Australia: catch all

[davidbfpo]

Badmash,

From this faraway vantage point I do recall that Australia has been for a long time the home to a range of ostensibly shared intelligence facilities - although my source is Desmond Ball's now dated book published in 1980 'A Valuable Piece of Real Estate'.

Secondly I understood the USA had made limited, temporary use of Australian bases in the last twenty years, mainly by the USN and USAF.

I noted today The Daily Telegraph ran a short story, which opens with:

President Barack Obama is expected to reveal plans to station about 500 to 1000 Marines at a barracks in Darwin and to expand the US navy's use of bases at the Northern Territory capital and in Perth in Western Australia.

It cites a former Australian official, now a professor:

In Washington and in Beijing, this will be seen as Australia aligning itself with an American strategy to contain China...In the view from Beijing, everything the US is doing in the western Pacific is designed to bolster resistance to the Chinese challenge to US primacy.

Link:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...ence-grow.html

Personally I don't think the potential new facilities, not bases, have a role in the strategic equation

to bolster resistance to the Chinese challenge

[davidbfpo]

Two alternative Australian responses to the newly announced policy:

Yet, I wonder if future historians will see this as the moment where Australia fundamentally cast its lot in with the US.

Link:http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/...-the-ride.aspx

We have been on the ride that Andrew refers to for some time; it just got a little faster.

Link:http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/...-alliance.aspx

A third article 'Why Washington wants a base here' is a succinct guide and points at the potential impact in the Indian Ocean:http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/...lian-base.aspx

[davidbfpo]

A background article on the Australian-US alliance, which opens with the 1943 DoD advice for US troops going to Australia:

You're going to meet a people who like Americans and whom you will like. The Australians have much in common with us – they're a pioneer people: they believe in personal freedom: they love sports...But there are a lot of differences too – like tea, central heating, the best way to send Sunday morning, or saluting officers and such. You'll find out about all those, but the main point is they like us, and we like them.

Link:http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/...Australia.aspx

One trusts that the USMC facilities in Darwin have central heating!

[Ray]

Analysts say China stung by defence pact

CHINESE defence analysts have condemned what they see as Australia's contribution to the growing security rivalry between the US and China, noting that Darwin is comfortably within range of Chinese ballistic missiles.

But unofficial analysts and the media yesterday described the new Darwin base as a major step in American efforts to ''contain China'' by creating a ''net'' of defence ties stretching from Japan to Australia and India and including most of south-east Asia.

http://www.theage.com.au/national/an...117-1nl8p.html

Asia Pushes Back Against China

Beijing is caught in a diplomatic bear trap of its own making. After trying to bully the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) into not discussing disputes over the South China Sea at a summit this weekend in Bali, the territorial dispute is becoming the meeting's focus. ......

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...googlenews_wsj

[Mark O'Neill]

A background article on the Australian-US alliance, which opens with the 1943 DoD advice for US troops going to Australia:

Link:http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/...Australia.aspx

One trusts that the USMC facilities in Darwin have central heating!

Darwin has 'central heating' built into the climate... it is in the Tropics. The weather there makes Miami look like Green Bay...

[Backwards Observer]

Stone the flamin' crows China, shut yer flippin' yap!

Australia tells China not to interfere

[...]

"Number one position from us, and it's based in absolute reality, is that this enhanced set of arrangements with the United States are not directed at any one country," he said.

At the same time, Rudd, a Mandarin-speaking China expert and former prime minister, warned Beijing not to get involved in Australian policy decisions.
"Let's just be very blunt about it, we are not going to have our national security policy dictated by any other external power. That's a sovereign matter for Australia," he said.

"We don't seek to dictate to the Chinese what their national security policy should be. Therefore this must be advanced on the basis of mutual respect."

Australia Tells China Not To Interfere - AFP - Nov 18, 2011.

...

In previous non-interference news:

Al-Qaeda 'praying for Obama win'

[...]

The man who wants to be the first black US president has pledged to withdraw US troops from Iraq by March 2008, a timetable Mr Howard believes is dangerous.

"I think that would just encourage those who wanted completely to destabilise and destroy Iraq, and create chaos and victory for the terrorists to hang on and hope for (an) Obama victory," Mr Howard told the Nine Network.

"If I was running al-Qaeda in Iraq, I would put a circle around March 2008, and pray, as many times as possible, for a victory not only for Obama, but also for the Democrats."

Al-Qaeda 'Praying For Obama Win' - news.com.au - Feb 11, 2007.

...

If China is sincere about Confucian values and not just engaging in rhetorical legerdemain, she should probably take this opportunity to radically recalibrate what is realistically achievable in an international scene largely characterised by vacuous egotism, shameless hypocrisy, crippling greed and a wilfully debilitating ignorance.

A measured policy of defensive disengagement coupled with an attention to the well-being of the Chinese people may be prudent for the foreseeable future, meanwhile salvaging what is left of her virtues after decades of brutal authoritarianism.

If China's rise is indeed peaceful, this should be self-evident from her political behaviour, just as it would be for any other nation. "He who speaks without modesty will find it difficult to make his words good."

Now if you'll excuse me, I have a few more impossible things to consider before breakfast.

"Alice laughed: "There's no use trying," she said; "one can't believe impossible things."
"I daresay you haven't had much practice," said the Queen. "When I was younger, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."
Alice in Wonderland.

[Backwards Observer]

Pentagon Adds Military Force to Fight Cyber-Attacks

The Pentagon reports it reserves the right to use military force against cyber-attacks, taking a stronger offensive approach against the newest threats to homeland security.

Pentagon Adds Military Force to Fight Cyber-Attacks - Forbes - Nov 17, 2011.

...

China using WA satellite station to track navy

A SATELLITE ground station in the West Australian desert is being used by the Chinese military to help locate Australian and US navy warships in the region, an expert has warned.

The explosive claim has been made by the nation's foremost expert on space-based espionage, Des Ball, who says the government may have unwittingly acted against the national interest by allowing China to use the ground station at Mingenew to track Beijing's space satellites.

``This ground station would help China's space-based listening devices to more precisely locate the electronic emissions from aircraft carriers, destroyers and other navy ships,'' Professor Ball told The Australian.

``We're talking serious stuff here . . . why was the construction of this station never announced?''

China using WA satellite station to track navy - Perth Now - Nov 16, 2011.

...

Does this explain the USMC presence in Darwin? They're prepping for an attack on the verdomme quislings in Western Australia? Interesting times...or something.

[davidbfpo]

Good to know Des Ball is still active in this field.

He is an expert, I am an observer and find this very strange. The facility in Western Australia, there are two sites at Dongara, which are part of the Swedish-owned Swedish Space Corporation's PrioraNet satellite monitoring network. There are five similar stations in the USA and of the three network control stations two are in the USA. See:http://www.sscspace.com/products-ser...rioranet-sites

One site, Dongara West:

is owned, operated and maintained by SSC’s US-based subsidiary, Universal Space Network (“USN”). USN functions under a US Government Special Security Agreement (SSA) and primarily serves US-Government and commercial customers.

Whilst Dongara East is:

owned and maintained by SSC’s Australia-based subsidiary, SSC Space Australia. The station is operated from the SSC main station in northern Sweden at the Esrange Space Center. The Dongara East Satellite Station primarily serves government agencies and commercial customers.

I would assume in the event of damaging circumstances this network would be prone to "extended maintenance", if not outright cessation.

What is curious is whether the Australian government knew what was happening. Clearly the "informed public" did not.