“US policy needs to be based on a clear understanding of what the rest of the Indo Pacific wants. We need to demonstrate we have interests we want to nurture beyond security interests.”
Australia’s foreign minister Penny Wong made an important speech in Washington on December 7, spoilt by an untenable claim discussed below. In addressing the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, she gave the strongest expression of her views since the election. She said, “US policy needs to be based on a clear understanding of what the rest of the Indo Pacific wants. We need to demonstrate we have interests we want to nurture beyond security interests.”
She said the region is “not enthusiastic about great power competition” and pressed China to take up President Biden’s offer to put in place “guardrails” to prevent growing tensions from spiralling into confrontation or war.” Concerned by increasingly strident criticisms of China in US politics, Wong said,“Heads of government need assurance that nationalistic domestic posturing won’t sink the effort to build safe guards.”
Unhappily, Wong also said Australia is creating deterrence with major military investments in future capability, including through the AUKUS partners — a reference to the planned acquisition of nuclear submarines from the US .
Nuclear submarines will not create lasting deterrence or ensure stability. Wong acknowledged this when she said, “We need to do more than establish military deterrence to avoid conflict. We need to work to create together incentives for dialogue.”
Just before Wong’s speech, Australia US Ministerial Meeting (AUSMIN) in Washington kept alive the Albanese government’s desire to buy eight nuclear powered submarines fully owned by Australia. The US is having trouble fitting them on a crowded production line. They are likely to cost over $200 billion by the time they are all delivered sometime after 2060. The Albanese government wants what is candidly called the “Attack Class”. Australia will be the only non-nuclear weapons state to acquire nuclear submarines. Some neighbouring countries don’t like introduction of more nuclear submarines, particularly these ones fuelled by highly enriched weapons grade uranium.
Supporters see big Australian nuclear submarines being deployed to loiter off China’s coast to sink Chinese submarines and fire cruise missiles into the mainland. What happens when China retaliates is not explained. These submarines are not suited to the job of defending Australia in the shallow waters off its coast. Smaller conventionally powered submarines, which are much harder to detect, can effectively deny access for hostile ships to the seas around Australia. They can also range much further from Australia if needed.
Australia’s budget making processes have been shattered by the decision to buy eight nuclear submarines, only two of which are likely to be operational available at any time. The decision to go down the nuclear path has been taken without a cost effectiveness study by the Treasury and Finance departments, let alone Defence. At a minimum, these studies must make the comparison with modern conventional submarines that can operate silently for long periods, as well as examining the advantages of underwater drones and other weapons systems. Choosing nuclear will freeze out funding for many important vote winning civilian programs.
During AUSMIN, the US defence secretary Lloyd Austin said the US would increase its forces in Australia, including “rotations of bomber task forces, fighters and future rotations of US Navy and US Army capabilities”. Australia’s defence minister Richard Marles strongly supported this build up, including B2 and B-52 bombers which are offensive weapons platforms. In response China is likely to further build up its forces. Based on past US behaviour, a future US administration is likely to engage in wars of aggression with Australia’s participation. But Marles focuses on increasing the “lethality” of Australia’s weapons, rather than giving a convincing commitment not to use them for wars of aggressive. Arms-control agreements, not arms races, are needed to avoid war.
The US is extraordinarily secure. Its military spending is more than the combined total of the next nine biggest spenders, including China. One reason China is increasing its military spending is in response to its encirclement by the US and its partners. China is deploying these air and naval forces to defend the approaches to its homeland, far from the US homeland. The US is yet to provide evidence of what threat China poses to distant countries like Australia, let alone the US homeland.
Austin criticised China during AUSMIN for “It’s dangerous and coercive actions throughout the Indo Pacific”. That is much too sweeping. China and Taiwan claim a right to resources associated with some unoccupied rocks, shoals, etc. in a limited area of the South China Sea. China claims ownership of a couple of unoccupied rocks between it and Japan in the East China Sea, but hasn’t tried to seize them. For its part, the US claims to respect the Law of the Sea Treaty, yet has refused to ratify it.
As for the rest of the vast Indo Pacific, China has not established military bases there, unlike the US which has coerced the indigenous population into accepting additional bases on islands such as Guam. Unlike China, the US left a terrible legacy from testing thermo- nuclear weapons in the South Pacific.
The AUSMIN communique blasted China for alleged human rights abuses while failing to acknowledge serious abuses committed by two other members of the Indo Pacific. One is India where Narenda Modi’s Hindu supremist government discriminates viciously against its 200 million Moslem population and has stripped Kashmir of its independent constitutional status.
The other is Australia where harsh national security laws ensure the country is no longer a liberal democracy. An example is a law that makes it an ill- defined criminal offence attracting a 15 year jail sentence to report or comment on “economic or political relations with another country”. More recently, peaceful demonstrators such as Violet Coco, who want more action on climate change, are being sentenced to 15 months jail without bail.
Brian Toohey is author of Secret: The Making of Australia’s Security State.
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