The Australian reports the latest Newspoll has Labor’s lead narrowing from 54-46 to 53-47, from primary votes of Labor 34% (down two from the previous poll three weeks ago, although the accompanying report only says one), Coalition 36% (steady), the Greens 12% (up one) and One Nation 5% (down one). Anthony Albanese is down two on approval to 45% and up two on disapproval to 46%, while Peter Dutton recovers from a slump in the previous result to gain five on approval to 37% and lose two on disapproval to 50%, which still leaves him behind where he was two polls ago. Albanese’s lead as preferred prime minister is in from 50-30 to 50-33.
The poll was conducted Tuesday to Friday from a sample of 1225. There are also several sets of polling on the Indigenous Voice, including from Newspoll and all showing no well ahead, which will be covered in a separate post later this evening.
And now to toss another AUKUS grenade into the room. The US Studies Centre (USSC) at Sydney uni has published this commendably honest paper: “Full knowledge and concurrence: Key questions for US-Australia extended deterrence and escalation management consultations”.
https://www.ussc.edu.au/key-questions-for-us-australia-extended-deterrence-and-escalation-management-consultations
This talks about the need for detailed negotiations between Australia and USA on the permissible roles and missions for US forces based in Australia and RAN SSNs in the event of war with China. It also identifies some plausible scenarios for what questions might arise if nuclear weapons got involved.
This comment in Section 3 Para 3 bullseyes some of the criticisms about sovereignty and roles for RAN SSNs. Clearly the USN would expect them to be at least available for some anti-China missions in peace and war. In particular:
“As Australia brings online additional capabilities, such as its conventionally-armed, nuclear-powered attack submarines, Washington and Canberra need to have frank discussions about what mission those capabilities will support, and how the alliance would manage an incident in the future. For instance, will Australian attack submarines be chasing Chinese ballistic missile submarines, a common mission for the type of subs Australia will acquire through the AUKUS partnership? Or will they be assigned different or complementary roles?”
If you read the cold war histories of the USN and RN SSN forces, one of their main jobs was shadowing Soviet SSBNs to be ready to sink them in case of nuclear war. In this regard it is much easier for an SSN to reach the likely PLAN SSBN patrol areas in the Yellow Sea or South China Sea from Perth than it is from Pearl Harbour.
I’d love to see this paper debated in parliament.
Socrates @ #399 Tuesday, October 10th, 2023 – 11:07 am
Me either.
That’s why we should play a neutral role by simply outright condemning all violence and war and not do anything stupid like taking a side and lighting up our APH and state landmarks in their colours.
Classic Propellor Cap Boy:
“ The only realistic solution now is to integrate Palestinians into Israel by granting them all of the rights of Israeli citizenship as well as generous compensation for the land that was stolen from them.”
______
Throwing in the word “realistic” doesn’t transform that sentence from being anything other than magical thinking.