AUSSIE ACTIVISTS OCCUPY TOP SECRET PINE GAP US SPY BASE – First To Ever Face Draconian Charges by Murray Horton

Peace Researcher 33 – November 2006

The top secret US spy base at Pine Gap, near Alice Springs, is not only America’s most important intelligence gathering base outside the US itself, it is one of America’s most important military bases full stop. It plays an absolutely critical role in all US wars, including those being waged in Afghanistan and Iraq today. When President Reagan ordered the assassination of Libyan leader, Colonel Gaddafi, in 1986, the planes which bombed his palace (killing one of his children) were guided by information from Pine Gap. If the US ever wages a nuclear war, Pine Gap will play a central role in that too. It has been designated as part of America’s unproven Star Wars missile programme to intercept and destroy, in space, incoming nuclear missiles.

It has been controversial ever since it opened several decades ago and the subject of major protests (I went on one there in 1987). For details of the most recent national protest, held in October 2002, see Peace Researcher 27, August 2003, “Militant Protest At Pine Gap Warbase”, by Lindy Nolan and Murray Horton, which can be read online at http://www.converge.org.nz/abc/pr27-75.htm).

Extensive details about Pine Gap can be found on the Website of the Australian Anti-Bases Campaign Coalition at www.anti-bases.org.There is a longstanding New Zealand connection to Pine Gap. US Air Force aircraft carry vital supplies en route to Pine Gap via the USAF base at Christchurch Airport (under the umbrella of it being an Antarctic logistics support base). Thus Christchurch Airport, or Harewood, is a vital cog in the chain of US military and spy bases throughout the Asia Pacific region. The Pine Gap connection is one of the main reasons that the Anti-Bases Campaign calls for the demilitarisation of Christchurch Airport (see the article elsewhere in this issue for details on Harewood).

Unlike the Waihopai and Tangimoana spybases in New Zealand, Pine Gap is deadly serious about remaining top secret. Nobody is allowed anywhere near the numerous “golf balls” (the giant radomes concealing the satellite dishes); they cannot be legally photographed; no planes are allowed to fly over the base. The main gate is several kilometres away from the operational area containing the domes and buildings, so protestors who brave the journey of several thousand kilometres through the Outback into the very Red Centre of Australia can’t even (legally) get to see the objects of their protests. A permanent armed security force is stationed there to keep outsiders out.

Through The Fences & Onto The Roof

None of that deterred a small band of veteran Christian peace activists. In December 2005 they made that huge journey, openly stating that they were going to enter Pine Gap and carry out a citizens’ inspection. What’s more, they did exactly that. Here is what happened, in the words of Jim Dowling, from Christians Against All Terrorism:

“…On Wednesday morning we sought out Pat Hayes, the traditional Arrente (Aboriginal) caretaker for the Pine Gap area and asked his permission to walk on his land in order to expose the violence of the base which occupied part of that land. No permission had ever been sought or given for Pine Gap to be used by the military. However Pat graciously gave us permission to enter the area.

“Late at night on Thursday (December) 8th, four of us, Donna Mulhearn and Brian Law in one group and Jessica Goldie and myself in the other started the walk to the base from two different directions. We walked for five hours and three hours respectively. At 4 a.m. Adele and I came close to the first three metre high security fence. As we lay on the ground perhaps 500 metres from the fence security vehicles drove nearby with their floodlight panning the area. We thought they must have known of our presence and were searching for us. At least twice we thought they must have seen us and our attempt to enter the base was over. Later we realised their surveillance was routine, and they had miraculously not seen us.

“After two vehicles had gone Adele and I made the last 100 metre dash through the open floodlit area to the outer security fence. As Adele hung our banner “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE? YOUR BROTHER’S BLOOD CRIES OUT TO ME FROM THE EARTH: Gen(esis) (Chapter) 4: (Verse)10” - on the fence, I placed Jessica’s beautiful barbed wire crucifix against the fence. Then I cut through the fence. We climbed through and I cut the second fence about ten metres away. Again we climbed through and realised all the power of the greatest empire in history could not stop two untrained, unfunded, unarmed Christian pacifists from entering one of their most important and secure bases - even after we had told them we were coming.

“I looked around at the huge white domes and radar dishes around us. It was obviously not possible to climb onto one of the white domes as I had sometimes fantasised. Adele headed for a tower next to a building and climbed on to the roof. I followed. Once on the roof we placed photos, leaflets, and other information on the roof and gave thanks to God. Shortly after we watched, as a security guard on a bicycle rode around. We still had not been seen. But the guard then rode around to the back of the building and must have noticed the banner on the fence. Meanwhile Adele and I took photos of one another with a huge white dome behind us. The security guard came back in sight and quickly climbed a tower holding a radar dish directly in front of us. Amazingly (although by this time nothing would surprise us), he must have looked around for a minute before seeing us. I waved, and he scrambled back down.

Arrested By Armed Guards

“Within a minute there were a number of Federal security guards and police assembled below us. My response to the first one who asked us to come down was to inform him that we had come to inspect the base for terrorist activity and would come down when we had something in writing from the Commander saying we would not be stopped from doing so. A second guard angrily yelled at me that he was coming up to drag me off the roof. I responded that I would certainly not be surprised by violence as I was aware the base had been directly involved in the slaughter of thousands in terrorist attacks.

“Of course it is easy to be brave when you are “king of the castle”. But shortly a number of guards and police were on the roof. The first one said, “Get on your knees”. “That’s a good idea”, I replied. I knelt down and prayed that he would withdraw his cooperation from the violence of Pine Gap. Unfortunately, when praying, it was impossible to hear the instructions that were being given to me. This made the original guard who threatened us rather annoyed. Amazingly he used a new compliance technique with which I am becoming familiar “the old push the head into the ground and push your knee into the head” technique. Luckily, unlike the concrete floor last time, the metal roof we were on had a little give and I only suffered a bruised cheek instead of a bloody face.

“After being escorted from the roof and into a wagon we were driven to the front of the base, searched numerous times and driven to the watch house. Meanwhile Bryan and Donna had just completed their amazing walk. Bryan has health conditions which made the walk extremely difficult and any chance of running impossible. So they slowly walked the last stretch to the security fence, Donna dressed in black and Brian in his bright white “Citizens Inspection Team” overalls. This walk was truly amazing. A security van drove towards them. They waved and the vehicle drove on. They reached the first security fence, unchallenged by the numerous police and guards now behind it, until Bryan started to cut the fence with bolt cutters. Then the security forces realised Bryan was the “enemy” and called out. Bryan kept cutting until a security guard put his hand on his gun, and perhaps not coincidentally Bryan decided he had done enough inspecting for the moment.

“Bryan and Donna were “captured” by Ken who had talked to us two days before. Ken had totally lost his jovial sense of humour as Bryan was rolled roughly in the dirt. Donna and Bryan did not think it was the time to remind Ken of how we had all laughed together about his advice that trying to break into the base in white overalls was probably not very helpful for us. Later in the watch house we joked about how next time we should try it handcuffed and carrying tracking devices to give them a fairer chance of catching us!...” (e-mail, 12/12/05, “The Bush Track To Pine Gap”, Jim Dowling).

Facing Up To Seven Years Prison

Two other members of the group were arrested outside the base but were eventually not charged. The Pine Gap Four - Jim Dowling, Bryan Law, Adele Goldie and Donna Mulhearn - became the first people to ever be charged under the Cold War-era 1952 Defence (Special Undertakings) Act, an act which requires the approval of the Attorney-General for a prosecution to proceed, and which carries up to seven years in prison. They are charged with entering a prohibited area and causing $A12,000 worth of criminal damage to fences (that is the amount that the maintenance contractor, Raytheon - which is also a notorious US weapons manufacturer – charged the base for repairing three small cuts in the fences). The depositions hearing against the four took place, in April 2006, in Alice Springs. They used the hearing to try and question prosecution witnesses, such as the base’s Deputy Director (the top Australian official at Pine Gap) but he refused to answer virtually everything, even whether security guards inside the base ride bikes, on the grounds that Pine Gap is “classified”. The defendants made the point that America’s top spymaster, John Negroponte, the Director of National Intelligence, who is in charge of all 16 US civilian and military Intelligence agencies, was visiting Pine Gap just three days before they made their unofficial visit (for details on Negroponte, see the article on US Intelligence agencies elsewhere in this issue).

A further stage of their trial took place, in Alice Springs, in October 2006, involving the defendants’ attempt to secure discovery (get access to) Crown documents to be used in evidence against them; and concerning the suppression order (not to be confused with a name suppression order) which was hand served on all of them in September, and about which nothing could be disclosed upon pain of one year’s imprisonment. The judge ruled in favour of the prosecution, namely that the Minister does not have to prove that Pine Gap is necessary for the nation’s defence in order to declare it a prohibited area, but merely say that it is. Therefore the charges of breaching the Defence (Special Undertakings) Act stand, as does the suppression order. No date has been set yet for the trial proper but it won’t be until sometime in 2007.

They have no fear of being convicted and cheerily expect to go to prison. For full details of their case and a wonderful selection of photos taken while they were inside Pine Gap, go to http://www.pinegap6.org/. During the October 2006 phase of the trial there were protest actions outside the Northern Territory Supreme Court and at Pine Gap’s main gate. Five people, including Sam Land, from the NZ Catholic Worker movement, were arrested for blocking the gate.

The guest of honour at the protests was Ciaron O’Reilly (see above article), the Australian peace warrior who was one of the five defendants acquitted by a Dublin jury in August 2006 for symbolically disarming a US Navy plane (to the tune of $US2.5 million) at Ireland’s Shannon Airport, in a Ploughshares non-violent direct action just before the start of the war on Iraq in 2003. That was fitting as one of the two people originally arrested, but not charged, in the December 2005 Pine Gap action was Ciaron’s older brother, Sean O’Reilly.

ABC Solidarity Messages

In October 2006, I sent a solidarity message on behalf of Anti-Bases Campaign to Christians Against All Terrorism, saying: “We live in the only city in Australasia to host a US military base and one of its main functions is logistics support for Pine Gap. So, in a very real sense, your fight is ours also. Having been on a Pine Gap protest (1987) I admire your enterprise and determination in getting into the place. Good luck with the trial and even better luck with your campaign to close down this vital part of the US global war machine”. To coincide with the protest action at Pine Gap, the Australian Anti-Bases Campaign Coalition held a solidarity protest action at the Richmond Royal Australian Air Force Base, west of Sydney, which hosts the US Air Force Air Mobility Command, which flies the planes from the US to and from Pine Gap, via Christchurch and Richmond.

I sent a further solidarity message to the AABCC saying: “Solidarity greetings from Christchurch the Peace City, in nuclear free, out of ANZUS, New Zealand. Except there is a very big fly in this ointment, namely the US Air Force base at Christchurch, the only city in Australasia to host a US military base (and it’s been here for 50 years, under the guise of providing logistic support for peaceful Antarctic research). Our city and RAAF Richmond are bound together, as the USAF Air Mobility Command planes fly between the two, with the common goal of servicing the obscene Pine Gap spy base, one of the kingpins in the US war machine. We wish you all success in your actions at Richmond. Our struggle is yours – we campaign to demilitarise our airport, so that Christchurch truly is a Peace City in fact as well as name; and you campaign to get the USAF out of Richmond, and Pine Gap closed. All strength to your arm!”

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