SIEV-X: Another bombshell

The SIEV-X stalemate has been broken. Last night, the unthrown children inquiry released explosive immigration department intelligence assessments to Philip Ruddock which prove that the government knew from the day Australians learned of the sinking that it sank in international waters.

That’s right, it sank almost precisely where Tony Kevin alleged it sank, 60 nautical miles south of the Sunda Strait, and well within the defence force’s blanket surveillance surveillance zone, which extended to 30 nautical miles from Indonesia.

Unbelievable! Do we have another children overboard lie on our hands? Surely, John Howard will now have to explain why he said so categorically, forcefully and repetitively on October 23 that SIEV-X sank in Indonesian waters. This is the same day that the immigration intelligence said that SIEV-X sank in international waters. And what about the defence force? It has sworn black and blue from the beginning, as has defence minister Robert Hill, that defence had no idea of where SIEV-X sank, and that it’s only information came from a calculation it did in March which suggested it sank in the Sunda Strait. Yet inquiry evidence is clear that defence received immigration department intelligence. Lots of the text in the documents are blanked out, including, intriguingly, the External Distribution list! I wonder why.

The documents also prove the immigration department believed from at least October 19, when the ship sunk (survivors were rescued on October 20) that it was en route to Christmas Island, again throwing serious doubt on defence force claims that intelligence reports were too sketchy for it to actively search for SIEV-X.

The unthrown children report is due on September 25, after Labor shut it down for party-political reasons. But that date looks likely to be put back as the defence force has so far failed to reply to crucial questions on notice about SIEV-X.

The much-maligned Tony Kevin has argued consistently that SIEV-X sank at the spot the documents now confirm. Why the cover-up? Why?

Here are the relevant passages of the heavily censored documents released last night, new questions to answer, an interview I did today with Philip Ruddock, extracts from previous Webdiaries on the matter, Tony Kevin’s reply to Tam Long in SIEV-X: Truth is out there and SIEV-X comments from Daniel Boase-Jelinek, Peter Funnell, Marilyn Shepherd and Jim West.

***

In a covering letter to the inquiry, G.W. Petitt of the immigration department’s border protection branch justifies slabs of blacked out text on the basis “of national security, particularly the possibility of exposing collection capability and the need to protect sources from exposure and, in the context of the current people smuggling environment in Indonesia, possible harm”. So why blank out the list of departments/ministers outside immigration to whom the intelligence notes were sent?

Department of immigration and multicultural affairs, border protection branch, intelligence analysis section

Intelligence note 81/2001, October 19

Current situation

Abu Qussay’s boat containing up to 250 passengers that reportedly departed from Cilicap on Tuesday night (Oct 16) has not yet been sighted. It was expected to arrive in the vicinity of Christmas Island late Thursday.

IAS COMMENT: Abu Qussay’s boats often take longer to complete the journey to Christmas Island than those organised by BLANK for example, possibly because of the departure point (south west Java) and the prevailing currents and the use of smaller boats.

Assessment

The sighting of (BLANK)’s vessel north west of Christmas Island earlier today is probably the vanguard of the anticipated surge and will probably be followed by Qussay’s boat later today.

***

Intelligence note 82/01, October 22

Summary

BLANK boat, carrying up to 300 plus passengers, is probably the vessel moored off Christmas Island. The other vessel believed to be heading for Christmas Island, organised by Abu Qussay and carrying up to 400 passengers, has not yet been sighted but should be in the vicinity of Christmas Island if it was able to depart successfully from the Cilicap area on Friday morning (Oct 19). (THREE BLANKED OUT PARAGRAPHS FOLLOW)

Current situation

Everything, amounting to a page of text, is blanked out.

***

Intelligence note 83/01, October 23

Summary

Abu Qussay’s boat with 421 passengers on board sank last Friday (19 October) (BLANK) with the loss of possibly 352 lives.

Current situation

* Media reporting has highlighted the sinking of Abu Qussay’s boat with probably only 69 survivors from the 421 passengers that boarded the boat. BLANK indicate the heavily overloaded 19.5 X 4m boat departed Sumatra at approximately 0130 hours on Thursday, 18 October. Qussay was said to be at the departure. The boat apparently took shelter in the lee of an island at about 0900 hours due to bad weather. 24 passengers are believed to have left the boat at that time.

* At about 1400 hours on Friday, when approximately 60NM south of the Sunda Strait, the boat began taking water and finally capsized and sank about 1500 hours. The boat resurfaced and started breaking up and 120 passengers were known to be clinging to the debris. There were about 70 lifejackets on board, but were of such poor quality that they were of no use.

* Between 1100 and 1200 hours the following day (Saturday), 44 survivors were rescued by an Indonesian fishing boat and survivors were taken to a port near Jakarta. Another fishing boat picked up three bodies and a lone female survivor. The survivors are now being cared for by the IOM and UNHCR at a campo about one hour from Jakarta.

Assessment

The consequences of the loss of Abu Qussay’s boat and thew heavy loss of life are unknown. As a relatively small player among the people smugglers, he probably does net have the degree of protection other, more prominent and powerful organisers have. To this end, he may attempt to flee the country. Given the wide international coverage has had, the Indonesian Government can be expected to act, at least against Qussay…

***

Many new questions now need to be answered.

1. We know that on October 23, the Prime Minster’s people smuggling task force was told that SIEV-X most likely sank in Indonesian waters. The task force did not report to the PM that day, but John Howard stated categorically that SIEV-X sank in Indonesian waters. He did this in response to claims by Kim Beazley that the sinking was partly the government’s fault. I asked Howard repeatedly for the source of his information. He refused point blank (see below).

Did Howard receive the immigration department briefing?

Did Ruddock tell Howard he was wrong to claim SIEV-X sank in Indonesian waters? (Ruddock’s spokesman said last night he “wouldn’t have the foggiest idea” whether Ruddock passed on the intelligence. Ruddock claimed today: “Nobody was absolutely certain, the report indicated it wasn’t certain.” This is patently false. The report is categorical: “At about 1400 hours on Friday, when approximately 60NM south of the Sunda Strait, the boat began taking water and finally capsized and sank about 1500 hours.”

Where did Howard get his information from. Did he have ANY source for it?

2. Ruddock has NEVER admitted that it sank in international waters, and has instead tried to fudge the issue. But in the light of the new documents, he got himself into deep water on Meet the Press on June 23:

PAUL BONGIORNO: Minister, are you satisfied that the so-called people-smuggling boat ‘SIEV-X’ sank in international waters and that the Australian Navy could do nothing to rescue them?

PHILIP RUDDOCK: Let’s go back to what happened. The information that we get is never precise. It comes from a variety of sources and we seek to use that to deal with unauthorised arrivals. The fact is that a vessel did depart with a very large number of people, it was overloaded. There were reports after it sank that it had sunk in Indonesian waters, whatever that meant. Some people are tying to make a point that wherever it sank it was in some way a reflection on what Australia may or may not have been able to do. The fact is that wherever it sank it was in at least the Indonesian air, sea and rescue zone responsibilities. It was quite possibly within its contiguous zone and also quite possibly within the 12 mile limits. We don’t know precisely where it sank. We never did. But the assertion that it was in those areas for which Indonesia is responsible is incontrovertible.

Why didn’t Ruddock tell the Australian people the truth?

Did Ruddock advise the Prime Minister to correct the record and if not, why not?

Late today, I did an interview with Philip Ruddock.

I asked why the external distribution list was blanked out? “I didn’t do this. It was done by the intelligence section,”

I asked who was on the external distribution list. “I don’t know,” he replied.

I asked whether those intelligence notes went to the Prime Minister’s office? He did not answer the question, and said instead: “This document and those comments were based on a collation of media reports. The document was prepared at 2pm on the 22nd of October. I didn’t receive those documents other than by safe hand.” He said he did not get the document on October 23, or the next day, when he was in Penrith. “The document would not have been in my hands at the time the Prime Minister made his statements. It wouldn’t have been received by me on the 23rd or the 24th.”

I asked if he had advised the Prime Minister to correct the record once he read the document? “I don’t normally ring the Prime Minister about intelligence briefs that I received. They were prepared by my department for my own use.” Did he ever advise the PM that he was incorrect to categorically state that it sank in Indonesian waters? Ruddock said he did not. I asked whether he knew the source of Howard’s information that SIEV-X sank in Indonesian waters? “No I don’t. I haven’t spoken to him about it,” Ruddock replied.

Mr Ruddock persisted with his claim that advice on where the boat sank was contradictory. I said that the only advices made public so far showed that on the 23rd of October, both the Prime Minister’s people smuggling task force and the Immigration Department had been told, and believed, that SIEV-X sank in International waters, and asked what information contradicting this was received. In particular, I asked where he got the in formation that led him to tell Meet the Press that “it was quite possibly within its contiguous zone and also quite possibly within the 12 mile limits”.

Ruddock would not answer. He said: “Nobody suggested anything other than it sank close to Indonesia.” He said the intelligence document findings that SIEV-X sank in international waters was largely based on media reports. This is extraordinary, because Mr Howard claimed when I first asked him where he got his information that SIEV-X sank in international waters partly it came from “media reports”!!!!

I asked if the intelligence document went to the Defence Force? “I don’t know,” Ruddock said.

3. The defence force is in yet another tight spot. It argued from the very beginning that it didn’t have any information about where SIEV-X sank. When asked by Simon Crean where SIEV-X sank, Defence Minister Robert Hill replied in March that it sank “in the vicinity of the Sunda strait”. The head of Operation Relex, Admiral Geoffrey Smith, went further, saying it sunk in Indonesian waters IN the Sunda strait. I pressed Hill for the basis of this advice, and he finally stated that it was a defence calculation, ie a best guess, done after Crean’s question.

Did defence get intelligence advice that SIEV-X sank in international waters? I put this question to defence today. I have not received a reply.

Why has defence constantly stated it had no information or advice on where SIEV-X sank?

****

EXTRACTS FROM WEBDIARY

More threads in SIEV-X caper, June 16

Here, there, wherever

By Margo Kingston

The government yesterday backtracked on its claim that 353 asylum seekers on mystery boat SIEV-X drowned in Indonesian waters, outside the range of the comprehensive defence force aerial surveillance of international waters between Indonesia and Christmas Island.

Defence minister Robert Hill reversed his position less than two days after telling the Herald he stood by his March assurance that “all indications” were that SIEV-X sank in the vicinity of the Sunda Strait in Indonesian waters. Asked yesterday if “you still maintain that boat was in Indonesian waters”, Senator Hill said, “We – well we don’t know exactly where it sank – what we do is that we didn’t have a capability to assist it because we didn’t know where it was”.

The backflip exposes the Prime Minister to charges that he misled voters during the election campaign on October 24 – the day after Australian Federal Police intelligence said SIEV-X sank in international waters – that “it sank in Indonesian waters – it had nothing to do with the actions of the Australian Government”.

Senator Hill’s reversal leaves Admiral Geoffrey Smith, the head of the defence force search, interception and return operation ordered by the government after Tampa, with yet more questions to answer on the tragedy. He told the inquiry last month that SIEV-X “foundered in the Sunda Straight”, after retracting his evidence that the navy knew nothing of SIEV-X either before it sank on October 19 or when Indonesian fishing boats rescued survivors on October 20.

In his letter of retraction, he admitted he had done nothing to search for SIEV-X after intelligence reports on October 18 and 19 that it was reported to have departed for Christmas Island and on October 20 that it was grossly overcrowded. On October 18, defence briefed the Prime Minister’s people smuggling task force that two boats were expected at Christmas Island with “some risk of vessels in poor condition and rescue at sea”.

A spokeswoman for the defence force said the navy would respond to Senator Hill’s remarks this afternoon.

Coastwatch chief Admiral Marcus Bonser has told the inquiry there was no need for a special search and rescue mission for SIEV-X because “a comprehensive surveillance pattern was in place doing nothing but looking for those boats.” But Admiral Smith’s retraction letter said that on October 19 he had pulled back aerial surveillance much closer to Christmas Island.

Speaking on the Nine Network’s Sunday program, Senator Hill appeared to withdraw his ban on the head of the defence force children overboard inquiry task force, Admiral Raydon Gates, giving evidence on Friday on his review of all intelligence the navy received on SIEV-X before it sank. Last week he banned Admiral Gates giving evidence as scheduled.

Senator Hill said he would now ban Admiral Gates giving evidence only on alleged witness tampering of a defence force witness by Dr Brendon Hammer, a senior office in the Prime Minister’s department. Admiral Gates made the allegation of witness tampering in a memo to Senator Hill on April 29.

***

The fog of war, June 25

Last Monday I delivered written questions to John Howard, citing his categorical statements on October 23, half way through the election campaign and the day Australians learned of the SIEV-X tragedy, that SIEV-X sank in Indonesian waters. This was his big, effective counter to suggestions by Beazley that the drowning of 353 asylum seekers was the fault of government policy.

Here is the note:

TO: PM’S Press Office

RE: SIEV-X

I refer to comments by the Prime Minister on October 23 and 24, 2001, after the media reported the sinking of SIEV-X and the death by drowning of 353 asylum seekers. The comments concern several public statements by the Prime Minister that SIEV-X sank in Indonesian waters, including:

October 23, Radio 6PR

1. “It sank in Indonesian waters, yet Mr Beazley has tried to exploit that human tragedy to score a cheap political point. He implied that that happened because of a failure of policy on our part.”

2. “Well his claim that this illustrates a failure of policy on part of the Howard Government, that is a desperate slur. A desperate slur. This vessel sunk in Indonesian waters. Now I am saddened by the loss of life, it is a huge human tragedy and it is a desperately despicable thing for the Leader of the Opposition to try and score a political point against me in relation to the sinking of a vessel in Indonesian waters. We had nothing to do with it, it sank, I repeat, sunk in Indonesian waters, not in Australian waters. It sunk in Indonesian waters and apparently that is our fault.”

3. “Can I just make one other point in all of the interceptions that the Navy has undertaken, lawful interceptions we’ve undertaken, there’s been no loss of life, we’ve been very careful in relation to all of that. Now you’ve got 350 people apparently tragically died in Indonesian waters, we had nothing at all to do with it in any way and Mr Beazley is saying its our fault. Now I think that’s a rotten slur.”

October 24, Radio 6WF

“That boat sank in Indonesian waters, it sank in Indonesian waters. It had nothing to do with the actions of the Australian Government and he sought quite contemptibly to link that with the policy of the Government.”

I ask:

1. Who advised Mr Howard that SIEV-X sank in Indonesian waters?

2. When was that advice given?

3. On what basis was that advice given?

4. Why were initial reports from Australian Federal Police intelligence (October 23) and contemporaneous media reports that SIEV-X sank in international waters south of Java discounted?

On Tuesday, I received this reply: “The reports and advice available at the time indicated that the vessel had sunk off the coast of West Java in the vicinity of the Sunda Strait and within the Indonesian search and rescue zone.”

At a doorstop on Thursday, I asked Mr Howard whether he got his advice on where SIEV-X sank from his people smuggling task force, which briefed him each day. He said: “I’ll have to check my recollection of that … but my understanding is that the remarks I made on October 23 … were based on reports, you know, not only government reports but also media reports.”

Mr Howard also backtracked on his election campaign certainty – repeated several times from October 23 to November 8 – that SIEV-X sank in Indonesian waters. “There remains conflicting evidence on that but look, I haven’t made a considered study of it in the last few days,” he told a press conference.

The media reports on October 23 were sketchy to say the least – the boat had sunk ‘off Indonesia’, etc, and authoritative reports came after journalists interviewed survivors in Indonesia that day. The Australian’s Don Greenlees filed the most detailed report, published on October 24 under the headline “Overload kills on voyage of doom”. He reported that SIEV-X sunk 80km south of Indonesia, in international waters well within Australia’s comprehensive aerial surveillance zone.

The people smuggling task force did not brief Howard on October 23 that SIEV-X sunk in Indonesian waters – indeed it got a briefing that day that it sank in international waters.

I again asked Mr Howard in writing for the official source of his October 23 statements. I have checked every weekday since. This afternoon, I was advised that no documents have yet been turned up, and that I should get an answer on Wednesday.

Waiting game on SIEV-X saga

Outgoing chief of the defence force Admiral Chris Barrie: Some commentators had concluded that the position of the sinking of SIEV-X is known. The fact is the position where the vessel foundered is unknown and all attempts to estimate the location are speculative at best.

Today I went to Howard’s press conference at Sydney airport before he flew to Europe. Here’s what he said about SIEV-X.

TRANSCRIPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER, THE HON JOHN HOWARD MP

PRESS CONFERENCE SYDNEY INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, 30 JUNE 2002

JOURNALIST:

Are you now able to advise where you got the information on or before the 23rd of October that SIEV-X sank in Indonesian waters?

PRIME MINISTER:

I haven’t got anything to add to what Ive said.

JOURNALIST:

But you recall that I asked you this question last week and you said that you’d have to check.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well I’m telling, you I don’t have anything to add to what I’ve said.

JOURNALIST:

So you’re not able to advise –

PRIME MINISTER:

I’m telling you I’m not adding anything to what I’ve said.

JOURNALIST:

Why not Mr Howard?

PRIME MINISTER:

Because I’m not adding anything to what I’ve said.

JOURNALIST:

What’s your reason for it?

PRIME MINISTER:

I’m not adding anything to what I’ve said.

***

REPLY TO TAM LONG ON SIEV X

By Tony Kevin

It is hard to know how I can most usefully respond to Tam Long’s second effort to demolish my case for public concern about the sinking of SIEV-X. She is so fearfully verbose! I was taught in my thirty years as a public servant to be economical with the written word. Those skills have been reinforced by efforts over the past four years to supplement my retirement pension a little by writing commentaries that I try to sell to newspapers. Newspapers won’t tolerate verbosity.

So I’m not going to get into detailed textual counter-argument, but will just make a few key points. First: readers might go back and read carefully my 24 August text at the Pax Christi “Tampa and Beyond ” conference in Sydney on 24 August, which Webdiary was kind enough to run in SIEV-X: Mystery unsolved. Most of the answers to Tam Long’s criticisms are already there.

This is about a crime

It is not an intellectual policy debate about migration issues. It is about accountability for the killing of 353 human beings. To plead, as Tam Long repeatedly does, that we should see whatever might have happened in a broader context: that Australia shares a huge international illegal migration problem with other countries, and that whatever is done has to be set in context of the size of the general worldwide problem and what other countries are doing about it – is an ethical cop-out. I will not be drawn into that kind of argument here.

Actually, this is sheerest sophistry, of the same order as trying to justify the terrible crime of September 11 by reference to the grievances aroused in Arab and Middle Eastern countries by American policy errors in the Middle East. Like September 11, this is about killing innocent people or letting them die – very many of them, mostly women and children. We know these people now – they are not nameless faceless ciphers any more. Surviving victims of this atrocity live precariously among us. Please get real, Tam Long!

The premised basic decency of Australians

The argument that Australians are too nice for it to be thought possible that any of us would do such wrong things is unfortunately not validated by our history. Many decent people lived good lives in Australia while Aboriginal communities were being massacred in our frontier wars. Many decent people of my own generation lived good lives in Australia. while Aboriginal kids were being dragged away from their distraught mothers to grow up in cruel orphanages and exploitative white households under evil “stolen children” policies.

I do not have to posit a huge conspiracy to say that something clearly went very wrong in Australian government agencies’ handling of the SIEV-X affair. I only have to posit that a few people in key positions may have made decisions or judgements at crucial points in the People Smuggling Disruption Program our Federal Police were running in Indonesia, and in the border protection surveillance and boat interception operation our ADF were conducting at sea, and for a lot of others involved in these operations who might have got a whiff of something wrong to have simply looked the other way, for 353 people to have died.

It is already clear from Senate testimony that some people in the system were trying to behave decently: Commander Banks of the “Adelaide” (as far as his indecent instructions to keep rescued people on board the unsafe and sinking SIEV 4 until it sank allowed him), AFP Officer Kylie Pratt who phoned through to warn of risk to life on SIEV-X, Admiral Mark Bonser of Coastwatch who acted promptly on that warning, the head at the time of the Australian Joint Intelligence Centre ASTJIC who circulated this report into the operational agencies, RAAF Orions’ Commodore Philip Byrne who would clearly have conducted a diligent safety of life at sea search for the people of SIEVX had Northern Command alerted him to the risk to life. Others in the system – we’re not yet sure who – were less compassionate, at key points in the chain from intelligence to action. To posit this is not to posit conspiracy.

I have never claimed that Australia was solely to blame.

Australia’s now admitted People Smuggling Disruption Program was conducted on Indonesian soil and it required the active cooperation of elements of the Indonesian police and military whom AFP bribed – let’s call a spade a spade – to carry out people smuggling disruption program activities. The key point of AFP Commissioner Mick Keelty’s crucial testimony on 11 July was this: that AFP had no control of how their Indonesian police counterparts whom they had so generously gifted with conferences in luxury Bali hotels, patrol boats etc, chose to repay the general obligation they were put under by this gifting.

They also had no control over what informants like Kevin Ennis did. Keelty admitted that what these police and Ennis were doing was out of AFP control: and everything we so far know about SIEV-X’s voyage fits such a scenario, in terms of admitted previous AFP working relationships and patterns of behaviour in Indonesia. Yes, of course the grey boats in the night were likely to have been Indonesian, and from the same uniformed team who made sure the boat would sink. I have no argument with Tam Long there.

But this in no way absolves the AFP of responsibility. Professor Mark Findlay whose speciality is criminal law was quite clear on the Channel Nine “Sunday” program on Kevin Ennis on 1 September. Read the transcript on the website. He said that if Australian laws were broken in Indonesia , the AFP cannot claim as a defence ignorance of what elements of the Indonesian Police with whom they were working might have been doing to disrupt people smuggling.

The AFP People Smuggling Disruption Program in Indonesia is at the heart of the investigation of the tragedy of SIEV-X, because the Australian Government was the prime mover of this program and therefore bears some part of the responsibility for how it was carried out on Indonesian soil. The issue of failures in the surveillance and interception stage in the Indian Ocean is equally important, and that has been the focus so far of the Senate Committee enquiry.

The so-called Indonesian search and rescue zone is irrelevant to this debate

Testimony – by Clive Davidson (Australian Maritime Safety Authority) and Mark Bonser (Coastwatch) in particular – made clear that while there was a nominal Indonesian search and rescue zone all the way from Java to Christmas Island, the reality is that Indonesia had no capacity or inclination to patrol these waters in a safety sense. But Australia had that capacity and responsibility, as part of the massive Operation Relex air and sea surveillance and interception operation ADF was mounting in that same whole area, as close as 24 miles to Indonesia. The Indonesian government had no operational interest in this area of the high seas at the time – or now. Australia did, and does now.

Actually John Howard pledged when Operation Relex began on 2 September that this operation would be conducted with proper respect for human life. In the case of SIEV-X, it clearly was not. It is as simple and basic as that.

My credentials to engage in this debate

Alexander Downer would enjoy reading Tam Long’s views on this. These days, when Ambassadors can be sacked for getting the cars wrong, there is little status or security in being a minor or even a major ambassador. Centrelink managers have more security of tenure – decisions to end their careers might be less whimsical.

We could argue elsewhere about how important it was to represent Australia in Poland, Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1991-94 and in Cambodia in 1994-97. But more centrally to SIEV-X, I was trained in 30 years as a diplomat and policy analyst to analyse facts and claims, especially in written form. The very lengthy Senate evidentiary process has brought out important facts that are available to non-specialists in the fields Tam Long cites. I have studied those facts in Hansard and attached documents, and as an informed and mentally active citizen I have drawn reasonable conclusions and further questions from them. I am happy for my work on SIEV X to be judged by Webdiary readers on its merits.

Tam Long’s assertion that it is still not proven that SIEV X sank well inside the Operation Relex surveillance zone

That case is already proven. >See the PM&C People Smuggling Taskforce minutes of 23 October that the boat was likely to have sunk in international waters (these minutes have been on public record since June). Now there’s the new immigration department documents revealing that its intelligence reported on 23 October (to a wide internal DIMIA and blacked-out external distribution) that SIEV-X sank 60 NM from Indonesia.

***

Daniel Boase-Jelinek

Reading Tam Long’s response to the sinking of the SIEV-X I get the impression that Tam is not really sure what to think. The response was very long and seemed to be more of a plea for help in arriving at a principled position than an argument in support of the Australian Government’s position.

Tam’s response appeared to have three main arguments:

(a) the asylum seekers are at least partly to blame because they are “shopping” for asylum,

(b) Australia should not be blamed because other countries should also take responsibility, and

(c) it is not fair to blame the Australian Government because the full facts are not known

I would like to ask Tam to answer these questions:

(a) if you were living in a situation with no hope for yourself or your family, would you not try to escape by whatever means available? What right do we as affluent people have to condemn people in other parts of the world to lives of desperation?

(b) if you are one of a group of people witnessing a person drowning, are you any less at fault for failing to act just because other people also failed to act?

(c) if a Government actively discourages public servants (by threatening their jobs) from telling the truth, are we not entitled to disbelieve anything that the Government tells us?

***

Peter Funnell in Farrer, Canberra

I find it impossible to believe that any elected representative of this nation or any ADF person would knowingly contribute or conspire to cause the deaths of those on SIEV-X.

That said, I do believe your article in SIEV-X:Truth is out there is on the mark. The lies, obfuscation and downright unwillingness of government to provide evidence or witnesses to a committee of our Parliament, can only lead a person to conclude that something of great shame and concern did occur. The opening evidence by the Admiral that lied, then recanted, is just amazing.

I also agree that as this matter emerged just days before that election, it would have been handled by the same operational processes, same committee(s) and a number of the same cast of characters as the “children overboard” deception. The rules and expectations for government would have been well understood and distorted (perverted) judgement in ways that could not be predicted. A bit like an aircraft crash – when all the gotchas get in line you get catastrophe and everyone wonders how it could have happened.

The AFP link to this is troubling and hints strongly at other lines of inquiry.

Did the same operational processes that mangled the “children overboard” matter, simply ensure that they bungled the SIEV-X matter?

I hold no hope for getting to the truth of this matter, when the Committee was unable to get all the witnesses and all the evidence. Just as they did in the “children overboard” inquiry, the committee simply did not subpoena witnesses. The PM saying they won’t appear doesn’t stop them from doing so if the committee is determined they should give their evidence.

Why Labour ever allowed this to happen is beyond my understanding and I have no sympathy for their crying now that all has not been told. I find it difficult to forgive them and they have not acted in the best interests of our democracy.

Short of a giant whistleblower, nothing will shake the truth loose and that is awful.

***

Marilyn Shepherd

I am one of the authors of the article “Long comes up short on SIEV-X” in SIEV-X: The case for concern. I was going to launch a personal rebuttal to Tam Long and Ron Jones in SIEV-X:Truth is out there but have decided to enclose the following speech.

A SPEECH I WOULD LIKE TO HAVE HEARD ABOUT SIEV-X

The Australian Government and indeed the public have just become aware of the worst maritime disaster ever seen in our neck of the woods. Three hundred and fifty three men, women and children have perished in International waters off Java while trying to seek asylum in Australia.

We in the government and the opposition are terribly distressed by this news and must confess that we did have knowledge that this vessel may have left Indonesia. We had received intelligence that it was very overloaded and in danger of sinking but believed it had returned to Indonesia. Sadly and tragically we were wrong.

To correct that we will be immediately issuing visas to the survivors with family members in Australia to be accepted as refugees and ordering a full judicial enquiry into how this disaster could have occurred.

We wish to offer our sincere condolences to those who suffered terrible losses and take steps to ensure it never happens again.

Whoever is responsible will be punished to the fullest extent of the law, whether they be Australians, Indonesians or from other countries.

We recognise and understand that whilst it is dangerous to make this journey to Australia it is not a crime and that all people should be accorded their full human rights, be treated with dignity and respect and we all resolve to uphold that pledge in accordance with our obligations under numerous international treaties.

John Howard and Kim Beazley

Sadly, what we heard was Ruddock “they were trying to come here illegally”, “It’s the Labor Parties fault”, Howard “it sank in Indonesian waters, I repeat it sank in Indonesian waters”, “it was not our responsibility”, “Mr Beazley is reprehensible to suggest a failure of policy or to suggest that somehow it was our fault.”

And from Beazley, “That’s a tragedy but it points to a failure of policy”.

Tragically the seven survivors who eventually made it to Australia were forced to wait months in awful conditions, no inquiry was called and only happened by accident, and many questions remain unanswered.

The country I knew as a child, under the true Leadership displayed repeatedly by Sir Robert Menzies, would have made the speech I have outlined. My country today could not and that is the national tragedy which has arisen from the disaster of SIEVX.

***

Jim West

I am once again grateful to Tam Long for finding the time and energy to provide such a well argued, logical piece on the SIEV-X “conspiracy”. It is terrible to contemplate the disappointment she will likely suffer when she reads the inevitable follow up “rebuttals” to his position. They will be every bit as shrill and wilfully illogical as those he sought to answer.

I have no idea of Tam’s background, but she comes across as some sort of gentlewoman scholar who has somehow managed to avoid contact with, or at least remain blissfully unaware of, the mindset of the conspiracy theorists that he wishes to correct by way of logical argument. Nowhere is this more evident than in the obvious surprise and sadness she expressed in the following two paragraphs of her most recent piece.

“Call me naive if you like, but I find such claims counter-intuitive to commonsense, and Australia’s way of life. They are also a sad reflection on how bad history teaching in our schools has become. There is almost a complete absence of verifiable evidence or reasonable argument to support such sweeping claims.

Few of the supposed arguments pursue a logical line forward from robust factual analysis. Most seem to instead assume Australian guilt and only search backwards to select and analyse evidence in light of that predetermined guilt only.”

 

Perhaps I can serve to pro-actively alleviate Tam’s coming frustration a little by providing some background information about what he is up against.

I first arrived at University in the early 80s, from a staunch Labor background, imagined myself to be of the left, and that the left was the moral place to be, although I had no intention of being “politically active”. Science was far more interesting than politics for me.

An unexpected and unwelcome discovery for me at Uni was the alarmingly high number of people (lecturers and students alike, concentrated in humanities faculties) who argued their cases in such a shoddy, blatantly selective, and wilfully illogical fashion. Moreover, it was pretty much accepted by the post-modernist, deconstructionist, anti-anything-the-establishment-might-like-or-respect left, of that time, as THE valid way to argue your case.

Yes Tam, it is my melancholy duty to inform you that, for a great many of our current “educated elite” and moral guardians who came through humanities faculties, assuming a position and searching backwards to select and analyse evidence only in light of that predetermined outcome”, is not only permitted, it is expected. They have been formally trained in it, at government expense.

The attraction of such an “analytic system” is obvious. It essentially enables you to justify virtually any previous prejudice or belief you find attractive, against almost any amount of evidence to the contrary. A few examples of the amazing powers of self-justification and self-deception conveyed to believers in this system of logic include:

1) Facts: Communist countries had/have to spend vast amounts of money building fences, laying minefields, and shooting those trying to escape, to keep their populations fleeing to the capitalist countries.

True Believer’s Conclusion: Communism offered/s hope and social justice to the common folk, whilst capitalism offers only misery and exploitation.

2) Facts: Stalin was a mass murderer paralleled only by Hitler, with whom he heartily collaborated in both the dismemberment of Poland, and in the supply of raw materials to the Nazi war machine to destroy the western democracies, right up to the day of the Nazi invasion of the USSR. He greatly exceeded Hitler in his enthusiasm and success in murdering his own citizens.

True Believer’s Conclusion: It was morally imperative to aid Stalin’s USSR and its successor states in any and all ways possible (including providing the secrets of the atomic bomb) in order to ensure that the people within its vast post war zone of influence would remain subject to the workers paradise, rather than join the western democracies.

3) Facts: Australia has had one of the largest immigration programs in the world since WWII, which has been explicitly non-racially biased for over 3 decades, and continues apace. We have a large per capita program for PERMANENT resettlement of refugees, the vast majority of the beneficiaries of which are from racial and religious backgrounds different to the majority of Australians.

True Believer’s Conclusion: Australians are irredeemably racist, are becoming an international pariah nation on a par with apartheid South Africa, and deservedly so.

4) Facts: SIEV-X sank in waters that were within the Indonesian Exclusive Economic Zone, within the Indonesian area of responsibility for search and rescue, after being overloaded at gun point in an Indonesian port. The nearest Australian territory, a remote outpost, was roughly as far away from the area where the boat sank as Indonesia’s largest and most important city, Jakarta.

True Believer’s Conclusion: Any Suggestions?

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