Australians say "stop the war", Albanese says "catch the bus"

When the petrol runs dry, you will return to the scene of the crime.

The PMs national address fell short during such a monumental crisis. A crisis caused by an illegal US-Israel invasion of Iran that his government supported. (Source: Youtube)

“Australia is not an active participant in this war. But all Australians are paying higher prices because of it” echoed the words of Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese during a national address about the crisis in Iran and the consequent economic and fuel catastrophe that awaits. The speech was viewed round the world, but it fell flat at home, failing in the days that followed to meaningfully reassure a country at the bottom of a broken supply chain caused by a war that both Albanese and his government actively support, and leaving many Australians wondering: why was any of this even necessary in the first place?

The higher price that Albanese mentions is the economic meltdown caused by the US-Israel-Gulf war on Iran, and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz — a situation only made certain by the invasion he supports. The markets have reflected this position, with the record rise in the price of a barrel of oil only being matched by the record crash of the stock market and the abrupt disruptions to the global supply chain. The ‘active participation’ the PM refutes our involvement in is also one of the biggest national porky pies in the country’s history, and one of the most consequential.

“Australia is at war, today” — retired ADF Major Stuart McCarthy on the Bogan Intelligentsia podcast.

As the government attempts to square the circle to redefine the meaning of ‘active’, it was Australian sailors onboard the US submarine that fired the opening salvo of the war, sinking the Iranian frigate IRIS Dena as it returned from neutral naval exercises in India. From the moment the government hyper-extended to support the Israel-led strikes that opened the war, killing senior government figures, the leader of the Shia Islam, Ayatollah Khamenei, and over 170 school girls in Tehran, the Albanese government has moved in tandem with the invading axis. That includes coordinating data via US spy bases located in Australia like Pine Gap, consignments of air-to-air missiles to the UAE, the dispatch of an SAS contingent, and the deployment of an E-7A Wedgetail and an entire crew. This seems pretty active.

Albanese made his important speech to the nation on April Fools’ Day, followed by Keir Starmer and Donald Trump along the time zones. Fitting, considering the counterintuitive messaging piped from all parties. The former two indicated ominous times ahead, and the latter declared victory along with an escalation that involves a ground invasion of Iran. While the global markets pumped and dumped at what seemed like market manipulation and insider trading, rumours of peace from the White House that were couched in acts of war and talk of de-escalation ended up in skipping up rungs of the ladder and jamming the conflict into ‘forever war’ mode. The PM’s address was watched with bated breath, and frustrated sighs.

“We must substitute co-operation for competition and public service for private profit,” was what John Curtin said during WWII. In hard times you stick together. When the recession began in the 90s, Paul Keating rallied the nation around the difficult circumstances. “When you’re confronted with a challenge, unity is strength,” seeking to galvanise the country at a time of economic downturn. “The months ahead may not be easy. I want to be upfront about that. No government can promise to eliminate the pressures that this war is causing,” said Anthony Albanese after his government supported the opening strikes that began this crisis, making a statement before an international audience that amounted to taking the bus. That was about it.

Albanese’s speech seemed to be padding the ground for Netanyahu-Trump’s war for regional Zionist hegemony, like his government has passed the test for economically, diplomatically and militarily supporting Israel during its genocide in Gaza, or acting coy when the US kidnapped sovereign Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez. As Penny, Richard and Albo stay mute on the capture of Greenland, the starvation blockade of Cuba, the chainsawing of NATO, the favouring of autocratic sycophants who don’t mind crushing their people for end-stage neoliberal projects mainlined into the US, they stuff us into this horror by default.

Kevin Rudd hands away our trillion-dollar super fund like it’s a bottle of snake oil to Mississippi congressmen, Marles waits in the DC hallways for a chop out from the volatile Trumpian avatar Pete Hegseth, and Penny Wong puts on her wise nods when standing next to US diplomats in moral suspended animation, who flip words around about liberty and democracy while the whole world burns from the top of the Black Sea down to the Horn of Africa due to American design. And we haven’t even mentioned the trillion dollar tithe that is AUKUS, which is unlikely to ever provide us with the nuclear subs we need to not contribute active support in the future. Fair fucking dinkum.

As his nation faces a looming crisis not experienced in multiple generations, with the cockpit lights flashing one after the other, Albanese didn’t repudiate the warmongers who seem on the verge of escalating the conflict, he didn’t announce the need to strategically realign our diplomatic footprint around energy and common struggles with our Asian and Pacific neighbours, he couldn’t even vote in Parliament to tax the multinational gas giants that are taking our resources offshore.

Labor has squeaked out a small objection to the Israel-US war of aggression against Iran, purely out of economic concern towards its cataclysmic existence, but it has barely said boo about much else other than chiding Iran as some unreasonable actor who is bringing the world fuel supply to its knees for some vibe.

Senator Penny Wong@SenatorWong

I joined over 40 countries on a call on the Strait of Hormuz as part of Australia’s support for international efforts to reopen the critical waterway. I thank @YvetteCooperMP for convening the meeting with representatives from every continent, and organisations including @IMOHQ.

10:00 PM · Apr 2, 2026 · 465K Views

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The Foreign Minister’s ‘Dennis Denuto’ approach to representing Australia’s interests during this impending crisis was captured in a corporate action shot on her social media on a conference call with 40 western leaders speaking about opening the Strait of Hormuz as part of Australia’s support for international efforts to reopen the critical waterway.

Consent for the Iraq War was manufactured in the media-hyped aftermath of September 11, 2001. Consent came after the West had enjoyed a decade of neoliberal prosperity, while the West had the money in the bank and the international reputation lift in the tank. Not so now, after decades of polyshambolic omnicrises like subprime mortgages, generational housing affordability, years of pandemic, an overwhelming cost of living surge, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the genocide in Gaza, the unveiling of a global pedophile elite spending a few largely unpunished decades partying on an island, and of course the long series of dodgy American “forever wars” that consent was manufactured for. John Howard had times of plenty to draw from, but Anthony Albanese has that.

Maybe the ominously deployed Wedgetail can get a better view of the situation, because the government speaks of the Strait of Hormuz closure like some Iranian-manufactured Gordian Knot, and not what it is: a brutal invasion of a sovereign nation of which Australia is a participant. Seventy-five percent of Australians are against this war, and more opposed to Australia’s involvement — however active or not the government wishes it to be — and no classy action shot from Penny Wong or augmented sentence structure from our under-equipped PM is going to change that.