Thank you Melody for bringing wider attention to this atrocity!
Folks might be interested in learning more about the gatherings
in Brisbane and Yepoon in a week or two. Go to peaceconvergence.com.au and have a look at the incredible
organisation behind this peaceful protest. There is also a peacetrain from Melbourne to Brisbane, you will find details on
the website. There will be 10's of thousands of people protesting. Did you know also that these 'whore' games will be
using live ammunition containing depleted uranium, which has been
proven to cause all types of cancers, and shocking birth defects in
newborns. The Ray Bradbury film 'Blowin' in the Wind' is compulsory
viewing on the topic of DU in weaponry. Lesley

OK, so you're a raging granny and you're raging. Fair enough - go for it.

However in my humble opinion, the best OLO contributions identify solutions as well as problems. I'm having trouble finding your solution here, Melody. Would you like the ADF to train somewhere else? If so, where? Would you like them not to train alongside the forces they regularly work with around the world? How would that help? Would you like them to conduct more environmental assessment? No live fire training?

In fact, other than recognising that you don't much like the ADF, I'm struggling to see your point, and I'm utterly lost about what you expect the government to do about it.

The sad reality is, whether we agree with the war in Iraq or not, Australian men and women are going there to fight. And they need the best training we can provide them, so that they come back alive, and so that they don't make inexperienced operational decisions which result in things like civilian casualties. they need to train to the very best of standards. If not in the current areas, then where?

Anthony Marinac might then line up behind Melody Kemp as one who appears to offer no solutions.

Maybe diplomats and would-be warriors who survey the battlefields of Iraq and the training grounds of Shoalwater Bay, mostly from their offices, could be included in the exercises. Say a yachting trip and a few menacing interdictions, to give them a distant notion of what it's like for a civilian family to have their house collapse on them in a heap of rubble.

Who knows, it might even put some spunk into their vague recollection of the idea that war is the consequence failed diplomacy.

I have no doubt that soldiers need training, but I think diplomats, who we trust equally with our lives, need more training. Maybe a bit of war games excitement would help Alexander Downer focus more actively on waging peace. Then again, I doubt he has steely nerves of a Douglas MacArthur. Alex might lose the plot, altogether.

And while we all stand in line (for I have contributed a most unlikely "solution"), turn your sense of humour loose on this:

"The Reliable Replacement Warhead (RRW) program was set up by [US]Congress to modernize the aging U.S. stockpile. The two labs were competing to replace a warhead that currently sits atop missiles in U.S. submarines. Some of the bombs are more than 30 years old, and scientists can't detonate them to see how well they've held up. Although the focus is reliability, RRW is also intended to create safer, more secure, and greener weapons."
(from Science Magazine 9 March 2007 page 1348)

"Greener" nuclear weapons!

Sustainable technology for Shoalwater Bay?

You can certainly tell the priorities of politicians - just follw the money. It certainly dooesn't seem peace is top of the agenda.

"War is Peace".

If I were a totally incompetent cruising yachty, or had just landed from the moon, I may be able to find my way into one of the small live firing areas of Shoalwater Bay, during an exercise. Its unlikely, as they are in very yacht unfriendly areas of what is a rather boat unfriendly area at any time. I would also have had to, somehow avoid hearing the barrage of advertising, [air & print], & miss all the talk between the yachties on their SSB radios.

However, should I manage it, I, personally, would be grateful to the army, if they spent the time, & effort, sending a helicopter, & crew to warn me, of the fact. Like most, I would also enjoy the close up inspection of one of our war birds. When a friends yacht was circled by one of these helicopters, the kids were still raving about it, 6 months later, a fact, the helicopter crews are well aware of.

Of course, if I were a long haired radical rat bag lefty, I would find it the perfect oppotunity for a bit of a misinformation campaign.
This would give a silly twit from Laos, [which would damn near fit in Shoalwater bay], an opportunity to get some anti defense force rubbish in print.

I don't know weather to feel disgusted or sorry for these people, but you've got to feel sorry for the people of Laos.

HasBeen - Of course the kids on the yacht would be talking about it for months, they will probably talk about it for the rest of their lives.
To provide a solution from using depleted uranium in the weaponry, would be a start. If you had a baby born with three arms, and only one eye, you may change your mind. Australia does not need defending.....So many War Games, So much Fear, so many Lies, so much
Waste. This whole scenario got out of hand after Sept. 11 2001.
I refuse to call it (9/11) I do not see Sweden, Switzerland, Norway,
Denmark, or Finland Going to War. or having Games. What do they know that we don't? Is it all something to do with non-renewable resources? These War Games (which are insanity), are just another symptom of the terminal illness humans have wreaked upon this Planet.