Finland lobbied EU to declare nuclear power sustainable after unpublished cabinet decision.
Finland lobbied EU to declare nuclear power sustainable after unpublished cabinet decision supported by Greens, Uutiset, 9 Oct 21,
The EU Commission decides this autumn if nuclear power will be classified as sustainable.
Finland’s government has agreed to lobby the EU to declare nuclear power a sustainable energy source, but kept the decision secret.
If nuclear power gets the so-called ‘green label’, financing for nuclear projects will be easier to come by and the terms of any loans will be softer than for other energy projects…..
Finland’s decision was reached at a meeting of ministers on 9 July, but not announced publicly. Yle’s sources say that parliament’s Grand Committee, which sets the parameters of Finland’s EU policy, has not been informed of the change.
Yle requested the memo from the meeting, which was provided after publishing a report on the decision on Thursday.
Finance Minister Annika Saarikko (Cen) said that she did not see a reason to keep Finland’s view on nuclear power secret, and that the decision was reached in order to influence the EU decision-making process.
The EU has already granted solar and wind power projects the green ‘sustainable’ stamp of approval, but postponed decisions on gas and nuclear…..
Greens emphasise that there are still different views on nuclear within the party, but it has now adopted a ‘technology neutral’ stance on fighting climate change, according to Yle’s sources…..
On Thursday Iltalehti reported that Prime Minister Sanna Marin (SDP) raised the matter of nuclear policy with EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in Helsinki on Monday https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/finland_lobbied_eu_to_declare_nuclear_power_sustainable_after_unpublished_cabinet_decision_supported_by_greens/12135621
The CIA Plot to Kidnap or Kill Julian Assange in London is a Story that is Being Mistakenly Ignored
The CIA Plot to Kidnap or Kill Julian Assange in London is a Story that is Being Mistakenly Ignored https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/10/05/the-cia-plot-to-kidnap-or-kill-julian-assange-in-london-is-a-story-that-is-being-mistakenly-ignored/?fbclid=IwAR3t BY PATRICK COCKBURN 5 October 21, Three years ago, on 2 October 2018, a team of Saudi officials murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. The purpose of the killing was to silence Khashoggi and to frighten critics of the Saudi regime by showing that it would pursue and punish them as though they were agents of a foreign power.
It was revealed this week that a year before the Khashoggi killing in 2017, the CIA had plotted to kidnap or assassinate Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, who had taken refuge five years earlier in the Ecuador embassy in London. A senior US counter-intelligence official said that plans for the forcible rendition of Assange to the US were discussed “at the highest levels” of the Trump administration. The informant was one of more than 30 US officials – eight of whom confirmed details of the abduction proposal – quoted in a 7,500-word investigation by Yahoo News into the CIA campaign against Assange.
The plan was to “break into the embassy, drag [Assange] out and bring him to where we want”, recalled a former intelligence official. Another informant said that he was briefed about a meeting in the spring of 2017 at which President Trump had asked if the CIA could assassinate Assange and provide “options” about how this could be done. Trump has denied that he did so.
The Trump-appointed head of the CIA, Mike Pompeo, said publicly that he would target Assange and WikiLeaks as the equivalent of “a hostile intelligence service”. Apologists for the CIA say that freedom of the press was not under threat because Assange and the WikiLeaks activists were not real journalists. Top intelligence officials intended to decide themselves who is and who is not a journalist, and lobbied the White House to redefine other high-profile journalists as “information brokers”, who were to be targeted as if they were agents of a foreign power.
Among those against whom the CIA reportedly wanted to take action were Glenn Greenwald, a founder of the Intercept magazine and a former Guardian columnist, and Laura Poitras, a documentary film-maker. The arguments for doing so were similar to those employed by the Chinese government for suppressing dissent in Hong Kong, which has been much criticised in the West. Imprisoning journalists as spies has always been the norm in authoritarian countries, such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt, while denouncing the free press as unpatriotic is a more recent hallmark of nationalist populist governments that have taken power all over the world.
It is possible to give only a brief precis of the extraordinary story exposed by Yahoo News, but the journalists who wrote it – Zach Dorfman, Sean D Naylor and Michael Isikoff – ought to scoop every journalistic prize. Their disclosures should be of particular interest in Britain because it was in the streets of central London that the CIA was planning an extra-judicial assault on an embassy, the abduction of a foreign national, and his secret rendition to the US, with the alternative option of killing him. These were not the crackpot ideas of low-level intelligence officials, but were reportedly operations that Pompeo and the agency fully intended to carry out.
This riveting and important story based on multiple sources might be expected to attract extensive coverage and widespread editorial comment in the British media, not to mention in parliament. Many newspapers have dutifully carried summaries of the investigation, but there has been no furor. Striking gaps in the coverage include the BBC, which only reported it, so far as I can see, as part of its Somali service. Channel 4, normally so swift to defend freedom of expression, apparently did not mention the story at all.
In the event, the embassy attack never took place, despite the advanced planning. “There was a discussion with the Brits about turning the other cheek or looking the other way when a team of guys went inside and did a rendition,” said a former senior US counter-intelligence official, who added that the British had refused to allow the operation to take place.
But the British government did carry out its own less melodramatic, but more effective measure against Assange, removing him from the embassy on 11 April 2019 after a new Ecuador government had revoked his asylum. He remains in Belmarsh top security prison two-and-a-half years later while the US appeals a judicial decision not to extradite him to the US on the grounds that he would be a suicide risk.
If he were to be extradited, he would face 175 years in prison. It is important, however, to understand, that only five of these would be under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, while the other 170 potential years are under the Espionage Act of 1917, passed during the height of the patriotic war fever as the US entered the First World War.
Only a single minor charge against Assange relates to the WikiLeaks disclosure in 2010 of a trove of US diplomatic cables and army reports relating to the Iraq and Afghan wars. The other 17 charges are to do with labeling normal journalistic investigation as the equivalent of spying.
Pompeo’s determination to conflate journalistic inquiry with espionage has particular relevance in Britain, because the home secretary, Priti Patel, wants to do much the same thing. She proposes updating the Official Secrets Act so that journalists, whistle-blowers and leakers could face sentences of up to 14 years in prison. A consultative paper issued in May titled Legislation to Counter State Threats (Hostile State Activity) redefines espionage as “the covert process of obtaining sensitive confidential information that is not normally publicly available”.
The true reason the scoop about the CIA’s plot to kidnap or kill Assange has been largely ignored or downplayed is rather that he is unfairly shunned as a pariah by all political persuasions: left, right and centre.
To give but two examples, the US government has gone on claiming that the disclosures by WikiLeaks in 2010 put the lives of US agents in danger. Yet the US Army admitted in a court hearing in 2013 that a team of 120 counter-intelligence officers had failed to find a single person in Iraq and Afghanistan who had died because of the disclosures by WikiLeaks. As regards the rape allegations in Sweden, many feel that these alone should deny Assange any claim to be a martyr in the cause of press freedom. Yet the Swedish prosecutor only carried out a “preliminary investigation” and no charges were brought.
Assange is a classic victim of “cancel culture”, so demonised that he can no longer get a hearing, even when a government plots to kidnap or murder him.
In reality, Khashoggi and Assange were pursued relentlessly by the state because they fulfilled the primary duty of journalists: finding out important information that the government would like to keep secret and disclosing it to the public.
Patrick Cockburn is the author of War in the Age of Trump (Verso).
Organised crime highly active in the nuclear industry
“A stunning number of revelations in recent years on irregularities, fraud, counterfeiting, bribery, corruption, sabotage, theft, and other criminal activities in the nuclear industry in various countries suggest that there is a systemic issue of ‘criminal energy’ in the sector. …
Organised crime goes nuclear Ecologist, Creative Commons , Dr Jim Green , 4th October 2021 Fraud, counterfeiting, bribery, corruption, sabotage, theft, and other criminal activities are rife in global nuclear industry.
“As prime minister of Japan at the time of the [Fukushima] disaster, I now believe that the time has come for Japan and the world to end its reliance on nuclear power,” Naoto Kan writes in the introduction of the World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2021 (WNISR).
“Around once a year, I still visit the remains of the Fukushima Daiichi site. Even though ten years have passed, progress in the decommissioning process remains frustratingly slow, driving home to me the importance of avoiding any repeat of such an event.
“The large quantities of radioactive debris that remain within the stricken reactors continue to release alarming levels of radiation. We already know from the example of Chernobyl that the timescale needed for this nuclear waste to drop to safe radioactivity levels will be measured in terms of centuries.”
Stagnation
This year’s WNISR is the work of 13 interdisciplinary experts from across the world. For nearly 30 years, these annual reports have provided important factual antidotes to industry promotion and obfuscation.
In broad terms, nuclear power has been stagnant for 30 years. WNISR notes that the world’s fleet of 415 power reactors is 23 fewer than the 2002 peak of 438, but nuclear capacity and generation have marginally increased due to uprating and larger reactors being built.
There is one big difference with the situation 30 years ago: the reactor fleet was young then, now it is old.
The ageing of the reactor fleet is a huge problem for the industry, as is the ageing of the nuclear workforce ‒ the silver tsunami. The average age of the world’s reactor fleet continues to rise, and by mid-2021 reached 30.9 years. The mean age of the 23 reactors shut down between 2016 and 2020 was 42.6 years.
The International Atomic Energy Agency anticipates the closure of around 10 reactors or 10 gigawatts (GW) per year over the next three decades. Reactor construction starts need to match closures just for the industry to maintain its 30-year pattern of stagnation.
Renewables………… Nuclear power’s contribution to global electricity supply has fallen from a peak of 17.5 percent in 1996 to 10.1 percent in 2020 – a 4.3 percent share of global commercial primary energy consumption.
Renewables reached an estimated 29 percent share of global electricity generation in 2020, a record share. Non-hydro renewables at 10.7 percent in 2020 overtook nuclear in 2019 and the gap grew in 2020 with non-hydro renewables generating 16.5 percent more electricity than nuclear reactors.
Total investment in new renewable electricity exceeded US$300 billion in 2020, including US$142 billion investment in wind and US$149 billion in solar. Investment in renewables was 17 times greater than nuclear investment of around US$18 billion.
Solar
In 2020, a record 256 GW of renewable capacity were added to the world’s power grids, including 111 GW of wind and 127 GW of solar. There was a net gain of 0.4 GW of nuclear capacity in 2020.
Despite the marginal increase in nuclear capacity in 2020, nuclear generation fell by 3.9 percent. That compares to a 21 percent increase in solar generation, and 12 percent for wind power……….
Vulnerabilities
In the European Union, renewable power generation at 38 percent overtook fossil fuels at 37 percent in 2020 while nuclear power accounted for 25 percent. Last year was the first year that non-hydro renewables generated more power than nuclear in the EU……………..
Crime
WNISR details the slow and unsteady progress of small modular reactors. The report notes that “so-called advanced reactors of various designs, including so-called Small Modular Reactors (SMRs), make a lot of noise in the media but their promoters have provided little evidence for any implementation scheme before a decade at the very least.”
WNISR notes that previous reports have covered irregularities, fraud, counterfeiting, corruption, and other criminal activities in the nuclear sector. This year’s report dedicates a chapter to nuclear criminality and includes 14 case studies with serious implications – including safety and public governance – that came to trial in the period 2010-2020.
The report states: “A stunning number of revelations in recent years on irregularities, fraud, counterfeiting, bribery, corruption, sabotage, theft, and other criminal activities in the nuclear industry in various countries suggest that there is a systemic issue of ‘criminal energy’ in the sector. …
“Although not comprehensive, this analysis offers several noteworthy insights: Criminal activities in the nuclear sector are not new. Some major scandals date back decades or have been ongoing for decades.
“Organized crime organizations have been supplying workers to nuclear sites – e.g. the Yakuza in Japan – for over a decade.
Corruption
“Serious insider sabotage has hit major nuclear countries in recent years – like a Belgian nuclear power plant – without ever leading to arrests.
“There is no systematic, comprehensive, public database on the issue. In 2019, the IAEA released a report on cases of counterfeit or fraudulent items in at least seven countries since at least the 1990s.
“In Transparency International’s 2020 Corruption Perceptions Index about half of the 35 countries operating or constructing nuclear power plants on their territory rate under 50 out of 100.
“In the Bribery Payers Index (BPI, last published in 2011), seven out of the ten worst rated countries operate or are building nuclear power plants on their territory.”
The discussion about whether safe nuclear power can be generated in the right circumstances remains white hot. However, we clearly do not live under the right circumstances. The risks from nuclear – both energy and weapons – remains existential.
This Author
Dr Jim Green is the national nuclear campaigner with Friends of the Earth Australia and an organiser of a global NGO statement on nuclear power and climate change to be released ahead of COP26. https://theecologist.org/2021/oct/04/organised-crime-goes-nuclear
Terrorists trying to get secrets on production of nuclear weapons
Terrorists try to get secrets on production of nuclear weapons — Security Council Russian Security Council Deputy Secretary Yuri Kokov pointed out that Russia registered terrorists’ attempts to gain access to information on the production of means of nuclear, chemical and biological damage, MOSCOW, October 6. /TASS/. Terrorists are trying to obtain information on the production of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, Russian Security Council Deputy Secretary Yuri Kokov said in an interview Wednesday.”We register terrorists’ attempts to gain access to information on the production of means of nuclear, chemical and biological damage, as well as their heightened attention to possible use of biological agents and toxic chemicals. To that extent, they deliberately recruit industry specialists, including professors and students of chemical and biological universities,” Kokov said……… https://tass.com/defense/1346507 |
Nuclear executive to go to prison for fraud
Former exec readies for 2 years in prison in nuclear debacle, abc, By Jeffrey Collins, Oct 5, 2021 Associated Press COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — An executive who spent billions of dollars on two South Carolina nuclear plants that never generated a watt of power, lying and deceiving regulators about their progress, is ready to go to prison.
Former SCANA Corp. CEO Kevin Marsh has agreed with prosecutors that he should spend two years in prison. He goes before a federal judge Thursday who will decide whether to accept that deal…..
Marsh is the first executive to go to prison for the nuclear debacle. A second former SCANA executive and an official at Westinghouse Electric Co., the lead contractor to build two new reactors at the V.C. Summer plant, have also pleaded guilty. A second Westinghouse executive has been indicted and is awaiting trial.
Marsh in February pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire and mail fraud in federal court, and obtaining property by false pretenses in state court. Prosecutors agreed to his request to serve his entire sentence on both sets of charges in a federal prison.
Marsh already paid $5 million in restitution. SCANA had paid Marsh $5 million in 2017, the year the utility abandoned the hopelessly behind-schedule project in Fairfield County
Marsh lied and presented rosy projections on the progress of the reactors that he knew was false in earning calls, presentations and press releases. The CEO wanted to keep investors pumping money into the project and the company’s stock price up, prosecutors said.
His actions took more than $1 billion from the pockets of ratepayers and investors, authorities said in an 87-page Securities and Exchange Commission lawsuit filed against them in 2020………….. https://www.abccolumbia.com/2021/10/05/former-exec-readies-for-2-years-in-prison-in-nuclear-debacle/
The plot thickens, as Michael Flynn’s shady nuclear deals are exposed.
Michael Flynn’s involvement in a plan to build nuclear reactors in the Middle East is looking even shadier https://www.vox.com/2017/12/6/16743476/michael-flynn-russia-sanctions
According to a whistleblower, a Flynn business associate bragged that Flynn would end sanctions on Russia to clear the way for this project.
That’s the explosive, but unverified, allegation of a whistleblower cooperating with House Democrats probing the myriad scandals surrounding Flynn, who pleaded guilty earlier this month to lying to the FBI about his contacts with a senior Russian diplomat.
The allegation has been made public by Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD), the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee — who is demanding that his Republican counterpart on the committee investigate Flynn and others involved in the matter more aggressively.
The project in question — promoted by a group of former senior US military officers, and often described as a “Marshall Plan” of sorts — would involve US companies working with Russian companies to build and operate nuclear plants in the Middle East, and export spent fuel from those plants.
In June 2015, Flynn flew to Egypt and Israel to “gauge attitudes” on the proposal, Newsweek’s Jeff Stein has reported. And one of the companies involved in the project covered his travel expenses and wrote him a check for $25,000 for the trip, though it’s not clear if Flynn cashed the check.
But reports over the last few months have suggested that Flynn continued to promote the project after the election, and even after he had been sworn in as national security adviser.
One businessman involved in the project — Alex Copson of ACU Strategic Partners — even dubbed it the “Trump/Putin M.E. [Middle East] Marshall Plan,” according to an email obtained by Reuters.
Now, new allegations are coming from a whistleblower who says he met Copson at a Washington, DC, event on Inauguration Day — and that Copson had some very interesting things to say about the project.
Michael Flynn’s business partner allegedly said this project was a pretext for expanding the US military presence in the Middle East
According to the whistleblower, Copson flat-out said the following things:
- That he “just got” a text message from Flynn saying the nuclear plant project was “good to go,” and that his business colleagues should “put things in place”
- That Flynn was making sure sanctions on Russia would be “ripped up,” which would let the project go forward
- That this was the “best day” of his life, and that the project would “make a lot of very wealthy people”
- That the project would also provide a pretext for expanding a US military presence in the Middle East (the pretext of defending the nuclear plants)
- That citizens of Middle Eastern countries would be better off “when we recolonize the Middle East”
The whistleblower said that Copson quickly displayed what he claimed to be a text message from Flynn that appeared to have been sent during Trump’s inauguration speech. But the whistleblower says he or she could not read the actual message. Still, he or she claims to have been disturbed enough by the interaction to have documented it at the time.
Perhaps most intriguingly of all, Cummings writes that he told Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team about all this some time ago — and that they asked him to delay publicly revealing this information “until they completed certain investigation steps.”
Cummings added: “They have now informed us that they have done so.”
Michael Flynn, Trump’s first National Security Advisor hid $200k in payments for Middle East nuclear power plan before joining White House
Michael Flynn hid $200k in payments for Middle East nuclear power plan before joining White House https://www.salon.com/2021/10/04/michael-flynn-hid-200k-in-payments-for-middle-east-nuclear-power-plan-before-joining_partner/
Trump’s first National Security Advisor did not disclose fees from consulting work in the Middle East
By TRAVIS GETTYS OCTOBER 4, 2021 MICHAEL FLYNN RECEIVED $200,000 IN UNDISCLOSED PAYMENTS FOR CONSULTING WORK IN THE MIDDLE EAST BEFORE JOINING DONALD TRUMP’S ADMINISTRATION.
The retired U.S. Army general was paid for his work in 2014 and 2015 on a plan to build 40 nuclear power plants in the Middle East,
Flynn briefly served as Trump’s first national security adviser before he resigned in disgrace for lying to FBI agents about his communications with then-Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak and his undisclosed work for the Turkish government.
Robert Mueller’s prosecutors filed charges against Flynn, who pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI, but Trump pardoned him in November.
The newly revealed payments to Flynn came from a U.S. firm connected to the project, ACU Strategic Partners, although his relationship to the project had been reported in 2017. ACU Strategic Partners, although his relationship to the project had been reported in 2017.
Two U.S. House committees investigated Flynn’s involvement in the project, which he had not disclosed before joining the White House, after Newsweek reported he had been repaid between $10,000-$15,000 for travel expenses.
An audit of a Dutch company that specializes in transport revealed the $200,000 payment to Flynn.
Russia confirms that ”Nuclear is Green”- George Orwell would be fascinated.
Russia confirms nuclear as green while EU remains undecided NEI, 30 September 2021 The assignment of the status of a “green” energy source to nuclear power generation in the Russian Federation should be a signal for other countries considering the inclusion of nuclear energy in their “green” lists, Rosatom Director General Alexei Likhachev said on 27 September. The previous week, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin had approved the criteria for the selection of “green” projects and initiatives in the field of sustainable development for concessional financing.
Among the “green” areas of energy, nuclear energy is separately designated……….
The approval of the Russian“ green ”taxonomy is an important step within the framework of the national climate and environmental agenda, an incentive for the development of green industries and projects,” Likhachev noted. He added that the taxonomy officially established the status of nuclear energy as a “green” source, along with solar, wind and geothermal energy.
“This confirms the effectiveness of nuclear power plants in combating climate change and opens up access to green financing instruments. We hope that the Russian taxonomy will become a signal for foreign countries considering the issue of including nuclear energy in their green lists, he stressed.
Meanwhile, the European Union (EU) has pushed back the deadline for objections to proposed rules for green investments, allowing an additional two months to scrutinise the policy. EU countries will now have until early December, instead of October, to scrutinise these rules………
The Commission is due to publish a second proposal in the coming months, confirming whether the taxonomy will label investments in nuclear and gas as green………… Countries such as France and Hungary are strong supporters of nuclear power, and say investments the low-carbon energy source should be encouraged to fight climate change. Others, including Austria and Luxembourg, are strongly opposed. One EU official said the analysis suggested Austria may consider legal action if the EU included nuclear in the taxonomy, Reuters reported…….. https://www.neimagazine.com/news/newsrussia-confirms-nuclear-as-green-while-eu-remains-undecided-9120845
CIA Reportedly Considered Kidnapping, Assassinating Julian Assange
CIA Reportedly Considered Kidnapping, Assassinating Julian Assange
Mike Pompeo was apparently motivated to get even with Wikileaks following its publication of sensitive CIA hacking tools https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/cia-julian-assange-kidnap-assasinate-1232546/
ByWILLIAM VAILLANCOUR The CIA reportedly plotted to kidnap Julian Assange, and some senior officials in the agency and the Trump administration allegedly went so far as to consider options for how to assassinate the WikiLeaks founder, Yahoo! Newsreported Sunday.
According to the report, then-director Mike Pompeo was apparently motivated to get even with Wikileaks following its publication of sensitive CIA hacking tools, which the agency found to be “the largest data loss in CIA history.”
Pompeo and others “were completely detached from reality because they were so embarrassed about Vault 7,” according to a former Trump national security official, referring to the document dump. “They were seeing blood.”
Additional CIA plans allegedly included “extensive spying on WikiLeaks associates, sowing discord among the group’s members, and stealing their electronic devices.”
The report, based on conversations with more than 30 former officials, notes that the CIA’s plans for Assange reportedly led to strenuous debates regarding their legality. Some administration officials were so concerned that they felt the need to tell members of Congress about Pompeo’s suggestions.
Assange is currently imprisoned in London as courts weigh a U.S. request to extradite him.
USA has conned Australia into paying for its super-costly nuclear submarine project
Last week’s AUKUS announcement was nothing more than PR stunt in Australia, with the government merely committing to spend the next 18 months deciding what to buy—which conveniently kicks any actual the decision far enough down the road to avoid the next federal election.
Has PM put Australia on the hook to finance struggling UK, US submarine projects? Michael West Media, By Marcus Reubenstein| September 23, 2021,
“Almost comical”. Experts lambast Scott Morrison’s “crazy” AUKUS deal to buy nuclear submarine tech from parlous UK and US programs. Marcus Reubenstein finds a real prospect Australia will be used to “underwrite” the foundering foreign submarine industry.
Twenty-five years of ongoing maintenance delays for nuclear submarines, chronic shortage of both parts and skilled workers, under capacity at shipyards, and attack class submarines missing from deployments for up to nine months. These sound like potential problems for Australia’s future nuclear submarine fleet but they are actual problems right now confronting the US Navy and its fleet of 70 submarines.
The US is at the cutting edge of nuclear propulsion. It has the largest and most sophisticated submarine fleet in the world, its first nuclear submarine was commissioned 67 years ago, and the US has literally decommissioned twice as many nuclear subs as Australia is planning to buy.
If the US cannot manage to keep its fleet in the water, how can the Morrison government commit up to $100 billion of taxpayer money to secure nuclear submarines and guarantee they will be always operational and ready for deployment?
Professor Hugh White, ANU Professor of Strategic Studies, former Deputy Secretary of Defence and an eminent figure in strategic policy, wrote in The Saturday Paper, “The old plan was to build a conventionally powered version of a nuclear-powered French submarine. It was crazy.”
“The new plan—to buy a nuclear-powered submarine instead—is worse”.
Says White, “There is a reason why only six countries, all of them nuclear-armed, operate nuclear powered subs.”
The sales pitch is underway
Last week’s AUKUS announcement was nothing more than PR stunt in Australia, with the government merely committing to spend the next 18 months deciding what to buy—which conveniently kicks any actual the decision far enough down the road to avoid the next federal election.
The ripples of the announcement, however, reached British shores in double-quick time. Just two days after the AUKUS alliance UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallis announced a $320 million (£170m) grant to be shared between BAE Systems and Rolls Royce to develop technology for Britain’s next generation submarines.
According to Department of Finance figures, In the past twelve months BAE Systems has collected $1.88 billion from Australian taxpayers. The Astute class submarine, touted as one of the two options Australia is considering, is manufactured by BAE Systems.
US Naval analyst, and Forbes Defense columnist, Craig Hooper predicts AUKUS could give the US Navy a big shot in the arm as well. He says a deal with Australia could effectively underwrite major improvements to the US Navy’s outdated submarine maintenance facilities by supporting “America’s decade-long, $US25 billion ($34.6 billion) effort to refit the U.S. Navy’s four aging public shipyards. With yard repair costs already high, America would go to great lengths to welcome any additional bidders for shipyard capability improvements.”
US subs in dry dock In a report published six months ago, the US Congressional Budget Office (CBO) found: “The Navy’s four shipyards have experienced significant delays in completing maintenance on its submarines (all of which are nuclear-powered).” ………. Should Australia go down the nuclear sub path what choice will it have other than to outsource the fleet’s maintenance? …..
Her Majesty’s sub optimal fleet
Britain, touted as the alternative nuclear submarine supplier to Australia, has problems of its own. The Royal Navy operates ten submarines, only four of them were designed and commissioned this century.
Like their American nuclear counterparts there are systemic problems keeping these subs in service……
That report also indicated significant delays to the BAE Systems built Astute hunter-killer submarines, the same class of nuclear submarine being touted for Australian as part of the AUKUS deal………. https://www.michaelwest.com.au/has-pm-put-australia-on-the-hook-to-finance-struggling-uk-us-submarine-projects/
Nuclear submarine deal planned for 18 months – French ambassador says this is treasonous
Recalled French ambassador accuses Australia of ‘treason in the making’ https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/recalled-french-ambassador-accuses-australia-of-treason-in-the-making-20210918-p58ssg.html. By Anthony Galloway
France’s recalled ambassador to Australia has likened Canberra’s actions to treason after the Morrison government dumped a $90 billion submarine contract with Paris and instead decided to build nuclear-powered submarines with the United States and Britain.
France on Saturday has taken the extraordinary step of recalling its ambassadors from Australia and the US, as the fallout grows from a new defence pact that has infuriated French President Emmanuel Macron.
Speaking to The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age hours before he was recalled, France’s ambassador to Australia, Jean-Pierre Thebault, did not rule out suspending talks to allow French troops greater access to Australian military bases after his nation was “stabbed in the back”.
Adding insult to the process… we have very reliable reports from the independent press, which I thank, about the fact that all this was in the making for 18 months. Which means we have been blind-sided intentionally for 18 months…. The crime was prepared for 18 months,” he said.
France’s recalled ambassador to Australia has likened Canberra’s actions to treason after the Morrison government dumped a $90 billion submarine contract with Paris and instead decided to build nuclear-powered submarines with the United States and Britain.
France on Saturday has taken the extraordinary step of recalling its ambassadors from Australia and the US, as the fallout grows from a new defence pact that has infuriated French President Emmanuel Macron.
Speaking to The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age hours before he was recalled, France’s ambassador to Australia, Jean-Pierre Thebault, did not rule out suspending talks to allow French troops greater access to Australian military bases after his nation was “stabbed in the back”.
“Adding insult to the process… we have very reliable reports from the independent press, which I thank, about the fact that all this was in the making for 18 months. Which means we have been blind-sided intentionally for 18 months…. The crime was prepared for 18 months,” he said.
He slammed Australia for allowing a meeting to go ahead between Mr Dutton and Foreign Minister Marise Payne late last month with their French counterparts where they spoke about enhancing defence ties between the two countries.
“It is us, through letters that were sent by the President [Macron] some months ago to the Prime Minister [Scott Morrison], who proposed to look at more ambitious and new ambitious cooperations,” Mr Thebault said……….. The extraordinary move follows the Morrison government’s decision to tear up a $90 billion contract to buy 12 French submarines in favour of a new nuclear-powered fleet using technology from the US and United Kingdom under a new partnership called AUKUS.
Russia urges IAEA monitoring, ‘transparency’ on US-Australia nuclear sub pact,
Russia urges IAEA monitoring, ‘transparency’ on US-Australia nuclear sub pact, Press TV, Friday, 17 September 2021 Russia warns against Australia’s attempt to becoming a nuclear power under a trilateral pact Canberra signed with the United States and Britain earlier this week.
Russian Permanent Representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna Mikhail Ulyanov said on Friday that “time has not come yet for such estimations” about Australia turning into a nuclear power.
Under a new Australia-UK-US alliance (Aukus), Canberra would be building at least eight nuclear submarines, using US technology.
The first of the submarines is expected to enter service is 2036.
Ulyanov warned that the plan “is alarming and makes you keep a close eye on that.”
“Australia is a non-nuclear power,” he said, adding that “all this should be closely supervised by the IAEA and its inspection mechanism.”……..
Many observers warned that the trilateral pact could lead to a situation very similar to the US-Russian arms race during the cold war…… https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2021/09/17/666731/Russia-Australia-nuclear-powered-submarines-Aukus-
Mossad assassinated Iran’s top nuclear scientist using an artificial-Intelligence-powered, remote-controlled machine gun
| Mossad assassinated Iran’s top nuclear scientist using an AI-powered, remote-controlled machine gun, report says, Business Insider Joshua ZitserSep. 19, 2021, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, “father” of Iran’s nuclear weapons program, was on Israel’s hit list since 2007.In November 2020, the Mossad pulled off a hit using a remote-controlled, AI-powered machine gun.It was controlled by operatives outside of Iran, who killed Fakhrizadeh in under a minute, per NYT……………….. https://www.businessinsider.com.au/mossad-remote-controlled-machine-gun-kill-iran-nuke-expert-nyt-2021-9 |
1 This Month
of the week – Shut Down Drone Warfare!
Tell the Ukrainian Government to Drop Prosecution of Peace Activist Yurii Sheliazhenko
Petition to revoke the licensing of the Near Surface Nuclear Disposal Facility (NSDF) at Chalk River. https://www.ourcommons.ca/petitions/en/Petition/Details?Petition=e-7247
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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