Back to the bases

Abstract

When Barack Obama visited Australia in November 2011, he and Julia Gillard announced a new level of military cooperation between the United States and Australia. The public centre-piece of the 'announceables' from Obama's visit was the planned deployment of a US Marine Air-Ground Task Force (MAGTF) to Darwin. Less attention was paid to the second part of the Obama-Gillard announcement describing more use of Australian air bases by US aircraft: more visits, more frequently, by a wider range of aircraft. No detail was provided as to which aircraft or which bases, but already US strategic B-52 and B-2 bombers based in Guam and the United States practise long-range bombing at the huge ADF (Austr..