This sinking feeling – Message from the editor

Sometimes you just have to wait.

I’m not a very patient person, but I’ve learned two things about patience and perseverance:

difficult and truly important things never happen quickly; And

problems happen in cycles. If you don’t cross the finish line this time, hang in there: there will definitely be another opportunity.

The problem – this time around – is AUKUS: the multi-year, multi-stage, multi-billion dollar three-way (Australia, UK, US) defense pact. During my first months at P&I at the beginning of last year, I got way ahead of myself and declared a turning point in this area. The P&I community talked about the cracks and contradictions in the deal long before it was announced with great bluster at that unforgettable event. three-way press conference with Joe Biden, Boris Johnson and Scott Morrison in September 2021.

And it was Morrison who put me in my chair this week. After a week that, once again, exposed the weakness of Australia’s position and the community’s growing opposition to it, the former prime minister has come to its defense.

He chose the ABC RN Global roaming program to tell us not to worry: his “forever” pact was on track. He later told the media: “Let’s not give up because we think we’re not good enough. »

But the problem isn’t that we’re not good enough – it’s that the deal is falling apart, with more changes being made this week. Many of you will have heard Defense Minister Richard Marles’ announcement that we are now receiving all second-hand Virginia Class submarines (the deal called for two second-hand and one new). The minister and defense officials then told the Senate Estimates and media that three used submarines were actually what we wanted all along.

Really?

And it’s not just about details and taxpayer money. It’s more than that.

Mike Gilligan nailed it this week when he said: “The move to second-hand Virginia-class submarines reveals AUKUS’s deepest flaw: Australia is committing enormous public funds to a capability designed around US strategic priorities rather than Australia’s own defense needs.”

Former Prime Minister Paul Keating made it clear in P&I in March 2023 that the deal was a failure. He said AUKUS was “the worst international decision made by an Australian Labor government since former Labor leader Billy Hughes sought to introduce conscription to augment Australian forces during the First World War.”

Gareth Evans argued its former leader with concise and devastating brevity: “AUKUS has been problematic from the start, in terms of deliverability, cost-benefit and implications for our sovereign decision-making agency. Above all, the mad irony of the whole project has always been that it commits Australia to spending colossal sums of money to build a capability that is supposed to defend us against military threats that are in fact most likely to arise simply because we we have this capability – and we use it to support the United States in a conflict that is not our country’s interests to engage – without any guarantee of support in return if we ever need it.

So you would think that would be it. Party elders don’t dictate policy, obviously, but this level of resistance from such senior Labor figures is quite unusual.

This week, former federal minister Ed Husic broke ranks on this issue and a public inquiry into AUKUS was launched. It will be led by Peter Garrett and will include former Western Australian Prime Minister Carmen Lawrence and former Australian Defense Force chief Chris Barrie. Garrett said AUKUS “was the largest, and by far the most expensive, decision made in secret by an Australian government, tying us to two other sovereign governments and taking an extraordinary amount of taxpayers’ money on a proposal that has many distinct and very difficult complexities and potential problems ahead.”

Well, yes.

My highlight of the week was Peter Garrett telling us what he really thought, via Midnight Oil’s 1982. American forces. He

American forces give the green light

This is a setback for your country

Bombs and trenches in rows

Bombs and threats always ask for more

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The opinions expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.