The bill is called the Defence Legislation Amendment (Naval Nuclear Propulsion) Bill 2023. The amendments involve inserting an additional paragraph in parts of each act to exempt ‘a naval nuclear propulsion plant related to use in a conventionally-armed, nuclear-powered submarine’ from the requirements in the parts of either of those acts which refer to nuclear power plants.
This must be of considerable concern to the Australian community as it is totally illogical to make a distinction between the nuclear plant providing the power to propel “conventionally-armed, nuclear-powered submarines” and that of a land-based nuclear power plant in relation to controls and protections as it is indeed still a nuclear power plant.
The nuclear power plant on board a submarine needs the same or more requirements for control and protection as a nuclear power plant on land. Indeed, the uranium to be used in these proposed SSN submarines is enriched to the level that is used in nuclear weapons.
It also presents more danger than conventionally uranium-fired nuclear power plants to the naval staff operating inside a nuclear-propelled submarine as they live and work in very close proximity to the nuclear power plant powering the submarine. When in port, residents in the vicinity of the port are potentially exposed to the toxic impact of possible radiation leaks from the submarine’s nuclear power plant.
To pass these amendments exempting nuclear power plants on board a nuclear-propelled submarine from the requirements of these two acts would be a betrayal by Parliament of its responsibilities to the naval staff operating the submarines and to the wider Australian public, especially those in proximity to the ports which service nuclear-powered submarines.
The Federal Parliament has never had the opportunity to vote on Australia joining the trilateral AUKUS security treaty through which the nuclear-powered submarine technology is to be transferred to Australia.
Nor has it had the opportunity to vote on the decision for Australia to buy/acquire nuclear-propelled submarines.
Here is one, possibly the only, opportunity for Parliament to vote on an aspect of the nuclear-propelled submarine procurement and step in and take some responsibility in maintaining the controls and protection of the nuclear power plant on board a submarine by not exempting it from the requirements of these two acts.
The gallery of the Autumn 2023 Salon entries that were awarded Highly Commended or Honours has been published. You can find the link to it here. Alternatively, select the Galleries menu from the top of the page and navigate to the page from there.
This subject has dominated the concerns of the Waikanae Community Board since late 2019, but didn’t get very far because of the previous mayor’s obsession with his Gateway vanity project instead, and the difficult council officer officer in charge, Alison Law. However, discussion options have gathered pace in the last year or so and Alison Law has gone to Tauranga. Now three main options are ready for consultation,
The report occupies pages 6-20 in the Agenda for the council meeting held yesterday. We delayed posting on it earlier to listen to what elected members had to say about it at the meeting, but there was little comment.
Rather than post the whole 16 pages, above are the first 5, and the link to the whole pdf is here.
It’s important that the size of the building encompasses a solid degree of ‘future proofing’ in floor area requirement because the Waikanae population is steadily increasing with new developments; particularly those of the Maypole company, as well as the Summerset village.
The big capital outlay for the most expensive option is likely to alarm Ratepayers outside Waikanae (and probably quite a few in Waikanae), however, one council project that can and should be abandoned to compensate for the cost is the futile seawall in Paekakariki which now involves the best part of $20 million expenditure. Seawalls like that don’t work and the far better option, as mentioned in our Council Long Term Plan submission in June 2021, is to dump a whole lot more big rocks to fortify what has been erected there already.
For some reason American militarists think its important for the U.S. to control the land mass on the opposite side of the world, which just happens to encompass both Russia and China.
All of us so-called geopolitical analysts owe a debt to Halford John Mackinder. His 1904 paper, “The Geographical Pivot of History” is the basis for nearly all strategic thinking in today’s policy rooms, think tanks, and military academies of the West.
We’ve all heard the first three rules of Mackinder:
Who rules Eastern Europe commands the Heartland Who rules the Heartland commands the World Island Who rules the World Island commands the world
Because of the dominance of Mackinder’s ideas and the policies erected to support it, the world has been subjected to endless conflict over his conception of the “World Island,” which is basically Eurasia.
And that’s why there can be no losing for the West in Ukraine. To the Mackinderists at the top of the power structures in London, Washington D.C. and Brussels, losing Ukraine means losing the entire world, because they have this very-outdated view of world geography.
Mackinder-ism in today’s world is a tautology, reducing to: We have to control the Heartland because we can’t lose the Heartland.
“I’m sorry, mein Gauleiter, the Kampfgruppe-Ost is no more and the Russians have taken Bidenburg.”
by Ted Snider from antiwar.com
Like an example of double think in a seminar on Orwell’s 1984, two The New York Times’ headlines read simultaneously that “Russia Claims Victory in Bakhmut” and “Ukraine Turns Tide in Bakhmut.” The Western media then gave an Orwellian example of rewriting history with the claim that, with Russia’s victory in Bakhmut, they had fallen into Ukraine’s trap. If the Russian occupation of Bakhmut was a trap, the Ukrainian military could have left long ago, sprung the trap and spared the lives of tens of thousands of soldiers.
Though far from the end of the war, the fall of Bakhmut is important. In March, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned, perhaps somewhat dramatically in his quest for more weapons, that, if Russia wins control of Bakhmut, “it would be open road for the Russians . . . to other towns in Ukraine” and said that if Bakhmut is captured, “Our society will push me to have to compromise” with Russia. Now the media has turned “fortress Bakhmut” into a “symbolic victory.”
The victory in Bakhmut is not merely symbolic for two reasons. Though the town itself may not be of much value, its locations is. A number of transportation lines run through Bakhmut. Russian control of Bakhmut makes it difficult for Ukraine to supply its forces and gives Russia increased mobility throughout the Donbas region. And though the conquest of Bakhmut may not really give Russia an open road west, it may allow them to advance several tens of kilometers to Ukraine’s next defensive line.
More importantly, though, the Russian assault on Bakhmut may not have been primarily about territory. As Ukraine continued to pour soldiers into Bakhmut, the Russian army, like death’s maw, devoured everyone Kiev sent in to displace it. Bakhmut may have been more about depleting Ukrainian troops and artillery to weaken its military for the anticipated Ukrainian offensive than it was about territory. Occupying Bakhmut also presents the possibility that, as Ukrainian forces move south for their offensive, they could find themselves dangerously between Russian forces on two sides.
by Josh Hertel and Wendy Markham for @nevadadot via U.S. Forest Service-Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest 19/5
