Planned US rocket base in WA sparks opposition
BY JIM GREEN
The United States military is planning to establish a rocket testing range in Western Australia, linked to its contentious plans for "missile defence" systems. Royal Australian Navy officers and US military officials visited north-west WA recently to scout for a possible site.
The rocket range, which could be built within five years, would launch ballistic missiles for US warships to use as target practice. The US wants the ability to destroy ballistic missiles in flight over the country which deployed them.
Australian Navy spokesperson Colin Blair said, "The Americans have been lobbying us over the ballistic missile test range ... They like the look of the north-west of WA, it is nice and remote and there is very little commercial air traffic. But the [Australian] navy is not interested in that. We don't see that as a major threat to our region."
Instead, the navy wants to set up a range to test sea-skimming missiles on the Beecroft Peninsula, near Jervis Bay in NSW. It plans to begin a feasibility study into the Beecroft plan in six months, with a view to completion of the site by 2005.
Since 1995, the Australian Defence Science and Technology Organisation (DSTO), the technology development arm of the defence department, has been involved in collaborative research on ballistic missile detection with the US Ballistic Missile Defense Organisation, which runs "Project Dundee" (Down Under Early Warning Experiment). In 1995, the DSTO fired a series of NASA rockets as surrogate missiles to demonstrate how they could be tracked. In 1997, four modified Orion rockets were fired from a coastal site between Broome and Port Hedland and were tracked by Australia's Jindalee over-the-horizon radar.
The proposed WA rocket testing range is connected to US plans for a "theatre missile defence" system in the Asian region, an extension of the proposed "national missile defence". In 1997, defence minister Ian McLachlan said that Project Dundee was aimed at developing a defence against theatre ballistic missiles.
In a public report, senior DSTO researcher David Cartwright said the research begun in 1995 "complements Australia's long-standing cooperation in the US missile early warning program ... The program is aimed at developing a defence against theatre ballistic missiles."
WA Labor MLC Tom Stephens said, "We want all the details on the table so the community can make an informed reaction ... While it may make sense to some boffins in Washington or Canberra to stick [a US missile range] in an isolated part of the world, it could kill the pearling, fishing and tourism industries."
However, federal Labor leader Kim Beazley said he had no problem with the plan for a US rocket range in WA. He doubted whether future exercises would involve tests over Australian soil because naval authorities were discussing tactical missile defence for warships. It would be more likely to involve testing at sea, Beazley said.
WA Premier Richard Court said there had been "zilch" consultation with the state government about the rocket range. Broome Shire Council says it will block rocket tests near the town because live warheads would be used.
Other critics say that regions of north-west WA are subject to native title claims and do not have necessary roads or infrastructure to support a rocket range. WA Greens WA MLC Giz Watson said the rocket base would contravene the 1972 Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty.