Nuclear-Powered Fixations: The Trump-Pratt Disclosures
In April 2021, the Australian billionaire Anthony Pratt had a meeting with Donald Trump at his Mar-a-Lago club. According to an ABC News report, “Pratt told Trump he believed Australia should start buying its submarines from the United States, to which an excited Trump – ‘leaning’ towards Pratt as if to be discreet – then told Pratt two pieces of information about US submarines: the supposed exact number of nuclear warheads they routinely carry, and exactly how close they supposedly can get to a Russian submarine without being detected.”
The report, citing “sources familiar with the matter,” goes on to mention that Pratt “allegedly shared the information with scores of others, including more than a dozen foreign officials, several of his own employees, and a handful of journalists.” The net, in other words, proved rather large, with emails and conversations taking place on the subject with three former Australian prime ministers, 10 Australian officials, 11 of Pratt’s employees and six journalists.
The revelation has emerged as part of an ongoing investigation by special counsel Jack Smith into Trump’s retention of classified documents on leaving the White House. Some of the documents, hoarded at Mar-a-Lago, covered US military matters, nuclear weapons, and spy satellites.
What is buried in the latest spray and foam of the Trump disclosures to Pratt is whether that encounter had any bearing on the broader strategic thinking in Canberra and its links to the US military industrial complex. The AUKUS security agreement between the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia contemplates the transfer of at least three US nuclear powered Virginia class boats, along with the construction of a specific co-designed nuclear-powered boat for the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). Did Pratt’s enthusiasm for US nuclear submarines percolate through to other officials, think-tankers and courtiers working for Washington’s interests?
Former Australian Prime Ministers Paul Keating and Tony Abbott have told the Australian Financial Review that Pratt never raised the issue of purchasing US nuclear submarines with them. Who, then, were the other prime ministers who received Pratt’s gobbets of wisdom? Surely Scott Morrison must figure, given his role in brokering the AUKUS agreement.
The ABC News report does acknowledge that a number of Australian officials who featured in the Pratt disclosures were “involved in then-ongoing negotiations with the Biden administration over a deal for Australia to purchase a number of nuclear-powered attack submarines from the United States.”
A number of Australian commentators have tried to minimise the significance of the Trump-Pratt encounter, thereby revealing visible smoke plumes. “We’ve had submariners serve on US nuclear submarines for years,” stated former Australian ambassador to the US Joe Hockey. “I find it hard to believe that in a conversation between Anthony Pratt and Donald Trump, anything of great significance was discussed that would have an impact on the national security of either Australia or the United States.”
Former Australian Defence Department official Peter Jennings, who also served as executive director of the US-funded and parochially pro-Washington think-tank, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, for over a decade, saw little reason to be concerned about the content of the disclosures. Most of the material on US submarines was already in the public domain. His concern, rather, was with Trump’s cavalier approach to national security information. “It’s just the 1000th example of why Trump is unfit to be president,” he tut-tutted. Jennings, along with the other members of the paid-up Washington consensus in combating Beijing, is no doubt losing sleep about Trump redux. Were Trump to return to the White House, all bets about Australia getting its nuclear-powered submarines are off.
The speed with which AUKUS was entered into by the Scott Morrison government in September 2021, an agreement which also brought no demurral or any murmurs of dissent from the then Labour opposition of Anthony Albanese, had a rank smell to it. For one thing, it has seen Australia further trapped in an insidious game of military competition being waged against China at the behest of US interests, militarising the country and mortgaging the budget to the tune of $368 billion over the course of two decades.
AUKUS also brought with it the abrupt termination of Canberra’s contract with the French Naval Group to construct twelve diesel-electric attack submarines for the RAN. This proved to be a disastrous affair for Australian diplomacy, savaging French-Australian relations and also advertising, to the region, the abject repudiation of Australian sovereignty.
While it should be stressed that Pratt faces no charges of illegality or impropriety, nor features in the 40 charges Smith is levelling against Trump, the Mar-a-Lago meeting with a former US president may prove critical in identifying a nexus with Canberra’s irrational interest in US-nuclear powered technology and the point at which that fascination ended the last vestiges of Australian independence.
Like what we do at The AIMN?
You’ll like it even more knowing that your donation will help us to keep up the good fight.
Chuck in a few bucks and see just how far it goes!
Your contribution to help with the running costs of this site will be gratefully accepted.
You can donate through PayPal or credit card via the button below, or donate via bank transfer: BSB: 062500; A/c no: 10495969
9 comments
Login here Register here-
New England Cocky
-
Kerri
-
Some Village Hampden
-
Lawriejay
-
andyfiftysix
-
Teiresias
-
Fred
-
Andrew Smith
-
Kerri
Return to home pageWILL AUSTRALIAN BILLIONAIRE ANTHONY PRATT BE PROSECUTED BY AMERICANS FOR RECEIVING US WAR SECRETS FROM TRUMPERY?
.
Will Trumpery be prosecuted for disclosing war secrets to an alien agent of a vassal state?
.
What is the difference with the Julian Assange jailing?
.
https://scontent.fsyd12-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/386730729_2398943353626721_3063728428269982385_n.jpg?_nc_cat=105&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=4c1e7d&_nc_ohc=yEZ9vZ7fVBgAX_rG4XZ&_nc_ht=scontent.fsyd12-1.fna&oh=00_AfAkAMmAvfIZMZ2SwFvj-AAgLxUXzZUuNmHXDjbcNSCJZw&oe=6525ED77
According to Keith Olbermann, Pratt told Abbott, Turnbull and Morrison.
Which makes one wonder if he was lobbying support or issuing warnings?
Suppose the rumoured content of Trump’s disclosure was as stated. In that case, it is pretty serious and not “common knowledge”: most American naval personnel serving on their subs do not know those details and would be in jail if they disclosed it. On the other hand, would anybody believe the reliability of the Trump disclosures? His reputation for boasting makes anything he says suspect.
My inquisitive mind has to ask – are Anthony and Donald related?
What an extraordinary likeness ! Astonishing !
Pratt seems to have been walking around like a naive rich kid. Enjoying the moment and talking like it was life changing.
Its typical of somebody who hasnt a care in the world, will never be short of change trying to join the big boys club. I bet he is a bit media shy now.
No doubt it reinforced the “nuclear sub bubble ” speak with the ex pms. It just shows how when Howard introduced work choices, he didnt miss the opportunity to impose conservative dogma. Abbott et al must have decided this was their chance with labor being somewhat a mess. Tis a pity labor carries the cross of the unloseable election at every policy decision. They need to make a stand on a whole lot of issues rather than timidly put a foot forward, scared to upset the hoi pa loi
Defense is no different. WTF are 6 subs going to do? They seen the size of australia and the depth of the oceans around us?
The only explanation is that we want to ride on the coat tails of the USA. Now this isnt the greatest idea going, but its also realistically, not the worst either.
The problem with the submarines is that as soon as they are detectable they are not so safe anymore.
So my advice to Anthony Albanese is, do not buy them.
And do not apply the Coalition level three tax reductions for wealthy people.
Biilions of dollars saved from not buying nuclear submarines and billions of dollars saved from not giving big tax returns to wealthy people means more money to help people struggling with living costs and renting/housing costs, etc, etc.
NEC: Great questions. A56: Answer to your first question – “eff all”. Six subs, which are unlikely to be fully operational at all times, to cover a coastline of 59,681 km armed with Tomahawk cruise missiles (which are used against an enemy’s land based targets) with a range of 1,500 km and anti-ship torpedoes with a range of under 100 km are not going to make a jot of difference in a war. Effectively a total waste of $368 billion. The biggest factor in our favor is being “girt by sea”. I cannot think of a successful invasion by sea of a country the size of Australia in the last 100 years.
Not the only nuclear news, preceding this time i.e. before and probably after Trump’s election, his team was liasing with the Red Sea Group inc. MBS/Saudi, MBZ/UAE, Sisi/Egypt, Bahrain and Netahyahu/Israel in trying to drop sanctions on Putin/Russia to ‘combat’ Iran (isolate Qatar & Turkey).
In the background were George Nader, ‘Moscow Mike’ Flynn, Bannon and Giuliani who were allegedly promoting/lobbying approval for the sale of nuclear reactors and weapons to Saudi….
‘To succeed, the plan would need a highly placed American politician willing to drop sanctions on Russia so that Vladimir Putin would in turn agree to end his support for Iran.’
Based on investigative writings of Seth Abramson in ‘Proof of Conspiracy: How Trump’s International Collusion Is Threatening American Democracy’
And, importantly, it shows yet again, the fast track the wealthy have into lobbying for government actions on federal affairs that are none of their business.