by Andrew Martin

The Australian federal election has brought the issue of defense spending to the forefront, underscoring Australia’s geopolitical position, its ‘national security,’ and its relationship with China. Each prime ministerial candidate has made bold promises on national security, pledging to ramp up military spending and uphold AUKUS, the military pact for American nuclear submarines. The looming threat of a global recession has further escalated concerns about security.

Deputy Prime Minister and minister of defence, Richard Marles, travelled to Washington in February to meet with the Trump administration. An official press release from the Australian government stated: “Australia’s Alliance with the US remains fundamental to our national security and we are working closely with the Trump Administration to build on our strong partnership, including through AUKUS…I look forward to reaffirming Australia’s commitment to the alliance, governed by our shared interests for a secure, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific.”

Note the term Indo-Pacific, a term adopted by the US, ironically, since their pivot to Asia. The ALP is so desperate to present a bi-partisan approach to “national security” and defence spending that they must skirt and tiptoe around the reality of the world they live in, avoiding naming China as a threat but going along hook-line-and-sinker with the US in its drive to war, so they adopt the same stance and language, but in more guarded tones. The ALP’s saving grace has not been any strategic acumen or redeeming features of their own party, its policies or platform, but the sheer odiousness of the Liberal opposition leader, Peter Dutton.

US Applies Pressure to Lift Defence Spending

Elbridge Colby, the head of policy at the Pentagon, told a US senate committee that Australia needed to lift its defence spending. According to Colby, Australia is “perhaps our closest ally in the world”, but he noted, “Australia is currently well below the 3 per cent level (of GDP military spending) advocated for NATO by NATO Secretary General Rutte, and Canberra faces a far more powerful challenge in China.”

He added that China is “the biggest, most powerful rival we have faced in probably 150 years.”

Choosing his words carefully, prime minister Albanese responded “Australia determines our national interest…My government is allocating significant additional resources for defence. That is being rolled out, including, including missiles, including a range of assets that improve both our capability, but also importantly, our delivery.”

These statements sparked a flurry of commentary in the mainstream media about the government’s commitment to its long-term ally. The Australian went as far to say the Australian government “will not line up with the U.S” under another term of Labor. If only it were true!

An Enduring Alliance

After WW11, it was clear that Britain was losing hold of its colonies. A wave of anti-colonial struggle swept through what we now refer to as the Global South. To preserve more favourable terms of trade and assert its own influence, Australia signed a number of treaties strengthening its alliance with the US. 

The foundation of Australia’s defence policy with the US is the ANZUS treaty, signed in 1951 during the hysteria of the Cold War, formalising military ties between Australia, New Zealand and the US. The ANZUS Treaty was invoked for the first time in 2001, after the 9/11 attacks on the Twin Towers, committing Australia to a war against Afghanistan.

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) envisions Australia’s role as: ‘Working alongside our Asian neighbours—asserting our perspective, of course, and acting as a conduit to the United States and European states—Australians may also glean from Asian experience in managing major power ambitions’. This deliberate ambiguity reflects the predicament of Australian strategists for foreign policy, caught between the nation’s most potent military ally, the US, and its largest trading partner, China.

Proponents of the trans-Atlantic rules-based-order such as ASPI have been alarmed by Trump’s handling of the war with Ukraine and are now knocked off balance by his trade-war. All they can produce is fog and mush, but they will not let go of their instinct to militarise. Coupled with this is a mystification of Australia’s role in imperialist wars, so much so, that those who question it are silenced.

For instance, whistleblower David McBride was gaoled for providing documents to the ABC that revealed details of 39 executions by the SAS in Afghanistan. The news of these war crimes received more coverage internationally than it did in Australia. Little wonder there’s no questioning the role the Australian military plays in foreign interventions in the mainstream media. It is verboten.

And so it goes for military funding. When the Coalition announced it would spend 2.5% of GDP within five years and 3% of GDP on defence within ten years, none of the mainstream media questioned whether this was good or bad. They meekly asked how this could be funded.

The ABC’s Laura Tingle’s (marketed as their stern firebrand journalist) fiercest criticism was only that “the budget would need a major structural change”. In the same article, she fawningly referred to Marcus Hellyer as “long one of our most respected defence analysts, particularly when it comes to the defence budget”. She failed to mention that Hellyer is a former analyst with APSI and a consultant to private weapons manufacturers. This apparently qualifies him to be respected, but to mention it may have been embarrassing.

Tingle uncritically quoted Hellyer’s call for Australian military spending to be 3% of GDP and that it “has become the new industry standard for countries that are serious about preserving their security and also countries that are interested in demonstrating that they’re not just freeloaders on the US”.

The Drive to War

A consistent theme in the media’s portrayal of China is that it is determined to dominate the world and that it is a threat to Australia. Sky News Australia aired a “documentary” Are We Ready for War? In 2023, a theatrical (almost comical) piece that was only one part in a wave of propaganda designed to soften up the Australian public for war.

In it, they describe Australia as being “hopelessly outgunned and unprepared for war”. The late Senator Jim Molan is interviewed calling for military spending to be 4% of GDP, concluding by saying, “Now is the time for real plans and real expenditure.” And further: “If war does come to our part of the world there is one thing we can be certain of, our alliance with America”.

Newscorp publications have consistently featured headlines and opinion pieces suggesting imminent conflict. Likewise, a 9News report in February 2023 warned that Australia could face war with China within three years. Heavens above, that leaves us only months to prepare now!

The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald are just as rabid. Both newspapers in 2023 published a “special report” by Peter Hartcher and Matthew Knott Red Alert: War risk exposed that believed Australia “faces the prospect of armed conflict in the Indo-Pacific within three years”. The title of the series, Red Alert, reflected as they put it, “their unanimous view that Australia’s biggest trading partner is also its dominant national security threat”.

The special report was a series of propaganda articles that repeated this claim. Nine Entertainment, which owns these liberal newspapers, brought together five “security experts”. One of them, Lavina Lee, stated: “I have to say, the critical threats stem from one source – China,” a foreign policy expert from Macquarie University, speaking during the one-and-a-half-day group discussion held in the Nine boardroom in Sydney stated: “I think China presents the most comprehensive challenge to the regional order that we have faced for the last 70 years after World War II.”

The Liberal opposition have been the most fervent in the drive to war. As former defence minister and Liberal party leader, Peter Dutton has continually argued that Australia needs to be prepared for military confrontation with China, especially over Taiwan. This is despite saying he’d also “love” to see trade with China “increase two-fold.”

When asked on Channel 7 who he thought was the biggest threat to Australia, he answered: “The biggest concern from our intelligence agencies and our defence agency is in relation to the Communist Party of China”.

Former SAS officer and prominent Liberal MP Andrew Hastie, who served as chair of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Intelligence and Security, has accused China of threatening Australia’s “sovereignty and values”, particularly in relation to espionage, foreign interference, and military buildup. Hastie has become a prominent war hawk and one of the most influential members of the Liberal party in relation to China.

Hastie thinks China should not have the right to defend itself or even possess a navy. In February, Hastie released a press statement stating: “The Chinese military has built a Blue-water navy and is now testing us, along with other allies in the region”. This was in response to an incident in which Chinese fighter jets released flares near an Australian surveillance aircraft, not in Australian waters—but in the South China Sea. No politician or journalist ever asks if we should be sending surveillance aircraft to the South China Sea, which obviously inflames tensions and the buildup to war.

The Dark Cloud of Think Tanks

It is not just the corporate media and politicians trying to prepare us for war with China. Australia’s increasingly corporatised universities are all playing their role and are part of an intelligentsia that are continually pushing to reshape public opinion on China. Rory Medcalf, head of the National Security College, ANU has written extensively on the “threat” of China.

In his book Indo-Pacific Empire, he argues that China is seeking to reshape the regional order, which could undermine Australian interests. His perspective is for Australia to play a leading role in preventing the rise of China, not just militarily, but politically and economically. Although the book promotes the idea of coexistence, it is not one in which China chooses its own destiny. The book explicitly pursues an idea of defence partnerships against China.

While these views are prominent in most Australian universities their administrations are caught in the contradiction between pursuing ideological conformity, in their discourse framing China as a strategic threat to Australia, while simultaneously pursuing financial and academic relationships with it. Another tension is that Chinese international students are a major source of revenue, particularly for research-intensive institutions like the University of Sydney, the University of Melbourne, and ANU. Research collaboration with Chinese institutions, especially in STEM fields, has been extensive.

More hawkish is the role of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), which informs the ALP and Liberal party on defence, cybersecurity, and strategic policy issues. It is partially funded by the Australian government’s Department of Defence but also receives funding from academic institutions and the private sector. While it purports to be “independent”, it also receives funding from other governments, including the UK, Japan and most notably, the US.

For example, the US Department of State awarded ASPI a grant totalling $500,000 for a project addressing foreign interference and disinformation. In the 2021–22 financial year, overseas government agencies contributed approximately $1.94 million, or 15.6% of ASPI’s total revenue. Just as tellingly, ASPI receives donations directly from weapons manufacturers.

ASPI receives financial support from major defence contractors such as Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon Technologies, Thales Group, and BAE Systems. It’s research agenda and objectivity are obviously skewed by this, yet it its research is often quoted uncritically. ASPI is particularly concerned by China’s rapid militarisation, especially its naval and missile capabilities.

Its Critical Technology Tracker is often sourced as evidence of China’s military advancement. It covers 64 critical technologies spanning defence, space, energy, the environment, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, robotics, cyber, computing, advanced materials and key quantum technology areas. They claim:

“Western democracies are losing the global technological competition, including the race for scientific and research breakthroughs, and the ability to retain global talent—crucial ingredients that underpin the development and control of the world’s most important technologies, including those that don’t yet exist.

Our research reveals that China has built the foundations to position itself as the world’s leading science and technology superpower by establishing a sometimes-stunning lead in high-impact research across the majority of critical and emerging technology domains. China’s global lead extends to 37 out of 44 technologies that ASPI is now tracking, covering a range of crucial technology fields spanning defence, space, robotics, energy, the environment, biotechnology, artificial intelligence (AI), advanced materials and key quantum technology areas.”

Their research found The US was still dominant in areas like high-performance computing and advanced chip design and China still relies on some US and allied technologies. NVIDIA, Intel and AMD control and dominate the production of high-end computer chips. But they are dependent on Taiwanese manufacturer TSMC which controls over 90% of their manufacture. 

TSMC has faced restrictions on exporting chips to China, which has restricted its technological development. Another caveat is that leading in research output (e.g., patents, papers) doesn’t always translate to operational superiority. 

While China has closed the gap with the US, the broader picture includes interdependencies and ongoing competition. There is a fundamental problem in ASPI’s research, which is why it should be viewed with caution. They have a direct interest in highlighting China as a threat to shore up funding for defence industries. 

Their methodology focussed on the quantity of patents, but it’s difficult to define how many are truly groundbreaking or if the technology can be produced on scale. Some categories may overstate leadership—e.g., China leads in 5G infrastructure (Huawei) but this leadership is negated if it relies on US technology such as semi-conductors.

It doesn’t take too much analysis to make ASPI’s agenda clear: decouple China from the West, prepare it for war in which its partners can profit from. Indeed it’s report has been justified to do exactly that, leading to the implementation of policies such as the US Chips Act with massive grants going to BAE and Intel. The European Union passed a similar policy—the European Chips Act in 2023.

China’s Advances

It is difficult to know how much of China’s development is overstated or not, but there is no denying it has been impressive, and it is not a myth that it is advancing. China is catching up to richer countries socially and in many areas of technological development. China’s state-directed economy and the sheer scale of its working class (772 million – over 112 million in factories) means it has the collective abilities to resolve the longstanding difficult question of matching or surpassing the efficiency of labour processes of the West. 

China, with its dominant state sector and centralised investment, is better able to allocate resources to where they are needed. It is making advances in technologies of the future such as AI technology, quantum computing, 5G infrastructure and electric vehicles. Militarily it has the edge on hypersonic missile technology. 

It dominates infrastructure-heavy sectors such as rail, renewable energy, and battery technology. China’s 14th Five Year Plan (FYP) for 2021–2025 prioritised these and other investments. Unlike Western firms driven by quarterly profits, China’s state-backed projects operate on decade-long horizons, allowing risky, high-reward bets. The government is able to direct investment through state owned banks, while local governments provide incentives to build R&D centres and factories. 

China spends 2.4% of its GDP on R&D (less than the US), but it has a far more focused application of this research towards human needs and the frontiers of science than the West. It has also put in place joint venture rules requiring companies to share tech for market access – something US tariffs seek to overcome. China has also protected its local industries through subsidies until they are globally competitive. For instance, there is no need for China to place tariffs on Western car manufacturers as it has passed through an extensive development phase for electric car manufacture.

All these measures are important. However, the main reason China is gaining on the West is that it has invested in its people. Its success in raising hundreds of millions of people out of absolute poverty has given the country a powerful sense of self-confidence to strive ahead. Its STEM education push means it graduates six times more engineers than the US annually, and now, worryingly for the US and its allies such as Australia, there is a reverse brain drain with incentives luring back Western-trained scientists. This is necessary as the tariffs increase the premium of this talent.

China’s development teaches us there is nothing permanent about the contemporary world system. The fear-mongering about the threat of China is unlikely to be much of a vote-winner, with Trump’s trade war proving to be deeply unpopular. On the other hand, it is China that appears to be even-handed and considerate as it defies the US, and people are becoming more curious about China and its people. 

Nevertheless, this is not going to stop the most powerful sections of the ruling class of Australia in trying to soften up the Australian public for war. Imperialism is desperate to assert itself and maintain its advantage over China. Whether Labor or Liberal is elected, the war industries backed up by their think tanks and the corporate media will continue to push for military confrontation.