Richard Marles’ double-speak knows no bounds. His national strategy is entirely contrived to deliver “projection” for America’s ends, without mentioning that Australia is now merely one cog in the unfolding US war machinery across the periphery of Asia. Which is what Paul Keating is saying.
Former prime minister Paul Keating has been chipping away at the Albanese Government’s unswerving embrace of AUKUS. And now a parade of prominent Australians, of recognised policy gravitas, is joining Keating in his standoff. From Gareth Evans to Ross Garnaut, to prominent academics and thinkers. Keating most recently described the US as an aggressive ally, declaring Australia would be better left alone than being protected by America and becoming the 51st State of America with military control being handed over to Washington.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese responded, but did not address Keating’s claims, merely observing the world is different. The world has changed between 1996 and 2024, and my government is doing what we need to do today. That’s all. Nothing about the way the world has changed, never mind why the government is doing what it’s doing. But Albanese happens to be right that things have changed since 1996. Two geostrategic milestones in that period say it all.
The venerable Owen Harries treated Australians to a geopolitically astute ABC Boyer Lecture on the United States in 2003 entitled Benign or Imperial? Here Harries argues the presidential statement of 2002 entitled “The National Security Strategy Of the USA” is without doubt the most important statement about American foreign policy, not just since the terrorist attack or since the end of the Cold War, but since the enunciation of the Truman Doctrine in 1947, for it spells out how the US intends to use its hegemonic power. US military will be an indispensable instrument for the creation of a new order to be used actively and assertively.
The US had no doubt about its power: Our forces will be strong enough to discourage potential adversaries from pursuing a military build-up in hopes of surpassing or equalising the power of the US.
The second milestone came with the Obama administration. By then, America had grasped the growing power of China and knew it could not stand alone. A presidential pivot to Asia was proclaimed, which relied on allies to enforce US hegemony across Asia, principally Japan, the Philippines and Australia at that point. Australia galloped into line. Obama was applauded by Australia’s Parliament, as he received the keys to exploiting our defences to America’s ends. Prime Minister Julia Gillard saw votes, in vain.
This is the change since 1996 which Albanese is unable to talk about. America’s security bedrock is global hegemony.
The tragedy is that Albanese shows no awareness of what has been lost by Australia since 1996. He must be judged against what he is forsaking, not just his duplicity in what he is doing now.
Let’s revisit what happened in the 20 years before 1996. At the beginning, Defence Minister Denis Killen released Australia’s first-ever White Paper on defence, the product of serious thinking begun in Whitlam’s years. The objective was to direct a disparate military away from a patchwork of imperial dependencies into a unified capability focusing on defending Australia, independently. It proposed a barely believable, bipartisan revolution in policy, practice, effect and affordability. The ensuing 20 years delivered that revolution. The tyranny of our vast sovereign spaces and approaches was inverted to our advantage, through homegrown, unique fusion of technology and our ionospheric heavens. Australia’s specific needs became priorities – from maritime surveillance and patrol, counter-mining for our ports, to land-based aircraft designed to patrol, intercept and strike across our sea and air approaches.
The once insurmountable challenge of defending Australia independently had been conquered by 1996. Australia’s bedrock security was realised. But the American neoconservative dogma of 2004 signalled that our independence would no longer be seen as beneficial by the US, but rather as an obstacle to its hegemonic strategy. By 2010, Australia’s leaders had set us on the path to relinquishing our independence, to become America’s lapdog in its Asian ambitions, with Australia paying heavily for the imposition, for as long as the US desires.
Since Gillard, every government has embraced and expanded our role in America’s military confrontation with China for the last dozen years. All the while, Australians have been told that ever greater defence expenditures are required, yet they are kept in the dark about the intent of the spending. Leaders have employed euphamisms which nobody understands. Morrison spoke of making a “meaningful contribution” when announcing the mind-blowing cost of nuclear submarines. What he meant was that Australia would mortgage its financial future to be able to deliver a few torpedoes attacking China’s submarines in her own waters alongside US attack submarines to nullify China’s nuclear deterrent. Of minor benefit to the US operationally, if not an inconvenience, but priceless as a declaration of our sellout to America’s ambitions.
That’s the reality of AUKUS.
Defence Minister Marles introduced a National Defence Strategy to Parliament in April this year, which is all about projecting Australian military power into Asia against China.
To contribute to regional security we must be able to project. To resist the coercion that would come from the disruption of our sea lines of communication, we must be able to project. And to defend Australia’s interests in the geography-less domain of cyber, we must be able to project.
Of course, the spectre of Australia’s sea lanes being cut by China inverts reality. China has infinitely more to lose by disruption to regional sea lanes. America knows that. Hence, its force posture is designed to shut down China’s sea traffic. Australia is already deeply embedded in that US strategy, enabling new US basing and assets here. Our army has been transformed into an amphibious regional attack force with US Marines.
Marles’ double-speak knows no bounds. His national strategy is entirely contrived to deliver “projection” for America’s ends, without mentioning that Australia is now merely one cog in the unfolding US war machinery across the periphery of Asia. Which is what Paul Keating is saying.
Marles even flaunted the financial cost. Noting that defence budget was $48 billion in 2022-23, the Albanese government will raise it to $55.7 billion in 2024-25:
These increases will see annual defence spending almost double over the next 10 years to $100 billion in the financial year 2033-34. Taken over a 10- year period it will be the largest sustained growth in the defence budget since the Second World War.
So Australia’s fiscal future is ever-growing subsidy of America’s hegemonic ends, while relinquishing our bedrock defence. Australia’s fate is at the mercy of US politics. Both US parties are committed to the neoconservative hegemony unveiled in 2002, with China as their top target.
It will be a haul for Australia to retrieve its bedrock independence. Investing in our own needs will reverse the trajectory of defence spending and enhance our security. To begin, we must acknowledge that governance of national security is broken. With the two main political parties long consumed by wedging, honest debate is impossible. Parliament and the public have been kept ignorant, importantly by the Commonwealth public service. Ambassadors and departmental heads were pivotal in betraying long-standing policies silently. Our intelligence is utterly conflicted. Not to devise a new governance structure will see Keating’s predictions of our subjugation inevitable, to America or China.
Dr Mike Gilligan worked for 20 years in defence policy and evaluating military proposals for development, including time in the Pentagon on military balances in Asia.
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