Bases and missile pact spells Government's secret sell-out

Bob Briton

Without any fanfare — and certainly no consultation with the 
Australian people — the Howard Government has just signed two
decisions of grave regional strategic significance. In 
Washington last week, Defence Minister Robert Hill and his US 
counterpart Donald Rumsfeld agreed to establish a network of 
military bases in Australia that will host war preparations 
involving "tens of thousands" of US and Australian troops. They 
also shook hands on a 25-year commitment to joint research on the 
US's Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) system or "Son of Star 
Wars".

The decisions taken last week at the Australia-US Ministerial 
Consultations are radical steps toward the complete integration 
of the Australian armed forces into the US war machine. 
"Interoperability" is the euphemism being used to describe the 
takeover. While Defence Minister Hill is evasive about how many 
US troops and what sort of hardware would be permanently 
stationed on Australian soil, the plans are clearly huge in their 
scope.

The Shoalwater Bay Training Area just north of Rockhampton is to 
be upgraded and will serve as the main "multiple combined 
training centre". In the Northern Territory there will be another 
"joint facility" at the base at Delamere and the Bradshaw 
Training Area will give the US military an area larger than 
Austria to conduct their training and war preparations.

Senator Hill is also very defensive about the question of the 
"pre-positioning" of US military personnel and equipment on 
Australian soil. He denies that the nod has been given for such 
an arrangement but his friends in the US are making his attempted 
snow job that much harder.

US Under Secretary of Defence for Policy, Douglas Feith, was in 
Canberra earlier this year to take part in discussions that 
apparently led to the recent agreements. Back home in the US he 
was effusive in his praise of the Howard Government before the 
House Armed Services Committee. According to a piece carried in 
The Australian Financial Review last week, the hawkish neo-
conservative reported discussions "on a number of things — a 
combined training facility, possibly some pre-positioning".

Australian defence officials have described the bases agreement 
as "embryonic" and "politically and symbolically" important. They 
said a mouthful!

The 25-year agreement for joint work on the "Son of Star Wars" 
project is bound to heighten tensions in our region and to ignite 
an arms race in response. Hill recognises that we do not 
currently have any threat of attack from ballistic missiles but 
says that the situation could change in the long term. The 
Minister refuses to accept any responsibility for creating those 
changed circumstances.

This state of denial is maintained despite the opinions expressed 
at the Shangri-la dialogue held in Singapore last month by the 
London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies. 
Australia's group rapporteur Paul Dibb made it clear that China, 
Russia and India were all concerned about the implications of the 
so-called Ballistic Missile Defence system. They foreshadowed an 
arms race to prevent countries having BMD capabilities launching 
an attack from behind a BMD protective shield.

Hill has used nationalism to promote the risky scheme. He says 
that trials have shown that the Jindalee over-the-horizon might 
have some applications in missile defence.

Meanwhile, a one-sided slanging match between US Deputy Secretary 
of State Richard Armitage, ministers of the Howard Government and 
a very defensive Parliamentary Labor Party has sprung up in the 
wake of the decisions over just how committed a future Latham 
Government would be to the US Alliance and a military presence in 
Iraq.

Labor's defence spokesman Chris Evans has reiterated his party's 
long-standing support for joint training with the allies. He 
claims that the projects will be good for regional development 
and job creation. He has re-affirmed the ALP's opposition to the 
"pre- positioning" of US forces at the new bases. No harm done so 
far.

However, the ALP has drawn fire from Mr Armitage and his 
supporters in the Howard Government over Labor's opposition to 
"Son of Star Wars" and the commitment of troops to Iraq. "An 
alliance is a full-on relationship", the burly Deputy Secretary 
of State is reported as saying in response to what he sees as 
Labor's vacillation. An alliance with the US cannot be cherry-
picked. It is an all or nothing, "for us or against us" type of 
commitment.

Labor has taken some measures to get in step with popular 
opposition to the war on Iraq and misgivings about reckless 
projects like Ballistic Missile Defence. Mr Armitage believes 
that the Parliamentary Party is divided over the Iraq issue and 
has outraged many political players in Australia by saying so. 
Former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser has called on 
members of the Bush Administration to butt out of Australian 
domestic politics. So have Paul Keating and New Zealand Prime 
Minister Helen Clark. Mark Latham has objected by saying "we 
respect the great American democracy. I just hope the people 
would respect ours."

Still, Mr Armitage's outbursts deserve examination. Alexander 
Downer claims that Labor's foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd 
met US officials including Mr Armitage recently in Washington. 
Also present at the US-Australia Leadership Dialogue were Kim 
"Bomber" Beazley, deputy Senate leader Stephen Conroy and various 
Labor premiers including that connoisseur of US politics, Bob 
Carr. It is alleged that at these discussions Mr Rudd expressed 
the misgivings of a sizeable portion of the party about Mark 
Latham's pledge to bring part of our troop deployment in Iraq 
home by Christmas.

Though Mr Rudd flatly denies the claim, it does sound plausible. 
When the Government can enlist the Australian people in the 
military plans of the US by stealth and draw only minor criticism 
from Labor in response, it is clear that the peace movement still 
has a lot of work to do.