- by Marcus Browning
- The Guardian
- Issue #2125
A US Air Force Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor prepares to receive fuel above air force base Tindal, Northern Territory. Photo: Robert Sullivan – flickr.com (CC0)
“The United States is a Pacific power, and we are here to stay,” said US President Obama during his visit to Australia in 2011 as he announced the stationing of 2,500 US Marines in Darwin; more visits by US ships and aircraft to Australia; greater US access to Australian military bases; more joint military exercises; and storage of more US military equipment in Australia. Obama followed that up the following January when he announced the US policy which has brought war to Australia’s doorstep.
The policy laid out in Sustaining US Global Leadership: Priorities for the 21st Century Defence outlines a “historic shift” in which the US will maintain its military presence in the Middle East and Europe but will now give priority to Asia, the Pacific, and the Indian Ocean.
As more US ships, aircraft and troops come to Australian military facilities, the level of Australian military integration with the aggressive and destabilising US government has risen, further undermining Australia’s independence and security.
Over 160 years ago, Karl Marx predicted that the Pacific Ocean – “the great waterway of commerce” – would serve as “the centre of gravity of world commerce,” playing the same role as the Atlantic did in his century and the Mediterranean in Roman times. Marx’s comments captured the essence of the significant shift in global political economy that we are witnessing today, with increased trade and investment across the Pacific basin.
The central US goal is control of the planet; the power to install governments subservient to its demands; power to privatise and deregulate the economies of every nation in the world; the power to inflict on peoples everywhere “free market” corporate capitalism. US supremacy will be only be assured by preventing the emergence of any other potentially competing power or government independent of its control.
This doctrine places China at the centre of US “security” concerns and prioritises expansion of US war-making capacities in Asia and the Pacific and Indian Oceans. This means greater involvement of Australia, Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, and India as the US “pivots” from Iraq and Afghanistan to the heartland of the 21st Century global economy, Asia and the Pacific.
The US strategy is to first exaggerate the level of China’s present military build-up; to encircle China through the acquisition of military bases in the Asian-Pacific region; to establish anti-Chinese alliances; and to deploy missile systems near China. Australia is assisting with the supply of uranium.
US armaments companies are facilitating India’s military expansion, especially space development, through an aggressive move into South Asian markets to supplement reductions in their Pentagon contracts.
The Sustaining US Global Leadership strategy includes a focus on Iran, clearly intended to ensure that Tehran cannot jeopardise the West’s neo-colonial control of the Middle East and its oil which is so essential to its economies and militaries.
China’s military expansion is actually small compared to the US military. Australia’s intelligence community has stated that China’s current limited military build-up is not a threat to Australia. Rather it is China’s response to the huge US military expansion in the Asia-Pacific region.
China and Iran are the primary targets of weapons systems to be developed; of expanded US military alliances, bases, access agreements and an increased tempo of military exercises; as well as advanced cyber and space war capabilities.
Despite the fact that China’s military budget is less than one tenth that of the US, China is providing the “enemy” the US military-industrial complex requires.
Preparing for war with China provides additional super profits for the US armaments corporations. It will be the primary justification for the acquisition of these costly new weapons systems.
The expansion of “missile defence” systems in Australia, Japan, South Korea, and on US military platforms near China is intended to assist with these plans. It will actually create more regional tension and instability, increasing the possibility of war.
The US is engaged in an extensive build-up of military forces as part of a strategy to strengthen and position US and allied forces to contain or even militarily defeat China. Victory from these efforts would give the US its major economic goal of securing the natural resources, cheap labour and increasing productive strength of the region for the US transnationals.
Liberal and Labor governments have been obediently trotting after the US, with a bloated “defence” budget.
A 21st century US-China cold war catastrophe must not be allowed to happen.
