Latest news with #JohnPowers
News.com.au
a day ago
- Business
- News.com.au
Former intelligence agent reveals big problem facing Australia
Australia risks falling behind in its defence readiness, according to dual-citizen and former US special forces veteran John Powers, who cautioned that the Australian Defence Force may not be keeping pace with strategic demands. 'We have not manned and equipped and sustained our military, our ADF, so that it can keep pace materially and capability wise with the United States,' he told 7News. Mr Powers, who served as a US special forces brigade commander and military intelligence specialist, warned that Australia could become a 'strategic liability' if defence resources remain stretched. Describing Australia's reputation among US planners he said, 'We'd always start to figure out how can we get the Aussies into the fray because when it comes to just grit and mettle and the intangibles of being a reliable solder, sailor, and airman … you could not have a better ally.' 'I think we've underspent on defence from the standpoint of we don't have the capabilities that we need to even defend ourselves,' he added. It presses the case US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth put to Defence Minister Richard Marles in late May: That Australia needs to increase its defence budget to 3.5 per cent of our gross domestic product, tens of billions more in military spending every year. On matters close to home, Mr Powers challenged concerns about Chinese control of the Port of Darwin. 'I don't think it's a big deal. This same company owns and operates ports in the United States.' When news of 2015 agreement broke he says he saw it as an intelligence opportunity to 'collect on the Chinese … see how they do business'. When the conversation shifted to Australia's submarine pact with the US and UK, Mr Powers didn't mince his words. 'I'm not an AUKUS fan. I don't think it's a good deal,' he said. He went on to cast serious doubts on whether the American-built Virginia-class submarines would ever arrive on Australian shores saying, 'I'm not confident we'll ever see those three submarines.' The trilateral submarine pact has been facing growing pressure recently due to limitations in submarine production capacity. The deal would see the US share its nuclear propulsion technology for only the second time in history, while helping Canberra develop domestic capability to build and maintain its own nuclear-powered attack submarines. In June, the Pentagon publicly announced a review of the alliance in what many reported was a dramatic move to force Labor to increase defence spending. Admiral Daryl Caudle, the U.S. navy's nominee for Chief of Naval Operations, warned the senate last month that the US industrial base must double its attack submarine output to meet commitments under Pillar 1 of the deal. Currently, the US builds around 1.3 Virginia-class attack submarines per year, but to satisfy both its own needs and Australia's, production needs to ramp up to approximately 2.2-2.3 submarines annually. 'The question of Australia's ability to conduct undersea warfare is not in question by me or by anyone,' Adm. Caudle told Senators, per USNI News. 'But as you know, the delivery pace is not where it needs to be to make good on the Pillar 1 of the AUKUS agreement, which is currently under review by our Defense Department.' The AUKUS deal would see the US share its nuclear propulsion technology for only the second time in history, selling up to five Virginia-class boats to Australia while helping Canberra develop domestic capability to build and maintain its own nuclear-powered attack submarines. Adm. Caudle said, there would need to be 'transformational improvement' order to reach the required output to build the submarines. 'Not a 10 per cent improvement, not a 20 per cent, a 100 per cent improvement. We need a transformational improvement and the ability to deliver twice the capacity that we're currently delivering,' he said. Australia has already injected hundreds of millions into US shipbuilding capacity with the Albanese government confirming an additional $800 million payment just last month – bringing the total contribution to $1.6 billion.
Daily Mail
2 days ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
Ex-military intelligence agent John Powers chilling warning about Australia's defence forces
Australia has become a 'strategic liability' due to its 'waning' defence capabilities and can no longer even protect itself, according to a former military intelligence agent. John Powers served as a US special forces soldier, brigade task force commander and military intelligence specialist in his career spanning four decades. In his final posting before retiring from the US government, Mr Powers served as the Chief of Intelligence Liaison at the US Embassy in Canberra, where he resides today. The dual US-Australian citizen issued some harsh truths as he called on Australia to increase its military spending in order to keep pace with its largest strategic ally. 'When I look at where I'm going to strike, I look at where vulnerabilities are because it's through those vulnerabilities I'm going to get to the rest of the force,' he told Seven News. 'And right now, to no fault of the men and women who serve in our ADF, capability-wise we're waning so... we're a liability. 'There are people who aren't going to like what I've got to say but it's the truth. During his tenure with the US military, Mr Powers helped to plan wars. 'When we would put together plans, we would start with Australia,' he said. 'We'd always start to figure out how can we get the Aussies into the fray because when it comes to just grit and mettle and the intangibles of being a reliable soldier, sailor, airman... you could not have a better ally.' But Australia's underspending on defence had detracted from its allure as a strategic partner, according to Mr Powers. 'We have not manned and equipped and sustained our military, our ADF, so that it can keep pace materially and capability-wise with the United States,' he said. Mr Powers went as far as to claim that Australia had lost its ability to defend itself. It comes after US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth recently called on Australia to hike its defence budget to 3.5 per cent of its GDP 'as soon as possible '. Australia currently has plans to lift its defence spending from two per cent to about 2.4 per cent of its GDP by 2033-34, from about $53bn to an estimated $100bn. 'I think we've underspent on defence from the standpoint of we don't have the capabilities that we need to even defend ourselves,' Mr Powers said. He added that it's not just Australia that needs to step up. 'It's a collective thing that's happened over time,' Mr Powers said. 'It goes back to the fact that we always know, not only Australia, if you pick any NATO country, they always knew the US would be there. 'But those times have changed. We're in a different world environment.' Mr Powers also slammed the AUKUS security agreement between Australia, Us and the UK, which Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has spruiked as a boon to the defence of all three signatories. While the pact is designed to deliver at least three Virginia-class nuclear-powered submarines to Australia in the 2030s, it is contingent on US security assessments. 'I don't think it's a good deal,' Mr Powers said. 'I'm not confident we'll ever see those three Virginia-class submarines.' Mr Powers urged Australia to deepen its ties with the White House, with Albanese yet to lock in a face-to-face meeting with Trump since the US President was re-elected in January. He called on Australia's Ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd, to step down, claiming his contacts in the US had made their feelings about the former Prime Minister clear. 'Mr Rudd should do the honourable thing and resign,' Mr Powers said. 'Mr Trump doesn't like him. And as a result of Mr Trump not liking him, nobody else in his administration is going to give him the time of day. 'That is a disservice to us as Australians.'
7NEWS
2 days ago
- Business
- 7NEWS
The Issue with Tim Lester: 7NEWS sits down with John Powers, former US soldier and Australian citizen
For John Powers, it's a tough conclusion to reach. ' Australia is a strategic liability because of the waning capabilities that we have.' Powers is uniquely placed to comment on Australia's defence relationship with our great security ally, the United States. 'We have not manned and equipped and sustained our military, our ADF, so that it can keep pace materially and capability-wise with the United States,' he told 7NEWS. At first blush, it sounds self-serving, delivered with Powers' thick American accent. It presses the case US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth put to Defence Minister Richard Marles in late May: that Australia needs to increase its defence budget to 3.5 per cent of our gross domestic product, tens of billions of dollars more in military spending every year. In fact, John Powers is a dual citizen now living in Australia. He also brings extraordinary experience to the question of whether his adopted country is a good ally for his old country. Now retired, his experience as a US special forces soldier, brigade task force commander, and military intelligence specialist stretched across four decades — from Grenada in 1983 right up to the first Trump administration. Among his roles, he was a war planner. 'When we would put together plans, we would start with Australia,' he said. 'We'd always start to figure out how can we get the Aussies into the fray because when it comes to just grit and mettle and the intangibles of being a reliable soldier, sailor, airman ... you could not have a better ally.' These days, he's not trying to recruit Australians. He's speaking as one. 'I think we've underspent on defence from the standpoint of we don't have the capabilities that we need to even defend ourselves,' he said. On other issues, John Powers challenges American views. Loading content... He waves off a Chinese -owned company's contentious 99-year lease of the Port of Darwin. 'I don't think it's that big of a deal,' he said. 'This same company owns and operates ports in the United States.' When news of the 2015 agreement broke, he says he saw it as an intelligence opportunity '... to collect on the Chinese ... see how they do business, to be able to cross-pollinate with the Americans.' Powers cautions Australians who say assets like Pine Gap — the joint satellite surveillance base near Alice Springs — make us indispensable for US military intelligence. 'It's more important to the Australians than it is (to) the United States,' he said. 'We have similar bases or similar facilities in England, Turkey, Germany, places like that.' Powers argues 'with technology nowadays, you can … bend pipe that stuff back to Fort Meade, Maryland, and it all can be collected there'. He sees greater value, from the US point of view, in Perth and its 'very significant' future as a rotational base for American submarines. But on the biggest of defence hardware projects, he's a pessimist. 'I'm not an AUKUS fan,' he said. 'I don't think it's a good deal.' He doubts Australia will ever take delivery of the American nuclear-powered submarines promised under AUKUS. 'I'm not confident we'll ever see those three Virginia-class submarines,' he said. Now watching the friction between the Albanese government and the Trump administration, Powers is animated by one other issue: the tenure of Australia's ambassador in Washington. 'Mr Rudd should do the honorable thing and resign,' he said. According to Powers, his contacts back in the US are utterly clear on the issue. The fact Kevin Rudd is a former Prime Minister and respected voice on matters regarding China is beside the point. 'Mr Trump doesn't like him,' he said. 'And as a result of Mr Trump not liking him, nobody else in his administration is going to give him the time of day. That is a disservice to us as Australians.' For John Powers, any issue causing friction between the country he was born in, and the country he says he plans to die in, is a problem worth solving.
ABC News
02-07-2025
- Politics
- ABC News
How we could end up with two Dalai Lamas
The Dalai Lama will address a major three-day gathering of Buddhist religious figures this week ahead of his 90th birthday. His followers have been waiting several months for the Tibetan spiritual leader to share details about his succession — a move that could upset China. Beijing views the Dalai Lama, who fled Tibet in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule, as a separatist, and says it will choose his successor. The Dalai Lama has said his successor will be born outside China and urged his followers to reject anyone chosen by Beijing. 'What's very clear is that there will end up being two Dalai Lamas,' said Tibet expert John Powers, a Lecturer in Buddhism Studies at the University of Melbourne. Butter lamps are offered in front of a portrait of the Dalai Lama. ( Navesh Chitrakar ) 'Tibetans are going to want to have a Dalai Lama because the Dalai Lama has been a very important person for Tibetan Buddhists. The other thing is that he's also very important for the Chinese Communist Party. 'So, there'll be one chosen by Tibetan Buddhist masters in exile, and they will follow the traditional methodology [to] choose somebody according to the standards and procedures that have been worked out over the course of centuries. 'And the Chinese Communist Party will probably come up with some sort of ersatz ceremony and they will force lamas to participate and pretend that it's a legitimate exercise.'' How is the Dalai Lama chosen? Tibetan Buddhists believe that enlightened monks are reborn to carry forward their spiritual legacy. The 14th Dalai Lama will turn 90 on Sunday, July 6, and has said he would consult senior monks and others at this time to share possible clues on where his successor could be found following his death. 'There will be some kind of a framework within which we can talk about the continuation of the institution of the Dalai Lamas," the Dalai Lama told a gathering of his followers this week, without elaborating on the framework. Robbie Barnett, a senior research fellow on Tibetan, Chinese history and politics at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University in London, told ABC radio that there's been an 'esoteric' system which has worked for 500 years. "Lamas look for divination signs ... mystical signs in lakes or in the mountains, messages from mountain deities that tell them where to go and look for a child who they then test and see if that child is the reincarnation of the consciousness of the former Dalai Lama," Professor Barnett said. "That's a process that takes many years.' Professor Powers also said it's an extremely rigorous process. 'It's surprising they do manage to find people who pass all the tests because it would be very difficult for somebody to just sort of randomly answer questions and pass,' he said. The current Dalai Lama is the 14th. He was identified when he was two, nearly four years after the 13th Dalai Lama died. He managed to pass every test offered to him and identify items belonging to his predecessor, reportedly shouting: "It's mine!" Are there any clues to who the next Dalai Lama will be? Professor Powers said one of things that the present Dalai Lama has made very clear is that he will definitely not be reborn inside occupied Tibet. 'Because, as he says, the main work of the next incarnation of any reincarnating lama is to carry on the unfinished work of the predecessor. And he says that would be impossible in Chinese occupied Tibet,' he said. Tibetan Buddhists believe that after death a person's consciousness transmigrates to a new body. For most people, this happens involuntarily, but advanced masters can choose their life situations, said Professor Powers. These are referred to as "tulkus" ("emanation bodies"). Traditionally, tulkus have exercised ultimate authority over their own successions. Many lamas issue predictions regarding the circumstances of their rebirths, including place and timing. The Panchen Lama precedent In 1995, the Dalai Lama issued a proclamation that a Tibetan boy named Gendün Chökyi Nyima was the Panchen Lama, the second-most prominent reincarnate lama in his order, the Geluk. China responded by arresting the boy, then six years old, along with his family. They have not been seen since. Gyaltsen Norbu, the Chinese government-appointed 11th Panchen Lama, presents a hada to Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Zhongnanhai leadership compound in Beijing on Friday, June 6, 2025. ( Xinhua via AP: Xie Huanchi ) Beijing found its own Panchen Lama, who is dismissed as an imposter by many Tibetans at home and in exile, according to Professor Powers. 'But he is often quoted in China's state-run media toeing the Communist Party's line and praising its policies in Tibet.'' How Beijing has boxed itself in The Chinese Communist Party official law says that if a Dalai Lama (or other Buddhist leaders) are not recognised by the Communist Party, then they're not true reincarnations, said Professor Powers. 'They've basically boxed themselves into a cognitive and conceptual corner. 'The thing that's important here is that the Chinese Communist Party is materialist. They don't believe there's such a thing as reincarnation. 'And so they can't claim that the person that is chosen is the reincarnation of Tenzin Gyatso, the present Dalai Lama, because they don't believe that's even possible. 'From the point of view of the Chinese Communist Party, naming somebody Dalai Lama is a prerogative that the government has because it's the government. "It has no more significance in a religious sense than calling somebody a postmaster. 'They don't believe that this person actually is a reincarnated consciousness of the predecessor. And from the point of view of Tibetan Buddhists, that's the only reason why the Dalai Lama is important, not because of that title.'' Professor Barnett said China is demanding complete control of the process. "Apparently, because they want to have a Dalai Lama in the future who will tell Tibetans that they should be loyal to China and should accept Chinese rule. 'So this is all a political power play, but it's very high stakes.'
Yahoo
06-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Here's all the advice 3 blockchain detectives have on how to protect yourself from crypto scammers
Crypto scams are becoming more sophisticated. Scam activity in the crypto world has grown 24% annually since 2020. Losses from crypto fraud reached $3.96 billion in 2023, up 335% from 2021. Crypto scams are booming. Luckily, there are crypto detectives and blockchain sleuths who track down stolen funds and help those who suspect they've been defrauded. The business of these investigators has flourished in recent years, three of them told Business Insider, in part because scams in the crypto sphere are becoming more sophisticated and even harder for even intelligent, computer-savvy people to avoid. Cryptocurrency crime has skyrocketed in recent years. Losses stemming from crypto investment frauds, the most common type of crypto scam, ballooned to $3.96 billion in 2023, according to data from the FBI, up 335% in two years. Scam activity has grown an average of 24% year-over-year since the pandemic, with bad actors likely pulling in a record $12.4 billion in revenue last year, according to estimates from the analytics firm Chainalysis. Here are investigators' top tips on how you can protect yourself from crypto scammers. First things first: be aware that talking to strangers on the internet isn't exactly safe to begin with. The vast majority of fraud takes place online — a digital jungle where it's hard, even for intelligent, experienced investors to tell what's a hoax and what's the real deal, according to John Powers, the president of the financial investigations firm Hudson Intelligence. Powers, who worked as a PI for years prior to doing investigative work on the blockchain, thinks scams are becoming so good they're defining a new era of con-artistry. "We've moved beyond the Nigerian 419 scams where the prince was contacting you by email," Powers told BI in an interview. "We're in a much different and more subtle and sophisticated place now. And it turns out that chatting online with random strangers is not necessarily a low-risk activity, especially if that seeming casual contact is actually just the tip of the spear." He recommends people maintain healthy skepticism, particularly when talking to people or making investments online. The risk is evident in the numbers. Pig butchering scams — one type of fraud where a scammer establishes an online relationship with someone before asking them to invest or send money — have been on the rise, with revenue from this type of fraud soaring 40% in 2024, according to Chainalysis. Joe Greenfield, the chief forensic examiner at the investigative firm Maryman, strongly urges investors not to take anything at face value. Before sending over any info or money on the blockchain, you should check out everything you can about the situation, like researching the investment, calling the person directly, or even showing the exchange to another person in your life to get another pair of eyes on the situation. "Assume in today's day and age that everything is a fraud. Everything's a scam until you prove otherwise to yourself," Greenfield said. There's no such thing as a crypto exchange withholding your funds for tax reasons. There's also no such thing as an exchange requiring you to send in a fee in order to withdraw your money. But those are common examples of fraudulent expenses scammers come up with to extort money out of their victims, according to Kyla Curley, a partner at the professional services firm StoneTurn who frequently investigates financial fraud. Curley says she often sees clients who had been unknowingly defrauded for months, due to a scammer repeatedly making small financial asks. In pig butchering schemes, victims can also be roped into fake relationships that involve sending payments for months — or sometimes, years —before victims finally realize they've been scammed, Greenfield adds. "It can drag for some time before people realize, like, oh shoot. They're asking me for more money again. Maybe this isn't right." One nightmare scenario Greenfield frequently investigates is when investors wake up and realize that their crypto wallets have been emptied overnight. In many cases, the theft was made possible by cybersecurity weaknesses within the person's crypto storage, such as by using a cloud-based wallet, weak passwords, and setting up SMS authentication instead of an app-based verification method. For the strongest security, he recommends using a cold storage wallet, using app-based authentication on sensitive accounts when possible, and following best-practices when it comes to picking a password. "We've seen hundreds of millions of dollars stolen that way," he said of cases stemming from cybersecurity vulnerabilities. Fraud victims, often strung along for months, frequently come to the realization that they've been scammed far too late. Sometimes, they choose to remain silent and not get help due to embarrassment or shame, Powers said. But it's most useful if people get help right away. "The sooner, the better, the faster that we can try to work with the client, try to work with the online provider if they've got one for these online wallets and their legal counsel," Greenfield said. Curley says scam victims will also need the help of an attorney or law enforcement if they hope to recover some of their funds. Once an investigation finds a wallet on an exchange with the stolen funds, the exchange needs a subpoena order to release private information about who owns the wallet. Be aware of how costly help could be. It's common for attorney and investigator fees to rack up in the thousands, according Powers. He added that his firm typically does not take on fraud victims who have lost less than $100,000 in crypto, which he said was in clients' financial best interests. Curley estimates that around 20% of cases she oversees will end with a client getting at least some money back. Unfortunately, Curley also expects scams to become more sophisticated and damaging over time, due to how rapidly scams evolve. "It's really, really hard for probably 90% of the population to identify or even be in tune with," she said of the sophistication of some scams out there. "I think, again, with AI, we all know that's just going to get much much worse." Read the original article on Business Insider
