AUSTRALIA'S DEFENCE FIASCO

by Jeremy Lee
If Australia successfully completes a phased withdrawal from East Timor, handing over to the United Nations, our involvement may be seen in retrospect as incredibly lucky. Few would doubt the superb professionalism of General Peter Cosgrove and the Australian troops in East Timor. But, as we have pointed out before, had there been any sort of engagement with a better-trained and more resolute opponent, Australia's defence position would have unravelled.

Nine years ago The Australian Financial Review (24/10/91) made the following comments: "More officers are leading less troops in the shrinking Australian Defence Force despite progress in thinning out the top brass in recent years. The ADF has one of the highest ratios of officers to other ranks of any military force in the world...."

Many of these so-called officers were bureaucrats in an increasingly paper-run, Canberra-based Department. Meanwhile, combat-field-effectiveness was reduced to dangerously low levels. All this came to a head on February 17th, when a shocked defence seminar in Canberra was treated to a scathing unprecedented attack by the Secretary to the Department of Defence on his own Department. Such a thing is virtually unheard of. The attack seems to have come with Minister John Moore's agreement - again, unprecedented.

Defence Secretary Allan Hawke said his department lacked credibility, and its financial position was parlous. Hawke's speech was immediately followed by an equally scathing summary by former Army chief Major-General John Sanderson, before the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence on February 18th. He bluntly said that Australia's army could not take part in land operations against a well-equipped and heavily armed military force: "…It may be satisfactory for Australia to lead or participate in an enforcement operation against a confused and lightly armed rabble like the East Timorese militia, or even the Somali clans; it would require considerable development of the army before it could contemplate playing a part in land operations against a well and heavily-armed military force,' he said...." (The Weekend Australian, 19-20/2/2000)

We can only pray that the lessons that have surfaced as a result of East Timor, and these timely warnings, do not fall on deaf ears. We may not be nearly so lucky next time.

BRACKS GOVERNMENT IN VICTORIA SHOWS REPUBLICAN BIAS

"The judges of the Victorian Supreme Court will meet next week to consider abolishing court rules which require prospective lawyers to swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen. "The meeting follows a letter in December from the Victorian Attorney-General Rob Hulls to Victorian Chief Justice John Phillips, calling for a review of the oath.... 'In my view this requirement is neither vital to the practice of law in Victoria, nor desirable at this time,' Mr. Hulls said in his letter to the Chief Justice "(Australian Financial Review, 18/2/2000).

It would be interesting to know whether Mr. Hulls himself took the normal Oath of office as a Member of Parliament? And why he should think such an Oath from someone serving in the Queen's Courts should not be "desirable"? Didn't we have a referendum just four months ago in which a majority of Australians in all States -including Victoria- rejected republicanism?

PETROL PRICES TO SOAR

CREDIT CARD DEBT STILL SOARING

ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS GATHER

The latest news shows that there are some 10,000 illegal immigrants in Indonesia, waiting for transit to Australia. The trouble, we gather, is a shortage of boats. The problem is now so serious that the Department of Immigration's resources cannot cope.

The Australian, 15/2/2000 said: "Immigration officials are braced for up to 6,000 refugee claims from people in Australia illegally, prompting the Federal Government to freeze its processing of priority cases from overseas, immigration Minister Philip Ruddock ordered a suspension of processing overseas claims after receiving departmental projections of up to four times as many as last year...."

In other words, those who go through the 'legal' channels are held back in favour of those who have jumped the queue and entered Australia illegally! What message is that go to send overseas?

THE 'PINK' DOLLAR

THE IRVING/LIPSTADT TRIAL CONTINUES

by Betty Luks
Memories of the Lindy Chamberlain trial flood back when one observes the Australian media 'blackout' of the David Irving/Deborah Lipstadt libel trial now taking place in a London court. It seems there are two sets of rules for those in power (this includes the power of the media) and those over whom that power is wielded.

I distinctly remember the disgraceful way the media treated Mrs. Lindy Chamberlain. Blazing billboard headlines of the now defunct Adelaide News screamed out for all to see "She Lied". "Oh!" I thought, "she has been found out in a lie." But no, as one read into the article, it was discovered that the prosecutor accused Lindy of lying - a very different fact. Not only did the headlines help reinforce people's prejudices against Mrs. Chamberlain, she was judged guilty by them. It was a 'trial by the media'.

Not so in the Irving/Lipstadt case now being heard before Mr. Justice Gray. There have been some sensational revelations that have not seen the light of day through the establishment media in this country. But those who have access to the Internet can follow the trial word by word. It seems 500,000 a week are tapping into David Irving's website. His website address is at the end of this article.

As expected, the defence lawyers honed in on Irving's 'racist' attitudes, but they would not have been pleased when Irving got one of their 'expert' witnesses to admit that not only were there no holes in the underside of the reinforced-concrete roof of the alleged gas chamber (through which Zyklon-B canisters were alleged to have been dropped), but it was revealed that the drainage system that operated during the alleged gassing fed into the main sewage system.

Professor Robert van Pelt, who modestly admitted to being the world's leading expert on Auschwitz, and had publicly described the Crematorium 2 at Birkenau as the "centre of any map of human suffering in which 'millions' had died", did say in court that the true figure was probably 500,000. Irving also established the fact that Professor van Pelt was in the 'cultural history' section of the architectural department of the university in which he works - even though he is appearing for the Lipstadt camp as an expert on the architectural structure of the alleged 'gas chambers'.

Irving observed in court that "when people die en mass, it produces unpleasant after-effects which need to be cleaned up." He asked Professor van Pelt "Can you tell the court what they (the drains) are connected to on the outside? To the main sewage?" The professor's answer was, "They are connected. This continues. This is not a main sewage system there. But this obviously connects back to something." Irving then asked him, "It does not just go into a hole in the ground, though, does it? They do something with it at the other end?" To which the Professor replied, "No. This probably goes on right there all the way, yes." Irving: "What would environmentalists have to say about kilograms of cyanide being dumped in the sewage system...?"
* Mr. Justice Gray cautioned Irving, "I think we had this debate before." Irving responded "It is very useful, my Lord, actually to see the drainage system. We only have Professor van Pelt's word for it that all the cyanide would have gone out of the building, none of it would have been washed off down into the sewage system, which is clearly wrong. Neither of us is an architect. We agree on that point. But the evidence of our eyes on that plan is that they had the drainage going into the public sewage system, and 8 kilograms, or however many, of cyanide being pumped into those rooms to kill people on a lethal scale, and the bodies being washed down, the room being washed down afterwards, and you are telling us that none of that cyanide would have gone into the environment?" Professor van Pelt: "I certainly think that you are a little over estimated on the eight kilograms, to start with. The gas thing in this building could have been very well done in these rooms with 200 gramme tins, maybe two 500 grammes, maybe a kilo was used, a kilo of cyanide and most of it would have evaporated into the air."

David Irving's site: https://www.ftp.co.uklonline.html or Raeto West's trial coverage: http://www2.prestel.co.uk/littleton/irving-v-lipstadt.htm

(*Maybe the environmentalists would be saying the same things that the Hungarians and Romanians are now saying to the Esmeralda Australian mining company alleged to have polluted their river systems with cyanide.)

SELL-OFF OF OUR ASSETS

"Premier John Olsen satisfied with his recent sale/lease of ETSA (Electricity Trust) for $3.5billion to the Chinese, is now offering to sell South Australian seaports for an estimated $500million, also to the Chinese. "John Olsen has privatised our water utility which is now basically owned by the French. When all our once profitable assets are sold, to reduce our State debt, what will there be left to sell? "From what will the government receive its revenue in the future? The Taxpayers will once again be slugged with increased levies and charges. "The Howard government has given $1.5 billion in foreign aid during 1999-2000 throughout the world, of which $55.5 million was given to China. "Mr. Neil Andrew, Federal Member for Wakefield, stated that Australia's foreign aid programme to China, is to advance Australia's national interest (whatever that means) by assisting China to reduce poverty, and achieve sustainable development. "Why do they need our aid, when they are already in a position of sustained development in being able to buy many of our major assets, from the hundreds of millions of dollars that successive federal governments have been giving them in foreign aid? "Mr. Andrew stated that some 265 million Chinese still live on less than $US1.00 a day, therefore Australia should provide assistance to them. "Mr. Andrew fails to explain why such poverty exists in China. "Is it because the Chinese live under a Totalitarian government, whose spending on defence becomes top priority - instead of controlling poverty - with over three million trained personnel in their defence forces? "If the trend of selling our assets to overseas countries continues, Australians will become like strangers living in a foreign-owned country." Hedley Scholz, Eudunda, SA (Also published in 17 South Australian country newspapers)

SA Premier Olsen has urged Victor Li Ka Shing, who bought ETSA for $3.5 billion to open a regional office in Adelaide to explore future investment opportunities in SA. (HS)

PRICES WILL RISE MORE THAN THE GST IMPOST

WHAT ABOUT PETROL PRICES?

PITY THE FARMER AND THE GST HIKE

"When goods are auctioned, purchasers see the amount paid as the final price. With the advent of the GST, this price paid will (from 1 July 2000) have to include the 10% GST. We have been concerned that farmers and other taxpayers taking livestock (and other goods) to auction will find themselves at an extreme disadvantage, as the 'hammer price' will include GST and 1/11th of the proceeds will have to be remitted to the Australian Tax Office as GST.

The Assistant Treasurer, Senator Kemp, has advised the following in relation to livestock auctions:
· As live animals are excluded from the definition of food, livestock sold at auction will be subject to GST where the seller is registered for GST
· Where stock sold after slaughter is food for human consumption, it will be GST free and
· Sales of livestock under auction will be consistent with the treatment of other sales where an intermediary is involved."
(Taken from a circular on the GST and other tax matters sent out to clients from a Tax Agent.)