Australian nuclear proliferation – contemporary

See also:

• Nuclear developments and Australia-Indonesia security

• Australia nuclear proliferation - history

Government sources

Canberra Commission on the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

Archive of Commission official site, includes full text of report.

Analysis and commentary

Australia’s Nuclear Dilemma: Dependence, Deterrence or Denial?, Raoul E. Heinrichs, Security Challenges*, Volume 4, Number 1, 2008, pp. 55-67 (*Subscription required)

"An outright offensive deterrent is not the only mechanism which might eventually reduce Australia's reliance on the US nuclear umbrella. An Australian Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) shield, by shifting to a strategy of nuclear denial, may in time reduce the burden on the United States to maintain a credible offensive threat against Australian adversaries."

Australia and the Future of Nuclear Deterrence, Robyn Lim, Centre for Independent Studies, 1 March 2007

“Australia, including for reasons of distance, can afford to rely more than Japan does on extended deterrence in relation to both China and North Korea. But it may not elect to do so if in future Indonesia were to decide it needed its own deterrent….So for security as well as economic reasons, Australia is successfully resisting aspects of President Bush's Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) that would have seen Australia required permanently to give up the option to enrich uranium.”

A reply to Richard Tanter, Martine Letts, 12 November 2007, Austral Policy Forum 07-20B

"’Richard Tanter appears to have carefully deconstructed my contribution to the Lowy Institute's Voters’ Guide and put it back together again through the rather artificial conceit of a ‘realist’ approach to international relations, which leads to some wrong conclusions about what my article really means.’ Letts argues that ‘a future government should consider the ‘what if’ questions too - what if we live in a region with not just one, but two and maybe three nuclear-armed states. I for one hope that the very prospect of Australia needing to revisit its decision not to consider a nuclear deterrent would be sufficient to encourage us to work harder to shore up and strengthen the existing global nuclear governance arrangements and not to further undermine them. This involves more than pious slogans and adherence to old ways of doing things. To conclude that the logical consequence of this line of argument is to advocate for an Australian nuclear weapon is about as credible as the search for those elusive weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.’”

The Re-emergence of an Australian nuclear weapons option? Austral Policy Forum 07-20A, 29 October 2007.

“Australian nuclear policy does indeed need to be reviewed. But such reconsideration of our current policy failures needs to be genuinely and comprehensively realist, informed by abiding commitments to the avoidance of nuclear next-use, and eschewing any suggestion that if our half-hearted arms control measures do not bear fruit, then Australia too will take the genocidal option, and once again and try to join the nuclear club."

Australian Voters’ Guide to International Policy: Non-proliferation and Arms Control, Martine Letts, Lowy Institute, 15 Oct 2007 [80KB PDF]

"An incoming Australian government will need to assess the changed global nuclear environment and develop strategic policy options to protect and project our interests. Some of these options may be controversial and unpopular.

"Nuclear weapons proliferation and the threat of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of terrorists are at the top of the global security agenda. Global demand for nuclear energy is a signifi cant, if partial, solution to the global problems of climate change and has put pressure on the comparatively contained nuclear world we have lived in so far. These and related developments have implications for Australian policy settings over the next fi ve years. They traverse our non-proliferation policy, its intimate relationship with our role as a major supplier of uranium, our strategic relationships with the United States and major Asian powers, and our own decisions on the role nuclear weapons will play for the future security of Australia.

"A thorough nuclear policy review should also consider which strategic circumstances might lead to Australia’s revisiting the nuclear weapons option. As extreme as this may sound, failure to sustain and strengthen our current non-proliferation regime may force us to consider such an option. In the current strategic circumstances, no government could leave such an eventuality entirely out of mind."

"Australia's New Nuclear Ambitions, Richard Broinowski, Austral Policy Forum 06-24A 24 July 2006

"Outlandish as it may seem to many Australians, the challenge may soon be to reassure Australia's neighbours, especially Indonesia, that Mr Howard has no plans to build nuclear weapons in Australia."

See also

• Australia nuclear proliferation history - resource list, Re-framing Australia-Indonesia security relations, Nautilus Institute

Project coordinator: Richard Tanter
18 May 2008