Daniel Hurst

Yes, I was expecting to see an itemised cast of characters, not one catch-all answer. Lesson learned

This is very niche clickbait. It worked

This hits pretty hard, from the chair of the UN commission on Gaza www.nytimes.com/2025/09/16/o...

Who killed Meanjin? And why won’t Melbourne University Publishing engage with efforts to save it?

New:
A deep dive with some alarming new revelations on the silencing of one of the few remaining independent progressive voices in Australian media. Who killed Meanjin?

More recently the Trump admin has reportedly sought more explicit guarantees about how Australia would act in a war with China. @emmashortis.bsky.social observed recently: “The ‘pre-commitment’ to joining conflict is built in, it’s just that the Trump administration might make it explicit.”

END

US won’t guarantee Australia will have complete control of Aukus submarines US Aukus commitment should not be doubted, says assistant secretary of state, while refusing to be drawn on lingering concerns about the sale of nuclear submarines

When I asked about this issue last year, Biden’s assistant secretary of state, Daniel Kritenbrink, declined to explicitly guarantee Australia would have full control of the subs: he wouldn't get “into some of the minutiae of various questions that are out there”. www.theguardian.com/world/articl...

Australia is sending billions to the Trump administration – and wants to keep it secret The Albanese government is wiring public money to the US military while refusing to release payment details or guarantees.

Meanwhile, Australia is sending large sums to the Trump admin with no guarantee the money will be refunded if the US later exercises its right to not transfer Virginia class subs to Australia in the 2030s. Here’s my recent report for @deepcutnews.bsky.social www.deepcutnews.com/p/australia-...

Extract from September 2021 Biden White House press briefing on AUKUS: I just want to underscore that this is a fundamental decision — fundamental — that binds decisively Australia to the United States and Great Britain for generations. This is the biggest strategic step that Australia has taken in generations. And it is noteworthy that it comes here during the 70th anniversary of ANZUS. So it’s a substantial strategic alignment for Australia, building on a deep partnership with both countries.

That sounds similar to a comment from an unnamed “senior Biden admin official” when AUKUS was first announced in Sept 2021: “this is a fundamental decision ... that binds decisively Australia to the United States and Great Britain for generations”. bidenwhitehouse.archives.gov/briefing-roo...

In the AFR, James Curran reported that Campbell told European officials in 2022 that AUKUS was about “getting Australia off the fence – we have them locked in now for the next 40 years”. I haven't verified this quote but have no reason to disbelieve Curran’s reporting. www.afr.com/policy/forei...

Extract from a CNAS event: Kurt Campbell: Look, I would argue that as the United States and other nations confront a challenging security environment, that the best way to maintain peace and security is to work constructively and deeply with allies and partners. I would, as a propositional statement, I would begin with that. I think there would be some that would say no, that the best thing that the United States can do is to act alone and to husband its resources and think about unilateral, individual steps it might take. I would reject that thinking. I think what we're confronting now are challenges that require a much deeper engagement with allies and partners. I think the idea over time, Richard, will be in a number of potential areas of conflict and in a number of scenarios that countries acting together, and I think the leading nations right now in the Indo-Pacific, including Japan, Australia, South Korea, I would add India to that framework, increasingly operating more closely, greater capabilities more generally. I think that balance, that additional capacity will help strengthen deterrence more general. I think those practical circumstances in which AUKUS has the potential to have submarines from a number of countries operating in close coordination that could deliver conventional ordinance from long distances. Those have enormous implications in a variety of scenarios, including in cross-strait circumstances, and so I think I would argue that working closely with other nations, not just diplomatically, but in defense avenues, has the consequence of strengthening peace and stability more generally.

At an event on 3 April 2024, Campbell was asked to describe the “ultimate payoff” for AUKUS. He flagged “enormous implications in a variety of scenarios, including in cross-strait circumstances” (meaning the Taiwan Strait)
www.cnas.org/publications...

Extract Kurt Campbell's comments at a CSIS event: We have an unprecedented commitment of Australia into our industrial base to basically focus on improving, what I would argue, is the jewel in the crown, which is our submarine capacity, which frankly needs more resources. It needs more focus. And they’re not only providing it, but they're helping us understand the kinds of investments that the Admiral indicates. And I would simply say, Charles, that it is not just the ability to build two submarines a year of the attack variety that you were describing, it is also getting a troublingly large number of submarines that are in drydock and are in repair back into the water and deployed more quickly. And I think the truth is we do have a plan that will allow us to meet the requirements that are laid out in AUKUS. But I would also just remember that when submarines are provided from the United States to Australia, it's not like they're lost. They will just be deployed by the closest possible allied force. In many cases, you could make the argument that that enhances deterrence, which I would, and, frankly, creates more capacity. And that's really the reason why I'm grateful for the way that you asked these questions. The strategic significance of AUKUS is that both Australia and Great Britain have made a fundamental decision to align with us strategically, not just now, but as the Admiral indicates, into the distant future.

26 June 2023, Campbell told an event: “I would also just remember that when submarines are provided from the United States to Australia, it's not like they're lost. They will just be deployed by the closest possible allied force.”
www.csis.org/analysis/con...

But he would later make other comments that sounded flippant or casual about Australian control of the submarines.

Biden adviser says Australia won’t lose sovereignty under Aukus, warns China wants to ‘break’ country Kurt Campbell says China’s attempts to drive Australia ‘to its knees’ through a trade war won’t succeed

Addressing an Australian audience later, Campbell tried to clean up those remarks. He flagged “strategic intimacy” but said he understood “how important sovereignty & independence is for Australia so I don’t want to leave any sense that somehow that would be lost”
www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

Extract from a Guardian article: Those concerns were heightened when, in recent remarks, Campbell predicted Aukus would lead to “almost a melding of our services”. “I would think in the next little while we will have more British sailors serving on our naval vessels, Australians and the like, more of our forward-deployed assets in Australia,” Campbell told the US Institute of Peace two weeks ago. “This leads to a deeper interconnection and, almost a melding in many respects of our services and working together on common purpose that we couldn’t have dreamed about five or 10 years ago.”

On 19 November 2021, Campbell told an event that the AUKUS arrangement among the US, Australia and the UK could lead to “almost a melding" of the three countries' military services
web.archive.org/web/20240125...

Kurt Campbell - a senior Biden administration official and AUKUS architect who has previously sounded dismissive about Australia’s sovereign control of any submarines it receives under AUKUS - is due to address the National Press Club in Canberra today. Here’s a short thread of his past statements.

Complaint letter emerges after Melbourne hospital’s decision to cancel ‘children and war’ panel angers staff Exclusive: Letter to CEO argued event would pose a risk of ‘moral injury, vicarious trauma and harmful workplace behaviours’ to staff and patients

Exclusive: Complaint letter emerges after the Royal Children’s Hospital decided to cancel a ‘children and war’ panel, angering staff
www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

Complaint letter emerges after Melbourne hospital’s decision to cancel ‘children and war’ panel angers staff Exclusive: Letter to CEO argued event would pose a risk of ‘moral injury, vicarious trauma and harmful workplace behaviours’ to staff and patients

Waiting for the Free Speech™ warriors to speak up about the cancel culture on display here... www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

Charlie Kirk died in the America he wanted I mourn the loss of human life. I feel compassion, empathy and grief at an inexcusable killing. But I find nothing to lionise in his legacy.

Given this is making some waves - here is the piece and you can judge for yourself.

(I'm fine, there are no issues - right wing ecosystem just doing what right wing ecosystem does).

Take care of you - it's rough out there! Ax

amyremeikis.substack.com/p/charlie-ki...

Gareth Evans scolds ‘bone-headed’ Meanjin publisher as imminent closure sparks protest Critics want Melbourne University Publishing to transfer ownership of Meanjin rather than dissolve it. But CEO says ‘the journal is not for sale’

So MUP claimed it was closing #Meanjin "on purely financial grounds" because it was "no longer viable" - but today it claimed that if a buyer offered cash to take ownership it would reject said cash ("The journal is not for sale"). This does NOT add up www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

Sliding doors: cabinet papers reveal how close Coalition came to endorsing emissions trading in 2003 The Howard government drafted a statement declaring its support for an emissions trading scheme before abruptly changing course

Speaking of which: www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

This is terrible news. I’ve read so many things in Meanjin over the years I just never would have seen anywhere else.

Extract from the Guardian's article: Jillian Segal has also declined to specifically address the presence of neo-Nazis at anti-immigration marches on the weekend, during a speech at a Gold Coast conference organised by the US-based Combat Antisemitism Movement and during a subsequent press conference. “I don’t want to comment on any particular incidents as I think this goes beyond any particular incident, this is part of the fabric of our society. We have found that fabric is shredded. Antisemitism is actually shredding it,” Segal said, when asked by reporters about Sunday’s March for Australia rallies.

So according to the Guardian, Australia's Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism has declined to comment on the neo-Nazis www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

Starmer government now at 11% approval

Sad to see this

With enough creativity of an FOI decision maker, almost anything of substance could be interpreted to prejudice frank and timely advice or the orderly and effective conduct of govt

Good thread from someone who has looked closely at the Freedom from Information bill

Leading genocide scholars organization says Israeli action in Gaza is genocide The largest professional organization of scholars studying genocide says that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

The largest professional organization of scholars studying genocide said Monday that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.

Across Europe, when centrist parties have adopted far right themes and sought to appease far right voters, they go down in flames. Why? Because:
1. They alienate their own base.
2. They tell other voters that the far right is correct.
The determination not to learn this lesson is a wonder to behold.

Extremely important for everyone amplifying the neo-Nazis to bear this in mind: they crave this sort of coverage

How mainstream media and politicians fuelled Australia's biggest far-right rally Six takeaways from the March for Australia and why it should be a wake-up call.

"This was not a protest hijacked by the far-right, it was far-right from inception to execution," @osmanfaruqi.bsky.social writes.

He warns: "It’s impossible to fight against white supremacists and the far-right by effectively doing their bidding." www.lamestream.com.au/how-mainstre...