Green Socialist Notes, Episode 332

But what I really want to talk about is why we were talking about the ecological destruction of Ukraine by Russian aggression last week.

There were things going on in green politics around the world, and it was not a good weekend for the Greens as far as I'm concerned.

The first thing that happened is David Shoebridge, the Australian senator who we had on this podcast in July 2025 to talk about breaking up AUKUS.

That's Australia, UK and US acronym AUKUS, which provides for US forces on Australian bases and particularly US nuclear submarines using Australian naval bases.

And in return, Australia is supposed to get nuclear submarines, which is a stupid idea and is unlikely to happen.

But that's AUKUS and, you know, it should be dismantled.

And that's what we talked about in July 2025.

But on Friday, a week ago, Shoebridge was elected as the new leader of the Australian Greens.

That's the elected officials they have appointed.

I think they have 11 senators and one member of the House, and they caucused and made him the new leader, which I thought would be a good idea.

But then he came out immediately in an interview in the Sydney Morning Herald saying, quote, we don't support military aid to Ukraine.

which is not something the Greens have said.

They haven't really said they support it, but they haven't really spoken out on it.

And so it's caused a problem.

Colin Long, who's an Australian Green that is active in solidarity with Ukraine, immediately published a statement condemning Shoebridge's position.

And we'll put a link in the chat to his piece, which I think is right on point.

And you can read it and see for yourself.

I wrote to Shoebridge and the Australian Greens International liaison, who I know, criticizing the position.

And they wrote back, well, we support sanctions on Russia and humanitarian aid, but not arms to Ukraine.

And I said, hey, there's a difference between arms to an imperialist aggressor like Russia, in arms to a country defending itself from imperialism like Ukraine.

But they responded to that just dogmatically, sticking to their position that no Australian arms should go to anybody under any circumstances, not even for people to defend themselves from imperialism, which I think is complicity and aggression.

It's immoral.

In a fight like that, you can't sit neutrally saying, well, we're not giving arms to anybody.

And it doesn't help the Ukrainian resistance to Russian imperialism that the Australian Greens have taken the same position as fucking Donald Trump.

So, you know, I wasn't happy about that.

But what I really want to talk about is why we were talking about the ecological destruction of Ukraine by Russian aggression last week.

There were things going on in green politics around the world, and it was not a good weekend for the Greens as far as I'm concerned.

The first thing that happened is David Shoebridge, the Australian senator who we had on this podcast in July 2025 to talk about breaking up AUKUS.

That's Australia, UK and US acronym AUKUS, which provides for US forces on Australian bases and particularly US nuclear submarines using Australian naval bases.

And in return, Australia is supposed to get nuclear submarines, which is a stupid idea and is unlikely to happen.

But that's AUKUS and, you know, it should be dismantled.

And that's what we talked about in July 2025.

But on Friday, a week ago, Shoebridge was elected as the new leader of the Australian Greens.

That's the elected officials they have appointed.

I think they have 11 senators and one member of the House, and they caucused and made him the new leader, which I thought would be a good idea.

But then he came out immediately in an interview in the Sydney Morning Herald saying, quote, we don't support military aid to Ukraine.

which is not something the Greens have said.

They haven't really said they support it, but they haven't really spoken out on it.

And so it's caused a problem.

Colin Long, who's an Australian Green that is active in solidarity with Ukraine, immediately published a statement condemning Shoebridge's position.

And we'll put a link in the chat to his piece, which I think is right on point.

And you can read it and see for yourself.

I wrote to Shoebridge and the Australian Greens International liaison, who I know, criticizing the position.

And they wrote back, well, we support sanctions on Russia and humanitarian aid, but not arms to Ukraine.

And I said, hey, there's a difference between arms to an imperialist aggressor like Russia, in arms to a country defending itself from imperialism like Ukraine.

But they responded to that just dogmatically, sticking to their position that no Australian arms should go to anybody under any circumstances, not even for people to defend themselves from imperialism, which I think is complicity and aggression.

It's immoral.

In a fight like that, you can't sit neutrally saying, well, we're not giving arms to anybody.

And it doesn't help the Ukrainian resistance to Russian imperialism that the Australian Greens have taken the same position as fucking Donald Trump.

So, you know, I wasn't happy about that.