Yes, we're back to you, listener.

Episode 425 of the Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove podcast.

I'm Trevor, the Iron Fist, with me Scott, the Velvet Glove.

How are you, Scott?

Good, thanks, Trevor.

G'day, Trevor.

G'day, Joe.

G'day, listeners.

I hope everyone's well.

Joe, the tech guy's here as well.

Evening, all.

Joe's volume is low.

We're trying to fix that as we go, but we'll see how we go.

Hey, Joe, maybe we're not live on Facebook.

Maybe I didn't put it down as a I might have somehow missed it as

one of the places to stream to.

If you can try and fix it.

It says we've got, we have one viewer on Facebook.

Oh, okay.

So it is doing it.

Okay.

It just looked like it wasn't coming through.

Worldly Listener.

News and politics, sex and religion.

Maybe not so much sex, I don't think, in this episode.

Uh, news, international politics.

I mean, everything revolves around just Gaza, um, international

Politics at the moment, I think.

Um, so what have we got for you?

I pull the air out of everything.

Yeah.

What have we got for you?

We've got, um, well, my hero, Yanis Varoufakis,

effectively banned from Germany.

And we'll just talk about what they are doing in Germany in their response

to this whole Palestine Gaza crisis.

And then we're going to, um, Talk a little bit about China and the Spratly Islands.

Found some information about, um, past treaties that might guide us into

the ownership of the Spratly Islands.

And then a bit more about, um, sort of global hegemony and, um, hypocrisy

around Gaza, China update, uh, US protectionism, multi polar world.

We might even get on to a four day week, which was quite interesting.

Um, Scott's going to leave us by nine, if we're still going, he'll tune out.

But, uh, we'll see how we go, so.

Um, what are we grateful for?

I have something, do you gentlemen have anything that you're

grateful for in particular?

Yeah, getting up early in the morning and starting work

every day, yeah, that's Cuba.

I'm a, I'm a groundskeeper Point State School at the moment, people.

So I've actually finally started working, so it's only a temporary gig.

Well, God, I hope it's only temporary.

Um, I'm a casual groundskeeper staff member and all that sort of stuff.

So I kind of start there at six o'clock in the morning and work

until three in the afternoon.

Well.

As you sit there in the lunchroom with your work colleagues, I hope you

tell them about this podcast, Scott.

I did tell them about the podcast.

Any more listeners?

Good.

Any of them, have any of them tried it?

Sorry?

Have any of them listened?

I don't know.

Um, you know, I've got Lloyd down in Rockhampton to start listening.

I'm he.

I'm he.

Tunes in every Monday night to have a look at us online, and if he doesn't

make it there on Monday night, he listens to the podcast itself.

Okay.

Um, and I couldn't tell you about anyone from Parker, and I

don't think any of them have, so.

Okay, very good.

Joe, got anything you're grateful for?

Uh, not off the top of my head, no.

Fair enough.

I'm grateful for a support group for Trevor's came across this article in

The Sun, which is of course a UK paper, and it reads that a bloke fed up with

a bloke fed up PA paper's a loose term.

But anyway, yes.

Okay.

The sun, a.

A type of toilet paper with black ink printed on it, Joe, yes, um, in the UK.

So featured a story about a, a guy called Trevor fed up with

negativity over his name has set up a support group for other Trevors.

Trevor Cunningham, 66, says he wants to stop the maligned moniker

being linked to geeks and nitwits.

He said, I thought if I could get Trevors from all over the world to

offer their services for free to other Trevors, people would then

associate the name with kindness.

The once popular title, shared by the likes of England footballer

And broadcaster Trevor McDonald fell out of favor in the 1970s.

This is all news to me, dear listener.

It was mocked in the Ian D'S 1977 song.

Clever Trevor.

Clever Trevor.

Yep.

Mm-Hmm.

And in 2020 in the UK, just 11 Tots.

These kids were given the tainted term, Trevor.

How many, they'd have, what, 100, 000 or, they'd have more than that, wouldn't they?

They'd have births a year, wouldn't they?

I don't know.

Oh, I'm just They'd have, they'd have almost a million, wouldn't they?

I don't know, but Trevor's a tainted term, according to this article.

Yeah.

Retired engineer Trevor of Torquay, Devon, said, I always liked my name

as a child, I thought it was posh.

But by the time I was eight, I realized it was associated with nitwits.

As I've got older, I've embraced it.

Good on you, Trevor.

And realized the name doesn't deserve the reputation it has.

Have I missed something here?

Is it, is it true?

Like, is Trevor a bit of a funny name?

I've never heard of it being funny.

It's just Joe is looking a little hesitant here.

No, I was gonna say, I mean, I remember Ian Dury's song, but Right.

Right.

Right.

Right.

Uh, aside from that, not really.

I mean, the only Trevor I'm thinking is Trevor McDonald, who's the

BBC, not BBC, Channel 4, I think.

Yeah, broadcaster.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Who's well respected.

Yeah, I was shocked to read this article, I have to say, although I am grateful

that there is a support group, which I didn't really need until now, perhaps.

So, uh, yeah, there's 126 members, apparently, and, um Just be

thankful you're not a Karen.

Yes, that's true.

And apparently the website proves that Trevor's aren't all boring or daft.

Yeah, uh, and there was a thing that a guy, Trevor Kavanagh, who was one

of the Sun's top Trevors, and he said, Until now I never realised my name made

me a nerd in need of a support group.

For the first time I understand what it's like to be part of a persecuted minority.

There you go, Scott, you are an openly gay man living in rural Queensland.

Part of a persecuted minority, arguably.

I don't feel persecuted or anything like that.

See, most of my mates up here know that I'm gay and no one gives a shit.

Yeah.

You know.

Well, most of my friends know I'm called Trevor.

Exactly.

I didn't think it was a problem until now.

But anyway, there we go.

Your mate Bob says that a thousand flowers bloom, doesn't he?

Yes.

Who says that?

Bob Catter.

Oh, does he?

Yes.

Yes.

Anyway, that's it.

I'm grateful for the Trevor support group that I didn't think I needed.

I didn't know anything about, but I'm glad it's there.

Exactly.

Mm.

Now, in recent times, we've been talking about Giannis Fourafakis, more

so than usual, because he has that documentary, which I still haven't read.

But it is, it is on the list, Joe, and you enjoyed it, I know.

And, um, he's been in the news, in addition to that, because,

um, of being banned in Germany.

And, the sort of, the German response to this whole Palestinian

Gaza issue is, Very interesting.

I think.

So.

First of all, we just need, need to deal with what actually happened to

Giannis in Germany and did he deserve it.

So he wrote an article in New Statesman and so reading his article, he says,

in the name of Protecting Israel Security, the German government

has UNK to new, uh, sunk to farcical, new authoritarian loaves.

As I write these lines, I am banned, not only from stepping on

German soil, so, Janus Perifarcus cannot step on German soil.

Remarkably, also, he's banned from connecting via video

link to any event in Germany.

I mean, it's pretty extraordinary.

And he says why.

And, uh, on October the 8th, so the day after Hamas attacked Israel, he was in

Berlin, found out about the attack from the previous day, during a TV interview,

and was asked, do you condemn Hamas?

And he replied, this is on the 8th of October.

I condemn every single atrocity, whomever is the perpetrator or the victim.

What I do not condemn is armed resistance to an apartheid system

designed as part of a slow burning but inexorable ethnic cleansing program.

As a European, it is important to refrain from condemning either

the Israelis or the Palestinians.

when it is us Europeans who have caused this never ending tragedy.

After practicing rabid anti Semitism for centuries, leading up to the

uniquely vile Holocaust, we have been complicit for decades with

the slow genocide of Palestinians, as if two wrongs make one right.

Gentlemen, anything Yanis Varoufakis?

None.

No, it's quite reasonable what he said.

Yes.

You know, I suppose he could take exception to his comments of, I do not

condemn, I do not, I do not condemn armed resistance to an apartheid system.

Now, you could then argue whether or not Israel is an apartheid system, it clearly

is apartheid, that's between us, but it hasn't actually been recognised as being

apartheid system, because you do have, Islamic people, you do have Palestinian

people who are, who are citizens of Israel and all that stuff, and they've

got Israeli cards and everything else.

So I don't think you could actually call that a direct apartheid system

there, but the way they're treating the people in the West Bank and the

Gaza Strip is definitely apartheid.

Mm.

They're behaving so appallingly badly.

I don't think there's any other word for it Certainly is comments, uh,

nuanced and informative and yeah, there's nothing in it that is inciting.

No.

Some sort of.

Uh, hatred or anti Semitic viewpoint, it's, it's quite reasonable

commentary, I would have thought.

Even if you disagree with some of it, you can't really give it the flavour

of something so incendiary that it needs to be banned for the safety

of the public, uh, or, uh, yeah.

So, days later, he was disinvited.

by Vienna's Academy of Fine Arts from delivering the

prestigious Otto Wagner lecture.

Then, um, on the 16th of February at Berlin's Babylon Theatre It was going

to be the premiere of the documentary we've been talking about, and the

police leaned heavily on the, um, the theatre's proprietor to cancel

the event, asked why, the authorities simply replied, for a focus, and,

well, defiantly, the proprietor of the theatre happened to be Jewish.

And he told the police he wouldn't budge.

So, ironic, I guess.

Then he says a month ago, he got an email from his publisher, who he's

used, um, for publishing books in Germany, um, has been with them for

dozens of years and issued six books.

And basically the publisher pulled the pin on him.

And, um, he says, as the body count in Gaza mounted, The authorities began

to lash out, and he talks about the case of a colleague, Iris Heffetz.

Iris is an Israeli psychoanalyst.

I suppose every Israeli is a psychoanalyst, aren't they?

Like, if you've watched enough Woody Allen movies?

Anyway.

Iris, an Israeli psychoanalyst, in Berlin, was arrested on charges of anti Semitism

for walking alone on the street with a placard reading, I'm As an Israeli and

as a Jew, stop the genocide in Gaza.

Hmm.

So he's arrested for anti Semitism for saying that.

An Israeli Jew with a placard saying, as an Israeli and as a

Jew, stop the genocide in Gaza.

This is outrageous that Germany's doing this.

Then, um, 12th of April, uh, Ghazan Abu Sittar, British Palestinian

Rector of the University of Glasgow, was prevented from entering Germany.

to join Ayannas and others at the Palestinian, at the Palestine

Congress, and he was deported to the UK after hours of interrogation.

Um, so yeah, so there was this sort of event where they were going to talk about

Palestine and Gaza and all the problems.

Meanwhile, 2, 500 police mobilized outside the event and harassed attendees.

Imagine!

Two and a half thousand police.

Outsider, a Palestinian congress.

A young Jewish activist, holding a placard with the words Jews

Against Genocide, was arrested.

As he was led away, only half jokingly, he asked the policeman, Would it have been

okay if it read, Jews support genocide?

So the Congress started with only a fraction of the attendees,

who managed to get through the two and a half thousand police.

And shortly before Yarnus was about to talk to the audience, the police

invaded the auditorium, grabbed the microphone, tore out the wires

of the live streaming equipment.

And then on Saturday the 13th, he was issued a, ah,

betta, betta ta goongs a bot.

Which is a ban on any political activity that has been used only,

and it's only been used a few times, against Islamic state operatives.

So he was banned from any political activity.

And then that, um, after a couple of days with his lawyers harassing the

government, that was replaced with an Ein Reiseverbot, a softer entry ban.

Um, to this day the German authorities have refused any His request for a

written statement on their rationale.

So, um, so he says it's clear that, um, it's not about protecting Jews, it's

about protecting the right of Israel to commit any war crime of its choice.

And he said it's a sad reflection of the waning economic power that is embracing

an increasingly farcical authoritarianism.

It's quite extraordinary, isn't it?

A guy like Yanis and those stories of just, um, Israeli

Jew sympathisers being arrested.

Um, it makes me wonder whether or not Germany is actually

trampling on freedom of speech.

That's the stuff.

They certainly seem to be trampling on freedom of expression, don't they?

Well, they've always had anti Nazi laws, whether they're trying to

Yeah, I know, it's But the optics of German police arresting a Jew

Yeah, that's got to make them, sure that's got to make them shudder.

Hmm.

You'd hope so.

Yeah.

So I was listening to a podcast with Yanis talking to Naomi Klein, and there is a

little clip from this, which is a really interesting take on what's happening here

with Germany and just bringing it up now.

So I'll play this and have a listen to this.

All

of these Western powers lining up, you know, for Israel, including Germany,

saying, you know, whatever, whatever the result, we stand with Israel, um, and then

Namibia steps forward and says, excuse me, you know, Germany, it's just because

you've committed genocide several times doesn't make you It seems to me that

in Germany these days, uh, you can only mention genocide if you are supporting it.

You're a teacher.

What do we want from students?

We want them to be able to think critically, to recognize patterns, not

just to memorize, you know, like a rule.

Don't be mean to Jews.

No, that's not the lesson.

The lesson is, uh, Don't, don't, don't, don't practice othering.

Don't create an in group and an out group.

This is why I always say Germany is a terrible student because they learned a

rule, but they didn't learn a principle.

So now they're like, okay, well, we're just, the rule is stand with Israel,

but we're going to transfer all of these similar sort of patterns of

thought and project them onto Muslims and Palestinians and, you know.

You know, even within our own movement, Naomi, it was very difficult to make

the arguments that you're making.

I thought that was very good.

I really liked that.

Um, so what she said there was, Germany is a terrible student.

Germany learned a rule, but not a principle.

They learnt Don't be mean to Jews, but they miss the concept,

which is don't practice othering.

Hmm hmm.

Yeah.

I mean this is very much, um, uh, as I do, don't do, as I say, uh, it's, as

a parent bringing up a child, it was very much, I didn't want to give my

daughter rules that she had to obey.

I wanted her to understand principles of not being mean to other people.

So that she didn't just blindly follow a rule, she had the tools

to make up her own mind as to what was right and what was wrong.

The thing about this Gaza atrocity, just dragging on the

way it has, and now that the,

Nah, Scott has bumped it.

Can you hear me now?

Yes.

Okay, I bumped the microphone, I'm sorry.

Um, the Gaza atrocity dragging on as long as it has, it means that the Israeli

soldiers have lost all discipline.

They are just You know, like that, that footage you were talking about

last week on the podcast, you were saying that the Jewish soldiers

were shooting those Palestinians that were crawling away from them.

You know, that is very reminiscent of the, when the, uh, SS cracked down on

the Jewish uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto.

They called them parachutists or balloonists or something like that.

They'd set fire to the lower levels of the building as the fire just

moved throughout the whole building.

So then they'd then throw a mattress down and they'd jump out of the windows

and they'd say that the SS guards had, the SS soldiers had developed a game and

that was who could get the most number of shots in before the body hit the ground.

You know, it's that sort of thing that, um, It certainly sounds like the

Israelis have developed that type of thing now that they see a palestinian

and just want to pick them off, you know?

Yeah, I'll get onto that in a bit later in the podcast, but I'm just going to circle

back here to this idea that that Germany is a terrible student, that they learnt

this rule but not the principle, and Dear listener, if you've been listening to this

podcast long enough, you will understand that the lawyer in me, and this happened

a lot with, uh, the Twelfth Man as well, is, you know, he would say certain things

about freedom of speech or, you know, we were arguing about, um, bakeries and

their right to refuse service to different people, and, and what we were examining

in all those arguments was I would try and say, well, if the circumstances are

different in this way, what's your answer?

And if the circumstances are different in another way, what's your answer?

And it was all about trying to come to a set of principles, a statement

of principle that you could then apply in a multiple approach.

range of situations.

That's when you've got an ethical principle in place that's robust, and the

less number of exceptions, the better.

And, uh, you know, that comes from doing law, where invariably, whether

in criminal law or tort law or other things, you're exposed to this idea

of, of, for certain things to either be a crime or to be a tort, Here

are the elements of the offense.

Here are the elements of the action.

A, B, C, D, E.

Can you find those elements?

If so, then you've got whatever the section's applying to.

And it's a way of thinking that is about being systematic and having concepts

that go beyond just one set of facts and can be applied to multiple set of facts.

So, I just find that an exact, what she's talked about there Naomi Klein is right,

that the Germans haven't understood that the problem wasn't, the lesson was not

that you should not be mean to Jews.

It was that you should not practice othering and having

in groups and out groups.

That was the lesson.

And you apply that to the situation with the Jews, but then you apply it

to any other races or any other type of difference that arises in our community.

And dear listener, that's what happened with the voice debate.

And my argument was that people were feeling sorry for Indigenous

people and took the lesson to be, don't be mean to Indigenous people.

Where in fact, the lesson from history was, don't be a racist.

And people missed that in Australia and committed the same mistake.

Germany is making right now where people here in Australia went, well, whatever

the case, we just must be, make sure we're not mean to Indigenous people.

And they missed the underlying principle of treating people equally

and, uh, without a racial difference.

So there we go.

That was my take on the Yanis Varoufakis, um, matter.

Anybody want to dispute that?

Nope, all good.

Yeah, okay.

Um, Now, just on, um, God Rundle was writing in Crikey, I quite

enjoy the Crikey articles, I don't always agree with them.

I really enjoy Guy Rundle's writing.

He's very verbose and uses words that you just don't know the meaning of, but

you kind of suspect what he's saying.

And, um, uh, anyway, he wrote about, um, well he wrote, Penny Wong's

statement this week suggesting Australia might join a UN unilateral

declaration of Palestinian statehood.

Is the surest sign yet that Labor has started to pay attention to the

potential electoral fallout as a direct result of its position on Gaza.

So then his article goes on to really say that Labor has taken

for granted ethnic minorities as being part of their voting base.

and hasn't felt that it needs to do anything to keep them happy and in fact

can do things that will make them unhappy but they're hardly likely to switch to the

greens because culturally too different.

Um, and he's saying that, um, things are changing and that in fact within the

Labor Party that's a new faction that's kind of based on ethnic minorities and

He also, what else did he say, that uh, they're starting to see, for example,

Greens leader Sam Ratnam has announced that he's going to try for the federal

seat of wills currently held by Labor and that a guy like that would not be

doing a run like that if he didn't think he had a chance and so, um, so he's

suggesting that Labor has ignored say, Palestinian, Middle Eastern constituents,

and that they're starting to find that maybe that's politically dangerous.

Uh, he sort of describes, uh, Albanese's faction, As being in bed with the right

wing faction, who of course are very pro USA, pro defence, very You know,

the right wing of the Labor Party, Richard Marles, and his group, they're

closer to the Liberals than they are to Most people would have thought as,

say, the left wing of the Labor Party.

These guys are pretty hot conservatives on a lot of this stuff.

Um, so Oh, what did he say here?

Um He said, uh, it's about mounting.

It's about mounting a basic resistance to a government and

party that pulled a swift one.

Surprising to even the most jaded and cynical progressive

substituting post-election, a war party for a social Democrat one.

I think that's right.

They've spent a lot of time, this podcast, we've spent a lot of time talking about.

You know, previously, Scott, we spent a lot of time talking about submarines

when nobody was talking about submarines, but we're spending a lot of time talking

about China and defence in America and all the rest of it when, when I

think this current Labor government is talking a lot of that stuff.

So, um, it seems to me, um, so, yeah.

And then Bernard Keane writes an article basically describing Richard

Marles as Australia's worst minister.

And the Department of Defence has been recently given an extra

10 billion a year in spending.

Um, so it's going to increase from 2 percent of GDP to 2.

4 percent of GDP.

And, um, he says, so Richard Marles, Defence Minister and

Deputy PM was talking, um, At a press club, National Press Club.

And he said, the Liberals were one of the worst defence governments in

our nation's history and at a time when Australia could least afford it.

Um, and as Bernard Keane in Crikey says, when Miles complains about the

Coalition, um, being in and out of a submarine deal with Japan, and then in

and out of a submarine deal with France.

Uh, he, Miles, neglects to mention that Labor supported both of those decisions.

So how can Miles complain about that when And he goes on to say, this is

the interesting part, as Bernard Dekeen and Crikey, In fact, the best decision

made in defence procurement in recent decades was Tony Abbott's decision

to buy off the shelf conventional submarines from the Japanese.

And that's one that Labor strongly opposed, and which was eventually

overturned by Abbott's own party in a desperate bid to save the

careers of South Australian MPs.

So, I wasn't aware of that.

Why was Labor opposed to that?

Is it because they weren't going to manufacture it over here?

I guess so.

I suspect that's the case.

But I wasn't aware of that until now, so.

It's always the vote winner, isn't it?

Yeah, jobs for South Australians.

So, uh, jobs for onshore.

Yeah.

Yep.

So there we go.

Um, there's a little, um, trivia point that we knew about Tony Abbott wanting

to get the Japanese off the shelf subs.

Wasn't aware that it was, uh, Labor opposed that, so.

Yeah, um, and he just finishes off by calling Miles a dullard

and labour hack, elevated to high office purely by his geographical

origin and factional allegiance.

And I reckon that is all true and he's just captive to the, uh, defence force

and is basically just, uh, like a little puppet doing what they tell him to do.

So, Joe, did you put something up on the screen?

I missed it.

It was a quote or something?

Yeah.

It was John saying, I couldn't agree more.

Some of the stuff I've learned since joining the party would surprise you.

Right, there we go.

John, of course, our resident Labor Party man, or member.

Now, well, what does China say about all this?

China says they've slammed the plans by the federal government

to spend extra dollars on defense.

And they've urged Australia to abandon the Cold War mentality, which we are in.

End quote.

The Chinese said, We hope Australia will correctly view China's development

and strategic intentions, abandon the Cold War mentality, do more things

to keep the region peaceful and stable, and stop buzzing about China.

That's what the Chinese have to say.

Um, they must just, um, look at us and laugh.

In fact, uh, um, Oh, the other thing in this was, um, The defence strategy

that Miles announced includes a push to widen the recruitment eligibility

criteria, um, and they're looking, Scott, at allowing Defence to

recruit non Australian citizens.

What do you think of the idea of non Australian citizens being recruited

into our Australian Defence Force?

I don't know.

We've got to think about that because it's One of those things,

you've never had to do that before.

So, you know, is it a fast track to them getting residency here, or not?

That's how it's promoted in the US, when they have, when they have

allowed non citizens to join their armies, that they, uh, they do their

five years and that sort of stuff, they get out and become citizens.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, non citizens in that case is people who are second

generation, but not citizens.

Yeah, so they came over as children generally, isn't it?

It's sort of undocumented, second generation, yeah.

So, so it's not recruiting people from overseas, Joe?

No, I bet I'm just wondering, like It's people who've grown up in the

country, and are being recruited in.

So, so they're in, uh, Americans in name, or sorry, in, in spirit.

Hmm.

It's not going around the world and I'm going to go with Vietnamese

and he's over here and he's, um, a working visa and that sort of stuff.

And he, he came up here because that was a regional area and if you'd spend

time in the regional area, you'd get an extension to your working visa.

Now he's almost run out of that and he wanted to apply to go into university,

but they've actually started to crack down on that as a way to getting here,

permanent residency is getting through university and that sort of stuff.

And then you graduate and you end up.

Leaving with a degree and you also end up leaving with PR, but they've

cracked down on that, so he's talking about heading home now, so.

Hmm.

I was just wondering if he could join the army for five years, whether that

would be a way for him to get residency.

Hmm.

Hmm.

Yeah.

So, so we don't really have a large popular, population of people who have

been here since, Who would fill that same sort of role of being Australian,

sort of born and bred, but non citizen.

Who could be encouraged to fight as a means of getting citizenship.

Like it's a pretty crummy way of So do you recruit overseas?

I mean, I did meet somebody I think they've got to explain to us exactly

what they're talking about before we can actually Because we're just making

suppositions here, so we just don't know.

You know, and I kind of get Are they going to go over to Malaysia and

Thailand and that sort of stuff and say, you want to become an Australian

citizen, you've just got to go and join the army for five years.

Yeah, okay, but you know, we've got to make sure you can speak English

and all that sort of stuff first.

I've met, um, British soldiers who've been recruited, fast tracked out, because

it's deemed a friendly nation, but yeah, where, how do you go for recruiting?

And then there was the big thing in the UK about former Gurkhas who were not given

citizenship, having served in the army.

Yeah, and that was really bloody cruel, actually.

I think, I think Miles might be thinking of New Zealanders.

Well, he might be thinking New Zealanders and all that sort of stuff, but you know.

They're close enough.

I mean, we're always, you know, claiming New Zealanders as Aussies

when it suits us, but you know.

So, does it just be another example of it?

I'm not opposed to it.

I'm not opposed to it at all, but I think they've got to actually explain

what they're actually talking about.

I'm opposed to it.

If we can't rustle up enough people who want to defend the

country, then that's our problem.

Well, I don't really have a problem if we're going to import people

and all that sort of stuff to fill out the ranks of the army.

You know, look at it.

Joel in the chat room says there are plenty of Australian army guys

that struggle to speak English, especially when they're at the pub.

Yeah, I suppose that's very true, Joel.

You know, that's very true.

When they're at the pub, they don't speak English, they speak bullshit.

You know, it's one of those things.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Anyway, um, so, and also in amongst all that, um, Miles was saying that

China has employed coercive tactics in pursuit of its strategic objectives.

What do you think he'd be thinking about there, Scott, when he talks about it?

I'm not sure.

I mean, when they're accused of so many coercive tactics and all that

sort of stuff, I couldn't tell you what the hell he's talking about.

I think he's thinking of, uh, the Spratly Islands and the South China Sea.

Yeah, I understand that.

And the way that China has been building fortifications on them.

Infrastructure?

Yes.

On the various islands.

rocks and adding sand and soil to create ports and whatnot.

So I think that's what he's talking about.

And we spent some time in this podcast, Scott, years ago,

talking about international maritime law and economic zones.

And, you know, if a rock only appeared at low tide, whether that enabled you

to create an economic, an economic zone around it or not, um, you remember that?

Very vaguely.

Yeah.

Anyway, came across this thing, which was, um, by a lawyer professor, an

Irish professor of international law, Anthony Carty, and So, he's an Irish

professor of international law, he's now a visiting professor at the Institute

of Humanities and Social Sciences at Peking University, and a professor at

the School of Law of Beijing Institute of Technology, and he has delved into

the history of the of the treaties surrounding the Philippines with Spain

and the USA and also the views of, uh, the UK and France in relation to the Spratly

Islands and who actually owns them.

So he's basically looked through diplomatic archives and cabinet papers

of the UK and French governments over the last century to see, well,

what were these people saying about the Spratly Islands way back when?

And he comes to the conclusion that, um, in fact, the UK and France, its

senior diplomats, its government.

Uh, cabinet papers and whatnot, uh, basically pretty clear in saying that

the Spratly Islands belong to China.

And that, uh, uh, and also acknowledging that the USA has been encouraging

Vietnam and the Philippines to, uh, to sort of make claim on these islands.

Um, simply for shit stirring and causing problems.

So, that's a sort of a, a summary of what he found in the article and he, there's

various quotes I won't go into, but the really interesting one as part of all

this was that, um, so you may recall.

America and Spain have had their difficulties over the

years, especially early on.

And there was a Treaty of Paris, 1898, and that was the one where

Spain relinquished Um, it's empire to the US, especially Cuba, Puerto

Rico, Guam and the Philippines.

So that's, that's when Spain said, okay, we give up.

You can have this territory and the US gave them 20 million and

that was all signed in 1898.

And then, um, much later on in 1946, the U.

S.

relinquished sovereignty over the Philippines.

And in doing so, the Treaty of Manila in 1946 referred to the Treaty of Paris,

1898, when speaking about Well, what territory are we talking about when

we're talking about the Philippines?

And in that, um, Treaty of Paris The one where Spain gave up the

Philippines, which was then used by the US when it gave up the Philippines.

It's really clear, um, uh, the definition of Filipino territory

excludes the Spratly Islands.

Because they're located beyond the 118th meridian of longitude east of Greenwich.

And the treaty documents are quite clear that that territory

is not included in the definition of the Philippines at that time.

So I find that quite interesting.

And this guy has written a book which is currently in Chinese and there's an

English language version coming out.

I'm going to get a copy when it comes out, provided it's not exorbitant,

and tell you more of the details.

So So you're saying somebody implied by the Chinese government has found

in favour of the Chinese government?

I'm shocked.

Yeah, exactly.

And that's why I quoted, um, his credentials.

But when he can actually draw on the treaty documents, of 1898 and of 1946,

and point to the definition of the Philippines that was used in those

documents, which clearly excludes the Spratly Islands, then you have

to go, okay, well maybe he's biased in favour of the Chinese government,

but it's still a compelling argument.

Yeah.

He hasn't made up the treaty, it's there.

And he's very compelling, there's no doubt about that.

And he's got sort of, um, uh, documents retrieved from the

archives from, um, various people, um, ambassadors and others.

Basically saying it's Chinese.

So, you know, this is where if the source material matches up with the

argument, then it doesn't really matter what his sort of bias might be.

Um, I find it quite interesting.

So, anyway, dear listener, if you're in the, uh, if you're a patron, you get the

show notes with all the detail about that.

Yeah.

Um, Iran and China.

Ben Norton, um, uh, yeah, John Simmons says it doesn't matter who paid for

the research if it can be fact checked.

There we go.

Um, so we've got the U.

S.

Illegally imposed unilateral sanctions on China in violation of international law.

Uh, sorry, unilateral sanctions on Iran in violation of international law.

Um, China is legally trading with Iran, which it's entitled to do, and the U.

S.

Congress has just voted to sanction China for violating the illegal U.

S.

unilateral sanctions.

So the U.

S.

has told Iran, you're not allowed to sell oil, there's no international

agreement on this, it's just the U.

S.

saying it, which is illegal, and um, and because China's buying the oil, uh, the U.

S.

has decided to sanction China as a secondary item, so they just do

what they want when it's theirs.

Um, uh, you know, do you guys spend any time on Twitter?

No, very little.

It's gone to hell in a handbasket recently, hasn't it?

I think everybody should get on Twitter.

And just look at what is going on in Gaza and the images of these children

and their poor parents who are just cradling these dead and dying children.

It just breaks your heart and it should be on the first 10 minutes of every news

program in this country, but it doesn't.

They're just the most tragic scenes of, of people just having their final

cuddle with their, with their dead kid.

Or the kid is mangled and, and begging their parents for help and their

parents can't do anything about it.

Or a kid wakes up and their legs are missing and says, I want my legs back.

And just the most heart breaking stuff that we just don't see in regular media.

And it's all there on Twitter.

So for all of the terrible things about Elon Musk, and the way he's running

Twitter and whatnot, it is still a space where these sorts of things.

are, are shown.

And people need to see them to be reminded of just the cruelty

that is going on in that country.

Um, it just beggars belief that we are, we're all just sitting around

with our first world problems and upwards of 30, 000 people are just

being, systematically wiped off the planet and a lot of them are just kids

and it's so cruel what's going on.

And I think, dear listener, you should get onto Twitter and just start looking

around and reminding yourself of the cruelty that is going on there.

So Um, that's my recommendation rather than me showing it all to you.

Maybe I will in another episode.

I don't know.

Sorry?

Maybe I will, Graham.

I've got a bunch of the clips.

Maybe I will, just to save everybody the trouble.

Maybe next week.

And um, it's horrendous.

Horrendous.

But we need to see it to remind ourselves of the cruelty that's going on there.

Ah, fortunately though, apparently, uh, the U.

S.

has not violated human rights.

According to the U.

S., sorry, Israel has not violated any human rights.

Here we go, just listen to one of these spokesmen.

And to date, as you and I are speaking, they have not found any incidents

where the Israelis have violated international humanitarian law.

And lest you think we don't take it seriously, I can assure you that we do.

We look at this in real time.

They have never violated international humanitarian law, ever, in

the past five to six months.

I'm telling you, the State Department has looked at incidents in the

past, and has yet to determine that any of those incidents violate

international humanitarian law.

We just can't take, we can't take these people seriously.

Why are we listening?

Why are we allies with these people?

Oh.

That makes absolutely no sense at all.

Well, it does if you're just trying to cover up, because

you don't care, you know.

Ah, there we go, according to the US, Israel's not violating, well, they

wouldn't be able to sell them arms, Scott, if they were violating international law.

You know, there is one country in the world that could stop this,

that's Israel, and there's a second country in the world that could stop

this, this is the United States.

All the United States actually has to say to Benjamin Netanyahu.

Pull your troops back now.

And then they're going to fuck around for a couple of days, and

then after that, Joe Biden's just got to do exactly what George W.

said, well, for the last time, that Israel could either the West Bank

or Gaza, or Gaza, whatever it was.

He said, I meant what I said, withdraw without delay, and they

did, they did pack up and move out.

The or else is, we won't, you know, we're just going to stop supplying

you with money and materials.

Like, they just can't keep waging this sort of, um, battle

without, uh, the US arming them.

So.

Joe, you sent me a message about the Dance No podcast about Zionism, and I

started it, but I haven't finished it.

Okay.

You said you learnt things about Zionism that you hadn't learnt before.

Yeah, I mean, um, a lot of it was, um, stuff I'd heard before, but, um,

particularly, um, What I'd forgotten was the background of, um, the late

19th century Europe was a nationalism.

So historically Europe had been major empires and a melting pot.

The empires had all been melting pots of nationalities.

And suddenly in the 19th century you have Italy becoming a country,

Germany becoming a country.

Um, and a, uh, a wave of nationalism that people wanted their own country

depending on their, uh, background.

And suddenly the Jews who had moved to, um, Poland effectively in the Austro

Hungarian Empire were suddenly finding themselves, having historically been

considered, uh, as much citizens as anyone else, as being treated differently.

Um, and so they said, look, the only way we're going to stop this anti

Semitism is to have a country of our own.

Yeah, we're being treated differently, not because of our religion,

because these were secular Jews.

but because of our ancestry, because we're different, and so we need a place.

If, if the Germans are going to have a Germany, and if the uh, English

are going to have an England, then we Jews need a country of our own.

And so this was the beginning of Zionism.

And I forget, they were talking about over 30 or 40 different

places that were proposed.

So the number of places that were proposed, I think the big sticking point

was this whole, um, them wedded on the fact that Palestine was the historical

home and it was given to them by God.

And this is where all the trouble arises.

Whether, whether we could have found somewhere else that would

have been a good place for them.

But yeah, interesting.

And, um, uh, they also, so that was, uh, an Irish professor, um, talking on that.

Another Irish professor, was it?

Uh, yeah.

I mean, he's University of, uh, University of Oxford, um,

but yes, he was an Irishman.

And then somebody talking about the Galveston movement, where apparently

lots of Jews were emigrating out of Eastern Europe to the US, uh,

and there was concern about large numbers of Jews migrating to

New York, causing anti Semitism.

And so they were all, uh, brought into Galveston, Texas, uh, rather

than into New York, and then dispersed into the hinterland of, uh, the U.

S., which is why there are a lot of Jews spread out across the U.

S., because literally they said, we don't want an enclave, we don't want

a, uh, we want them integrated into society, America as a new country.

So that was quite interesting about the, the history of the Jews in the U.

S.

So anyway, that was the Dan Snow podcast and I had a flick through

some of the episodes and yeah, looked like there might be some worthwhile

stuff on there, so check that out.

Scott, we've got you for three more minutes, um, bearing that in mind, Scott,

um, uh, what else do I want to quickly get in here before we finish up, um,

There better not be any pro Putin stuff.

What's that?

There better not be any pro Putin stuff in this thing.

How about, just a quick mention, because we're talking about um, how we're

moving to a multi polar world now and the loss of US hegemony, and um, and

I was sort of reading something and it just reminded me that um, Because

what, what we've got now is, you know, the Ukraine has lost to Russia.

We've got Iran seizing US ships.

We've got Yemen winning in terms of its activities in the Red Sea.

Um, enough that the French basically had to pull their, their Navy out

or their Navy vessel or whatever.

And the commander was saying, I've never seen anything like it.

This was, this was tough stuff and we've run out of ammunition fighting the Yemens.

So, um, we've got Iran bombing Israel in retaliation for the Damascus

incident and sort of the US having to say to Iran, please don't bomb

Israel and, you know, or if you do, don't bomb them too much and trying to

find face saving ways for that to be.

Don't think the Iranian attack on Israel could be considered all that successful.

You know, the dome did work as it was expected to and that sort of stuff.

It did actually kick out most of the arsenal.

Yeah.

You know, it's Part of the argument is that Iran was just doing it as

a It was a face saving measure.

They were trying to save face because they had their Because their

population would say, what do you mean, our consulate's been bombed,

you're not going to do anything?

Exactly, yeah, so they had to do something.

Yeah, and they were warning everybody, we're going to do it.

So that's why all of the advices were coming through in the days beforehand,

for God's sake, don't go to these places.

Yeah.

You know why the embassy was bombed though?

Uh, presumably to kill some high ranking Iranian Officials.

But the why, why those officials in particular, because they were it's

enemies in it's been led, Israel bec, they were apparently the planners behind

and they provided the logistics behind the, uh, attacks in the first place.

The attacks from, uh.

Gaza.

So that's Israel's excuse as to why they bombed the embassy.

According to who?

Um, I think because they were the head of the Iranian Republican Guards.

And so it sounds like it's probably Israel who said these guys were the guys.

Oh yeah, yeah.

Yes, I think it is.

At this point, I can't believe a word the Israeli Defence Force says about anything.

I think.

Uh, there's a fair recognition that Iran is funding, uh, Hamas and Hezbollah.

Hamas and Hezbollah.

Well, but didn't you just say that they bombed them because these were

the guys who were responsible for planning the the attack or something?

Is that what you just said?

Yeah, yeah.

So that part of it,

I think that's just supposition.

Well, that's just a statement by the Israelis.

Oh yeah, absolutely.

That's their reason for bombing it.

Yeah.

So it wasn't, it wasn't out of thin air, is what I'm saying.

Yeah.

Now, I, I, I don't think bombing the embassy is the answer, but yeah.

It's not like it was just some random thing.

I think the whole point of the attack on the Israel, on the Iran, on the Iranian

embassy was to try and get the Iranians to hit back so that that would actually

drag the Yanks into a war with Iran.

Sorry, say that again.

I think the whole point behind the attack on the Iranian embassy was to

get the Iranians to hit back and they were hoping they'd hit back harder

than what they did so that would drag the Yanks into a war with Iran.

Maybe.

Don't know.

But anyway, this sort of, um, idea that now these minor countries are

sort of conducting things and the US, uh, is, is losing its power to stop,

you know, to throw its weight around.

And it's a little bit reminiscent of the Suez Crisis.

So, with the Suez Canal, Britain, France and Israel respond to the

nationalisation of the Suez Canal Company?

By the Egyptian President, Nasser, and they used a military

operation, this was back in 1956.

But the landing received international condemnation.

Under intense pressure, particularly from the U.

S., troops were rapidly withdrawn and replaced by a U.

N.

force.

Britain's declining status was highlighted, its Prime

Minister, Anthony Eden, resigned.

Egypt got ownership and sovereignty of the Suez Canal.

So, um, sort of it started off with Britain throwing its weight around and

trying to prove that it was still a force in the world, and it ended up being

sort of a defining moment where, um, sort of signalled the loss of Britain.

Britain, as a preeminent force, confirmed that it's lower status, that it couldn't

do things that it wanted to do, and it was a sort of a second tier world power.

So, yeah, just events of recent times leading to a more multipolar world sort of

demonstrating a similar thing where the U.

S.

is losing control of areas that it might have thought it had control.

That's my thesis.

Hmm.

There we go.

I don't think you're wrong about that.

I think that we are in the very early stages of watching America decline.

Hmm.

Yeah.

It's whether or not China actually wants to step up and become the

world's number one power, or whether it wants to remain number two.

Hmm.

Interestingly, it was a PR disaster for Britain.

Oh, it was, yeah.

Name the country that supported Britain.

France and Israel.

Sorry, besides those.

We couldn't say it.

Probably Australia.

Yep, spot on, Scott.

Yes, of course we did.

Yeah, because, you know, that was Bob Menzies and all that sort of stuff.

He was British to his bootstraps, you know.

Well, but also, it's the major trade route between the UK and Australia.

But if the Egyptians owned it, it was still going to be the major trade route.

It was just the money was going to go to someone else.

The money was going to go to the Egyptian government rather than the,

um, companies that owned and operated the, um, owned and operated the canal.

Now, you know, the canal was how old by then?

I don't know.

It was probably at least a hundred years old, wasn't it?

So they would have paid for it and all that sort of stuff.

So I just think to myself, yeah, I.

Britain never accepted the fact that they never really lost control of Egypt.

You know, they always wanted Egypt as one of their own colonies and all

that sort of stuff, but they never accepted that they, they never really

had control of it in the first place.

Mm.

Yeah.

Was the concern that NASA would shut out?

Countries that weren't friendly to Egypt.

Yeah, there was probably that concern too, but you know, I just think, well, money

talks and money talks and bullshit walks.

So, you know, if you've got to, if you've got enough, if you can control the flow

of traffic through that canal, that's what's going to generate the income

for them and all that sort of stuff.

And then they're just going to work out where to decide.

They've been bread and buttered on.

Are they going to actually, are they going to actually block supply of oil going to

Britain and France or anything like that?

Or are they actually going to allow it to go through?

I think to myself they're not allowed to go through because

it's where the money's coming.

Anyway, well, Scott, it's your bedtime and, um, and that's enough.

I've got stuff we can use for next week.

So, um, good on you in the chat room.

Looks like you've been, um, busily making comments there.

for that.

We'll be back next week with another episode.

Bye for now.

Yeah, that's a good night for me.

And it's a good night for him.

Good night.