when dealing with 'US interests'. The two countries are regional hubs, closely linked to US military planning and tend to follow Washington and the Pentagon without question.

The announcement about Fumio Kishida's appointment as LDP leader was greeted with enthusiasm in Canberra, where it was noted 'it has been suggested he could seek Japanese entry into the Five Eyes intelligence-sharing alliance'. (2)  

The issue of missile-strike capacity has followed decisions taken by the Pentagon earlier this year to bolster existing regional military and security provision with a network of precision-strike missiles based on island chains. The core proposals for the new Pacific Deterrence Initiative (PDI) were submitted by the Pentagon to Congress in March. (3) It has been costed at about $27 billion, amounting to about $4.7 billion for fiscal year 2022 and later years to 2027. (4)

The Pentagon, in recent years, has returned to military planning resting upon Island Chain Theory (ICT), which had largely been discounted following the end of the last Cold War.

ICT, for the Pentagon, has become primarily a way in which they seek to encircle and contain China's influences and restrict their ready military access and egress. The first island chain consists of a group including Taiwan, Okinawa in Japan and the Philippines. The second island chain runs from south-east Japan, through Guam and south of Indonesia, providing access to the western Pacific and Oceania.  

The fact the US seeks to position its proposed Integrated Joint Force (IJF) with precision-strike missile facilities along the first island chain and an integrated air missile defence in the second chain, has revealed how the US are seeking to militarise the region still further.

The announcements were not accompanied with any known diplomatic approach to the countries located along the island chains to request they host the US military facilities. No concern appears to have been given by the Pentagon to the national interests of the countries and the likely diplomatic reaction by China toward them. It was noted, for example, that while 'a network of missiles countering China in the Indo-Pacific region would be a plus for Japan … nevertheless … Tokyo has not discussed such a move with Washington'. (5)

Informed sources, however, have acknowledged that Japan hosting the proposed missile program was 'fraught with difficulty'. (6) It was noted with concern that, 'Tokyo is likely to encounter local opposition around potential deployment sites', with Japanese people not keen to see their country militarised and placed on a likely war-footing with China'. (7) When pressed, a Japanese Defence Ministry official also acknowledged that defence budget concerns might also arise; 'Washington', he noted, 'could ask us to shoulder maintenance and other costs associated with missiles deployed in Japan'. (8)

To date, the Morrison coalition government in Canberra and the Australian Defence Department has been remarkably quiet about the matter; it is no difficult to explain. Highly sensitive US military facilities are hosted in Australia, including Pine Gap, which provide regional-wide signals and intelligence coverage. It is not particularly difficult, therefore, to see how Australia might find itself dragged into military hostilities to defend 'US interests' at the beck and call of the US:

                                        We need an independent foreign policy!

1.     China hawk to be next Japanese PM., Australian, 30 September 2021.
2.     Japan's push back on China right, Editorial, Australian, 1 October 2021.
3.     US to build anti-China missile network along first island chain, NIKKEI., 5 March 2021.
4.     US Indo-Pacific Command proposes new missile capabilities to deter China, RFA., 5 March 2021.
5.     Nikkei., op.cit., 5 March 2021.
6.     Ibid.
7.     Ibid.
8.     Ibid.

Sold Down the River!

Written by: Duncan B. on 2 October 2021

Sold Down the River. How Robber Barons and Wall Street Traders Cornered Australia’s Water Market by Scott Hamilton and Stuart Kells, (Text Publishing 2021, $35), is a book that everyone interested in the sad story of the Murray-Darling Basin should read.

The authors tell how Australia’s most precious resource was handed over to speculators at the expense of farmers, the other inhabitants of irrigation areas, Indigenous people and the environment. 

From the earliest days in the late nineteenth century when irrigation schemes were established, water was publicly owned and controlled and water rights were always linked to land ownership. In the early nineteen nineties, under the influence of the Friedman economics of the “free market” which brought on a mania for “competition” and privatisation in Australia, water rights were separated from land ownership and water rights became something that could be traded or sold. 

In 2004 the “National Water Initiative” made water markets the primary tool of water management. Water became just like any other commodity. It became a financial asset. Compared to sectors of the economy such as banking and finance there was very little regulation of the players in the water market - the traders and brokers who set about making enormous profits from trading water. There was no requirement for water traders to have any connection to farming.

Farmers who often struggle with poor mobile phone and internet connections found themselves in competition for water with water traders who use supercomputers and “bots” to trade water in seconds.

Many of the traders are US based banks and hedge funds. The authors detail how these parasites manipulate the water market, benefit from periods of water shortage and create artificial shortages. They milk high profits from farmers desperate to obtain water to start or finish off their crops. 

The water traders ally themselves with the mega-farms run by organisations such as the Canadian pension funds. They ensure that there is adequate water for the huge plantations of almond, olives etc, while depriving productive farmers of much-needed water.

The authors call for a new model of governance for water where “we would decide as a society how best to allocate scarce water in a way that balanced all the imperatives such as efficient agriculture, river health, and recognising the cultural and economic rights of Indigenous people.”

Given the vested interests involved in the water market and the billions of dollars in profits they are making, the chances of this happening are remote.

Organized Workers In Collective Action Provide Leadership To Australian People

 Written by: Ned K. on 25 September 2021

The week leading up to the AFL Grand Final on 25 September saw two contrasting trends in the working class movement in Australia.

One trend, strongly promoted by the imperialist media outlets, was epitomized by the extreme right wing influenced street demonstrations in Melbourne under the Trump like banner of "freedom" of workers to take no responsibility for the impact of actions, such as opposing vaccinations against Covid 19, and opposing restrictions on movement of people to stop the spread of Covid 19. This trend suited the needs of big corporations who oppose any restrictions that retard their production and services for profit maximization.

The other trend, disciplined, united collective action by workers in pursuit of the working people's interests received hardly any publicity in the imperialist media outlets.

In the Riverland and Southern Vales of South Australia on Thursday, winery and vineyard workers employed by US multinational Accolade, the largest winery in the southern hemisphere, took strike action and marched through the streets of Berri.

The workers and their union, United Workers Union, took this collective action to prevent Accolade eroding conditions of employment that would have dire implications for the whole community. Accolade want to reduce workers' retirement income (superannuation) and undermine community standards by accelerating a two-tiered worker system by increasing insecure work at the winery and vineyards. Workers' future action will depend on whether Accolade back off or not.

In the city and regional areas of South Australia, workers employed by SA Water went on strike on Friday and held a rally outside SA Water House in protest at SA Water's intention to change rosters, enforce longer working hours and its consequent negative impact on safe work standards.  These workers look after the quality and supply of water, an essential service to the people of South Australia.

On Thursday, 2,000 Transport Workers Union members employed by Australia Post’s StarTrack parcel delivery service went on a 24-hour strike to oppose provisions in an “offer” made by the employer as part of a new Enterprise Agreement. The corporate bosses have mischievously described their offer as generous, but they have been outsourcing jobs to companies like Amazon’s Flex service which use lower paid sham “sub-contractors” and labour hire employees. Delivery service standards have fallen at the same time as outsourcing has occurred.

The vote strike was carried by a 97% majority vote. Next week 2,500 TWU members at FedEx will also strike.

In the examples described above, workers actions were well organized and in the interests of the people.

During the week, both the Maritime Union of Australia and the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union on behalf of their members made strong public statements opposing the Morrison Government and US imperialism's intention to intensify military tensions with China and threaten the people's security and well-being by building nuclear-powered submarines in Australia. At Friday’s anti-nuclear-powered subs rally in Adelaide, a strong message of support was sent by the SA State Secretary of the Communications, Electrical and Plumbing Union.

This latter trend of organized workers taking collective action to defend and extend living standards and for peace, not war mongering, is the dominant trend and is sure to grow while the former trend promoted by big business does not have the support of the overwhelming majority of working people and is sure to fail.

Rally to stop AUKUS-strating for war

Written by: Nick G. on 24 September 2021

Several hundred people rallied in Adelaide late on Friday afternoon to protest nuclear-powered submarines and the latest war AUKUS-strations.

The rally was called by organisations including the Independent and Peaceful Australia Network (IPAN), Friends of the Earth, SA Greens, and the Medical Association for the Prevention of War.

The rally was called by organisations including the Independent and Peaceful Australia Network (IPAN), Friends of the Earth, SA Greens, and the Medical Association for the Prevention of War.

The rally was held at Parliament House just as commuters were leaving the city via the nearby Train Station. 

Several speakers connected the issue of nuclear-powered submarines with the proposed nuclear waste dump at Kimba on Eyre Peninsula, commending the Barngarla First Peoples for their staunch opposition to the dump on their land. 

Arabunna elder Uncle Kevin Buzzacott, well-known for his opposition to uranium mining and to big corporations like BHP, bemoaned the fact that materials for the submarines were likely to be taken from Aboriginal lands without the permission of traditional owners. He said that for the future of our children, war must be opposed.

Greens Senate candidate Barbara Pocock condemned the nuclear-powered submarine decision and the AUKUS Pact for further embedding Australia in the war plans of the United States. 

IPAN’s Stephen Darley  said AUKUS denied Australia the capacity to act independently, contributed to regional tensions and imposed an extraordinary economic burden on the Australian people.

It was a very good beginning for what is going to be  a long campaign.