[Editors Note: The Turnbull government is setting aside $50 million to launch Australia’s national space agency in the 2018 budget. This is a follow up of Tony’s article ‘Australia’s Top End — America’s 51st State‘.]
by Tony Ryan
Is this easy money for Gumatj clan? Or is this a development that might alarm, not only Arnhem Land people, but all Australians.
Despite widespread suspicions, details about the evidently broader military function of the Arnhem Land rocket base will never be accessible until it is too late to alter the course of events.
If our suspicions prove correct, we are confronted by:
- The threat to survival of East Arnhem Aboriginal culture;
- The possible elimination of our only Arnhem Land town; and
- The nationally pivotal issue of Australian defence sovereignty, which it appears is now the subject of capitulation to the US.
Like the citizens of any other country, we cannot accept foreign military occupation as fait accompli merely because money-mad federal politicians want to be paid by a foreign nation.
Responsible Australians must look at the available evidence now and identify probable Pentagon objectives, and then challenge government to confirm or deny.
Of concomitant concern: the already exposed covert military incursion runs parallel with the US-led fracking campaign, with government clearly about to capitulate in the face of massive electoral opposition. This attack on Australian democracy, also must be resolved in the very near future.
When national discussions about an Australian civilian rocket base began quietly four years ago, the parties identified on the internet were:
- Australian Department of Defence
- Lockheed-Martin
- Raytheon
As plans progressed, Raytheon and the Department of Defence dropped out of media publicity and a couple of new organisations emerged: DEAL (Develop East Arnhem Land) and Equatorial Launch Australia.
The word civilian has been stressed, again and again and again. The repetition is far from subtle and has triggered wide-ranging speculation.
As we all know, the Department of Defence deals in wars; Lockheed-Martin makes aircraft, and Raytheon makes only war machines, particularly rockets and missiles. (Its best-known is the Patriot Missile.)
So far, it has become obvious that whoever initiated this project wants the words weapons and defence eliminated from publicity. And, curiously, the article outlining the Ratheon/Dept of Defence discussions has been withdrawn from the internet.
Again, we wonder why? And who will be the recipient of this proposed $50 million budget allocation?
So, what other factors might further illuminate the circumstances near the NT’s Gove Peninsula?
Geopolitical context: The search for clues
The people of Guam and Okinawa, where there are giant Northern and Mid-Pacific American military bases, are sick of their women being raped and assaulted by US servicemen; of having sleep interrupted around the clock; and they do not want any more poisons from military bases contaminating their water supplies and seas.
They also fear their land will be nuclear bombed by China or North Korea in the event of war with the USA.
Obviously, the US needs a new site for another and much bigger military base and this must be in a China-confronting South Pacific deep-water harbour. We have long been aware of rumours that the Pentagon wants to move its Naval fleet to Melville Bay on the Gove Peninsula, however, just when one might reasonably expect negotiations to warm up, there has been a sudden cessation of dialogue.
This silence is deafening. If Australians knew the truth about the 750 American bases around the world they would probably deliver a loud NO to such a base here. So, if Melville Bay is indeed on the Pentagon’s agenda, it would certainly make sense to move into stealth mode.
Patterns of Geopolitical History
With a little imagination we can guess the likely progression of events:
First, a tiny civilian rocket base will be established, with maximum publicity blurbs about Australia finally joining the exciting Space Exploration Frontier. Indeed, this was the exact line adopted by Alan Duffy, ABC TV’s celebrity astronomer.
In the second stage of the PR campaign, two or three satellite relay installations will be established on neighbouring clan leases, to track the rockets and satellites.
Then, entirely disparately of course, will follow a few minor reconstructions to Rio Tinto’s bauxite plant in Inverell Bay to enable “civilian” ships to call in with “civilian” communication technology, installations and equipment. At some stage, there will be a projection of hundreds of jobs for Aborigines and former mine workers.
Then, as the US creates more tension in the Asia Pacific, there will be the Australian Government’s inevitable ‘speculation’ that our national security might well be served if the civilian installations also provide minor assistance to the Depart of Defence. No doubt, the term “cost-effectiveness” will be injected into media releases, as will the forecast potential for passenger ship visitation and a lucrative explosion of tourism.
The eyes of shop keepers and traders in Nhulunbuy will glitter at this prospect, even though anyone with market research capability would roll his eyes and refocus on real-world prospects.
Additional Evidence — Luke Bowen
Government has already budgeted for $50,000 and $75,000 for consultation and negotiation — to help out, among other things…”increasing the American Defence Presence”… Ref: Estimates transcript – Day 1 – 28 November 2017 page 49.
This was a quote from Luke Bowen, who is General Manager of the NT Government’s Northern Australian Development Office, and who is in charge of major projects and strategic infrastructure.
Bowen’s positions are both curious and telling. He was formerly Executive Director and CEO of the NT Cattlemen’s Association; General Manager of Northern Territory Cattlemen’s Trading Pty Ltd; Member of the Agricultural Industry Advisory Council (Chaired by Federal Minister for Agriculture); and on Prime Minister’s Centenary of ANZAC Advisory Board (past); and gained nationwide notoriety as the conspicuous promoter of the nationally-unpopular Live Cattle Export campaign, which was roundly condemned for:
- Destroying Australia’s good reputation for humane animal handling;
- The elimination of 150 abattoirs;
- The destruction of 240,000 regional Australian jobs (directly and from feeder industries).
It would seem that archetypical pragmatist Luke Bowen is a useful person to front enterprises which can be expected to attract national and even global condemnation. A corresponding anticipation of more conflict in the wind seems, under the circumstances, to be eminently reasonable. Right man. Right place. Right time.
The Pentagon
One might ask why the Pentagon is progenitor of a “civilian space rocket launching facility”?
Once the military are involved the term civilian is automatically disqualified. To claim otherwise is like being half pregnant.
Meanwhile, the current number of US Marines in Darwin is around 2000 and Defence Housing Australia has announced provision of 329 new houses in the new Breeze Muirhead suburb. Northern military expansion is clearly on the horizon.
America, in its additional PR contribution, makes daily references to North Korea’s ability to drop nuclear bombs on Australia — which is absurd as North Korea does not have the prerequisite guidance systems, nor miniature war heads. (The entire media circus surrounding the North Korea “crisis” ignores the contextual nature of the original American attack on North Korea.)
Impact on NT tourism and the Environment
An aspect of all this that does not appear to have been factored in, is tourism in the Top End. International awareness of nuclear missile-attracting installations might well, during periods of international tension, harm NT tourism visitation. One reason for Australia’s tourism success has always been our excellent personal security status. A US military presence could very well drive tourists away.
Presumably, a rocket base in Arnhem Land could possibly create an ozone void. Western nation rockets use solid fuel, which produce chlorine gas, which interacts with oxygen to form chlorine oxides, and these damage the ozone layer.
What We Already Know
If we list all relevant military developments in the Top End, and fill in the gaps with the most likely projections, a credible albeit disturbing picture emerges. This is what we know so far:
- A US Airforce Base in Tindal is gaining in military significance (and is already poisoning the region’s soils, ground water, and the Katherine River).
- A US Marines Base in Darwin is destined for rapid expansion.
- The Australia-epi-centred hemisphere spy and navigation satellite relay bases in Shoal Bay and Middle Point (which have been active for decades and are off-limits to all Australians, and serve only American interests), will gain in regional military first-strike target significance for China.
- The ongoing militarisation of Darwin International Airport for nuclear-armed B52 staging (which has happened in the past and made Darwin a double nuclear target during the Cold War).
- There is now, apparently, a US Nuclear armed submarine base in Darwin harbour, which we always thought was built for Australian Collins submarines.
Only two more elements of the prospective South Pacific US war machine have yet to be installed:
- A major navy base; and
- An Intercontinental ballistic missile-launching platform.
Melville Bay is the perfect deep-water harbour for a naval base, and the nearby “civilian” rocket installation completes all elements of the Pentagon’s Military Acquisition Strategy.
Strategy… As Contextually Speculated
By the time the South Pacific naval base strategy becomes public knowledge, Australians will be inured to the US military presence and, anyway, 60% of Australians believe we must put up with bully Americans because we need the superpower to defend us from China or Indonesia.
Are they right?
According to former Prime Minister, Malcolm Fraser, the answer is NO! and NO!
Before he passed away a couple of years ago, Malcolm Fraser several times warned Australians to cut the military alliance with America because, he said, the US cannot be trusted.
Fraser pointed out that when Indonesia planned invasion of North Australia in 1975, America took Indonesia’s side against Australia. And according to our own military intelligence, the information produced from the joint survey of Timor and Arafura oceanic sea floors, was shared exclusively between the US and Indonesia. Australia was left out in the cold.
Since 1946, the US has militarily and aggressively invaded 56 sovereign nations and confiscated their resources. Arnhem Land is one of the richest resource zones in the world and we know America wants to own this too. Taking over the Top End will also create a vast new complex of American military bases — that’s simply a magnificent bonus.
An American Base
How will an American Base in Gove affect the people in Arnhem Land?
Based on the kind of security exclusion zones imposed on other US Bases (ie Okinawa, Guam, and in Latin America), we can guess that the Wessel Islands and mainland almost as far south and west as Gurrumuru will be off-limits to Yolngu and other Australians.
- If events follow the usual American pattern, Yirrkala, Ski Beach, Wallaby Beach, and all nearby Homelands will be bulldozed and the residents relocated to a new and no doubt flimsy town to be located on country somewhere just north-east of Gurrumuru. Nhulunbuy will be militarised; that is, only people with appropriate security classification will be permitted to visit or reside there, and no civilians whatsoever.
- The kinds of toxic substances used in military bases, will inevitably poison the local coast, creeks, and groundwater.
- Americans typically treat local indigenous people with contempt, and so any interaction with US personnel will not be a positive experience. Abuse and rapes will become commonplace. With Rio Tinto already in situ, this ruthless mining corporation may follow its South American tradition of assisting the eliminating Aborigines with introduced diseases before expediting more extensive Arnhem Land resource exploitation. Handily, even its traditional agent for distributing disease-infected clothes, The Summer Institute of Linguistics, (a bible-interpreting service) is also already in position in the Top End. (War hero, explorer, journalist, and historian Frank Alcorta accurately narrated this sad episode of history in the NT News three decades ago).
Malcolm Fraser’s Warnings
This scenario mirrors the warnings issued by ultra-insider, Malcolm Fraser.
As former PM, and with ongoing privileged access to classified information, he was in possession of the disturbing facts. We would be prudent to heed Fraser’s warning, which he clearly intended as his legacy to the Australian People.
Even if an American military presence was not on the table, there is still the matter of public safety surrounding even a civilian rocket base.
Indeed, a comprehensive 1987 government study found that there was no place in the north of Australia where it would be safe to install a rocket launching platform, let alone the initially envisaged Gunn Point location. I quote from the report:
“As all of the common trajectories for geostationary, polar and space shuttle orbits traverse populated areas, and most of impact zones occur in inhabited localities including cities, towns and communities, the Working Party has reluctantly drawn the inevitable conclusion that none of the studied sites is suitable for a commercial spaceport”… (1987 Cabinet Papers, NTRS 2575/P1, Decision 5266; Northern Territory Archives Service).
Please ask: why is a rocket base now suddenly classified as safe, especially considering that the relevant resident population is much denser now than it was in 1987? And why has internet reference to the results of that study, and the Raytheon/Lockheed Martin link, suddenly disappeared?
Another question: Why has the Native Title Act been breached? Traditional consensus protocols, these forming the Indigenous decision-making process, have been ignored. Instead, a purely western process was applied and completed in 13 days, inclusive of weekends.
Clearly, the time has come for a rethink, and resist this planned invasion.
—Tony Ryan is a former journalist, government welfare officer, social researcher, business enterprise operator, and cross-cultural specialist and advisor. He currently assists in the redevelopment of an Arnhem Land Homeland and associated Aboriginal health restoration project.
In my opinion there could not possibly be an excuse for space exploration while the human race is suffering as it is today.
Anyway, Tony, you have deftly shown that this “venture” has nothing to do with space. Please work hard at nipping it in the bud. (I realize you have already worked hard to get even this far.)
Tony, your marshalling of the case is just about perfect. All the practical reasons notwithstanding, though, I feel – in my heart, so to speak – that the whole issue is a moral one.
Starting with the faux promises of a civilian thingie (as you describe) and all the other lies, plus putting people out of their homes (a real shocker), and wrecking the harbor (ask Hawaiians about this!), it is plainly disgusting that we might let this happen.
It is like saying “We don’t believe in the power of good anymore. The wicked have free rein. Rah-rah for them.”
Thanks, Mary.
I am afraid your intuition is right on target. This is a moral issue and there is no morality remaining in parliament, finance, the judiciary, the medical industry, education, defense, the CEC, housing, government statistics, or welfare.
By my calculation, Australia is now the most corrupt of all OECD nations; including he US.
Examining the electorate, hoping there is an answer there, it appears to me that the two generations below ours are bereft of morality, ethics, integrity, energy, honour, or even intelligence and knowledge.
A handful of young people tell me the emerging generation is different and has only contempt for its predecessors. Which takes us to an age-old scenario whereby grandparents and grandchildren unite against a common enemy. LOL.
Around about now, our generation outnumbers all others in the electorate. We now have the opportunity to form a new force in politics. All we need is an inspirational force in the form of somebody who is charismatic, adventurous, attractive, fearless, and with access to unlimited funds.
At that point I look about me and my shoulders slump. Where are we gonna find somebody like that?
censored!!
Tony, you say:
“The word civilian has been stressed, again and again and again. The repetition is far from subtle and has triggered wide-ranging speculation.”
Speculation by whom?
Hi Mary… The first speculation emerged from the electoral office of NT Independent MLA Mark Yingiya Guyula, who is the dynamic Aboriginal political representative for the electorate of Nhulunbuy (North East Arnhem).
Yingiya’s office asked me if I would independently read NT budget estimates and that is when his staff brought the Luke Bowen statement to my attention. While making inquiries in the wider community local speculation commenced, especially among the clique which has bought residential properties and pushed rentals to $200 per night. An American military presence would cause property values to plummet and their investments to evaporate
Gradually, further speculation is emerging in the Aboriginal communities but such a thought process is entirely alien to them. Most will regard this as unbelievable, for the time being. To put this in context, only about three Aborigines in the entirety of Arnhem Land have even the vaguest awareness of geopolitics.
If Aussies wanted to join the space race.. Russia is the obvious partner as it is, according to NASA, the leader in such things.
Oz of course will follow the well trodden path to oblivion as is our right to do so… being as we are a rather pathetic colony that cannot find the hormones needed to grow up into a Nation.
What was the question?
The question is: how are your hormones today?
Headline on one of our local newspapers, “Call for US Navy presence”. My response, which to my surprise they printed, was thus:
I thought Paul Papalia had more sense than to back HMAS Stirling as a naval facility for US use and nuclear capabilities. He’s lost my vote.
The US military and military-industrial complex are the backbone to the US economy, so it is vital for them to be pushing for continuous wars around our globe. However, none of the wars that they generate are to ever be on their continent.
Why not? If they want wars, their people should face the consequences.
For several years, the US appears to have been pushing, first Russia and now China into a confrontation, but well away from mainland US.
If these two nations are left alone, to trade peacefully, there is no risk of global conflagration. Unfortunately, it has never been US policy to leave other nations alone.
If the US is told to leave our country, from all bases, and to leave us to our own destiny, we will be more secure.
Note, Mr Paul Papalia is a Labor state politician of my local area. (Ex Navy)
and as you said re an earlier Post, Aus is a potentially self-sufficient island. Which means that it poses a potential threat to the US that’s commensurate to the alleged threat posed by Russia
Hey, Berry, you are absolutely right on target there.
Australia is the only nation in the world that is potentially self-sufficient; which means we could cease all trade and be impervious to trade sanctions. Inflation would fall too. Rockefeller’s Trilateral Commission realised this in 1973, which is when the slow-motion invasion of our nation commenced, with free trade wiping out manufacturing, and immigration diluting any sense of national sovereignty.
In point of fact, the British realised this right back in the 1950s, and got Anglophile Bob Menzies to introduce the Oil Price Parity Agreement, in which we agreed to pay international prices (viz a viz NYMEX and IPE) for our own oil. (But for this, and tax, we would be paying 12 cents per litre at the bowser).
The US is the biggest threat to Australian peace and prosperity in our brief history.
When our Federal politicians arrange the sale of port facilities to a supposed enemy (China), is that not an act of treason?
When a person, pushes himself into so many highly prestigious positions as Luke Bowden has done, it is a time to worry. Firstly if that person is an honest worker they don’t have time for more than one position at a time and secondly they are likely to be on a egotistic journey. Or maybe the idea is to bring all those organisations under the control of the one body. Not good for competition or for those in the differing organisations.
So the authority to enter the respective land: what’s that based on exactly?
Cos if it’s Crown derived…………….
In Arnhem, it is Aboriginal land, but the Northern Land Council was set up to prevent Aborigines from preventing mining and drilling; and now foreign military invasion
Fulfilling an obligation has much more clout than claiming a right:
https://www.sbs.com.au/nitv/article/2017/06/22/native-title-not-land-rights
Berry
I dunno who Natalie Cromb is but she appears to be a southern urban academic. The Aboriginal attachment to land is a whole lot more specific than she states, but I won’t go into that here.
Cromb is manipulated by the powerful interests she thinks she is fighting. To give her credit, she clearly suspects this and resists valiantly.
As far as I know, the term terra nullius was first used by lawyers of the Law Reform Commission around 1975. It is a strategic fabrication to further their aims, which were nowhere as pure as history apparently acknowledges. In my experience, departing from the truth is perilous at the best of times.
The Gove bauxite mine was given permission by the Methodist Missionaries, on behalf of Aborigines. For the record, they still think they have the right to represent Aboriginal interests. In fact, their target is money and children… and, of course, little black souls.
Then patrol officer Ted Egan read that Canberra claimed the Aborigines of the region were fully conversant with the mine proposal and, smelling a rat, he conducted his own survey and discovered that only two men had any idea what was going on. He told his boss, who did nothing. So he broke all the rules and wrote directly to Canberra, which had much the same affect as a grenade in Parliament.
Consultation had to start all over again.
The then leaders of the Gumatj and Rrirritjingu clans proceeded to suck up all the compensation themselves. This continues to this day, but with some royalties being more fairly distributed.
As for Native Title, in my opinion this was a government and judicial ploy to terminate traditional Aboriginal consensus protocols and promote western style leadership roles, which are easily manipulated.
No doubt Cromb is well meaning, but when southern urban Aborigines speak for the traditional people of the north this has the effect of silencing people who are uncomfortable with English language in the first place. They cannot contradict because confrontation is avoided in their culture. The English-speaking monolingual non-cultural Aborigines have disenfranchised the northern cultural delta (Kimberly/Arnhem/Central Australia) even more effectively than the white colonialists.
Currently, Arnhem Land represents a power vacuum which the US is adroitly filling. Thus, colonial Canberra is being happily ousted by even more Colonial America.
Tony, I spent nearly 2 years in the (at that time) very isolated Kalumburu settlement.
You cannot fool me with the idealised notions of aboriginal “culture” formulated in air conditioned offices of “political correctness”
Tony: “As for Native Title, in my opinion this was a government and judicial ploy to terminate traditional Aboriginal consensus protocols and promote western style leadership roles, which are easily manipulated.”
Ya gotta give ’em credit. Ya gotta give ’em credit. Man, how do they think of such things!
So true, Mary.
The Trilateral Commission employs the cleverest people around, and then sends them across the word to implement mischief. Ross Garnaut is one. His job is to push the LNP and ALP into accepting carbon prices… the biggest load of old cobblers in human history.
You gotta laugh. Future generations will be gobsmacked we were so gullible.
And institutes that advise…
Tony, I read somewhere, years ago, that Lloyd Cutler was sent on a mission to Washington, DC, to make the Congress more like the Westminster system of party discipline. Undoubtedly this has come true.
The media assists “Lloyd” by teaching us that all bills depend on the numbers. “Trump can’t get impeached because GOP has the majority.” Not so. If “they” paid the fence sitters, Trump could be impeached.
(Not that I want this to happen, but in theory I like impeachments.)
If this does not prove Austalia is a vassal state of the US what does?
Australia and the U.S. and practically all other States in the World are vassals of the “City” and its subsidiaries all over the place.
A couple, like Libya and Iraq tried to duck out but look what happened to them.
This is what happened to them . . . and will happen to others (who don’t have nuke weapons to defend themselves):
http://www.whatdoesitmean.com/dssc4.jpg
Tony,
Thanks for the amazing expose of just how deep the corruption has become entrenched into the fabric of Australian political life. It seems just about everyone is on the take, to some degree or another. Perhaps the coming financial shakeout will sort some of this mess out and expose many of the bad actors.
On a brighter note Hillary and Juliar entertained 5000 morons,(or complicit individuals) at the Sydney Convention Centre last night. I was totally enthralled at NOT being in the audience.
NOW I understand why she lost. She just didn’t get enough votes, despite the rigging of the election. (how do you lose a rigged election??) Extreme unpopularity. EXTREME!!
“Now what are we gonna do about it??”
Good question.
I think a few Australians were asking the same question back in 1984.
Between jobs, and having walked out of government in disgust at the rampant corruption in the NT Peron Government; I was driving a cab for a living. One day a man ordered a cab and, part way to the destination, asked me to pull over.
He explained his connection to federal military intelligence and told me about the myriad serious betrayals of Australia’s defense; invariably led by the US. He explained the corruption of the military hierarchy, something I was already aware of.
He then asked me if I would join a military coup of Australia.
I pointed out that with very young children I had to back away from this. Their timing was bad.
But this gives us some indication of just how much serious anger there is across the nation. When enough people get up and shout “Enough is enough. It’s time to fight!”, then I think the military will back us.
In fact, I am sure of it.
Two notes on comments above. How does one lose a rigged election? Ask Hillary Clinton.
Phil’s comment: “Thanks for the amazing expose of just how deep the corruption has become entrenched into the fabric of Australian political life. It seems just about everyone is on the take, to some degree or another. Perhaps the coming financial shakeout will sort some of this mess out and expose many of the bad actors.”
Anybody that knows anything about the facts of Port Arthur, has already worked out about the deep corruption of everybody scratching everybody else’s back. All those in positions who are supposed to be acting on behalf of the public, like politicians both Federal and State, police commissioners, police officers, lawyers, intelligence agencies, A.F.P., Australian Crime Commission, the Federal Ombudsman Office, banks, the office of the Governor General, and of course the News Media. Who have I missed out?
I know who I missed off the above list, judges.
“Local councils aka local government”
Mal, I think you’ve nailed it.
Who have you missed out
No one
Australia is a Deep State controlled entity. Run by criminals .For criminals. Lining their own pockets and probably raping a few kids on the side.(just for fun???)
End of section.
Govt. is corrupt. .Media is corrupt. Corporations are corrupt. Bureaucracy is corrupt.
Judiciary and law enforcement is corrupt.
Houston, we have a problem!!
As Ms.Maxwell often says, Now what are we gonna do about it??
Years ago, I would have said, “they can’t all be corrupt, and a group of them will stand up and bring the criminal ones to account”. However I now see that it is not going to happen. The rot is too far gone. Our whole society seems to be rotten to the core, except for little pockets. That includes all religions.
There are the “wise guys” who think they’re smarter than God and there are the ordinary guys who just gotta do what they gotta do according to nature and purpose.
The ‘Left’ gatekeepers have been left out, they are equal traitors to the working class.
The potential for a space base in northern Australia was raised by John Fredricks, Director of the NSCA (vic) in the 1980’s. Is there a connection?
Probably. The timing is right. There was a proposal to establish such a pad at Gunn Point, one hour away from Darwin but it was ruled out as unsafe by the 1987 government inquiry.