Nautilus Institute for Security and Sustainability

Um, this report, um, basically puts together a new database.

This is done by the Nautilus Institute and Australian Bases and US Involvement Project.

Yeah, led by, um ...

The author of the port- of the report is Professor Richard Tanter from Melbourne University.

To the extent that that might ever have been true in the first place, it certainly is not anymore.

A report co-published last month by public policy think tank the Nautilus Institute and the Australian Bases and US Involvement Project, complementing the release of the latter's new online public database, shows that gradually over several decades and then rapidly since the signing of the Australia-US Force Posture Agreement in 2014, the US military has gained either outright ownership and control of or unimpeded access to nearly three-quarters of the defense facilities nationwide, 110 out of 151, on which enough data is available to make an informed assessment, adding up to more than half of the total number known to exist.

Many of them, at the US military's insistence, are also accessible to the American corporations who supply its and most of Australia's armaments and equipment and the technological systems required to run them.

And contrary to Canberra's rhetoric, the forces the USA is deploying and the weapons it is developing, testing and stockpiling here have nothing to do with helping defend Australia, but by its own description are about using Australia as a platform for, quote, force projection, end quote.

That is, for making war upon other countries from Australian territory in which Australia would automatically be involved with or without the knowledge or consent of any Australian official and regardless of Australia's national interest.

As the report's author, Nautilus Institute Senior Research Associate Professor Richard Tanter, told The Guardian in a 7th of September exclusive upon the publication of the database, quote, We have been thinking about American influence on Australian defense policy as a matter of penetration, and we're aware of the closeness of the alliance, the integration of the armed forces, but what this database shows is it's not a matter of penetration, it's a matter of saturation, end quote.

And not just of the Australian Defense Force as such, as bad as that alone would be, but as he wrote in his report, quote, a saturation of the Australian defense ecosystem by US access and influence, end quote, including over Australia's defense acquisition and industrial development policy in a manner which, quote, raises questions about Australian strategic autonomy, end quote.

Or in other words, its national sovereignty.

Well, think about that, and then we'll pair it with our deterrence news from Australia, which is The Guardian Australia has published a striking new map of America's military footprint in Australia.

It draws on research by the Nautilus Institute and identifies 17 facilities under U.S. control with Australian access, 75 Australian facilities accessible to the U.S. military, and 18 sites involving U.S. defense companies.

So that's 110 in total.

The headline number needs some care as these aren't 110 separate American bases.

I'm Richard Tanta.

I'm a senior research associate at the Nautilus Institute and an honorary professor at Melbourne University.

How much ministers understood, I think we always have to be a bit sceptical about that.

But the main thing is that both the ministers and the officials did not enlighten Australians about its actual purpose.

You can't get sovereign defence capability through an alliance.

You get it by being independent.

Dr Richard Tanta, Senior Research Associate with US-based Nautilus Institute, ending today's program.

You also heard Kieran Fennane, Alice Springs journalist and author, David Rosenberg, former Signals Intelligence Officer at Pine Gap, and Dr Nicole Townsend, Lecturer in War Studies at UNSW Canberra.