As Australia acquiesces in the United States’ latest disastrous, illegal war, the Greens last week introduced a bill which would require both houses of parliament to vote before our troops can be sent overseas to engage in conflict. After one hour’s debate, this was squashed by the Labor and Liberal parties, despite polls showing 90 per cent of Australians support war powers reform.
As the situation currently stands, the prime minister and members of his executive are able to send our armed forces into harm’s way and enmesh the nation in violence with no parliamentary oversight. As a result, we currently have more than 80 military personnel and an RAAF E-7A Wedgetail aircraft in the Middle East, one missile away from disaster. Donald Trump is asking for much more.
As Senator David Shoebridge put it in the Senate, ‘When a handful of people in a darkened, smoke-filled room get a phone call from Washington and then send Australia to war, that’s not democracy. That is a disaster waiting to happen…
‘That’s how thousands of Australians went to Vietnam – hundreds were killed in Vietnam. That’s how thousands of Australians went into a never-ending conflict in Afghanistan – which was apparently to depose the Taliban,’ he said.
‘That decision is never democratic.’
Shoebridge then pointed out that the Coalition brought a motion into parliament to congratulate Donald Trump on his latest war, to which the Liberals’ Michaelia Cash responded ‘Hear hear!’
Sickening moral hypocrisy
Speaking for the government, Senator Murray Watt waffled about how important it was for the executive to retain control over war powers, and said Labor wouldn’t be supporting the bill.
Senator Cash then pretended to be a friend of the oppressed people of Iran, attacking the Greens for their ‘sickening moral hypocrisy’, and saying ‘sometimes a nation must stand with its friends, with its allies’, which in this case apparently means the mad king Donald Trump and his buddy Bibi.
Cash argued that speed was much more important than parliamentary debate at time of war, and said the Liberals would support the government and the status quo.
Greens leader Senator Larissa Waters noted that Labor, Liberal and One Nation were as one in support of Trump and Netanyahu’s war, which was based on a lie, and had already killed at least 1,500 Iranians, including 160 primary school children, displaced more than a million people, and hammered the global economy.
‘Our prime minister was the first in the whole world to support this illegal war, which is illegal because it’s in breach of international law,’ said Senator Waters. ‘Our prime minister, with his full-throated support of this war, said, “We support the United States acting to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and to prevent Iran continuing to threaten international peace and security.”
‘Yet the US national security director later told the US Congress that Iran had not restarted its nuclear program – that same program that Trump had already said had been obliterated in June of last year. So this is yet another war based on a lie that Australian warplanes, equipment and now 85 of our people have been sent to,’ she said.
‘They are allegedly not engaged in offensive action, but there will be mission creep, and our presence and resourcing will free up the resourcing and the personnel of Israel and the US to launch yet more offensive strikes, which will punish civilians.’
WA’s Senator Payman brought it back to basics. ‘Imagine some Australian, someone from your suburbs, someone your kids went to school with, someone you work with, signing up to serve in the ADF,’ she said.
‘They’re proud, their family’s proud, and then one day they’re told they’re being deployed overseas into a conflict situation that could turn deadly very quickly. Their family is left wondering who made that decision. Was it debated? Did anybody actually vote for it? Right now, the answer is no.’
The Greens politician who has been fighting for war powers reform since 2020, Senator Jordon Steele-John, spoke next. ‘In my mind, there is no more serious request that a government can make of its people than the request to send their children, their mothers and daughters and their fathers and sons into harm’s way on fields of battle far from home,’ he said.
‘The Australian Greens believe that, before politicians ask that of our community, they should be willing to turn up to the houses of parliament to which they have been elected, make the case as to why it is necessary for people to put themselves in harm’s way and explain what the objective is that those service men and women will be asked to achieve, how they know that that objective will be achieved and what we will do to support them once they return.
‘These are very reasonable expectations that the Australian community have of their leaders before a request is made of them to put themselves in harm’s way,’ said Senator Steele-John.
But as he pointed out, for decades, both sides of parliament have resisted every attempt to take that expectation and turn it into law.
Collective forgetting
‘Time after time, war is entered into based on lie and deception,’ said the senator. ‘And, every single time, the full extent of the disaster of that decision-making process is laid bare to the public. Every single time, it becomes clear that this process of trusting politicians to make these decisions has once again failed.
‘Those very same politicians rock up to this parliament and they make sombre speeches about the loss and sacrifice, the serious respect that they hold for the members of the armed services and the deep reverence they have for military service.
‘And yet will they back that up with action? Do they take a moment to reflect on whether their decision-making led to that harm? No. Every single time, there is a collective forgetting.’
Senator Steele-John said it was time for Australia to reassess its relationship with the United States as an exceptional friend.
‘It is time for this parliament to join with our community in leading us collectively away and into an independent and peaceful foreign and defence policy. That work begins with requiring this parliament and its politicians to get out of bed, put on a tie and bother to turn up to vote before they send our service personnel into harm’s way.’
Senator Whish-Wilson closed the debate by saying, ‘Right now Australians are feeling very frustrated and very helpless.
‘As they go to the petrol bowsers and the petrol has run out, as farmers can’t get access to fertiliser, as Australians are looking at the skyrocketing prices of groceries and as interest rates go up, they are feeling helpless because they are pawns in a game.
‘They are pawns in a game that has been rigged by powerful men with their hands on the levers making billions of dollars. This is what frustrates people. They feel helpless. At least their elected representatives can have a say on their behalf if we get a war powers reform bill through. At least then it’s on the conscience of each and every MP and senator.’
Countries including France, Finland, Denmark, Germany and Spain require a parliamentary vote before going to war or deploying troops overseas. For now though, thanks to Labor, the Liberals, the Nationals and One Nation, that sanity is a step too far.
Originally from Canberra, David Lowe is an award-winning filmmaker, writer and photographer with particular interests in the environment and politics. He’s known for his campaigning work with Cloudcatcher Media.
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