Australia considering Nukes....

Originally posted by Daedalus3
ok.. a different kidn of a question..

IF they did NOT have them, what what be a good number of warheads, delivery means, and yields for minimum credible deterence (presuming min cred deterence is what they would want)?


50-100 bombs, 25KT-200KT, F-111s, Blue Streak(?)... ?

If Australia were to get nukes, all we would need is the capability to hit as far as China's coast, say Shanghai and Beijing.
Wether the entire city is destroyed or not is irrelevant. Nobody wants one of their major cities nuked.

Closer to home, a few MRBM's with multiple warheads, say 5 per missile, and Jakarta is toast. That pretty much will keep the Indonesians at bay for ever, or until they decide to develop nukes.

And that's the problem right there. As soon as Australia gets them, everyone around us will go nuts and get them.


Anyway, it's always been the belief that we are too far, and too large to invade.
The desert out here is not a hospitable place, and that is really all there is until you hit the east and south east where the majority of the population lives.
And the only threat we could face in a non world war scenario is from Indonesia...and they lack the capability to effecitively launch a large scale amphibious assault against Australia and land enough troops and equipment to make it count.
All of the big airbases up north and west are kept operational around the year. If tensions rise for some reason and we edge closer to the brink with Indonesia(unthinkable anyway), RAAF will forward deploy to those bases.

And we would know well in advance of a massive Indonesia assault, due to the JORN network which is an over the horizon radar network used to monitor Australia's northern waters and approaches and well beyond that(the true capabilities are a state secret).

In short, we don't need nukes.
Anyone who thinks we have nukes, I challenge you to provide the evidence.
Anyone who thinks we have wmd factories underground, I challenge you to provide the evidence.
Anyone who thinks we have foreign nukes in Australia, I challenge you to provide the evidence.

All this bs started anyway because the original poster misinterpreted the article as if it was the official Australian government position, when the Australian government had nothing to do with it.

reply to post by BLV12


nice post.. So Aus would be ok with credible min deterrence (be able to smack a couple of enemy cities) as opposed to MAD? hmmm

Because though 'nobody wants their cities nuked' is most certainly correct from a general 'clean-war-clean-hands' perspective, when one gets into the mud with these things (read details) the question transforms to 'what kind of a response would Aus' enemy consider to a nuclear attack on 2 of its cities?' Would it retaliate with a total response or a measured one.

This leads to another question: Would Australia retain the right to strike preemptively or would be good with a "no-first use" doctrine? Interesting enough because the major Asian nuclear powers with the ability to target Asia have a blanket no-first-use policy on nuclear weapons.


[edit on 16-1-2010 by Daedalus3]

reply to post by Daedalus3


If Australia was to obtain nuclear weapons, I think it's pretty easy and fair to say that the policy would be no first use, and pretty much they would be a deterrent, and only to be used as a last resort in the worst case scenario - ie an invasion of Australia were we are about to lose.

Did the USA and Soviet Union ever go to war directly? No. Because they feared it would end in nuclear war.
Have Russia and the USA gone to war since the fall of the USSR? No, for the same reason as above.

I wish i had a Nuke....that would be awesome

reply to post by BLV12


The reasons why the USSR and the US had nuclear weapons was not quite the same for both. But then I don't want to get into that as I would open a can of worms

We don't need to get into the reasoning why they had them or developed them.

But it is a fact that I think we can agree on, that since they both had them, they avoided direct conflict with each other, in fear of MAD.

Now who wants to attack a nuclear armed country with the capability to destroy you(the attacker)?

That was the point I was trying to make, sorry if it didn't come out like that.

reply to post by BLV12


Ok good. So that is exactly what I was trying to ask. There's a world of a difference between a minimum credible nuclear deterrence and a MAD deterrence.
Min. deterrence is mostly independent of your adversary's capability to attack and defend/endure nuclear war, thus being independent of the adversary itself.
MAD is quite the opposite. Its a whole new ball game of pre-emption, second strike etc etc..

I was curious about Australia's choices in this regard (though I agree that Australia and nuclear weapons does not make sense for Australia, not public, not secret, not now and not in the near future).

Australia was a nuclear testing ground for the British in the 50's. Although we may not have nukes ourselves, our allies do. I am Aussie. And i welcome nuclear weapons, we don't want to be the only ones not doing it, do we?

Originally posted by WinterWonderland
Australia was a nuclear testing ground for the British in the 50's. Although we may not have nukes ourselves, our allies do. I am Aussie. And i welcome nuclear weapons, we don't want to be the only ones not doing it, do we?

Fret not old son, for Nukes we do secretly have.

reply to post by mazzroth


Curious to know what you would wager on numbers, yields and delivery modes (aside from the F-111)

reply to post by Daedalus3


Going on conversations I have had, minuteman powered rockets with unknown yield warheads.

Can humanity sink and de-evolve any lower? Nuclear Weapons are bazookas in the hands of toddlers. When will the human race just grow up already?! Such a hostile, belligerent, boastful, prideful, megalomaniacal, self important race.....

Im sure if the aussy's wanted nukes they would get them, i could well believe they already have some facilitys hidden aways in the out backs, also they have friends who would want them to have them, and not so friendly people not knowing they had them is also a card up the sleeves,

Yes I believe Australia should have some nukes just to make everyone else think twice before attacking us

Whilst I've seen several people in this thread say Australia has nuclear weapons, there has been zero evidence provided...

Lines like "I knew a bloke who knew a bloke and I can't tell you the details cos I'll get into trouble" is not evidence...

And until said evidence is provided, Australia does not have nuclear weapons...Simple...

I think if there were nukes in Australia, its because we're just borrowing them. We've got a wonderful little platform all out in the southern hemisphere...
...i'd let my best friend bury his guns in my backyard for a small fee, if you know what i mean

Everyone in this thread is talking about strategic nukes.

Australia has tactical nuke delivery systems, fact, and that makes sense given their most likely military threats.

reply to post by amonza


The nuclear delivery systems your talking about, are the F111 bombers, which are being retired soon.

Sorry, but Australia does not have nukes.

If you have evidence in your possession, then post it.
Otherwise stop wasting peoples time and server bandwidth with nonsense.

reply to post by somthing


I imagine they could have nukes installed by the US. Other countries have had these.

reply to post by WishForWings


Help Australia be taken more seriously?

"Do what we say or we will bomb the hell outta ya!"

Is that what you want?

It is not hypocritical for people to want as few countries as possible to have nukes; it is actually good for people to speak against these weapons.