China Military Budget to surpass $100 Billion Dollars 2012!
Source- Washington Post
By Keith B. Richburg, Published: March 3
BEIJING — Beijing’s Communist rulers plan to boost military spending by 11 percent this year, passing the $100 billion mark for the first time and renewing questions about China’s long-term intentions.
The new spending plan comes as China’s neighbors are unnerved by the country’s growing assertiveness in pressing territorial claims and as the Obama administration has announced a strategic “pivot” to the Asia-Pacific region.
The new defense spending plans, outlined at the start of the annual session of China’s largely rubber-stamp legislature, would bring China’s official military budget to 670 billion yuan. That would be the equivalent of $106 billion at the current exchange rate of 6.3 renminbi to the dollar. That amounts to an increase of $10.6 billion over 2011.
Defense analysts outside of China say the real outlay on defense could be considerably higher, when other areas, such as spending on outer space, are included.
The People’s Liberation Army has seen years of double-digit budget increases, which have helped transform China’s military into a force now capable of projecting power throughout the region and, increasingly, to faraway conflict zones such as the Somali coast, where pirates have harassed Chinese vessels and crews.
China has also embarked on a program to build and acquire more sophisticated, modern weaponry, including a new home-built J-20 stealth fighter jet, which made a test flight last year, and China’s first aircraft carrier, a refurbished, unfinished Soviet-era vessel purchased in 1998 from Ukraine.
The defense budget for 2011 was $91.5 billion, which was a 12.7 percent increase over the 2010 budget of $78 billion.
Li Zhaoxing, the spokesman for China’s legislature, known as the National People’s Congress, deflected a reporter’s questions about the need for the large increase in military spending. He said that “China is committed to the path of peaceful development” and “follows a defense policy that is peaceful in nature.”
Li said that China’s defense spending as a share of its gross domestic product was 1.28 percent in 2011 and that the military budgets of countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom exceeded 2 percent of GDP. However, some outside sources, such as the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, put China’s actual military spending as a percentage of GDP at higher than 2 percent. Most outside analysts use a broader view of defense spending and include such areas as space activities.
Some analysts have projected that by 2015, China’s military spending will surpass that of all 12 of its Asia-Pacific neighbors.
That kind of spending is causing jitters in the region, particularly as China has become increasingly assertive over long-standing territorial claims. In the oil-rich South China Sea, China is involved in a dispute over a small island chain also claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei.
Relations between China and Japan soured after a 2010 incident involving a Chinese fishing boat captain who rammed a Japanese patrol boat in waters around islands — called Senkaku by Japan and Diaoyu by China — also claimed by both sides.
China and India are also involved in a long-running border dispute involving Arunachal Pradesh, which China refers to as Southern Tibet.
Several regional countries, including India, Indonesia and Vietnam, have begun increasing their military capabilities in response to China’s increased military spending and growing assertiveness. Some longtime U.S. allies, such as the Philippines, have appealed for a stronger American presence in the region.
Researcher Zhang Jie contributed to this report.
Source- Washington Post
By Keith B. Richburg, Published: March 3
BEIJING — Beijing’s Communist rulers plan to boost military spending by 11 percent this year, passing the $100 billion mark for the first time and renewing questions about China’s long-term intentions.
The new spending plan comes as China’s neighbors are unnerved by the country’s growing assertiveness in pressing territorial claims and as the Obama administration has announced a strategic “pivot” to the Asia-Pacific region.
The new defense spending plans, outlined at the start of the annual session of China’s largely rubber-stamp legislature, would bring China’s official military budget to 670 billion yuan. That would be the equivalent of $106 billion at the current exchange rate of 6.3 renminbi to the dollar. That amounts to an increase of $10.6 billion over 2011.
Defense analysts outside of China say the real outlay on defense could be considerably higher, when other areas, such as spending on outer space, are included.
The People’s Liberation Army has seen years of double-digit budget increases, which have helped transform China’s military into a force now capable of projecting power throughout the region and, increasingly, to faraway conflict zones such as the Somali coast, where pirates have harassed Chinese vessels and crews.
China has also embarked on a program to build and acquire more sophisticated, modern weaponry, including a new home-built J-20 stealth fighter jet, which made a test flight last year, and China’s first aircraft carrier, a refurbished, unfinished Soviet-era vessel purchased in 1998 from Ukraine.
The defense budget for 2011 was $91.5 billion, which was a 12.7 percent increase over the 2010 budget of $78 billion.
Li Zhaoxing, the spokesman for China’s legislature, known as the National People’s Congress, deflected a reporter’s questions about the need for the large increase in military spending. He said that “China is committed to the path of peaceful development” and “follows a defense policy that is peaceful in nature.”
Li said that China’s defense spending as a share of its gross domestic product was 1.28 percent in 2011 and that the military budgets of countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom exceeded 2 percent of GDP. However, some outside sources, such as the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, put China’s actual military spending as a percentage of GDP at higher than 2 percent. Most outside analysts use a broader view of defense spending and include such areas as space activities.
Some analysts have projected that by 2015, China’s military spending will surpass that of all 12 of its Asia-Pacific neighbors.
That kind of spending is causing jitters in the region, particularly as China has become increasingly assertive over long-standing territorial claims. In the oil-rich South China Sea, China is involved in a dispute over a small island chain also claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei.
Relations between China and Japan soured after a 2010 incident involving a Chinese fishing boat captain who rammed a Japanese patrol boat in waters around islands — called Senkaku by Japan and Diaoyu by China — also claimed by both sides.
China and India are also involved in a long-running border dispute involving Arunachal Pradesh, which China refers to as Southern Tibet.
Several regional countries, including India, Indonesia and Vietnam, have begun increasing their military capabilities in response to China’s increased military spending and growing assertiveness. Some longtime U.S. allies, such as the Philippines, have appealed for a stronger American presence in the region.
Researcher Zhang Jie contributed to this report.
AUSTRALIAN POLITICS
Source- UK Guardian
Julia Gillard cabinet reshuffle brings Bob Carr into Australian governmentCarve-up of portfolios in wake of Kevin Rudd challenge is marred by Labor infighting over new foreign minister
Share 8 reddit this Warren Murray
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 1 March 2012 21.39 EST Article history
Julia Gillard, the Australian prime minister, has appointed a new cabinet after hanging on to power in a challenge from Kevin Rudd – and was plunged straight back into controversy by party infighting over the appointment of his replacement as foreign minister.
Gillard drafted in Bob Carr, a former premier of the state of New South Wales, via a vacancy in the senate created by the resignation of Mark Arbib, a Gillard loyalist, in the fallout from the failed Rudd bid for leadership of the governing Labor party.
The appointment of respected Carr to the senate and the foreign affairs portfolio should have been a political masterstroke but Gillard is being attacked again as untrustworthy and unable to control the party after earlier denying that Carr would be manoeuvred into the federal parliament. Reports also emerged of a showdown with senior ministers over the plan.
Carr – New South Wales' longest serving premier, with 10 years in power that spanned the Sydney Olympics in 2000 – had retired from politics but said he "couldn't have found it within myself to say no" when he was offered the chance to return to public service.
"She [Gillard] asked me to serve my country, I couldn't have said no to that."
When an Australian senator departs, his or her party can appoint a replacement without the need for a byelection.
Carr's elevation was marred by another round of Labor bloodletting when reports emerged that ministers including Stephen Smith, who holds the defence portfolio, tried to block Carr's appointment. Smith and others in the party were scrambling to deny it when the news broke that Carr would in fact be brought into the government after all.
The opposition leader, Tony Abbott, echoed Kevin Rudd's words when he said the affair showed how "faceless men" were able to dictate terms to the prime minister, and said it was another example of how "you can't believe anything she says".
Rudd resigned as foreign minister to challenge Gillard for the Labor leadership and therefore the prime minister's position. He lost by 31 votes to Gillard's 71, and has promised to remain on the backbench and not challenge her again
As part of the reshuffle, Kevin Rudd supporter Robert McClelland has been demoted to the backbench. Ms Gillard said Stephen Smith, who preceded Rudd in foreign affairs and had been tipped to return, would remain as defence minister.
The carve-up did not amount to a purge of Rudd supporters. Martin Ferguson, Anthony Albanese and Chris Bowen all kept their ministries despite backing the challenger, although Robert McClelland was sent to the backbench.
THE battle for the Labor leadership has split the cabinet and ministry, as a succession of Gillard government frontbenchers publicly threw their support behind Kevin Rudd today.
In the most significant show of support so far for the former prime minister, Resources and Energy Minister Martin Ferguson said Mr Rudd was best placed to take on Tony Abbott at the next election.
“I'm not sure whether or not there will be leadership ballot on Monday. But can I say, should Kevin Rudd choose to run, I will vote for Kevin Rudd as prime minister of Australia,” the cabinet minister said.
Junior ministers Kim Carr and Robert McClelland, both of whom were demoted by Ms Gillard, also declared they would back Mr Rudd.
Cabinet minister Chris Bowen urged Mr Rudd to challenge for the leadership and advised caucus members to reflect on his popularity with voters, but stopped short of saying he would vote for him.
Other ministers declared their support for Ms Gillard, including Communications Minister Stephen Conroy, Finance Minister Penny Wong, Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig, Assistant Treasurer Mark Arbib and Veterans' Affairs Minister Warren Snowdon.
Earlier, Ms Gillard announced a caucus leadership spill for 10am (AEDT) on Monday. She said she “expects” to win but ruled out a future challenge if she lost, and urged Mr Rudd to make a similar commitment.
In a press conference in Washington before flying home to Australia, Mr Rudd said he believed he stood a better chance at beating Tony Abbott than Ms Gillard, talking up his “formidable” achievements as prime minister and calling for a new era of political unity.
Senator Kim Carr said Mr Rudd was a “changed man” and would give the party a better chance at winning the next election.
Mr McClelland said Mr Rudd enjoyed the “overwhelming support” of the Australian people, and urged colleagues not to forget Mr Rudd’s victory at the 2007 election.
Source- UK Guardian
Julia Gillard cabinet reshuffle brings Bob Carr into Australian governmentCarve-up of portfolios in wake of Kevin Rudd challenge is marred by Labor infighting over new foreign minister
Share 8 reddit this Warren Murray
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 1 March 2012 21.39 EST Article history
Julia Gillard, the Australian prime minister, has appointed a new cabinet after hanging on to power in a challenge from Kevin Rudd – and was plunged straight back into controversy by party infighting over the appointment of his replacement as foreign minister.
Gillard drafted in Bob Carr, a former premier of the state of New South Wales, via a vacancy in the senate created by the resignation of Mark Arbib, a Gillard loyalist, in the fallout from the failed Rudd bid for leadership of the governing Labor party.
The appointment of respected Carr to the senate and the foreign affairs portfolio should have been a political masterstroke but Gillard is being attacked again as untrustworthy and unable to control the party after earlier denying that Carr would be manoeuvred into the federal parliament. Reports also emerged of a showdown with senior ministers over the plan.
Carr – New South Wales' longest serving premier, with 10 years in power that spanned the Sydney Olympics in 2000 – had retired from politics but said he "couldn't have found it within myself to say no" when he was offered the chance to return to public service.
"She [Gillard] asked me to serve my country, I couldn't have said no to that."
When an Australian senator departs, his or her party can appoint a replacement without the need for a byelection.
Carr's elevation was marred by another round of Labor bloodletting when reports emerged that ministers including Stephen Smith, who holds the defence portfolio, tried to block Carr's appointment. Smith and others in the party were scrambling to deny it when the news broke that Carr would in fact be brought into the government after all.
The opposition leader, Tony Abbott, echoed Kevin Rudd's words when he said the affair showed how "faceless men" were able to dictate terms to the prime minister, and said it was another example of how "you can't believe anything she says".
Rudd resigned as foreign minister to challenge Gillard for the Labor leadership and therefore the prime minister's position. He lost by 31 votes to Gillard's 71, and has promised to remain on the backbench and not challenge her again
As part of the reshuffle, Kevin Rudd supporter Robert McClelland has been demoted to the backbench. Ms Gillard said Stephen Smith, who preceded Rudd in foreign affairs and had been tipped to return, would remain as defence minister.
The carve-up did not amount to a purge of Rudd supporters. Martin Ferguson, Anthony Albanese and Chris Bowen all kept their ministries despite backing the challenger, although Robert McClelland was sent to the backbench.
THE battle for the Labor leadership has split the cabinet and ministry, as a succession of Gillard government frontbenchers publicly threw their support behind Kevin Rudd today.
In the most significant show of support so far for the former prime minister, Resources and Energy Minister Martin Ferguson said Mr Rudd was best placed to take on Tony Abbott at the next election.
“I'm not sure whether or not there will be leadership ballot on Monday. But can I say, should Kevin Rudd choose to run, I will vote for Kevin Rudd as prime minister of Australia,” the cabinet minister said.
Junior ministers Kim Carr and Robert McClelland, both of whom were demoted by Ms Gillard, also declared they would back Mr Rudd.
Cabinet minister Chris Bowen urged Mr Rudd to challenge for the leadership and advised caucus members to reflect on his popularity with voters, but stopped short of saying he would vote for him.
Other ministers declared their support for Ms Gillard, including Communications Minister Stephen Conroy, Finance Minister Penny Wong, Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig, Assistant Treasurer Mark Arbib and Veterans' Affairs Minister Warren Snowdon.
Earlier, Ms Gillard announced a caucus leadership spill for 10am (AEDT) on Monday. She said she “expects” to win but ruled out a future challenge if she lost, and urged Mr Rudd to make a similar commitment.
In a press conference in Washington before flying home to Australia, Mr Rudd said he believed he stood a better chance at beating Tony Abbott than Ms Gillard, talking up his “formidable” achievements as prime minister and calling for a new era of political unity.
Senator Kim Carr said Mr Rudd was a “changed man” and would give the party a better chance at winning the next election.
Mr McClelland said Mr Rudd enjoyed the “overwhelming support” of the Australian people, and urged colleagues not to forget Mr Rudd’s victory at the 2007 election.
Australian Politics-continued here
Source-The Australian.com
Thankfully, Whitlam and Co rescued Labor from the Reds
Bob Carr
July 05, 2010 12:00AM
25 comments
PAUL Keating, as president of Young Labor in 1968, always referred to the Left of the ALP as "the comms".
I was a bit taken aback by this brutal political shorthand. Fresh from university studies in history and politics, I thought snootily that his language a bit crude.
I was wrong.
How wrong is confirmed by the just-published book The Family File by Mark Aarons. It's an account of what ASIO files - the largest collection in Australian history - say about four generations of a communist family, Mark's father Laurie being the long-term general secretary of the Communist Party of Australia.
But the bombshell revelation is the system of dual membership of the ALP and the CPA, something long suspected but now spelt out by the ASIO documents and Mark Aarons's family familiarity with Australian communism.
The implications are huge.
As a teenage Whitlam-ite I sat in the gallery of Sydney Town Hall and watched factional debates at the annual state ALP conference. I now know, courtesy of this book, the Left leaders carried Communist Party tickets. Their real loyalty was to the CPA, a party still loyal to Moscow.
Aarons quotes ASIO files that place former senators Arthur Gietzelt and Bruce Childs as CPA members.
It is almost certain that in the circle of activists around them there were numerous others. Others were simple left-wingers who had fond and close association with the CPA. Others took their political cues from its campaigns and propaganda.
One ASIO agent believed that former federal ALP minister Tom Uren was a CPA member between 1948 and 1958. Bob Hawke, it is reported, believes Uren as well as Gietzelt, both ministers in his cabinet, were CPA members, probably on the basis of ASIO advice.
But Uren strongly denies it and Aarons, who listened to a long oral history interview between Uren and his father, accepts Uren's denial.
The revelation of dual membership is rich in implications. They recast the political history of Australia from the 1950s to the 70s.
First, they vindicate the decision of a large part of Catholic Australia to veto the election of federal Labor governments by voting for the breakaway Democratic Labor Party after the Labor split of 1955.
Still something of a Labor romantic, I find it painful to squeeze this out, but it strikes me the DLP indictment of the ramshackle Labor Party led by H. V. Evatt and Arthur Calwell was mostly right.
A "pro-communist left wing" - you can hear Bob Santamaria enunciating it as one word - secured an elevated role in the ALP once so many Catholics withdrew and this Labor Left was led (or largely led) by figures who kept a dual membership in the Communist Party in their bottom drawers or pasted in the end piece of an unread Das Kapital above the family fireplace.
Second, the revelations demean the reputations of Evatt, the mercurial and somewhat disturbed leader of the ALP 1951-60, and his successor Calwell, leader of the party from 1960 to 1967. Both compromised the party, in Evatt's case by choosing a communist-led Left wing to be his ally and tolerating cosy relationships with CPA personnel at a time when they were rusted-on Soviet loyalists. Calwell accommodated himself to the communist-dominated Victorian state ALP executive and finally, absurdly, joined it even while serving as federal leader.
Under Calwell's leadership the left was able to hammer a commitment to a nuclear-free southern hemisphere into federal ALP policy. This came straight out of the CPA and was designed to rupture the Australian-American alliance when Labor won government; that is, it was a policy device for banning visits by US naval vessels to Australian ports.
In 1963 the Left got to within one vote at a national ALP conference of committing Labor to oppose the American communications base on Northwest Cape. The other Left policy victory was to lock federal and state Labor governments into denying state aid to non-state (that is, Catholic) schools.
We can now assume the impetus behind these policy thrusts was delivered by ALP officials and trade unionists who held dual membership in the CPA or were so aligned to it a party ticket barely mattered.
It was Gough Whitlam who challenged this bunch and, I believe, must be rewarded with a marking up in his historic reputation. Historians should rediscover Whitlam the anti-communist.
It was he who took on the Victorian executive, even abusing them to their faces, in 1967 at the first Victorian conference he addressed as leader. It was he who treated the federal executive of the party with the contempt it deserved; it was he who sought to build a modern, reforming social democratic party instead of the comm-dominated rabble it had sunk to.
Just think: with no Gough, Jim Cairns would have led Labor, a naive academic who never conceded the North Vietnamese presence in South Vietnam, never criticised North Vietnam, could refer to Stalin and Mao as "leaders of world socialism", and as treasurer said he would print money to reduce unemployment. As I write this, the chilling analogy dawns on me: Cairns as an Australian Salvador Allende.
From Aarons's book not just Whitlam but the whole ALP Right is elevated, the party members who did not take Santamaria's advice and walk out but who opted to stay in the ALP and fight. Their names should be recorded on some kind of honour roll. They include Laurie Short and John Ducker, and the secretaries of unions of carpenters, electricians and rubber workers now dead and forgotten, united in a view that the party of Curtin and Chifley was not to be packaged up and handed over to Marxist-Leninists and outright Soviet agents.
Ducker, leader of the NSW Labor Right who died two years ago, once used the expression in a conversation with me, "the right-wing of the Labor Party, in the best sense of the term": in the 50s and 60s they turned up at conferences and blocked a takeover of the ALP by "the comms" - I now adopt young Keating's nomenclature.
Bob Carr is a former Labor premier of NSW.
Thankfully, Whitlam and Co rescued Labor from the Reds
Bob Carr
July 05, 2010 12:00AM
25 comments
PAUL Keating, as president of Young Labor in 1968, always referred to the Left of the ALP as "the comms".
I was a bit taken aback by this brutal political shorthand. Fresh from university studies in history and politics, I thought snootily that his language a bit crude.
I was wrong.
How wrong is confirmed by the just-published book The Family File by Mark Aarons. It's an account of what ASIO files - the largest collection in Australian history - say about four generations of a communist family, Mark's father Laurie being the long-term general secretary of the Communist Party of Australia.
But the bombshell revelation is the system of dual membership of the ALP and the CPA, something long suspected but now spelt out by the ASIO documents and Mark Aarons's family familiarity with Australian communism.
The implications are huge.
As a teenage Whitlam-ite I sat in the gallery of Sydney Town Hall and watched factional debates at the annual state ALP conference. I now know, courtesy of this book, the Left leaders carried Communist Party tickets. Their real loyalty was to the CPA, a party still loyal to Moscow.
Aarons quotes ASIO files that place former senators Arthur Gietzelt and Bruce Childs as CPA members.
It is almost certain that in the circle of activists around them there were numerous others. Others were simple left-wingers who had fond and close association with the CPA. Others took their political cues from its campaigns and propaganda.
One ASIO agent believed that former federal ALP minister Tom Uren was a CPA member between 1948 and 1958. Bob Hawke, it is reported, believes Uren as well as Gietzelt, both ministers in his cabinet, were CPA members, probably on the basis of ASIO advice.
But Uren strongly denies it and Aarons, who listened to a long oral history interview between Uren and his father, accepts Uren's denial.
The revelation of dual membership is rich in implications. They recast the political history of Australia from the 1950s to the 70s.
First, they vindicate the decision of a large part of Catholic Australia to veto the election of federal Labor governments by voting for the breakaway Democratic Labor Party after the Labor split of 1955.
Still something of a Labor romantic, I find it painful to squeeze this out, but it strikes me the DLP indictment of the ramshackle Labor Party led by H. V. Evatt and Arthur Calwell was mostly right.
A "pro-communist left wing" - you can hear Bob Santamaria enunciating it as one word - secured an elevated role in the ALP once so many Catholics withdrew and this Labor Left was led (or largely led) by figures who kept a dual membership in the Communist Party in their bottom drawers or pasted in the end piece of an unread Das Kapital above the family fireplace.
Second, the revelations demean the reputations of Evatt, the mercurial and somewhat disturbed leader of the ALP 1951-60, and his successor Calwell, leader of the party from 1960 to 1967. Both compromised the party, in Evatt's case by choosing a communist-led Left wing to be his ally and tolerating cosy relationships with CPA personnel at a time when they were rusted-on Soviet loyalists. Calwell accommodated himself to the communist-dominated Victorian state ALP executive and finally, absurdly, joined it even while serving as federal leader.
Under Calwell's leadership the left was able to hammer a commitment to a nuclear-free southern hemisphere into federal ALP policy. This came straight out of the CPA and was designed to rupture the Australian-American alliance when Labor won government; that is, it was a policy device for banning visits by US naval vessels to Australian ports.
In 1963 the Left got to within one vote at a national ALP conference of committing Labor to oppose the American communications base on Northwest Cape. The other Left policy victory was to lock federal and state Labor governments into denying state aid to non-state (that is, Catholic) schools.
We can now assume the impetus behind these policy thrusts was delivered by ALP officials and trade unionists who held dual membership in the CPA or were so aligned to it a party ticket barely mattered.
It was Gough Whitlam who challenged this bunch and, I believe, must be rewarded with a marking up in his historic reputation. Historians should rediscover Whitlam the anti-communist.
It was he who took on the Victorian executive, even abusing them to their faces, in 1967 at the first Victorian conference he addressed as leader. It was he who treated the federal executive of the party with the contempt it deserved; it was he who sought to build a modern, reforming social democratic party instead of the comm-dominated rabble it had sunk to.
Just think: with no Gough, Jim Cairns would have led Labor, a naive academic who never conceded the North Vietnamese presence in South Vietnam, never criticised North Vietnam, could refer to Stalin and Mao as "leaders of world socialism", and as treasurer said he would print money to reduce unemployment. As I write this, the chilling analogy dawns on me: Cairns as an Australian Salvador Allende.
From Aarons's book not just Whitlam but the whole ALP Right is elevated, the party members who did not take Santamaria's advice and walk out but who opted to stay in the ALP and fight. Their names should be recorded on some kind of honour roll. They include Laurie Short and John Ducker, and the secretaries of unions of carpenters, electricians and rubber workers now dead and forgotten, united in a view that the party of Curtin and Chifley was not to be packaged up and handed over to Marxist-Leninists and outright Soviet agents.
Ducker, leader of the NSW Labor Right who died two years ago, once used the expression in a conversation with me, "the right-wing of the Labor Party, in the best sense of the term": in the 50s and 60s they turned up at conferences and blocked a takeover of the ALP by "the comms" - I now adopt young Keating's nomenclature.
Bob Carr is a former Labor premier of NSW.
Source-International Communist League
U.S., Australia Reinforce Alliance Against China
At the Pentagon on January 5, Barack Obama, surrounded by top military brass, announced a shift in military strategy that, he made clear, puts China more directly in U.S. imperialism’s crosshairs. While Washington is planning nearly $500 billion in spending cuts, this would still make U.S. military spending greater than that of the next ten countries combined. As it firms up its imperialist alliances with Japan and Australia with its turn toward the Asia-Pacific region, the Obama White House promises a “leaner and meaner” military, centrally to target China, the largest and most powerful of those countries today that have overthrown capitalist rule. Obama also renewed U.S. threats against capitalist Iran, which has been subjected to increasing imperialist sanctions and provocations. Below we reprint an article, edited for publication in WV, from Australasian Spartacist No. 215 (Summer 2011/12), newspaper of the Spartacist League of Australia.
* * *
On 17 November, in an address to the Australian federal parliament, visiting U.S. president Barack Obama announced that American imperialism intends to make its “presence and mission in the Asia Pacific a top priority.” “The United States is a Pacific power, and we are here to stay,” declared the U.S. Commander-in-Chief. The day before, in a direct provocation against the People’s Republic of China, Obama and Labor Party (ALP) prime minister Julia Gillard jointly announced a deepening of U.S. military ties with Australia. The agreement includes expanded U.S. access to air and naval bases in the Northern Territory and Western Australia, and a permanent troop presence in Darwin of 2,500 Marines by 2016-17.
In 2009 the ALP government released a Defence White Paper that outlined a vast program of military spending while hawkishly targeting China. Alongside Canberra’s increasing militarisation of the north, this build-up is designed to work in concert with the expansion of U.S. military forces in Australia under the reactionary U.S./Australia alliance. A second-rate jackal imperialist power, Australia looks to the U.S. for protection. As such, Canberra has offered its services in countless dirty murderous operations, including the U.S.-led wars and occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan, while pursuing its own predatory interests in the region. The projected Marine air ground taskforce in Darwin will provide Washington with a rapid intervention force to carry out whatever forward imperialist dirty work is required.
Obama’s “strategic decision” for U.S. imperialism to play a larger, long-term role in “shaping this region and its future” is ominous for the worker and peasant masses of Asia. Having now withdrawn troops from Iraq and projecting to scale down in Afghanistan, Washington is once again focusing its gun sights on China after being temporarily deflected following September 11, 2001. Obama demands China “play by the rules” of capitalism and, using language straight out of the 1950s Cold War and 1980s Cold War II against the Soviet Union, lectures that “prosperity without freedom is just another form of poverty”! For the imperialists, “freedom” means being at liberty to loot impoverished and subjugated nations, fomenting racism and communalist slaughter as they ensure their continued class rule over the exploited masses.
The proletariat of the U.S., Australia and throughout Asia have a vital interest in vigorously opposing this imperialist militarism. We Trotskyists of the International Communist League have long stressed that the future for workers in Australia lies in common struggle with the working masses of Asia against capitalist exploitation. Our fight for a workers republic of Australia is part of our perspective for socialist revolutions throughout Southeast Asia and beyond. Key to this proletarian internationalist perspective is our unconditional military defence of the Chinese bureaucratically deformed workers state against imperialist attack and internal capitalist counterrevolution.
In 1949, China experienced a profound social revolution as the peasant-based People’s Liberation Army (PLA) led by Mao Zedong’s Communist Party (CCP) overthrew the imperialist-backed bourgeois-nationalist regime of Chiang Kai-shek’s Guomindang. The victory of Mao’s PLA destroyed the Chinese capitalist state, smashing the rule of the Chinese bourgeoisie and landlords, and liberated the Chinese masses from the yoke of imperialist subjugation. It led to the development of a collectivised economy that laid the basis for massive social progress for the worker and peasant masses, particularly women.
However, unlike the 1917 Russian Revolution, which was carried out by a class-conscious proletariat guided by the Bolshevik internationalism of Lenin and Trotsky, the 1949 Chinese Revolution was bureaucratically deformed from its inception under the rule of Mao Zedong’s Stalinist peasant-based CCP regime. Resting atop the workers state, this parasitic nationalist bureaucratic caste modelled itself on the Stalinist regime in Russia that, beginning with a political counterrevolution in 1923-24, usurped political power from the working class. Despite decades of the bureaucracy’s “market reforms,” China’s economy remains dominated by state-controlled banks and the core of its heavy industry remains collectivised, an historic gain for the world’s working class that the imperialists have long sought to overthrow.
The imperialists want to return China to the pre-1949 days of unbridled imperialist exploitation. In seeking to restore capitalist rule, they pursue a multi-pronged strategy of economic and political subversion combined with intensifying military pressure against China. In contrast to social-democratic reformists such as Socialist Alliance (SA), who pronounce China capitalist and join with pro-imperialist counterrevolutionary causes from “Free Tibet” to “independence” for the anti-communist bastion of Taiwan, we Marxists declare that it is in the direct interest of the international proletariat to defend China and other countries where capitalism has been overthrown—today, North Korea, Laos, Vietnam and Cuba. This includes supporting North Korea’s and China’s development and testing of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems as a deterrent against the threat of annihilation by the nuclear-armed imperialists in Washington, backed by their lackeys in Canberra.
At the same time, the ICL fights for proletarian political revolution in the deformed workers states to oust the Stalinist misleaders, whose bureaucratic mismanagement and conciliation of imperialism pave the way for counterrevolution. The Chinese bureaucracy, in its pursuit of “peaceful coexistence” with imperialism, have supported the U.S.-led “war on terror” under which banner the imperialists have occupied Iraq and Afghanistan while threatening one of China’s main oil suppliers, Iran. Proletarian political revolution, establishing regimes based on workers democracy and an internationalist perspective, would be a beacon for the oppressed working masses of Asia and the entire world. Ultimately, to defend and extend the gains of these social revolutions requires fighting for socialist revolution in the imperialist centres. The fight to defend the deformed workers states against imperialist attack and internal capitalist counterrevolution is crucial to bringing to the proletariat in Australia as well as in Japan, Europe and the U.S. the consciousness necessary to overthrow their own exploiters.
Smash ANZUS Through Workers Revolution!
Obama’s visit to Australia was timed to coincide with the 60th anniversary of the blood-drenched ANZUS [Australia, New Zealand, United States] alliance. The signing of the ANZUS agreement in 1951, just two years after the Chinese Revolution and in the midst of the Korean War, followed the Australian capitalist rulers switching their dependence from Britain to the U.S. at the end of World War II. ANZUS immediately became a Cold War weapon, particularly targeting the Soviet Union and Vietnam. Under this alliance, the U.S. and Australian military have carried out the slaughter of millions of workers and peasants in counterrevolutionary wars from Korea to Vietnam as they acted to “contain” pro-Communist insurgencies rolling across Asia in the wake of the unravelling of British and other colonial rule, and the defeat of Japanese imperialism in the Pacific War.
In Indonesia, Australia’s security forces collaborated with the CIA to help orchestrate the 1965-66 military-led anti-Communist massacre, serving to “stabilise” Southeast Asia under the imperialist yoke at the cost of more than a million lives. The subsequent stinging military defeat of U.S. and Australian imperialisms in 1975 by the heroic Vietnamese workers and peasants was a great victory for the working people of the world. Not least, it punctured a hole in this country’s “culture” of racist white supremacy. The proletariat here owes a special debt to the Vietnamese masses—a debt they will be in the forefront of helping to repay when, under the leadership of a revolutionary party, they sweep away Australian capitalist rule and establish a workers state.
Today, Australian imperialism plays an aggressive role as a counterrevolutionary gendarme under the U.S. umbrella, acting to help shore up U.S. and Australian control and capitalist “stability” in the region. This includes its police/military occupations of East Timor and the Solomon Islands, Butterworth airforce base in Malaysia, training of special forces in Indonesia, and training troops in the southern Philippines.
Under ANZUS, Australia hosts the top-secret Pine Gap satellite spy base and provides U.S. access to the Geraldton tracking station and other facilities that were key to the imperialists’ counterrevolutionary Cold War II offensive against the former Soviet Union. Pine Gap is part of a string of U.S. military installations from South Korea to Central Asia that assist in bloody imperialist interventions while targeting the deformed workers states, particularly China. In 2010, WikiLeaks revelations confirmed that Australian spy agencies target the Chinese military and Canberra’s beefing up of Australian naval capabilities is aimed at countering China’s influence, including in the Asia-Pacific. Leaked cables also report on former Labor prime minister, now foreign affairs minister, Kevin Rudd advising U.S. secretary of state Hillary Clinton to be prepared to use force against China.
As part of its military encirclement of China, the U.S. is strengthening a web of reactionary alliances, from South Korea to Japan to the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and the Indian subcontinent, with Australia as a southern anchor. In the words of Hillary Clinton, America is “expanding our alliance with Australia from a Pacific partnership to an Indo-Pacific one, and indeed a global partnership” (“America’s Pacific Century,” November 2011). This is, in part, about dominating vital sea lanes, including the Strait of Malacca, the narrow channel between Malaysia and Indonesia through which 40 percent of the world’s trade passes, including most of China’s oil and a significant portion of its iron ore imports. Now the U.S. is using China’s dispute with neighbouring regimes over the potentially resource-rich Spratly Islands in the South China Sea to ramp up further military and other pressure against the Chinese deformed workers state. Beijing claims the U.S. is sending ships into these waters to collect intelligence close to China’s coastal territories. Indeed, in April 2001 the U.S. was caught out engaging in military/espionage missions off China’s coastline (see “U.S. Spy Plane Provocation: Defend China!” WV No. 756, 13 April 2001).
Our American section carries out a particular obligation to oppose the military machinations of its own ruling class, which emerged from World War II on top among the imperialist powers; this top cop of the world is the main military threat to the deformed workers states and chief enemy of the peoples of the world. As proletarian internationalists we fight to smash the ANZUS military alliance through workers revolution! We say: No U.S. Marines to Darwin! All U.S. bases and military installations out now! We stand for class-struggle opposition to the Australian imperialist military. In the tradition of our revolutionary communist forebears—Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Liebknecht and Lenin—we demand not one person, not one cent for the Australian imperialist military! Implacably opposed to Australian imperialism, we demand that U.S./NATO/Australia get out of Afghanistan and Pakistan and that the Australian military get out of Malaysia, the Philippines, East Timor and the Solomons and keep its bloody hands off the South Pacific!
Today’s militarisation of Australia’s north not only targets the working masses of the region and particularly the Chinese deformed workers state but has also sharpened deep racist reaction within capitalist Australia. Since 2007, scores of Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory have been occupied by police and military in a land grab serving the bourgeoisie’s desire for unhindered access to mineral resources on land previously under some measure of Aboriginal self-government. Meanwhile desperate refugees have been intercepted on the high seas by heavily armed Australian naval vessels and turned back or redirected to Indonesia. The brutal “White Australia” capitalist order was built on the slaughter and degradation of the indigenous inhabitants and the systematic exclusion of Asian and dark-skinned people. As part of the fight against the whole capitalist-imperialist system, the multiracial Australian working class must champion the cause of the deeply oppressed Aboriginal people and refugees. We say: Full citizenship rights for all immigrants! No deportations! Cops and military get out of Aboriginal communities now!
Nationalist Laborite Anti-Communism
Renewed sabre rattling against China has been met with disquiet by sections of the Australian bourgeoisie who have accrued massive wealth from mineral resource sales to China. In fact, it is only due to China’s booming resource markets that Australia’s economy has not been plunged into recession like most of the capitalist world—across the U.S., Japan and Europe, millions have been thrown out of work and/or made homeless. While China cannot avoid the pressures of the world economy in which it now plays a significant part, it is not subject to the wild swings of those market-driven economies which are based on private ownership of the banks, mines and factories. Its economy continues to grow at a rate unmatched by any capitalist country.
With China now Australia’s largest two-way trading partner, companies were reportedly lining up for a meeting with the Chinese vice-president when he visited here in 2010. In contrast, the Australian Financial Review (AFR) reported that the state dinner with President Obama was largely ignored by CEOs, with the heads of [mining conglomerate] BHP, the major banks and airline companies all declining invitations. One company director remarked, “Corporate Australia recognises our economy is fundamentally tied to China, not America.” However, whatever conjunctural concern that sections of Australia’s capitalist class may have about Obama’s recent visit, they deeply share U.S. and Australian imperialisms’ strategic aim to restore capitalist rule in China.
When the Chinese state-run Global Times responded to Obama’s visit by warning that “Australia surely cannot play China for a fool” and that it could “be caught in the crossfire,” Kevin Rudd sharply responded, “Our national security orientation is a matter of Australian national sovereignty and we believe in a strong Australia” (AFR, 17 November 2011). In the ALP, with its thoroughly pro-capitalist and staunchly anti-communist leadership and program, the bosses have a government deeply committed to the imperialists’ counterrevolutionary goals. In 1949, the same year the Chifley Labor government sent troops to smash the powerful coal miners strike, it also dispatched warships to take supplies up China’s Yangtze River to Chiang Kai-shek’s counterrevolutionary forces. Backed by virtually the entire reformist left in this country, one of the ALP’s greatest crimes against the working class was its loyal service to the imperialists’ drive to restore capitalism in the Soviet Union, leading to the counterrevolutionary destruction of the world’s first workers state in 1991-92.
Today, while the ALP government marches in lockstep with the U.S.-led militarism against China, the pro-capitalist Laborite union misleaders continue to push anti-China protectionism. Last August, just prior to BlueScope Steel announcing more than 1,000 job cuts, pro-ALP union tops, including Paul Howes from the Australian Workers Union, sought to pressure the Gillard government to back the U.S. campaign for China to revalue the yuan in order to protect Australian manufacturers. Fostering the lie that the workers and the bosses share common interests, they called for a joint campaign with the manufacturing bosses to demand the government “muscle up to China.” The union tops work overtime to tie workers to Australian capitalism by portraying Chinese manufacturing as a threat to jobs. With slogans like “Make it here, or jobs disappear,” these nationalist union misleaders demand government subsidies for Australian capitalists and do next to nothing to mobilise their base in industrial action against the bosses’ attacks and government’s anti-union laws.
In opposition to this poisonous Laborite nationalism and class collaboration, we fight to build an internationalist revolutionary workers party that mobilises the working class in struggle in complete political independence from the capitalist exploiters. Such a party will stand on the important but all too rare examples of international class-struggle action by the organised labour movement, especially maritime, including solidarity with the Indonesian independence struggle in the 1940s and with the Vietnamese Revolution in the 1960s. Such traditions and practices must be revived and put into practice around an internationalist class-struggle program. A Leninist-Trotskyist party will be built by splitting the working-class base of the ALP from the pro-capitalist leadership, centrally through the political fight to replace the social-democratic union misleaders with a class-struggle, revolutionary leadership.
Reforge the Fourth International!
In a 23 November Lateline interview on the ABC, former Labor prime minister Paul Keating criticised the fact that Obama delivered his anti-China speech in federal parliament, complaining that the Australian government should not have allowed itself to be “verballed” and “part of that particular kabuki show. Not to be fingerprints all over it.” While strongly backing the U.S./Australia alliance, Keating opined that “the whole notion of Australia as a middle power trying to project an independent foreign policy was hugely inhibited by what happen[ed] this week.” Such nationalist views are widely imbibed by the Laborite reformist left in this country, including the Communist Party of Australia (CPA) and SA.
The CPA welcomed the U.S. presidential election of Democratic Party candidate Obama, and the election of the Rudd/Gillard federal ALP governments here, in both instances betraying the class interests of workers. Now they complain that Rudd, Gillard and Obama have “not delivered on the promise for change” and moan that “Australia’s sovereignty was torn to shreds last week in Canberra” by Obama’s visit. Similarly peddling nationalist bourgeois pacifism, SA declare “US bases in Australia a setback for peace” (30 November 2011) and call for “a foreign policy that serves the 99% in Australia.” Opposed to independent class opposition to imperialist militarism and worried that Australian imperialism’s interests are being overlooked for those of its U.S. big brother, these “little Australia” nationalist opponents of revolutionary Marxism echo and regularly call for a vote to the anti-Communist, anti-China Greens, who have long demanded to bring Australian “troops home” from Afghanistan in order to defend bloody Australian imperialist interests in the region. This in fact dovetails with the militarisation of the Asia-Pacific sought by Obama and Gillard.
The imperialist build-up comes at a time when sharp economic crisis grips the capitalist world and underlines how capitalism in its epoch of imperialist decay leads inexorably to war, unless the problem is destroyed at its roots by socialist revolution. Under the system of capitalist imperialism, the ruling classes of the richest capitalist countries are compelled, through their very inner workings and thirst for profits, into an unrelenting drive for new markets, ever-greater supplies of natural resources and sources of cheap labour in the neocolonial countries. The various imperialist bourgeoisies enforce their neocolonial looting and protect their spheres of exploitation through the expansion of their military might. As Karl Marx made clear, the workers of all countries must unite, rejecting the divide-and-rule capitalist machinations parroted by the current misleaders of the working class, to throw out their exploiters and take the future in their own hands.
Since the 1991-92 collapse of the Soviet Union, a world-historic defeat for the international proletariat, the working class has been taking a beating with few workers today identifying their struggles with the ideals of socialism. However, contrary to the wishes of the capitalist-imperialist rulers, class struggle cannot be legislated or repressed out of existence but is a product of class-divided society. As long as capitalist exploitation and oppression exists new struggles will inevitably break out, including against imperialist militarism.
Like our comrades in the U.S., Japan and other sections of the ICL, comrades of the Spartacist League of Australia fight to build a revolutionary vanguard party to lead the multiracial working people in this country in sweeping away the capitalist rulers and establishing their own class rule. This requires an intransigently proletarian internationalist perspective. Down with Australian imperialism! Defend the Chinese deformed workers state! For a workers republic of Australia, part of a socialist Asia!
U.S., Australia Reinforce Alliance Against China
At the Pentagon on January 5, Barack Obama, surrounded by top military brass, announced a shift in military strategy that, he made clear, puts China more directly in U.S. imperialism’s crosshairs. While Washington is planning nearly $500 billion in spending cuts, this would still make U.S. military spending greater than that of the next ten countries combined. As it firms up its imperialist alliances with Japan and Australia with its turn toward the Asia-Pacific region, the Obama White House promises a “leaner and meaner” military, centrally to target China, the largest and most powerful of those countries today that have overthrown capitalist rule. Obama also renewed U.S. threats against capitalist Iran, which has been subjected to increasing imperialist sanctions and provocations. Below we reprint an article, edited for publication in WV, from Australasian Spartacist No. 215 (Summer 2011/12), newspaper of the Spartacist League of Australia.
* * *
On 17 November, in an address to the Australian federal parliament, visiting U.S. president Barack Obama announced that American imperialism intends to make its “presence and mission in the Asia Pacific a top priority.” “The United States is a Pacific power, and we are here to stay,” declared the U.S. Commander-in-Chief. The day before, in a direct provocation against the People’s Republic of China, Obama and Labor Party (ALP) prime minister Julia Gillard jointly announced a deepening of U.S. military ties with Australia. The agreement includes expanded U.S. access to air and naval bases in the Northern Territory and Western Australia, and a permanent troop presence in Darwin of 2,500 Marines by 2016-17.
In 2009 the ALP government released a Defence White Paper that outlined a vast program of military spending while hawkishly targeting China. Alongside Canberra’s increasing militarisation of the north, this build-up is designed to work in concert with the expansion of U.S. military forces in Australia under the reactionary U.S./Australia alliance. A second-rate jackal imperialist power, Australia looks to the U.S. for protection. As such, Canberra has offered its services in countless dirty murderous operations, including the U.S.-led wars and occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan, while pursuing its own predatory interests in the region. The projected Marine air ground taskforce in Darwin will provide Washington with a rapid intervention force to carry out whatever forward imperialist dirty work is required.
Obama’s “strategic decision” for U.S. imperialism to play a larger, long-term role in “shaping this region and its future” is ominous for the worker and peasant masses of Asia. Having now withdrawn troops from Iraq and projecting to scale down in Afghanistan, Washington is once again focusing its gun sights on China after being temporarily deflected following September 11, 2001. Obama demands China “play by the rules” of capitalism and, using language straight out of the 1950s Cold War and 1980s Cold War II against the Soviet Union, lectures that “prosperity without freedom is just another form of poverty”! For the imperialists, “freedom” means being at liberty to loot impoverished and subjugated nations, fomenting racism and communalist slaughter as they ensure their continued class rule over the exploited masses.
The proletariat of the U.S., Australia and throughout Asia have a vital interest in vigorously opposing this imperialist militarism. We Trotskyists of the International Communist League have long stressed that the future for workers in Australia lies in common struggle with the working masses of Asia against capitalist exploitation. Our fight for a workers republic of Australia is part of our perspective for socialist revolutions throughout Southeast Asia and beyond. Key to this proletarian internationalist perspective is our unconditional military defence of the Chinese bureaucratically deformed workers state against imperialist attack and internal capitalist counterrevolution.
In 1949, China experienced a profound social revolution as the peasant-based People’s Liberation Army (PLA) led by Mao Zedong’s Communist Party (CCP) overthrew the imperialist-backed bourgeois-nationalist regime of Chiang Kai-shek’s Guomindang. The victory of Mao’s PLA destroyed the Chinese capitalist state, smashing the rule of the Chinese bourgeoisie and landlords, and liberated the Chinese masses from the yoke of imperialist subjugation. It led to the development of a collectivised economy that laid the basis for massive social progress for the worker and peasant masses, particularly women.
However, unlike the 1917 Russian Revolution, which was carried out by a class-conscious proletariat guided by the Bolshevik internationalism of Lenin and Trotsky, the 1949 Chinese Revolution was bureaucratically deformed from its inception under the rule of Mao Zedong’s Stalinist peasant-based CCP regime. Resting atop the workers state, this parasitic nationalist bureaucratic caste modelled itself on the Stalinist regime in Russia that, beginning with a political counterrevolution in 1923-24, usurped political power from the working class. Despite decades of the bureaucracy’s “market reforms,” China’s economy remains dominated by state-controlled banks and the core of its heavy industry remains collectivised, an historic gain for the world’s working class that the imperialists have long sought to overthrow.
The imperialists want to return China to the pre-1949 days of unbridled imperialist exploitation. In seeking to restore capitalist rule, they pursue a multi-pronged strategy of economic and political subversion combined with intensifying military pressure against China. In contrast to social-democratic reformists such as Socialist Alliance (SA), who pronounce China capitalist and join with pro-imperialist counterrevolutionary causes from “Free Tibet” to “independence” for the anti-communist bastion of Taiwan, we Marxists declare that it is in the direct interest of the international proletariat to defend China and other countries where capitalism has been overthrown—today, North Korea, Laos, Vietnam and Cuba. This includes supporting North Korea’s and China’s development and testing of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems as a deterrent against the threat of annihilation by the nuclear-armed imperialists in Washington, backed by their lackeys in Canberra.
At the same time, the ICL fights for proletarian political revolution in the deformed workers states to oust the Stalinist misleaders, whose bureaucratic mismanagement and conciliation of imperialism pave the way for counterrevolution. The Chinese bureaucracy, in its pursuit of “peaceful coexistence” with imperialism, have supported the U.S.-led “war on terror” under which banner the imperialists have occupied Iraq and Afghanistan while threatening one of China’s main oil suppliers, Iran. Proletarian political revolution, establishing regimes based on workers democracy and an internationalist perspective, would be a beacon for the oppressed working masses of Asia and the entire world. Ultimately, to defend and extend the gains of these social revolutions requires fighting for socialist revolution in the imperialist centres. The fight to defend the deformed workers states against imperialist attack and internal capitalist counterrevolution is crucial to bringing to the proletariat in Australia as well as in Japan, Europe and the U.S. the consciousness necessary to overthrow their own exploiters.
Smash ANZUS Through Workers Revolution!
Obama’s visit to Australia was timed to coincide with the 60th anniversary of the blood-drenched ANZUS [Australia, New Zealand, United States] alliance. The signing of the ANZUS agreement in 1951, just two years after the Chinese Revolution and in the midst of the Korean War, followed the Australian capitalist rulers switching their dependence from Britain to the U.S. at the end of World War II. ANZUS immediately became a Cold War weapon, particularly targeting the Soviet Union and Vietnam. Under this alliance, the U.S. and Australian military have carried out the slaughter of millions of workers and peasants in counterrevolutionary wars from Korea to Vietnam as they acted to “contain” pro-Communist insurgencies rolling across Asia in the wake of the unravelling of British and other colonial rule, and the defeat of Japanese imperialism in the Pacific War.
In Indonesia, Australia’s security forces collaborated with the CIA to help orchestrate the 1965-66 military-led anti-Communist massacre, serving to “stabilise” Southeast Asia under the imperialist yoke at the cost of more than a million lives. The subsequent stinging military defeat of U.S. and Australian imperialisms in 1975 by the heroic Vietnamese workers and peasants was a great victory for the working people of the world. Not least, it punctured a hole in this country’s “culture” of racist white supremacy. The proletariat here owes a special debt to the Vietnamese masses—a debt they will be in the forefront of helping to repay when, under the leadership of a revolutionary party, they sweep away Australian capitalist rule and establish a workers state.
Today, Australian imperialism plays an aggressive role as a counterrevolutionary gendarme under the U.S. umbrella, acting to help shore up U.S. and Australian control and capitalist “stability” in the region. This includes its police/military occupations of East Timor and the Solomon Islands, Butterworth airforce base in Malaysia, training of special forces in Indonesia, and training troops in the southern Philippines.
Under ANZUS, Australia hosts the top-secret Pine Gap satellite spy base and provides U.S. access to the Geraldton tracking station and other facilities that were key to the imperialists’ counterrevolutionary Cold War II offensive against the former Soviet Union. Pine Gap is part of a string of U.S. military installations from South Korea to Central Asia that assist in bloody imperialist interventions while targeting the deformed workers states, particularly China. In 2010, WikiLeaks revelations confirmed that Australian spy agencies target the Chinese military and Canberra’s beefing up of Australian naval capabilities is aimed at countering China’s influence, including in the Asia-Pacific. Leaked cables also report on former Labor prime minister, now foreign affairs minister, Kevin Rudd advising U.S. secretary of state Hillary Clinton to be prepared to use force against China.
As part of its military encirclement of China, the U.S. is strengthening a web of reactionary alliances, from South Korea to Japan to the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and the Indian subcontinent, with Australia as a southern anchor. In the words of Hillary Clinton, America is “expanding our alliance with Australia from a Pacific partnership to an Indo-Pacific one, and indeed a global partnership” (“America’s Pacific Century,” November 2011). This is, in part, about dominating vital sea lanes, including the Strait of Malacca, the narrow channel between Malaysia and Indonesia through which 40 percent of the world’s trade passes, including most of China’s oil and a significant portion of its iron ore imports. Now the U.S. is using China’s dispute with neighbouring regimes over the potentially resource-rich Spratly Islands in the South China Sea to ramp up further military and other pressure against the Chinese deformed workers state. Beijing claims the U.S. is sending ships into these waters to collect intelligence close to China’s coastal territories. Indeed, in April 2001 the U.S. was caught out engaging in military/espionage missions off China’s coastline (see “U.S. Spy Plane Provocation: Defend China!” WV No. 756, 13 April 2001).
Our American section carries out a particular obligation to oppose the military machinations of its own ruling class, which emerged from World War II on top among the imperialist powers; this top cop of the world is the main military threat to the deformed workers states and chief enemy of the peoples of the world. As proletarian internationalists we fight to smash the ANZUS military alliance through workers revolution! We say: No U.S. Marines to Darwin! All U.S. bases and military installations out now! We stand for class-struggle opposition to the Australian imperialist military. In the tradition of our revolutionary communist forebears—Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Liebknecht and Lenin—we demand not one person, not one cent for the Australian imperialist military! Implacably opposed to Australian imperialism, we demand that U.S./NATO/Australia get out of Afghanistan and Pakistan and that the Australian military get out of Malaysia, the Philippines, East Timor and the Solomons and keep its bloody hands off the South Pacific!
Today’s militarisation of Australia’s north not only targets the working masses of the region and particularly the Chinese deformed workers state but has also sharpened deep racist reaction within capitalist Australia. Since 2007, scores of Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory have been occupied by police and military in a land grab serving the bourgeoisie’s desire for unhindered access to mineral resources on land previously under some measure of Aboriginal self-government. Meanwhile desperate refugees have been intercepted on the high seas by heavily armed Australian naval vessels and turned back or redirected to Indonesia. The brutal “White Australia” capitalist order was built on the slaughter and degradation of the indigenous inhabitants and the systematic exclusion of Asian and dark-skinned people. As part of the fight against the whole capitalist-imperialist system, the multiracial Australian working class must champion the cause of the deeply oppressed Aboriginal people and refugees. We say: Full citizenship rights for all immigrants! No deportations! Cops and military get out of Aboriginal communities now!
Nationalist Laborite Anti-Communism
Renewed sabre rattling against China has been met with disquiet by sections of the Australian bourgeoisie who have accrued massive wealth from mineral resource sales to China. In fact, it is only due to China’s booming resource markets that Australia’s economy has not been plunged into recession like most of the capitalist world—across the U.S., Japan and Europe, millions have been thrown out of work and/or made homeless. While China cannot avoid the pressures of the world economy in which it now plays a significant part, it is not subject to the wild swings of those market-driven economies which are based on private ownership of the banks, mines and factories. Its economy continues to grow at a rate unmatched by any capitalist country.
With China now Australia’s largest two-way trading partner, companies were reportedly lining up for a meeting with the Chinese vice-president when he visited here in 2010. In contrast, the Australian Financial Review (AFR) reported that the state dinner with President Obama was largely ignored by CEOs, with the heads of [mining conglomerate] BHP, the major banks and airline companies all declining invitations. One company director remarked, “Corporate Australia recognises our economy is fundamentally tied to China, not America.” However, whatever conjunctural concern that sections of Australia’s capitalist class may have about Obama’s recent visit, they deeply share U.S. and Australian imperialisms’ strategic aim to restore capitalist rule in China.
When the Chinese state-run Global Times responded to Obama’s visit by warning that “Australia surely cannot play China for a fool” and that it could “be caught in the crossfire,” Kevin Rudd sharply responded, “Our national security orientation is a matter of Australian national sovereignty and we believe in a strong Australia” (AFR, 17 November 2011). In the ALP, with its thoroughly pro-capitalist and staunchly anti-communist leadership and program, the bosses have a government deeply committed to the imperialists’ counterrevolutionary goals. In 1949, the same year the Chifley Labor government sent troops to smash the powerful coal miners strike, it also dispatched warships to take supplies up China’s Yangtze River to Chiang Kai-shek’s counterrevolutionary forces. Backed by virtually the entire reformist left in this country, one of the ALP’s greatest crimes against the working class was its loyal service to the imperialists’ drive to restore capitalism in the Soviet Union, leading to the counterrevolutionary destruction of the world’s first workers state in 1991-92.
Today, while the ALP government marches in lockstep with the U.S.-led militarism against China, the pro-capitalist Laborite union misleaders continue to push anti-China protectionism. Last August, just prior to BlueScope Steel announcing more than 1,000 job cuts, pro-ALP union tops, including Paul Howes from the Australian Workers Union, sought to pressure the Gillard government to back the U.S. campaign for China to revalue the yuan in order to protect Australian manufacturers. Fostering the lie that the workers and the bosses share common interests, they called for a joint campaign with the manufacturing bosses to demand the government “muscle up to China.” The union tops work overtime to tie workers to Australian capitalism by portraying Chinese manufacturing as a threat to jobs. With slogans like “Make it here, or jobs disappear,” these nationalist union misleaders demand government subsidies for Australian capitalists and do next to nothing to mobilise their base in industrial action against the bosses’ attacks and government’s anti-union laws.
In opposition to this poisonous Laborite nationalism and class collaboration, we fight to build an internationalist revolutionary workers party that mobilises the working class in struggle in complete political independence from the capitalist exploiters. Such a party will stand on the important but all too rare examples of international class-struggle action by the organised labour movement, especially maritime, including solidarity with the Indonesian independence struggle in the 1940s and with the Vietnamese Revolution in the 1960s. Such traditions and practices must be revived and put into practice around an internationalist class-struggle program. A Leninist-Trotskyist party will be built by splitting the working-class base of the ALP from the pro-capitalist leadership, centrally through the political fight to replace the social-democratic union misleaders with a class-struggle, revolutionary leadership.
Reforge the Fourth International!
In a 23 November Lateline interview on the ABC, former Labor prime minister Paul Keating criticised the fact that Obama delivered his anti-China speech in federal parliament, complaining that the Australian government should not have allowed itself to be “verballed” and “part of that particular kabuki show. Not to be fingerprints all over it.” While strongly backing the U.S./Australia alliance, Keating opined that “the whole notion of Australia as a middle power trying to project an independent foreign policy was hugely inhibited by what happen[ed] this week.” Such nationalist views are widely imbibed by the Laborite reformist left in this country, including the Communist Party of Australia (CPA) and SA.
The CPA welcomed the U.S. presidential election of Democratic Party candidate Obama, and the election of the Rudd/Gillard federal ALP governments here, in both instances betraying the class interests of workers. Now they complain that Rudd, Gillard and Obama have “not delivered on the promise for change” and moan that “Australia’s sovereignty was torn to shreds last week in Canberra” by Obama’s visit. Similarly peddling nationalist bourgeois pacifism, SA declare “US bases in Australia a setback for peace” (30 November 2011) and call for “a foreign policy that serves the 99% in Australia.” Opposed to independent class opposition to imperialist militarism and worried that Australian imperialism’s interests are being overlooked for those of its U.S. big brother, these “little Australia” nationalist opponents of revolutionary Marxism echo and regularly call for a vote to the anti-Communist, anti-China Greens, who have long demanded to bring Australian “troops home” from Afghanistan in order to defend bloody Australian imperialist interests in the region. This in fact dovetails with the militarisation of the Asia-Pacific sought by Obama and Gillard.
The imperialist build-up comes at a time when sharp economic crisis grips the capitalist world and underlines how capitalism in its epoch of imperialist decay leads inexorably to war, unless the problem is destroyed at its roots by socialist revolution. Under the system of capitalist imperialism, the ruling classes of the richest capitalist countries are compelled, through their very inner workings and thirst for profits, into an unrelenting drive for new markets, ever-greater supplies of natural resources and sources of cheap labour in the neocolonial countries. The various imperialist bourgeoisies enforce their neocolonial looting and protect their spheres of exploitation through the expansion of their military might. As Karl Marx made clear, the workers of all countries must unite, rejecting the divide-and-rule capitalist machinations parroted by the current misleaders of the working class, to throw out their exploiters and take the future in their own hands.
Since the 1991-92 collapse of the Soviet Union, a world-historic defeat for the international proletariat, the working class has been taking a beating with few workers today identifying their struggles with the ideals of socialism. However, contrary to the wishes of the capitalist-imperialist rulers, class struggle cannot be legislated or repressed out of existence but is a product of class-divided society. As long as capitalist exploitation and oppression exists new struggles will inevitably break out, including against imperialist militarism.
Like our comrades in the U.S., Japan and other sections of the ICL, comrades of the Spartacist League of Australia fight to build a revolutionary vanguard party to lead the multiracial working people in this country in sweeping away the capitalist rulers and establishing their own class rule. This requires an intransigently proletarian internationalist perspective. Down with Australian imperialism! Defend the Chinese deformed workers state! For a workers republic of Australia, part of a socialist Asia!
Australian Energy Resources and Chinese Special Forces Invasion
Peoples Liberation Army Uniforms,Patches, Gear and Equipment
Source-Chinese Special Operations Forces
In PLA’s terminology, “special forces” or “special operations forces” (SOF) refers specifically to a group of small, highly-trained, elite ground forces units tasked with specialised operations such as special reconnaissance, counter terrorism, and direct action. The PLA has assigned one SOF unit to each of its seven military regions. Additionally, the Air Force (in its airborne corps) and Navy (in its marine corps) also have their own SOF elements. The People’s Armed Police (PAP) also has special counter-terrorism units known as “Special Police Units” (SPU).
History
Although the PLA did not have dedicated SOF until the late 1980s, it was no stranger to the special forces warfare. As early as the WWII and the 1940s Chinese Civil War, carefully selected soldiers from ordinary units were formed into temporary composite units, given specialised training and weapon equipments, and tasked with special missions such as long-range penetration, tactical reconnaissance, raid on vital enemy positions, etc. After the mission was accomplished, these units were normally disbanded and soldiers returned to their original units.
Between the 1950s~1980s, the PLA relied on specially-trained reconnaissance units within its ground forces for some special missions. Each military region (MR) had a regiment-sized reconnaissance group directly organic to the military region headquarters (MRHQ). Army corps and division also had their own subordinated reconnaissance units (battalions or companies). Although these reconnaissance units were not “special forces” in modern term, their missions covered the spectrum of special operations tasking.
The Sino-Vietnam border conflicts that took place in 1979 and the 1980s was the first wake-up call to the PLA in its lack of dedicated SOF. During the conflicts, Vietnamese SOF operating in small groups caused the PLA some considerable causalities and losses. Towards the end of the conflicts, the PLA quickly learned from its lessons and began to send its own SOF units, mostly composed of personnel from army reconnaissance units, to operate behind enemy lines for raid, ambushing, kidnapping, reconnaissance, and other special operations.
Soon after the end of the conflict, the PLA began to create its own dedicated SOF. In 1988, the first “special mission, rapid reaction” unit was formed in Guangzhou Military Region. The unit, known as “Special Reconnaissance Group”, was given new weapons and equipments which were not available to regular army units. Its members of the unit received specialised training in field surviving, swimming with full gear, parachute jumping, helicopterborne assault, etc. By the end of the 1980s, the reconnaissance groups directly organic to the military region headquarters were all transformed into dedicated SOF units.
Inspired by the actions of the U.S. special forces during the First Gulf War in 1990/91, and also as a response to the growing tensions between China mainland and Taiwan since the mid-1990s, the PLA’s SOF had a major expansion in the late 1990s, with high-technology being introduced as a new key element in the SOF development. The name of these units were also changed from “Special Reconnaissance Groups” to “Special Operations Groups”.
Organization
Each of the PLA’s seven MR has a “Special Operations Group”, which is the size of Army regiment with about 1,000~2,000 men organised into three battalions. Each battalion has its own headquarters and support unit. Their operations are usually in company strength (70~100) or smaller teams. Each of the SOF unit has a unique codename. For examples, the SOF unit of the Guangzhou MR is known as “Sharp Sword of Southern China”, and that of the Nanjing MR “The Flying Dragons”.
Officially, the PLA does not have a unified command like the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) for special operations, but the Intelligence Department (2nd Department) of the PLA General Staff Department may serve as a general director for SOF and special forces warfare doctrines development. The SOF units are also believed to be closely associated with the intelligence department of the seven MRHQs.
One important move since 2003 in the PLA SOF development is that the command of the SOF units has been transferred from MRHQs to the headquarters of some group armies (GA). For example, the SOF unit of the Beijing MR is now directly organic to the headquarters of the 38th Group Army. The SOF unit of Chengdu MR is now directly organic to the 13th Group Army.
Roles
Unlike the U.S. SOF, the PLA focuses the roles of its SOF very much on direct action (DA), special reconnaissance (SR), and counter-terrorism (CT). PLA SOF units are not trained for unconventional warfare (UW) and civil affairs (CA) like their American counterparts. This is because the PLA only intends to use the SOF for a high-intensity, lightening-fast regional conflict that is over in short amount of time. They are not going to be involved in long-duration, low-intensity operations in foreign countries, like what the U.S. SOF did in Southeast Asia in the 1960s/70s.
Direct Action (DA) - The most important mission for PLA SOF, involving short-duration strikes and other small-scale offensive actions by SOF to seize, destroy, capture, recover or inflict damage on designated personnel or material. For example, prior to the outbreak of major hostilities between the PRC and Taiwan, PLA SOF will infiltrate the Taiwan island using powered parachutes, helicopters, or other methods, and launch a pre-empty strike against key enemy personnel and command & control elements, to paralyse the enemy C3I network and leave the enemy troops leaderless. This strategy is sometimes being referred to as “Decapitation Operation”.
Other DA operations may include capturing enemy airfields and seaports for the upcoming airborne and amphibious landing troops; sabotaging enemy equipments and systems; attacking vital civilian infrastructure; ambushing enemy forces; spreading rumours to cause enemy confusion and misjudgement, etc.
Special Reconnaissance (SR) - SR involves reconnaissance and surveillance actions to obtain or verify vital intelligence and information, by using visual and other hi-tech collection methods. This is very much like what SOF units of the Coalitions Forces did during the two Gulf Wars. Small teams consisting 2~4 people will be dispatched to behind enemy lines to collect intelligence concerning the capabilities, intensions, and activities or enemy forces. It may also involve locating and designating targets for precision strikes.
Counter-Terrorism (CT) - PLA SOF units are receiving training in offensive counter-terrorism operations to prevent, deter and respond to terrorism. As a result of the growing separatist activities in China’s remote regions such as Xijiang, PLA SOF have became increasingly involved in the counter-terrorism role. In October 2002, a PLA SOF unit took part in the joint China-Tajikistan counter-terrorism exercise. A recent report by the Chinese state media also confirmed that counter-terrorism had been added to the basic Special Forces training subjects under the renewed PLA doctrines.
Other Roles - In some occasions, PLA SOF are also acting as “Blue Army” (opposing force) in exercise to test the ability of regular army unit against special forces.
_army_navy_anti_terror_operation_ssg__n_PLA_CHINA_SSG_SPECIAL_FORCES.jpg)
Training
Selection – PLA SOF are composed of highly-trained, skilled and motivated professional soldiers, who are carefully selected from officers and non-commission officers (NCO) serving in active service. These members must pass highly strict and demanding multi-phase selection and screen process before they are accepted.
Basic Training – PLA SOF, like their counterparts around the world, emphasise superior physical fitness and small-arms proficiency in their members. All SOF members are trained in martial arts and field survival skills.
Specialised Training – Depending their specific roles, PLA SOF members have specialised training in one or more of the following areas: urban warfare, sniper tactics, amphibious operations, demolitions, communications, computers, or foreign languages.
Infiltration – The ability to infiltrate undetected behind the enemy lines is one of the most essential skills required for PLA SOF. Members of PLA SOF are said to undergo “highly intensive and comprehensive multi-course training in complex terrain, including in-depth infiltration and covered reconnaissance behind the enemy line.”
PLA SOF adopts a “three-dimensional, all-weather” infiltration approach, using sea (submarine, high-speed boat, open-water swimming
and scuba diving), air (airborne, powered parachute and helicopter) and land (long-distance movement and rock climbing). Chinese media has reported that PLA SOF were able to penetrate through defensive positions that use night-vision equipment, anti-infantry radar, and other hi-tech surveillance equipments.
Mountain Training – The potential operating theatres of PLA SOF including Taiwan, Tibet and central Asia all feature mountainous terrains. Therefore, PLA SOF are routinely trained in some high mountain areas in Western China that offer extremely harsh weather conditions.
Field Survival Training – Chinese media frequently report various field survival skills training for PLA SOF, carried out on small islands, in jungle or mountainous regions. Sometimes these training courses were also carried out in harsh weather conditions. Students will learn to catch wild animals; to identify and gather edible plants; to find, extract and purify water; to make fires by any means; to make shelters and resist rain and insects; etc.
Equipments
Firearms – The small arms used by PLA SOF include standard issue weapons such as QBZ95 automatic weapons, QBU88 sniper rifle, QSZ92 pistol, and PF89 80mm individual rocket launcher. They also has specialised weapons including Type 64 silenced pistol, Type 85 silenced submachine gun, and explosives. Crew-served weapons include QYJ88 general machine gun, QLZ87 35mm automatic grenade launcher, W99 82mm automatic mortar, PF98 120mm rocket launcher.
FHJ84 Rocket Launcher – PLA SOF has been spotted using the FHJ84 twin-62mm rocket launcher in the exercise. The rocket was designed to launch rocket-propelled incendiary and smoke grenades. A high-explosive (HE) air burst steel balls round was also introduced for SOF.
Satellite Positioning Receivers – PLA SOF are currently equipped with PDA sized device that can receive both the U.S. GPS and Russian GLONASS signals. This could provide 10~50m class accuracy positioning data. China is also developing its own COMPASS satellite positioning system, which could provide military class positioning data in East Asia region as early as 2010.
Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) – PLA SOF is equipped with a variety of UAV for reconnaissance and surveillance roles. These UAV can be launched by handheld or from a small vehicle-mounted launcher.
All-Terrain Vehicles (ATV) – PLA SOF has been widely using ATV for travelling in the battlefield. These vehicles can be carried by helicopters for airborne operations.
Light Utility Vehicles – PLA SOF has been using light utility vehicles such as BJ2020SJ and EQ2050 for travelling.
Fast Attack Vehicles (FAV) – The FAV originally developed for the airborne forces is also equipped by PLA SOF.
Powered Parachute (PPC) – PLA SOF has been investing heavily in the use of PPC for air infiltration and assault. The small size of the PPC means that it is very difficult to be detected by conventional radar and other surveillance equipment.
High-Speed Boat – These are used for operations in water regions and sea infiltration operations.
Surveillance Equipment - Night-vision goggles (NVGs), low-light TV (LLTV), handheld laser rangefinders.
Communications – PLA SOF are equipped with manpack tactical radio and video-voice-data communication equipment.
Digitised Army - The SOF unit in the Chengdu MR has been experimenting with the use of digitised army systems similar to those in the U.S. Land Warrior project
Peoples Liberation Army Uniforms,Patches, Gear and Equipment
Source-Chinese Special Operations Forces
In PLA’s terminology, “special forces” or “special operations forces” (SOF) refers specifically to a group of small, highly-trained, elite ground forces units tasked with specialised operations such as special reconnaissance, counter terrorism, and direct action. The PLA has assigned one SOF unit to each of its seven military regions. Additionally, the Air Force (in its airborne corps) and Navy (in its marine corps) also have their own SOF elements. The People’s Armed Police (PAP) also has special counter-terrorism units known as “Special Police Units” (SPU).
History
Although the PLA did not have dedicated SOF until the late 1980s, it was no stranger to the special forces warfare. As early as the WWII and the 1940s Chinese Civil War, carefully selected soldiers from ordinary units were formed into temporary composite units, given specialised training and weapon equipments, and tasked with special missions such as long-range penetration, tactical reconnaissance, raid on vital enemy positions, etc. After the mission was accomplished, these units were normally disbanded and soldiers returned to their original units.
Between the 1950s~1980s, the PLA relied on specially-trained reconnaissance units within its ground forces for some special missions. Each military region (MR) had a regiment-sized reconnaissance group directly organic to the military region headquarters (MRHQ). Army corps and division also had their own subordinated reconnaissance units (battalions or companies). Although these reconnaissance units were not “special forces” in modern term, their missions covered the spectrum of special operations tasking.
The Sino-Vietnam border conflicts that took place in 1979 and the 1980s was the first wake-up call to the PLA in its lack of dedicated SOF. During the conflicts, Vietnamese SOF operating in small groups caused the PLA some considerable causalities and losses. Towards the end of the conflicts, the PLA quickly learned from its lessons and began to send its own SOF units, mostly composed of personnel from army reconnaissance units, to operate behind enemy lines for raid, ambushing, kidnapping, reconnaissance, and other special operations.
Soon after the end of the conflict, the PLA began to create its own dedicated SOF. In 1988, the first “special mission, rapid reaction” unit was formed in Guangzhou Military Region. The unit, known as “Special Reconnaissance Group”, was given new weapons and equipments which were not available to regular army units. Its members of the unit received specialised training in field surviving, swimming with full gear, parachute jumping, helicopterborne assault, etc. By the end of the 1980s, the reconnaissance groups directly organic to the military region headquarters were all transformed into dedicated SOF units.
Inspired by the actions of the U.S. special forces during the First Gulf War in 1990/91, and also as a response to the growing tensions between China mainland and Taiwan since the mid-1990s, the PLA’s SOF had a major expansion in the late 1990s, with high-technology being introduced as a new key element in the SOF development. The name of these units were also changed from “Special Reconnaissance Groups” to “Special Operations Groups”.
Organization
Each of the PLA’s seven MR has a “Special Operations Group”, which is the size of Army regiment with about 1,000~2,000 men organised into three battalions. Each battalion has its own headquarters and support unit. Their operations are usually in company strength (70~100) or smaller teams. Each of the SOF unit has a unique codename. For examples, the SOF unit of the Guangzhou MR is known as “Sharp Sword of Southern China”, and that of the Nanjing MR “The Flying Dragons”.
Officially, the PLA does not have a unified command like the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) for special operations, but the Intelligence Department (2nd Department) of the PLA General Staff Department may serve as a general director for SOF and special forces warfare doctrines development. The SOF units are also believed to be closely associated with the intelligence department of the seven MRHQs.
One important move since 2003 in the PLA SOF development is that the command of the SOF units has been transferred from MRHQs to the headquarters of some group armies (GA). For example, the SOF unit of the Beijing MR is now directly organic to the headquarters of the 38th Group Army. The SOF unit of Chengdu MR is now directly organic to the 13th Group Army.
Roles
Unlike the U.S. SOF, the PLA focuses the roles of its SOF very much on direct action (DA), special reconnaissance (SR), and counter-terrorism (CT). PLA SOF units are not trained for unconventional warfare (UW) and civil affairs (CA) like their American counterparts. This is because the PLA only intends to use the SOF for a high-intensity, lightening-fast regional conflict that is over in short amount of time. They are not going to be involved in long-duration, low-intensity operations in foreign countries, like what the U.S. SOF did in Southeast Asia in the 1960s/70s.
Direct Action (DA) - The most important mission for PLA SOF, involving short-duration strikes and other small-scale offensive actions by SOF to seize, destroy, capture, recover or inflict damage on designated personnel or material. For example, prior to the outbreak of major hostilities between the PRC and Taiwan, PLA SOF will infiltrate the Taiwan island using powered parachutes, helicopters, or other methods, and launch a pre-empty strike against key enemy personnel and command & control elements, to paralyse the enemy C3I network and leave the enemy troops leaderless. This strategy is sometimes being referred to as “Decapitation Operation”.
Other DA operations may include capturing enemy airfields and seaports for the upcoming airborne and amphibious landing troops; sabotaging enemy equipments and systems; attacking vital civilian infrastructure; ambushing enemy forces; spreading rumours to cause enemy confusion and misjudgement, etc.
Special Reconnaissance (SR) - SR involves reconnaissance and surveillance actions to obtain or verify vital intelligence and information, by using visual and other hi-tech collection methods. This is very much like what SOF units of the Coalitions Forces did during the two Gulf Wars. Small teams consisting 2~4 people will be dispatched to behind enemy lines to collect intelligence concerning the capabilities, intensions, and activities or enemy forces. It may also involve locating and designating targets for precision strikes.
Counter-Terrorism (CT) - PLA SOF units are receiving training in offensive counter-terrorism operations to prevent, deter and respond to terrorism. As a result of the growing separatist activities in China’s remote regions such as Xijiang, PLA SOF have became increasingly involved in the counter-terrorism role. In October 2002, a PLA SOF unit took part in the joint China-Tajikistan counter-terrorism exercise. A recent report by the Chinese state media also confirmed that counter-terrorism had been added to the basic Special Forces training subjects under the renewed PLA doctrines.
Other Roles - In some occasions, PLA SOF are also acting as “Blue Army” (opposing force) in exercise to test the ability of regular army unit against special forces.
_army_navy_anti_terror_operation_ssg__n_PLA_CHINA_SSG_SPECIAL_FORCES.jpg)
Training
Selection – PLA SOF are composed of highly-trained, skilled and motivated professional soldiers, who are carefully selected from officers and non-commission officers (NCO) serving in active service. These members must pass highly strict and demanding multi-phase selection and screen process before they are accepted.
Basic Training – PLA SOF, like their counterparts around the world, emphasise superior physical fitness and small-arms proficiency in their members. All SOF members are trained in martial arts and field survival skills.
Specialised Training – Depending their specific roles, PLA SOF members have specialised training in one or more of the following areas: urban warfare, sniper tactics, amphibious operations, demolitions, communications, computers, or foreign languages.
Infiltration – The ability to infiltrate undetected behind the enemy lines is one of the most essential skills required for PLA SOF. Members of PLA SOF are said to undergo “highly intensive and comprehensive multi-course training in complex terrain, including in-depth infiltration and covered reconnaissance behind the enemy line.”
PLA SOF adopts a “three-dimensional, all-weather” infiltration approach, using sea (submarine, high-speed boat, open-water swimming
and scuba diving), air (airborne, powered parachute and helicopter) and land (long-distance movement and rock climbing). Chinese media has reported that PLA SOF were able to penetrate through defensive positions that use night-vision equipment, anti-infantry radar, and other hi-tech surveillance equipments.
Mountain Training – The potential operating theatres of PLA SOF including Taiwan, Tibet and central Asia all feature mountainous terrains. Therefore, PLA SOF are routinely trained in some high mountain areas in Western China that offer extremely harsh weather conditions.
Field Survival Training – Chinese media frequently report various field survival skills training for PLA SOF, carried out on small islands, in jungle or mountainous regions. Sometimes these training courses were also carried out in harsh weather conditions. Students will learn to catch wild animals; to identify and gather edible plants; to find, extract and purify water; to make fires by any means; to make shelters and resist rain and insects; etc.
Equipments
Firearms – The small arms used by PLA SOF include standard issue weapons such as QBZ95 automatic weapons, QBU88 sniper rifle, QSZ92 pistol, and PF89 80mm individual rocket launcher. They also has specialised weapons including Type 64 silenced pistol, Type 85 silenced submachine gun, and explosives. Crew-served weapons include QYJ88 general machine gun, QLZ87 35mm automatic grenade launcher, W99 82mm automatic mortar, PF98 120mm rocket launcher.
FHJ84 Rocket Launcher – PLA SOF has been spotted using the FHJ84 twin-62mm rocket launcher in the exercise. The rocket was designed to launch rocket-propelled incendiary and smoke grenades. A high-explosive (HE) air burst steel balls round was also introduced for SOF.
Satellite Positioning Receivers – PLA SOF are currently equipped with PDA sized device that can receive both the U.S. GPS and Russian GLONASS signals. This could provide 10~50m class accuracy positioning data. China is also developing its own COMPASS satellite positioning system, which could provide military class positioning data in East Asia region as early as 2010.
Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) – PLA SOF is equipped with a variety of UAV for reconnaissance and surveillance roles. These UAV can be launched by handheld or from a small vehicle-mounted launcher.
All-Terrain Vehicles (ATV) – PLA SOF has been widely using ATV for travelling in the battlefield. These vehicles can be carried by helicopters for airborne operations.
Light Utility Vehicles – PLA SOF has been using light utility vehicles such as BJ2020SJ and EQ2050 for travelling.
Fast Attack Vehicles (FAV) – The FAV originally developed for the airborne forces is also equipped by PLA SOF.
Powered Parachute (PPC) – PLA SOF has been investing heavily in the use of PPC for air infiltration and assault. The small size of the PPC means that it is very difficult to be detected by conventional radar and other surveillance equipment.
High-Speed Boat – These are used for operations in water regions and sea infiltration operations.
Surveillance Equipment - Night-vision goggles (NVGs), low-light TV (LLTV), handheld laser rangefinders.
Communications – PLA SOF are equipped with manpack tactical radio and video-voice-data communication equipment.
Digitised Army - The SOF unit in the Chengdu MR has been experimenting with the use of digitised army systems similar to those in the U.S. Land Warrior project
Source-Reuters
In a WW3 Scenario, Australia to be Invaded by China!(Natural resource Rich Australia)
Australia's navy told to be more visible near resource projects
Mon Jan 30, 2012 1:30am EST
SHARE THIS ARTICLE
* Report calls for greater Indian Ocean military presence
* South China Sea, Korean instability remain threats
* Calls for more focus on resource sites
By James Grubel
CANBERRA, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Defence planners urged Australia's military on Monday to maintain a stronger presence in the country's north and northwest to guard the booming resource industry and be better placed to respond to challenges from Asia and the Indian Ocean.
An interim report of Australia's defence posture review said a more visible military presence could counter perceptions that offshore oil and gas projects could be easy targets.
The recommendation could see more navy exercises and new amphibious assault ships off the northwest coast, home to the iron ore industry and around A$200 billion ($212 billion) worth of liquefied natural gas projects, and a stronger navy presence around the coal and gas-rich Queensland state.
"The review makes the point that there is a perception in the north and north west of Australia of a lack of visibility, which undermines the notion of the defend Australia policy," Defence Minister Stephen Smith told reporters.
Smith set up the posture review last June and will receive its final report in March. Final decisions will be made with a wider review of the nation's defence strategy to 2030.
The United States, Australia's top strategic ally, also plans to increase its Asia Pacific presence and U.S. President Barack Obama has announced plans to position 2,500 marines in a de facto base in northern Australia.
China is also expanding its military and modernising its navy, moves that have alarmed other countries in the region, especially Taiwan and Japan, while India is building a blue-water navy to extend its strategic reach.
The Philippines is considering a U.S. proposal to deploy surveillance aircraft temporarily to enhance its ability to guard disputed areas in the South China Sea.
The posture review said that sea remained a potential flashpoint, while the risk of a major conflict on the Korean peninsula posed significant regional security challenges.
"Securing sea lines of communication and energy supplies will be a strategic driver for both competiton and cooperation in the Indian Ocean region to 2030, and Austrlaia's defence posture will need to place greater emhasis on the Indian Ocean," the review said.
TERRORIST ATTACKS
But it said the likelihood of a direct military attack on Australia remained remote and Australia's resource and energy assets were unlikely to face threats from specific states.
"The potential for terrorist attacks against oil, gas and other resource industry ifrastructure in the North West is also an important consideration, but the level of vulnerability to such attacks can be exaggerated," it said.
Offshore oil and gas projects, it said, would not be easy to access.
The resource state of Western Australia has a major navy base near the capital Perth, and is home to the elite Special Air Service forces, but there are no major military bases in the state's north, facing Asia.
The review said industry had expressed concern that the current presence in northern Western Australia was not in line with the importance of the resource sector to the economy.
The region includes the Gorgon oil and gas fields, operated by Chevron, Woodside's northwest shelf oil and gas fields, the Browse basin targeted by Royal Dutch Shell and Woodside's Sunrise oil and gas fields.
The review said Pilbara region alone provided 29 percent of merchandise exports and 60 percent of exports to China.
It said Australia should consider more navy exercises in the region, including the use of army landing forces, and more simulated war games. The navy should also seek more access to commercial ports at Exmouth, Dampier, Port Hedland and Broome.
In Queensland, the report said Australia should consider basing more large ships and submarines in Brisbane to ease pressures on the main eastern fleet base in Sydney.
Australia is considering building up to 12 new long-range submarines and has committed $7.6 billion for three powerful air warfare destroyers, due in service from 2015.
Australia is also aiming to buy 100 Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighters, to complement the fleet of F/A-18 Hornets and Super Hornets, based in Queensland, New South Wales and the remote Northern Territory.
In a WW3 Scenario, Australia to be Invaded by China!(Natural resource Rich Australia)
Australia's navy told to be more visible near resource projects
Mon Jan 30, 2012 1:30am EST
SHARE THIS ARTICLE
* Report calls for greater Indian Ocean military presence
* South China Sea, Korean instability remain threats
* Calls for more focus on resource sites
By James Grubel
CANBERRA, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Defence planners urged Australia's military on Monday to maintain a stronger presence in the country's north and northwest to guard the booming resource industry and be better placed to respond to challenges from Asia and the Indian Ocean.
An interim report of Australia's defence posture review said a more visible military presence could counter perceptions that offshore oil and gas projects could be easy targets.
The recommendation could see more navy exercises and new amphibious assault ships off the northwest coast, home to the iron ore industry and around A$200 billion ($212 billion) worth of liquefied natural gas projects, and a stronger navy presence around the coal and gas-rich Queensland state.
"The review makes the point that there is a perception in the north and north west of Australia of a lack of visibility, which undermines the notion of the defend Australia policy," Defence Minister Stephen Smith told reporters.
Smith set up the posture review last June and will receive its final report in March. Final decisions will be made with a wider review of the nation's defence strategy to 2030.
The United States, Australia's top strategic ally, also plans to increase its Asia Pacific presence and U.S. President Barack Obama has announced plans to position 2,500 marines in a de facto base in northern Australia.
China is also expanding its military and modernising its navy, moves that have alarmed other countries in the region, especially Taiwan and Japan, while India is building a blue-water navy to extend its strategic reach.
The Philippines is considering a U.S. proposal to deploy surveillance aircraft temporarily to enhance its ability to guard disputed areas in the South China Sea.
The posture review said that sea remained a potential flashpoint, while the risk of a major conflict on the Korean peninsula posed significant regional security challenges.
"Securing sea lines of communication and energy supplies will be a strategic driver for both competiton and cooperation in the Indian Ocean region to 2030, and Austrlaia's defence posture will need to place greater emhasis on the Indian Ocean," the review said.
TERRORIST ATTACKS
But it said the likelihood of a direct military attack on Australia remained remote and Australia's resource and energy assets were unlikely to face threats from specific states.
"The potential for terrorist attacks against oil, gas and other resource industry ifrastructure in the North West is also an important consideration, but the level of vulnerability to such attacks can be exaggerated," it said.
Offshore oil and gas projects, it said, would not be easy to access.
The resource state of Western Australia has a major navy base near the capital Perth, and is home to the elite Special Air Service forces, but there are no major military bases in the state's north, facing Asia.
The review said industry had expressed concern that the current presence in northern Western Australia was not in line with the importance of the resource sector to the economy.
The region includes the Gorgon oil and gas fields, operated by Chevron, Woodside's northwest shelf oil and gas fields, the Browse basin targeted by Royal Dutch Shell and Woodside's Sunrise oil and gas fields.
The review said Pilbara region alone provided 29 percent of merchandise exports and 60 percent of exports to China.
It said Australia should consider more navy exercises in the region, including the use of army landing forces, and more simulated war games. The navy should also seek more access to commercial ports at Exmouth, Dampier, Port Hedland and Broome.
In Queensland, the report said Australia should consider basing more large ships and submarines in Brisbane to ease pressures on the main eastern fleet base in Sydney.
Australia is considering building up to 12 new long-range submarines and has committed $7.6 billion for three powerful air warfare destroyers, due in service from 2015.
Australia is also aiming to buy 100 Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighters, to complement the fleet of F/A-18 Hornets and Super Hornets, based in Queensland, New South Wales and the remote Northern Territory.
Source-Washington Post/U.S. Australia Phillippines Alliance against China
Two decades after evicting U.S. forces from their biggest base in the Pacific, the Philippines is in talks with the Obama administration about expanding the American military presence in the island nation, the latest in a series of strategic moves aimed at China.
Although negotiations are in the early stages, officials from both governments said they are favorably inclined toward a deal. They are scheduled to intensify the discussions Thursday and Friday in Washington before higher-level meetings in March. If an arrangement is reached, it would follow other recent agreements to base thousands of U.S. Marines in northern Australia and to station Navy warships in Singapore.
Among the options under consideration are operating Navy ships from the Philippines, deploying troops on a rotational basis and staging more frequent joint exercises. Under each scenario, U.S. forces would effectively be guests at existing foreign bases.
The sudden rush by many in the Asia-Pacific region to embrace Washington is a direct reaction to China’s rise as a military power and its assertiveness in staking claims to disputed territories, such as the energy-rich South China Sea.
“We can point to other countries: Australia, Japan, Singapore,” said a senior Philippine official involved in the talks, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the confidentiality of the deliberations. “We’re not the only one doing this, and for good reason. We all want to see a peaceful and stable region. Nobody wants to have to face China or confront China.”
The strategic talks with the Philippines are in addition to feelers that the Obama administration has put out to other Southeast Asian countries, including Vietnam and Thailand, about possibly bolstering military partnerships.
The United States already has about 600 Special Operations troops in the Philippines, where they advise local forces in their fight with rebels sympathetic to al-Qaeda. But the talks underway between Manila and Washington potentially involve a much more extensive partnership.
Officials in the Philippines — which has 7,107 islands — said their priority is to strengthen maritime defenses, especially near the South China Sea. They indicated a willingness to host American ships and surveillance aircraft.
Although the U.S. military has tens of thousands of troops stationed at long-standing bases in Japan, South Korea and Guam, as well as the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, it is seeking to solidify its presence in Southeast Asia. Some of the world’s busiest trade routes pass through the South China Sea and the nearby Strait of Malacca.
Instead of trying to establish giant bases reminiscent of the Cold War, however, Pentagon officials said they want to maintain a light footprint.
“We have no desire nor any interest in creating a U.S.-only base in Southeast Asia,” said Robert Scher, a deputy assistant secretary of defense who oversees security policy in the region. “In each one of these cases, the core decision and discussion is about how we work better with our friends and allies. And the key piece of that is working from their locations.”
Beautiful Australian Women Break Records
Two decades after evicting U.S. forces from their biggest base in the Pacific, the Philippines is in talks with the Obama administration about expanding the American military presence in the island nation, the latest in a series of strategic moves aimed at China.
Although negotiations are in the early stages, officials from both governments said they are favorably inclined toward a deal. They are scheduled to intensify the discussions Thursday and Friday in Washington before higher-level meetings in March. If an arrangement is reached, it would follow other recent agreements to base thousands of U.S. Marines in northern Australia and to station Navy warships in Singapore.
Among the options under consideration are operating Navy ships from the Philippines, deploying troops on a rotational basis and staging more frequent joint exercises. Under each scenario, U.S. forces would effectively be guests at existing foreign bases.
The sudden rush by many in the Asia-Pacific region to embrace Washington is a direct reaction to China’s rise as a military power and its assertiveness in staking claims to disputed territories, such as the energy-rich South China Sea.
“We can point to other countries: Australia, Japan, Singapore,” said a senior Philippine official involved in the talks, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the confidentiality of the deliberations. “We’re not the only one doing this, and for good reason. We all want to see a peaceful and stable region. Nobody wants to have to face China or confront China.”
The strategic talks with the Philippines are in addition to feelers that the Obama administration has put out to other Southeast Asian countries, including Vietnam and Thailand, about possibly bolstering military partnerships.
The United States already has about 600 Special Operations troops in the Philippines, where they advise local forces in their fight with rebels sympathetic to al-Qaeda. But the talks underway between Manila and Washington potentially involve a much more extensive partnership.
Officials in the Philippines — which has 7,107 islands — said their priority is to strengthen maritime defenses, especially near the South China Sea. They indicated a willingness to host American ships and surveillance aircraft.
Although the U.S. military has tens of thousands of troops stationed at long-standing bases in Japan, South Korea and Guam, as well as the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, it is seeking to solidify its presence in Southeast Asia. Some of the world’s busiest trade routes pass through the South China Sea and the nearby Strait of Malacca.
Instead of trying to establish giant bases reminiscent of the Cold War, however, Pentagon officials said they want to maintain a light footprint.
“We have no desire nor any interest in creating a U.S.-only base in Southeast Asia,” said Robert Scher, a deputy assistant secretary of defense who oversees security policy in the region. “In each one of these cases, the core decision and discussion is about how we work better with our friends and allies. And the key piece of that is working from their locations.”
Beautiful Australian Women Break Records
Source-Australian Herald Sun/Gold Coast Bikini record
THE Gold Coast is officially the bikini capital of the world after 357 women donned the two-piece to set a new world record.
Bikini-clad women strutting through Surfers Paradise have bolstered the Gold Coast's reputation for producing world-beating women.
Just days after the city welcomed athletes Sally Pearson and Sam Stosur home after incredible sporting feats, hundreds of women joined this morning's Gold Coast Bikini Parade, smashing the standing world record.
Sponsored by the Surfers Paradise Alliance and the Gold Coast Bulletin, the parade needed to attract 332 bodies to beat the record set in the Cayman Islands last year.
Australian Guinness World Record adjudicator Chris Sheedy was on hand to officially declare the record attempt a success.
''Today 361 girls walked through the counter but there had to be a few disqualifications because they were not wearing bikinis,'' he said.
''Unfortunately for the Cayman Islands they have had their record smashed because 357 walked through the count today.''
Stilletto Race
THE Gold Coast is officially the bikini capital of the world after 357 women donned the two-piece to set a new world record.
Bikini-clad women strutting through Surfers Paradise have bolstered the Gold Coast's reputation for producing world-beating women.
Just days after the city welcomed athletes Sally Pearson and Sam Stosur home after incredible sporting feats, hundreds of women joined this morning's Gold Coast Bikini Parade, smashing the standing world record.
Sponsored by the Surfers Paradise Alliance and the Gold Coast Bulletin, the parade needed to attract 332 bodies to beat the record set in the Cayman Islands last year.
Australian Guinness World Record adjudicator Chris Sheedy was on hand to officially declare the record attempt a success.
''Today 361 girls walked through the counter but there had to be a few disqualifications because they were not wearing bikinis,'' he said.
''Unfortunately for the Cayman Islands they have had their record smashed because 357 walked through the count today.''
Stilletto Race
Australian Women
Source-CIA World Factbook/Australia
Background
Aboriginal settlers arrived on the continent from Southeast Asia about 40,000 years before the first Europeans began exploration in the 17th century. No formal territorial claims were made until 1770, when Capt. James COOK took possession of the east coast in the name of Great Britain (all of Australia was claimed as British territory in 1829 with the creation of the colony of Western Australia). Six colonies were created in the late 18th and 19th centuries; they federated and became the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901. The new country took advantage of its natural resources to rapidly develop agricultural and manufacturing industries and to make a major contribution to the British effort in World Wars I and II. In recent decades, Australia has transformed itself into an internationally competitive, advanced market economy. It boasted one of the OECD's fastest growing economies during the 1990s, a performance due in large part to economic reforms adopted in the 1980s. Long-term concerns include ageing of the population, pressure on infrastructure, and environmental issues such as frequent droughts.
Economy
Australia's abundant and diverse natural resources attract high levels of foreign investment and include extensive reserves of coal, iron ore, copper, gold, natural gas, uranium, and renewable energy sources. A series of major investments, such as the US$40 billion Gorgon Liquid Natural Gas project, will significantly expand the resources sector. Australia also has a large services sector and is a significant exporter of natural resources, energy, and food. Key tenets of Australia's trade policy include support for open trade and the successful culmination of the Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations, particularly for agriculture and services. The Australian economy grew for 17 consecutive years before the global financial crisis. Subsequently, the Rudd government introduced a fiscal stimulus package worth over US$50 billion to offset the effect of the slowing world economy, while the Reserve Bank of Australia cut interest rates to historic lows. These policies - and continued demand for commodities, especially from China - helped the Australian economy rebound after just one quarter of negative growth. The economy grew by 1.2% during 2009 - the best performance in the OECD - and by 3.3% in 2010. Unemployment, originally expected to reach 8-10%, peaked at 5.7% in late 2009 and fell to 5.1% in 2010. As a result of an improved economy, the budget deficit is expected to peak below 4.2% of GDP and the government could return to budget surpluses as early as 2015. Australia was one of the first advanced economies to raise interest rates, with seven rate hikes between October 2009 and November 2010. The GILLARD government is focused on raising Australia's economic productivity to ensure the sustainability of growth, and continues to manage the symbiotic, but sometimes tense, economic relationship with China. Australia is engaged in the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks and ongoing free trade agreement negotiations with China, Japan, and Korea.
Military
Military ::Australia
Military branches:
Australian Defense Force (ADF): Australian Army, Royal Australian Navy, Royal Australian Air Force, Special Operations Command (2006)
Military service age and obligation:
17 years of age for voluntary military service (with parental consent); no conscription; women allowed to serve in Army combat units in non-combat support roles (2010)
Manpower available for military service:
males age 16-49: 5,316,464
females age 16-49: 5,116,722 (2010 est.)
Manpower fit for military service:
males age 16-49: 4,411,958
females age 16-49: 4,239,985 (2010 est.)
Manpower reaching militarily significant age annually:
male: 143,565
female: 135,800 (2010 est.)
Military expenditures:
3% of GDP (2009)
country comparison to the world: 43
Julia Gillard Prime Minister of Australia
Background
Aboriginal settlers arrived on the continent from Southeast Asia about 40,000 years before the first Europeans began exploration in the 17th century. No formal territorial claims were made until 1770, when Capt. James COOK took possession of the east coast in the name of Great Britain (all of Australia was claimed as British territory in 1829 with the creation of the colony of Western Australia). Six colonies were created in the late 18th and 19th centuries; they federated and became the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901. The new country took advantage of its natural resources to rapidly develop agricultural and manufacturing industries and to make a major contribution to the British effort in World Wars I and II. In recent decades, Australia has transformed itself into an internationally competitive, advanced market economy. It boasted one of the OECD's fastest growing economies during the 1990s, a performance due in large part to economic reforms adopted in the 1980s. Long-term concerns include ageing of the population, pressure on infrastructure, and environmental issues such as frequent droughts.
Economy
Australia's abundant and diverse natural resources attract high levels of foreign investment and include extensive reserves of coal, iron ore, copper, gold, natural gas, uranium, and renewable energy sources. A series of major investments, such as the US$40 billion Gorgon Liquid Natural Gas project, will significantly expand the resources sector. Australia also has a large services sector and is a significant exporter of natural resources, energy, and food. Key tenets of Australia's trade policy include support for open trade and the successful culmination of the Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations, particularly for agriculture and services. The Australian economy grew for 17 consecutive years before the global financial crisis. Subsequently, the Rudd government introduced a fiscal stimulus package worth over US$50 billion to offset the effect of the slowing world economy, while the Reserve Bank of Australia cut interest rates to historic lows. These policies - and continued demand for commodities, especially from China - helped the Australian economy rebound after just one quarter of negative growth. The economy grew by 1.2% during 2009 - the best performance in the OECD - and by 3.3% in 2010. Unemployment, originally expected to reach 8-10%, peaked at 5.7% in late 2009 and fell to 5.1% in 2010. As a result of an improved economy, the budget deficit is expected to peak below 4.2% of GDP and the government could return to budget surpluses as early as 2015. Australia was one of the first advanced economies to raise interest rates, with seven rate hikes between October 2009 and November 2010. The GILLARD government is focused on raising Australia's economic productivity to ensure the sustainability of growth, and continues to manage the symbiotic, but sometimes tense, economic relationship with China. Australia is engaged in the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks and ongoing free trade agreement negotiations with China, Japan, and Korea.
Military
Military ::Australia
Military branches:
Australian Defense Force (ADF): Australian Army, Royal Australian Navy, Royal Australian Air Force, Special Operations Command (2006)
Military service age and obligation:
17 years of age for voluntary military service (with parental consent); no conscription; women allowed to serve in Army combat units in non-combat support roles (2010)
Manpower available for military service:
males age 16-49: 5,316,464
females age 16-49: 5,116,722 (2010 est.)
Manpower fit for military service:
males age 16-49: 4,411,958
females age 16-49: 4,239,985 (2010 est.)
Manpower reaching militarily significant age annually:
male: 143,565
female: 135,800 (2010 est.)
Military expenditures:
3% of GDP (2009)
country comparison to the world: 43
Julia Gillard Prime Minister of Australia
Source-OZunited.info/Julia Gillard bio
Source-Henry Makow.com/Julia Gillard lesbian Communist
Australian Candidates Pander to Money, Jews
August 14, 2010
Julia, which way will you go
Julia, I wanna know
Julia, only the moon and stars
Julia, know just where you are
Julia
Chris Rea's "Southern Blues Guitar" Julia
by John Vermeulen
(FOR HENRYMAKOW.COM)
This is how one pundit characterized the run-up to the Australian election Aug. 21 :
"Here's the plot: an unmarried, foreign-born, atheist woman whose partner is a male hairdresser wants to lead a nation famous for manly men. Her opponent [Tony Abbott] is the Mad Monk - a Speedo-loving amateur boxer who once studied to be a priest." (William Pesek in "An election about nothing that's made for TV")
Australia's current prime minister Julia Gillard is the first woman and first unmarried (cohabiting) childless Prime Minister of Australia.
Australian journalist Andrew Bolt noted that Julia Gillard began as a Communist and was a member of the Socialist Forum from 1998-2002 which later merged with the Fabian Society.
Australian conservatives should be aware that their darling faux-conservative John Howard was also a Fabian. To give credit, at least Julia is open about her left leanings. She is not as open about her lesbian sexual preferences. Many Australians think that Tim Mathieson, Julia's so called partner is a "beard."
One of Julia's first moves as prime minister was to pretend to lift (her predecessor) Kevin Rudd's tax on miners. We have now learned that Gillard did a back room deal favoring the big miners over the smaller ones.
The Rudd tax was paraded as the reason for his failure. It is clear now that corporate media spin began against Rudd in early 2010.
There was a soft droning of "Rudd is a weak leader" and "the party is unhappy" at the same time as a Julia Gillard push. Ms Gillard is not Elle McPherson or Megan Fox. Until late 2009 she was plain Jane in the background. In early February we noticed that she was looking more feminine and somewhat softer. Machinists were, how shall we say ... less inclined to borrow her face to sharpen their drill bits.
GILLARD SIDES WITH ZIONISTS
John Howard announced his commitment to the Iraq war in 2003 in front of a Jewish group in the US. The television news showed him walking out of a meeting surrounded by traditionally dressed Orthodox men, probably Rabbis. The "John Howard Negev Forest" was established in Israel in 2007 in his honour.
Kevin Rudd crossed the line. He dared to stand up to Israel for forging Australian passports and the flotilla raid. Well, he did not really stand up, but at least he commented. Rudd expelled an Israeli diplomat in a hollow gesture. (He was due to return to Israel shortly anyways.) Rudd, unlike Howard was more inclined to resist involvement in Israel's imminent war on Iran. Rudd had also angered the miners and faltered on climate change.
On the passports and the flotilla, Julia kept silent. She towed the party line behind Rudd on carbon trading and the miners tax. Perhaps Julia was encouraged by her live-in partner/handler (a hairdresser who works for an Israeli lobbyist) that she can sit on the throne if a.) she is prepared to sacrifice other people's children in Iran and Palestine b.) she assists the big miners over the small ones - treachery in the workers paradise c.) she pushes ahead with carbon trading known here as the Environmental Trading Scheme or ETS.
Julia now does the bidding of the Israeli lobby, big business and the banks. As a Communist, Julia may not outwardly support the big miners or the Israeli agenda, but as a Fabian the connection is natural. Gradualism is not the gradual distribution of wealth to all parties, it is the gradual draining of wealth to the elite.
Julia's allegiances are complex. She has just signed a preference deal with the Australian Greens in the senate. The Green leader, Bob Brown, is a self admitted homosexual who is green on the outside red on the inside. If Julia is elected and the Greens help her over the line Australia will be in for an emissions trading scheme (ETS) death duties and open boarders. What affect the Green influence will have on the Israeli connection is anyone's guess.
ABBOTT SIDES WITH ZIONISTS
Recently there is a cooling towards Australian Labour in the media. The campaign has become a freak show and every hack journalist seems to be gunning for Labour.
The media swing toward Abbott may have been influenced by his recent genuflection to Israel. At the Australian Israel Chamber of Commerce in Melbourne, Abbott said his government would "never support a one-sided UN resolution against Israel to curry favour with an anti-Israel authority". Rather than remain silent on the flotilla affair as did Gillard, Abbott actually criticized Rudd for overreacting.
So Ms Gillard (of ambiguous sexual orientation) is a Fabian socialist, atheist, foreign born, unmarried woman living with a hairdresser (also of ambiguous sexual orientation) who works for an Israeli lobbyist. She is beholden to the Jewish Lobby, the enviro lobby, the miners, the Greens and its homosexual leader. Her office is built like a masonic temple in the masonic city of Canberra.
Australian Candidates Pander to Money, Jews
August 14, 2010
Julia, which way will you go
Julia, I wanna know
Julia, only the moon and stars
Julia, know just where you are
Julia
Chris Rea's "Southern Blues Guitar" Julia
by John Vermeulen
(FOR HENRYMAKOW.COM)
This is how one pundit characterized the run-up to the Australian election Aug. 21 :
"Here's the plot: an unmarried, foreign-born, atheist woman whose partner is a male hairdresser wants to lead a nation famous for manly men. Her opponent [Tony Abbott] is the Mad Monk - a Speedo-loving amateur boxer who once studied to be a priest." (William Pesek in "An election about nothing that's made for TV")
Australia's current prime minister Julia Gillard is the first woman and first unmarried (cohabiting) childless Prime Minister of Australia.
Australian journalist Andrew Bolt noted that Julia Gillard began as a Communist and was a member of the Socialist Forum from 1998-2002 which later merged with the Fabian Society.
Australian conservatives should be aware that their darling faux-conservative John Howard was also a Fabian. To give credit, at least Julia is open about her left leanings. She is not as open about her lesbian sexual preferences. Many Australians think that Tim Mathieson, Julia's so called partner is a "beard."
One of Julia's first moves as prime minister was to pretend to lift (her predecessor) Kevin Rudd's tax on miners. We have now learned that Gillard did a back room deal favoring the big miners over the smaller ones.
The Rudd tax was paraded as the reason for his failure. It is clear now that corporate media spin began against Rudd in early 2010.
There was a soft droning of "Rudd is a weak leader" and "the party is unhappy" at the same time as a Julia Gillard push. Ms Gillard is not Elle McPherson or Megan Fox. Until late 2009 she was plain Jane in the background. In early February we noticed that she was looking more feminine and somewhat softer. Machinists were, how shall we say ... less inclined to borrow her face to sharpen their drill bits.
GILLARD SIDES WITH ZIONISTS
John Howard announced his commitment to the Iraq war in 2003 in front of a Jewish group in the US. The television news showed him walking out of a meeting surrounded by traditionally dressed Orthodox men, probably Rabbis. The "John Howard Negev Forest" was established in Israel in 2007 in his honour.
Kevin Rudd crossed the line. He dared to stand up to Israel for forging Australian passports and the flotilla raid. Well, he did not really stand up, but at least he commented. Rudd expelled an Israeli diplomat in a hollow gesture. (He was due to return to Israel shortly anyways.) Rudd, unlike Howard was more inclined to resist involvement in Israel's imminent war on Iran. Rudd had also angered the miners and faltered on climate change.
On the passports and the flotilla, Julia kept silent. She towed the party line behind Rudd on carbon trading and the miners tax. Perhaps Julia was encouraged by her live-in partner/handler (a hairdresser who works for an Israeli lobbyist) that she can sit on the throne if a.) she is prepared to sacrifice other people's children in Iran and Palestine b.) she assists the big miners over the small ones - treachery in the workers paradise c.) she pushes ahead with carbon trading known here as the Environmental Trading Scheme or ETS.
Julia now does the bidding of the Israeli lobby, big business and the banks. As a Communist, Julia may not outwardly support the big miners or the Israeli agenda, but as a Fabian the connection is natural. Gradualism is not the gradual distribution of wealth to all parties, it is the gradual draining of wealth to the elite.
Julia's allegiances are complex. She has just signed a preference deal with the Australian Greens in the senate. The Green leader, Bob Brown, is a self admitted homosexual who is green on the outside red on the inside. If Julia is elected and the Greens help her over the line Australia will be in for an emissions trading scheme (ETS) death duties and open boarders. What affect the Green influence will have on the Israeli connection is anyone's guess.
ABBOTT SIDES WITH ZIONISTS
Recently there is a cooling towards Australian Labour in the media. The campaign has become a freak show and every hack journalist seems to be gunning for Labour.
The media swing toward Abbott may have been influenced by his recent genuflection to Israel. At the Australian Israel Chamber of Commerce in Melbourne, Abbott said his government would "never support a one-sided UN resolution against Israel to curry favour with an anti-Israel authority". Rather than remain silent on the flotilla affair as did Gillard, Abbott actually criticized Rudd for overreacting.
So Ms Gillard (of ambiguous sexual orientation) is a Fabian socialist, atheist, foreign born, unmarried woman living with a hairdresser (also of ambiguous sexual orientation) who works for an Israeli lobbyist. She is beholden to the Jewish Lobby, the enviro lobby, the miners, the Greens and its homosexual leader. Her office is built like a masonic temple in the masonic city of Canberra.
Source-UK DAILY MAIL/ Julia Gillard Australian Prime Minister escapes Wrath
Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard clung to her bodyguard as she was dragged to safety through a crowd of angry protesters in Canberra today.
Riot police formed a shield around the prime minister as they helped her force a path through the protesters who surrounded a restaurant where she was attending an awards ceremony to mark Australia Day.
Miss Gillard stumbled after losing a shoe in the scuffle, but was caught by her personal security guard and managed to get into a waiting car.
Scroll down for video
New World Order Politicians getting what they deserve.
Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard clung to her bodyguard as she was dragged to safety through a crowd of angry protesters in Canberra today.
Riot police formed a shield around the prime minister as they helped her force a path through the protesters who surrounded a restaurant where she was attending an awards ceremony to mark Australia Day.
Miss Gillard stumbled after losing a shoe in the scuffle, but was caught by her personal security guard and managed to get into a waiting car.
Scroll down for video
New World Order Politicians getting what they deserve.
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