Alternative News Radio program – Government lies, spying and war provocations.
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Andrew 1. Good morning listeners. My name’s Andrew and with me is Bevan Ramsden. We’re from IPAN, the Independent and Peaceful Australia Network. In this edition of CICD’s Alternative News we examine recent actions of the Royal Australian Navy in the South China Sea in the light of the recent incident involving a Chinese fighter jet and an Australian Navy helicopter. For some years now the Australian Navy, in conjunction with the U.S. Navy, has been conducting so-called ‘freedom of navigation’ exercises in the South China Sea, supposedly to ensure that China does not restrict access to this waterway. Given that much of China’s import and export shipping traffic passes through this waterway, such an assertion is clearly absurd and an indication that these exercises have an ulterior motive, probably intelligence gathering. Bevan, do we have evidence of this?
BEVAN 1: Historian and former ADF signals intelligence officer Professor Clinton Fernandes has stated that the Australian Navy is involved in deploying sonar buoys in the South China Sea, the Yellow Sea and the Taiwan Strait. These underwater devices record the sound signatures of Chinese submarines. This information is then sent to the U.S. and stored in a library of sound signatures, to be used in war time for the identification and tracking of targets for U.S. hunter-killer submarines. With this in mind, let’s examine this recent incident and the Australian government’s response to it.
ANDREW 2: On May 4th 2024, a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force jet fighter released flares 300 metres in front of a helicopter operating from HMAS Hobart, forcing the pilot to change course. On May 6th the Australian government issued a media release calling the Chinese action ‘unsafe and unprofessional’ and stating that the Australian warship was in international waters and was undertaking routine operations as part of Operation Argos, a naval operation which commenced in 2018 with the stated purpose of enforcing United Nations sanctions against North Korea.
BEVAN 2: The Australian government’s response to this incident has been misleading, deceptive and hypocritical in a number of ways.
Firstly, their media release failed to acknowledge that flares are an internationally recognised method of conveying a warning.
Secondly, it failed to point out that the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution in relation to sanctions against North Korea, authorises a U.N. member state to inspect, interdict and seize a cargo only if it is within or transiting that state’s territory. The incident occurred 8,000 km away from Australian territory. It also failed to point out that Operation Argos allegedly to enforce sanctions against North Korea, was not operating under a UNSC mandate, but was in fact initiated and overseen by the U.S. Seventh Fleet.
Thirdly, and not mentioned was the fact that a Chinese Naval exercise was in progress near to where the helicopter was flying. It seems clear that Operation Argos is in reality a smokescreen behind which the U.S. and some of its allies including Australia gather intelligence on China under the pretext of enforcing U.N. sanctions on North Korea. Clearly, HMAS Hobart and its helicopter had no right to be where it was, 8000 kilometres from Australian waters and in breach of the U.N. mandate it claimed to be enforcing.
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ANDREW 3: Let’s consider the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). This treaty states that a nation’s territorial waters, within which it exercises exclusive sovereignty, extend to 22.2 kilometres from its coast and its’ Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), within which it has exclusive access to fisheries and mineral resources, extends to 370 kilometres from the coast. China has signed the UNCLOS, as has Australia, but the U.S. has not. The Australian warship was inside China’s EEZ, although the Government has not disclosed its exact location or exactly what the helicopter was doing. Our vessels cannot enter another country’s EEZ without that country’s permission especially as the intention of the Australian navy and its helicopter patrol were for intelligence gathering and there was a Chinese naval exercise proceeding in the area at that time.
BEVAN 3: IPAN produced a Media Release of May 22nd 2024 pointing out that the Australian government has not told us the truth about the May 4th incident involving the Australian Navy helicopter. This media release stated that: ‘Official claims by the Australian government that the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) was in the Yellow Sea as part of “the international effort to enforce United Nations Security Council sanctions against North Korea’ have been heavily refuted by experienced experts’. It further stated that ‘the RAN was spying on Chinese Coastal defence and military exercises at the behest of the USA Seventh Fleet, when the Chinese reacted and warned off the Australian Navy helicopter by dropping a flare.’
ANDREW 4: IPAN’s view is supported by three professionals with expertise in this matter.
Retired Major Cameron Leckie served 24 years in the Australian Army. He commented on the incident as follows:
“The Australian Government is withholding key information on this incident such as exactly where it took place and what the helicopter was doing. Why is this the case?” He further said that “This incident appears to be a result of actions taken by the Royal Australian Navy that could reasonably be expected to elicit a response from the People’s Liberation Army–Navy. In other words this is a provocation. Perhaps the aim was to provoke a response, which the Sinophobic hawks in both parliament and media can use as a tool to expand on the “China as threat” narrative. This incident was entirely avoidable. Australia has a 6000km plus buffer with China. Perhaps we should use that to our advantage to avoid future incidents of this kind which could result in a loss of life or a major international crisis of no benefit to Australia.”
BEVAN 4: John Lander was the Deputy Ambassador to China between 1974 and 1976 and Ambassador to Iran from 1985 to 1987. He states that:
“So the anti-China brigade have a meltdown over flares a safe 300 metres from a helicopter. What is an Australian helicopter doing in China’s waters, more than 8000 kilometres from Australia? The intrusion of an Australian helicopter into China’s EEZ, very close to where China was conducting a naval exercise in its own territorial waters, was a provocative act, probably motivated in part as an attempt to sour the atmosphere for the up-coming visit of Premier Li Qiang to Australia. The U.S.A has not signed the UN’s Convention on the Law of the Sea, which China HAS, and arrogantly talks of ‘freedom of navigation’ in seas thousands of kilometres from its own coastline. If it is concerned about its security, just like Australia, then they should both be patrolling their own coastlines and stop aggressively and purposely orchestrating conflict scenarios and then pretending to be ‘victims’”.
ANDREW 5: Dr Albert Palazzo was the Director of War Studies at the Australian Army Research Centre. He commented that: “The 2024 National Defence Strategy calls on the ADF to contribute to the maintenance of the US-led global rules-based order. The government should explain how sending a ship 8,000 kilometres into the East China Sea can possibly contribute to this objective and why such a distant patrol is in Australia’s interests.”
In addition, Richard Bardon, editor of the Australian Citizens Party online publication ‘Australian Alert Service’, stated in the May 14th edition of that journal that: “The Albanese government, the Liberal Party opposition, Canberra’s defence and security establishment, and their sundry media propagandists…claim the RAN was there as part of an international mission to enforce sanctions the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has imposed upon North Korea since 2006 to curtail its nuclear weapons and associated ballistic missile programs; and they pretend—but carefully avoid stating outright—that that mission enjoys a UNSC mandate. In reality it was instigated in 2019 by the USA as a quasi-legal pretext for elements of the US Seventh Fleet and its auxiliaries to traipse about in China’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), whence to gather intelligence on Chinese coastal defences and ship movements. In so doing, they have explicitly violated the terms for implementation of the UN sanctions they claim to be enforcing; and also certainly the spirit, and arguably the letter, of international maritime law as prescribed by the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Mr Bardon further says that what almost every report on the incident in either mainstream or alternative media has failed to acknowledge, is that Australia has no business gallivanting about the world enforcing UN sanctions on North Korea in the first place. Not on the high seas, so-called international waters- except in relation to Australian-flagged vessels, and not at all inside the EEZ of China, where the incident is acknowledged to have occurred, or any other nation.
BEVAN 5: The IPAN media release ends by stating that: “IPAN calls on the Australian government to cancel its hostile spying activities in the South China Sea which is at the behest of the US Seventh Fleet and recall the Australian Navy to operate in Australia territorial waters for true defence of our territory. Spying operations in the South China Sea can only led to confrontation and possible break out of hostilities between Australia and China, which is in no-one’s best interests.”
ANDREW 6: That’s all we have time for today. As always, we welcome listeners comments and suggestions, which can be emailed to peacecentre@cicd.org.au, that is peacecentre@cicd.og.au. Good morning and thanks for listening.
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