Dr Mike Gilligan has reminded us that Australia’s defence and foreign policies are pulling in opposite directions: we preach “equilibrium” in the Pacific while binding ourselves ever more tightly to Washington’s war plans against China. His warning is timely, but we must go further.

The central fact that should guide our policy is not whether US hegemony is fading, but that by 2050 it will be quantitively and qualitatively different and diminished to the point where it cannot sustain anything like the dominance it enjoyed after 1945.

That certainty clarifies our task in the present. We cannot act as though the US of 1945 or even 2025 will be the US of 2050. The trajectory of decline is locked in across economic, military, and diplomatic metrics. By mid-century, multipolarity will not be a possibility, but a reality. To ignore this is to sleepwalk into dependency.

The false comfort of AUKUS

Instead of facing this shift, Canberra has sunk billions into AUKUS submarines and US-centric integration. This is not strategy, but denial. It imagines that anchoring ourselves to the very power in decline will somehow insulate us from its fall. In reality, it magnifies our exposure. Defence Minister Marles speaks of “interoperability”; what he means is subordination.

The price is not only measured in dollars but in foregone choices. Every billion funnelled to nuclear submarines is a billion not invested in climate adaptation, housing, or the value-adding industries that could place Australia in the high-skill, high-wage core of the world economy. The opportunity cost is staggering.

A semi-peripheral trap

World-systems analysis helps us see the danger clearly. Australia has long been a rich but semi-peripheral economy: dependent on commodity exports, vulnerable to global price swings and slow to build the advanced industries that drive real thriving and sovereignty. Locking ourselves into US military supply chains deepens this trap. It ensures we remain a resource appendage and a garrison rather than an innovator.

By 2050, when the US share of global GDP and military dominance has further ebbed, our dependency will look less like an alliance and more like liability. We risk being drawn into conflicts not of our choosing with a patron unable to guarantee victory. That is the very definition of insecurity.

The Pacific contradiction

Gilligan is also right to highlight our contradictions in the Pacific. We claim partnership while echoing Washington’s hostility to China. We profit from China’s growth while urging our neighbours to fear it.

The result is mistrust. Pacific nations want climate action, resilient infrastructure, and genuine co-ownership of projects. Instead, we offer talking points shaped in Washington. It is no wonder our credibility suffers.

Acting on the 2050 premise

So what should we do? The first step is clarity: assume US hegemony will be decisively diminished by 2050. From that premise, certain “no-regrets” moves follow:

• Re-scope defence to genuine defence of Australia — autonomous systems, cyber, sensors, northern bases — rather than prestige submarines designed for US power projection.

• Cap the defence industry’s share of industrial policy and ring-fence funds for climate, housing, and sustainable industries.

• Build sovereign economic strength in green iron, batteries, grid technologies, medical devices, and housing construction systems – industries that will matter in a multipolar economy.

• Diversify finance and trade by developing multi-currency settlement options and expanding Export Finance Australia as a genuine development financier for the Pacific.

• Deliver in the Pacific what island nations actually ask for: climate resilience, water, housing, and connectivity. That builds trust no alliance slogan can.

A democratic reckoning

Fifteen years of bipartisan and increasing subservience to US planning have narrowed our options, but they have not eliminated them. What is missing is democratic debate. We need a citizens’ security compact that defines security in terms of food, water, housing, energy and climate as much as submarines. And we need an independent national review that sets out a sovereign course in light of the 2050 reality.

Conclusion

The decline of US primacy is not a question for academic speculation. It is the condition under which we will live and make policy. To continue as if Washington’s dominance will endure is to abdicate responsibility. Australia must act now to rebalance our defence, investing in our sovereign economy and earning credibility in our region because by 2050 the world will have changed beyond recognition. The only question is whether we will have changed with it, or remained a pawn in another empire’s endgame.

The views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.