2025 – Australia’s dangerous nuclear dance with Dutton?

Why I must now focus on Australia’s nuclear question

For the past 18 years, I have been running two websites dedicated to the nuclear-free cause. I started these when John Howard was proposing nuclear power for Australia. The hazards then were obvious, environmental and health damage, further oppression of Aboriginal people, threats to civil liberties, proliferation of nuclear weapons, and more.

Over the last few years the threat of nuclear war has increased. It has become clear that men in power have come to believe that a nuclear war can be won, despite what the scientists tell us. The idea of nuclear disarmament has gone out the window, as ever new, cleverer, bigger nuclear weapons are devised by our fine “defenders”.

While danger has increased, knowledge and understanding of history has decreased. So we have a Western world that pays no attention to the background to the war in Ukraine, and confidently believes that it is all about one “evil” man – Putin, and nothing to do with the complex story of the Donbass region of Ukraine, and its quest for autonomy.

Meanwhile the horror of the Israeli genocide of Palestinians in Gaza continues, and the Netanyahu government’s ruthless oppression there is backed by Western weapons, and moral support – because we “don’t want to be anti-semitic, do we?” And again, the history of the region is ignored.

These two situations could so easily tip the world over the brink – to nuclear war.  (I have been trying to bring attention to this.)

But as if that were not enough – there’s more on-the-brink background. We must now hate not only Russia, but also China, and Iran, and be ready to nuclear bomb them. We must build up more nuclear weapons – to the gratification of those lovely armaments companies and their happy shareholders.

And if that all is not enough to have us now teetering on that brink, we now have the most powerful nation in the world run by a deranged President Trump, who is supported, perhaps himself controlled, by a small group of obscenely rich men of brilliant minds but lopsided morals, including the ketamine-dependent Elon Musk.

So, to get back to the point. In this crazy new world, the new USA government will destroy or control political, judicial, educational and social institutions, with the aid of Murdoch media and social media. Misinformation and lies will be rife, and it will be a struggle to find media sources that can be trusted. But decent people, with the will for co-operation and for collective action continue – we just have to find them.

I have tried, through my websites, to cover those international political issues that bring nuclear war ever closer. But now, it is just too hard.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, here in Australia, we have the unique situation of an entire continent being taken over, militarily, by the USA. Liberal and Labor governments have let it happen. Labor Prime Ministers, terrified by what happened to the one Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam, who dared to stand up to the USA, continue to kowtow to America.

If the “tech bros” and the shadowy Atlas Foundation can play a role in bringing the chaotic Donald Trump to power in the USA, they could well do the same thing here, helping to bring Dutton’s nuclear madness to Australia. However, I must give Dutton some credit, too. He now looks likely to offer all sorts of other enticements to Australian voters, and perhaps just soft pedal on the nuclear propaganda, and hope we forget about it.

It is up to those of us who are aware, and perhaps have the time, to explore the scenario of what the nuclear industry would mean for this country.

Australia is somewhat scarred by the nuclear industry already, with the abomination of the British nuclear bombing of Aboriginal land in the 1950s, and with the environmental and health destruction of uranium mining. But Australia now has this unique opportunity – to be the world leader in renewable energy, and energy conservation.

Australia does not have to be “USA’s beachfront against China” as one American politician said recently. Australia does not have to be the Southern Hemisphere base for USA’s nuclear-armed bombers, and nuclear submarines.

So, anyway, I reckon that the job for aware Australians is to keep the focus on Dutton’s nuclear nuttiness, exposing its lies. For my own part, I’m narrowing the scope of my websites and newsletter, taking them back to their original theme – for a nuclear-free world.