“Australia with the Pacific”
or “Australia and the Pacific”?

A Pacific response to Australia’s AUKUS nuclear legacy and the Labor Party’s  “Australia and the Pacific” resolution

By Mere Tuilau

The Pacific is not a theatre for great-power militarisation or a dumping ground for nuclear legacies.

Our region, forged in the fires of nuclear testing, has not forgotten. 315 nuclear weapons were tested across the Pacific. Islands were scarred. Waters poisoned, communities displaced, and generations traumatised. Families still live with the consequences.

In response, Pacific nations chose a different path. The South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty (Treaty of Rarotonga), signed in 1985, committed our region to remain free of nuclear explosive devices and radioactive waste dumping. The commitment lives on in the Blue Pacific and the vision of an Ocean of Peace – born not from abstract ideals, but from lived pain.

AUKUS and the Pacific’s Reality

Australia’s AUKUS nuclear-powered submarine program now directly challenges this hard-won regional stance. 

While Australia, United Kingdom and the United States (AUKUS) argue the program is consistent with the Rarotonga Treaty and the NPT— based on the distinction between nuclear propulsion and nuclear explosive devices – legality does not equal legitimacy. Something can be legally permissible yet politically unacceptable, environmentally reckless, and morally troubling for the region most affected.

The risks are concrete. Each Virgina-class submarine is estimated to leave behind approximately 400 kilograms of highly enriched uranium (HEU) enriched to around 80 percent. The IAEA considers just 25 kilograms of contained uranium-235 a significant quantity for a nuclear weapon. By the end of the century, Australia could manage enough weapons-usable material in spent fuel for more than 100 nuclear weapons by IAEA benchmarks. This legacy will outlast every current government and generation. 

Australia has struggled for decades to find a permanent solution for even low-level nuclear waste. It now intends to manage a far worse nuclear burden on sovereign territory, with limited transparency and no genuine Pacific consultation. It has never gained the consent of Aboriginal Traditional Owners or the social licence from the wider Australian public to dump long-lived nuclear waste on Country, despite repeated attempts over many years. Trust is not a waste management plan. Classified information is not accountability. 

Why should a region that has already suffered nuclear testing be expected to accept new proliferation, environmental, and security risks without meaningful participation? Our lives, our health, our ocean, and our future are not negotiable.

A Clear Contradiction with Labor’s Commitments

This creates a bleak contradiction with the Australian Labor Party’s own stated values. At its recent National Conference, Labor passed the “Australia and the Pacific” resolution, moved by Joanne Ryan MP. It speaks powerfully of Pacific-led solution, trust, regionalism, partnership, and a peaceful, stable region. 

Yet Australia cannot credibly champion a Pacific-led future while advancing a program that increases nuclear risks in our waters without our consent. It cannot speak vuvale, partnership and family while treating Pacific nations as strategic assets rather than equal partners. Narrow legal compliance with Rarotonga is no substitute for honouring its spirit.

Security for Whom?

Australia’s security cannot be separated from the security of the Pacific. True regional security must include peace, climate justice, environmental restoration, decolonisation, and healing from nuclear legacies – not just military hardware. 

If Australia is prepared to invest hundreds of billions of dollars in AUKUS, it must show the same political will and financial commitment to climate justice, environmental restoration, support nuclear victims, and the resilience of the Blue Pacific. Security cannot be measured solely by submarines while our communities drown, our lands remain poisoned, and the wounds of nuclear colonialism go unhealed.

The Pacific will not serve as a military frontier for great-power rivalry. We will not become a nuclear buffer zone or the custodians of another generation’s radioactive legacy. Our ocean is not a strategic corridor– it is our ancestor, our identity, our livelihood, and our sacred duty to those yet unborn. 

From a Pacific perspective, AUKUS is not a benign defence pact. It is the continuation of an outdated logic that asks our region to absorb the risks while others claim the protection. That is not partnership. It is nuclear colonialism in new clothing. 

Australia now faces a defining choice: walk with the Pacific in true respect, justice and shared humanity–or pursue AUKUS and watch trust crumble. It cannot do both.

The Pacific has already paid dearly for the nuclear age. We will not pay for the next one.

Our Blue Pacific Continent is not negotiable. Our sovereignty is not negotiable. Our ocean is not negotiable. And our children’s future must never become collateral damage in another power’s quest for Military supremacy.