Don’t Bomb Iran

George Bush and Australian Prime Minister Howard signed The Australia - United States Treaty on Defense Trade Cooperation yesterday, reported to give Australian companies fewer bureaucratic problems when bidding for contracts involving sensitive US military technology. Interestingly, the Department of Defence factsheet says Australia’s WMD (Prevention of Proliferation Act) may need to be changed. Is Australia going to sell nuclear weapons-usable parts to the US?

I have not found the text of the treaty yet, but the Department of Defence factsheet outlines that the streamlining of US contracts will put Australia on a special level of trust shared only by the UK. It also says

“Key legislation that may require amendments are the Customs Act 1901, Customs (Prohibited Exports) Regulations 1958 and Weapons of Mass Destruction (Prevention of Proliferation) Act 1995 (WMD Act).b”

The 1995 Australian ‘WMD Act’ was amended in 2003. It’s introduction: An Act to prohibit the supply or export of goods that will or may be used in, and the provision of services that will or may assist, the development, production, acquisition or stockpiling of weapons capable of causing mass destruction or missiles capable of delivering such weapons. It is mostly criminalises people or companies exporting, without licence, goods that could be used in weapons of mass destruction, commonly known as dual-use technologies.
Now, interestingly, according to Dr Hugh White of the Australian National University on ABC TV last night, Australia already has special status similar only to the UK, so what can be new? Well, there is the UK-US Mutual Defence Agreement, another secret agreement dating from 1958 and recently renegotiated by Blair that enables the US and UK to exchange nuclear weapons designs, parts and ’special materials’ in contradiction of Article 1 of the NPT.

US lawmakers still have to approve the treaty, which could be difficult… US defence contractors lobby very hard to keep overseas competition out of the Pentagon honeypot, as many companies tendering for promised Star Wars contracts have found.

Several media reports wrongly seem to suggest the treaty also includes agreements on future basing of more US military material in Australia, possibly including humanitarian aid goods.  Talks on such matters are planned, but some reports even portrayed the treaty as being about future military humanitarian cooperation, not defence sales.