Tag Archive for 'Afghanistan'

Guest Post by Miriam Lyons: What does an Obama win mean for Australia?

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by
Guest Poster
3 weeks, 5 days ago
in Australiana, Climate change, Developing world, Economics, Environment, Foreign Elections, Foreign policy, Government, Immigration, International, Markets, Policy, Politics, Sociology and USA
. 12 Comments

Director of the Centre for Policy Development Miriam Lyons writes:

Barack Obama’s victory represents a watershed in American history, but it will also have ramifications around the world. Before I head out to celebrate I thought I’d just bash out a few quick notes on some of the policy implications for Australia of this momentous turnaround in the state of US politics:

Climate change

Today’s election result heralds the rise of Green Keynesianism. The US economy is in the toilet and smart economists are advocating direct investment over a more consumer-based fiscal stimulus. Democrats in Congress got a head start last year with the Green Jobs Act, and elements of the President-elect’s energy and environment policies look a lot like a ‘Green New Deal’. This from Time Magazine:

He wants to launch an “Apollo project” to build a new alternative-energy economy. His rationale for doing so includes some hard truths about the current economic mess: “The engine of economic growth for the past 20 years is not going to be there for the next 20. That was consumer spending. Basically, we turbocharged this economy based on cheap credit.” But the days of easy credit are over, Obama said, “because there is too much deleveraging taking place, too much debt.” A new economic turbocharger is going to have to be found, and “there is no better potential driver that pervades all aspects of our economy than a new energy economy … That’s going to be my No. 1 priority when I get into office.”

Calls for a Green New Deal are also starting to gain traction in the UK - and the UN. This can only help the chances of Australia’s version of the Apollo alliance, which released the ‘Green Gold Rush’ report last week calling for investment in green-collar jobs growth.

The Obama campaign’s target for emissions cuts was 80% by 2050 - a fair way ahead of Oz Labor’s as-yet-unaltered election promise of 60% by 2050. With the Arctic ice-sheet melting rapidly even an 80% target is too low for a developed country like the US, but it should certainly give Professor Ross Garnaut reason to revise his pessimism about the likely outcome of the Copenhagen round of climate negotiations. It’s worth noting that the Obama campaign’s climate and energy platform specifically called for 100% auctioning of permits.

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How serious are our troop deployments?

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by
Robert Merkel
6 months ago
in Afghanistan, International, Iraq, Security and War
. 30 Comments

One thing that’s puzzled me for a long time is how Australia has been able to continue to deploy soldiers to all manner of risky spots without significant casualties. Did our diggers have some kind of movie-style good-guy bullet repulsion field?

Apparently not, according to a pair of army officers writing in the Army Journal. Two separate articles reveal that in Iraq, Afghanistan, East Timor and the Solomons, that any actual “offensive manoeuvers” - that is, actual warfighting, has been virtually the exclusive province of the tiny number of SAS troops - that is, the super-elite “Special Forces”. This is in contrast to our American, British, and Canadian partners, where regular infantry troops have done much of the offensive fighting(there simply aren’t enough special forces to do everything). They’ve been effective, but have suffered far more casualties as a consequence.

The complaints of Australian troops about being left out and leaving the burdens to their allies are understandable. But, particularly when it comes to Iraq, I’d prefer them to feel cowardly and come home in one piece, rather than die or be maimed in glorious battle. But - assuming that these army officers (and my understanding of their articles) are basically accurate - it does raise some questions about our diplomatic posturing, particularly when it comes to Afghanistan. Our posturing about Europeans not putting their troops in harm’s way looks a bit hypocritical, given that only the SAS, who make up a very small fraction of our total deployment, appear to be really doing so. Force protection (as I understand it and very much in a nutshell, standing guard while people do stuff) is of course hardly risk-free, but much, much safer than offensive roles. And does the fact that we’re not prepared to actually risk our infantry in combat suggest that our generals think that they’re not up to the job?

The response of the Chief of the Army can be read in this ABC article; notice that he doesn’t disagree with the basic assertions of the officers.