Article

2003-05-26 Down Under

Archived material is restricted to Rantburg regulars and members. If you need access email fred.pruitt=at=gmail.com with your nick to be added to the members list. There is no charge to join Rantburg as a member.

Posted by Steve White 2003-05-26 12:50 am|| || Front Page|| [15 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Steve,

While most Aussies (and hopefully many Americans) would expect the US to be there in a crisis when we might need them - experience in East Timor didn't run that way. It was a different US Administration that looked at the Indonesians committing slaughter in Australia's nearest neighbour and announced that they felt like "we are being asked to tidy up my teenage daughter's bedroom". The US declined to provide material assistance.

We are realistic enough to realize that, while it helps to have good friends, when it comes down to it you may not be able to count on anybody. The current administration is unlikely to let us down, but you are bound to have another Carter or Clinton eventually.

Posted by Russell 2003-05-26 03:13:13|| 2003-05-26 03:13:13|| Front Page Top

#2 You know it ticks me off to no end? IT is when I read an Aussie official/prof state that "if the fight was a big one...of course we would expect the US to help" come on...we are trying to prevent a "big fight" by taking out the cowardly terrorists in southeast Asia...then the popular masses calling Howard a puppet? Go have another beer mate...you don't that you don't know! What fools! Yeah, we want to take over Australia, what a joke...any way I do think of the Aussies as friends of the US...Russell that fear you have of another Carter or Clinton coming into power is shared by me...on many levels...God bless!
Brien

Posted by Brien 2003-05-26 08:19:45|| 2003-05-26 08:19:45|| Front Page Top

#3 In the pubs of Sydney, Mr. Howard has gone down a few notches from being "honest Johnny Howard" to being referred to as "Little Johnny Howard."

Yeah, but that's been going on for at least four years. The newspapers (i.e. the Sydney Morning Herald) have been calling him that since before I went to Australia. Asking an Australian academic for his opinion on world affairs will always net you a result like the one shown. The rot is pervasive.

It would be very foolish to put any number of American troops in Australia. Right now, people making their way illegally to Australia are detained in camps in the desert until it can be determined that their status as asylum-seekers is legitimate. Advocates for the "hopeless" and "desperate" gather around them, trying to tear down the fences so the occupants can be free to flee into the wilderness and die.

There's a single atomic reactor in Australia, in Sydney. A while back Greenpeace invaded the place, hanging a big banner and generally making a nuisance of themselves. In neither case is the government (in my opinion) terribly serious about defending the facilities.

That's the sort of thing any American troops would have to contend with in Australia.

Posted by Angie Schultz 2003-05-26 08:48:20|| [darkblogules.blogspot.com] 2003-05-26 08:48:20|| Front Page Top

08:45 Raptor
03:23 Bulldog
01:44 Rajit
00:29 jegstuff
00:08 Frank Martin
23:56 Bomb-a-rama
23:46 pro-hindu jew
23:40 snellenr
23:28 leonidas
22:13 The Marmot
22:04 The Marmot
21:08 Frank G
20:54 Bomb-a-rama
20:21 Dishman
20:16 Dishman
20:05 Brian
19:48 True German Ally
19:28 Watcher
19:22 Alaska Paul
19:22 john
19:16 Alaska Paul
18:18 Scott
18:04 Baba Yaga
17:42 Scott