The president of Taiwan, Tsai Ing-wen, after visiting Taiwan’s few remaining diplomatic allies in Latin America, made a ‘stopover’ last week in California, where she met with US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Beijing responded with three days of military exercises, encircling Taiwan with hundreds of aircraft and ships.

It is another step forward in Beijing’s long-term tactic of normalising a military presence around Taiwan through opportunistic, systematic escalation. In Australia, this has come not long after the announcement of the details of Australia’s acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines under the AUKUS pact, which Beijing vociferously denounced.

These diplomatic and military activities have again focused the divisive national debate about relations with China on a question that’s been posed for decades: would Australia join the US in a war against China over Taiwan?

But Beijing’s military exercises around Taiwan should also serve as a reminder that Australia’s debate about China, the US and war involves a people we almost never hear from: the Taiwanese.

This is a very longstanding feature of Australia’s foreign and defence policy discourse. Leicester Webb, an august figure in the founding of the Australian National University who wrote the definitive account of the referendum to ban the Australian Communist Party, Communism and democracy in Australia, lamented in 1956 of Australia’s ‘tendency to think of the island simply as a pawn in the global chess game which is the cold war and to envisage solutions of the Taiwan “problem” which take account of everything except the actual situation on the island’. Webb said that ‘it seems necessary to insist that its inhabitants are entitled to be put in the foreground of the picture’.

Webb would recognise Australia’s conversation today and might note that it hasn’t moved forward much since the 1950s. What for him was a pawn in a global chess game has become today an underlying assumption that Taiwan can be treated as a proxy for US power in the region, as a sign of America’s waning primacy against a rising China.

For so-called hawks, this assumption makes for a very short and straight line from Chinese military action against Taiwan to Australia joining the US in a war with China. For those on the other side, it means that opposing the US alliance and opposing support for Taiwan’s defence are the same thing. The result is a very distorted debate that looks for truths not in the current realities of regional security but in perennial questions about Australian identity.

Needless to say, Taiwan is not just a proxy for US power. It is a real place. The war, if it comes, will be China’s war against the Taiwanese. In the absence of any viable roadmap to achieve the Chinese Communist Party’s goal of ‘unification’, war is the means through which Beijing would seek to annex the island and remake Taiwanese society in Beijing’s image.

Rather than presenting a single choice about Australia’s commitment to the US alliance, Beijing’s Taiwan war would require a number of difficult, equivocal decisions. The direct economic consequences for Australia would be severe: Taiwan was our fourth largest export market in 2022 and is at the centre of global technology supply chains. But Australia would also have to decide whether to impose trade sanctions on China. We would face pressure from the US, Europe and Japan to do so, but our joining in would come at great economic cost to us as well as China.

Hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of Taiwanese would flee the conflict and Australia would need to decide how many to accept as political refugees. We would face pressure from the international community to accept many and from Beijing to accept none.

Beijing’s war would affect Australia through our relations with Japan, which has its own historical ties to Taiwan through its imperial history. It also prompts questions for Australia about our position on Taiwan’s own defence preparedness and diplomatic isolation.

And yes, in Beijing’s war, Australia would also have to decide whether to join the US in any military support for the Taiwanese in their defence of their island. Without international support, the Taiwanese would lose. As Tsai’s stopovers have shown, the US has a substantial policy and legal architecture with which it manages a close relationship with Taiwan, and its military involvement is probably inevitable. But far from being a short, straight line for Australia, a strategic goal of Beijing’s would be to keep Australia out of its war using military, political and economic means, all of which we would have to overcome to be involved.

If Beijing goes to war with the Taiwanese, it will cost Australia directly and dearly. The choice, then, is not about following along or not following along with the US. It is about whether we passively wait for Beijing to take that fateful action and try to bear its economic and humanitarian costs on us or whether we strengthen our means to act with power in the region in our interests. The government has presented a very expensive and not unproblematic plan to establish those means with the submarines to be delivered through AUKUS. There may be other, wiser, ones. But trying to isolate ourselves from Beijing’s actions is not a choice available to us.

ASEAN centrality was the key principle that drove regional integration beginning with the Asian financial crisis in 1997 through to the mid-2000s. It was premised on an understanding that regional integration would be led by ASEAN.

Back then, Japan was still the second largest economy, while the US remained the preponderant power in the region. China’s power was clearly growing, but Beijing still needed to close the wide gap in capacity and capabilities between it and Washington. ASEAN could find consensus in its backyard because the geopolitical issues at the time were less severe and contentious, China was less capable, and the US and its allies enjoyed overwhelming economic, diplomatic and military superiority.

Fast-forward to 2023 and the dynamics of the region couldn’t be more different. China is the second largest economy in the world and by some measures the largest. Japan has slipped to third place and is facing a demographic implosion that will affect its ability to sustain its influence in the region. The US is no longer the preponderant power despite still enjoying relative advantages.

These dynamics have enabled China to use its economic influence to fracture ASEAN unity. In 2012, for example, Cambodia, reportedly under Beijing’s influence, objected to the wording about the South China Sea in the draft joint statement of the ASEAN ministerial meeting in which the Philippines and Vietnam voiced their opposition to China’s paramilitary activities and hydrocarbon production there. The incident caused ASEAN not to issue a joint statement for the first time in its history. China’s obstructionism re-emerged in 2016 when Beijing exerted heavy diplomatic pressure on ASEAN members not to include references to the South China Sea disputes in the draft joint statement of the special ASEAN–China foreign ministers’ meeting.

At the same time, ASEAN’s institutional functionality hasn’t changed to reflect the radical shift in the regional security environment. Members adhere strictly to the ASEAN way of decision-making, in which regional interactions and cooperation are based on discreteness, informality, consensus-building and non-confrontation. This has made multilateral engagement with ASEAN in matters of consequence inconsequential at best or a dead end at worse. Examples include addressing the coup d’état and subsequent violence in Myanmar, managing the Rohingya refugee crisis and negotiating a code of conduct for the South China Sea.

ASEAN’s heterogeneity in development, political systems and politico-economic prosperity, along with its institutional design vulnerabilities, inculcate enormous challenges into the association’s inability to create consequential policies for its internal and external environments.

Smaller,  so-called minilateral groupings such as the Quad and AUKUS are not simply about ‘the beginnings of a US-led bloc that will constrain China’; rather, they are a reflection of the deep dissatisfaction with ASEAN centrality, which is easily compromised on issues of priority for China in particular.

Frustration with the ASEAN model is a force that drives pragmatic and results-focused states towards minilateral cooperation. That’s because, in many cases, in dealing with real challenges in the region, ASEAN hasn’t been part of the solution. Instead, it has been rather obstructionist or a force that has at times significantly diluted results-oriented policies.

The structure of ASEAN and other multilateral organisations is driving pragmatic states to search for new mechanisms to have effective, sustainable foreign policies. This includes the US and middle powers such as Japan and Australia.

One reason for this trend is that cooperation with a more exclusive set of like-minded states allows for more synergy in approach as well as the pooling of resources. AUKUS is a case in point. Australia, the UK and the US already engage in high-level intelligence sharing under the Five Eye framework. They also have research institute complementarity and similar strategic visions on issues facing the Indo-Pacific region. Together, these factors bode well for seamless cooperation among the three partners on advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence, quantum computing and hypersonics, not to mention nuclear-powered submarines.

Second, working through tightly knit groupings makes it much more difficult for another state to disrupt their functional cooperation. This contributes to policy execution being less susceptible to tactics to fracture multilateral consensus as we have seen with ASEAN.

Minilaterals can also allow for novel approaches to diplomacy that circumvent longstanding contested understandings such as the ‘one China’ policy. For example, Canada’s new Indo-Pacific strategy has carved out several initiatives for minilateral cooperation, such as the Partners in the Blue Pacific and the Indigenous Peoples Economic and Trade Cooperation Arrangement.

Other forums for minilateral cooperation include the General Security of Military Information Agreement, which focuses on intelligence sharing, and the trilateral security dialogue between the US, Japan and Australia, which facilitates implementation of cooperative activities.

Minilaterals are here to stay, but that doesn’t mean multilateralism is dead. The united Western front following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine demonstrates both the utility and the limits of multilateralism. Without the support of the US, the EU, Japan, Canada, Australia and other developed countries, Ukraine may have not been able to resist Russia’s aggression. Nonetheless, much of the global south and key partners such as India and ASEAN have sat on the fence, and China’s reaction to the war has violated its longstanding five principles of peaceful coexistence.

In this light, the united front against Russia’s aggression is further evidence that minilateralism or revamped multilateralism is increasingly trending towards exclusive coalitions of like-minded states cooperating through resource-pooling and diplomatic coordination on ad hoc and long-term strategic challenges. This is based on the view that overly inclusive multilateralism can fall victim to the lowest common denominator in policy consensus, resulting in stagnation or paralysis.

Australia’s ability to make meaningful inroads into the downstream processing and manufacturing of critical minerals is hobbled by the downsizing of the country’s established metals processing industry over the past two decades.

The closure of plants, often under the pressure of Chinese competition, has reduced career opportunities in the technical fields that are needed to build and operate the highly complex processing and manufacturing technologies that many critical minerals require.

Perhaps a pivotal moment was BHP’s 1999 decision to shut its Newcastle steel mill and associated rolling plan, concluding it could not compete with much larger and more modern mills in Japan and South Korea.

In 2004, BHP shut its Boodarie clinker plant designed to upgrade iron ore exports and built at a cost of $2.5 billion over the previous eight years. Rio Tinto shut its Hismelt plant, which used innovative technology to produce high-quality pig-iron, in 2008, just three years after it had opened.

Bluescope, which purchased BHP’s major steel assets, shut Australia’s only tin mill at Port Kembla in 2006. In 2011, it shut one of its blast furnaces and coke ovens at Port Kembla along with its hot strip mill at Hastings in Western Port Bay. Australia can no longer manufacture stainless steel or tinplate.

The aluminium industry has also been contracting. Alcan closed its Kurri Kurri aluminium smelter in 2012, while Alcoa shut its Point Henry smelter at Geelong in 2014, along with rolling mills both there and at Yennora. Australia no longer has the capacity to manufacture flat aluminium products.

A number of the major metals processing plants that survive are relatively marginal operations, often battling the threat of closure. Australia’s remaining aluminium smelters at Portland in Victoria, Tomago in New South Wales, Boyne Island in Queensland and Bell Bay in Tasmania have all had to overcome challenges to their future over the past decade.

Glencore’s copper smelter at Mt Isa and copper refinery in Townsville both faced closure in 2020 but were given another three years of operation, which expires this year, after the Queensland government provided a subsidy.

The Ravensthorpe nickel processing plant in Western Australia and the Yabulu nickel refinery at Townsville have both battled closure, though Yabulu is expected to gain a new lease of life after being sold to a Swiss concern in December.

As a result, metallurgy is not a promising career for aspiring engineers. A 2021 review by the Australian Council of Engineering Deans of graduate specialisations concluded that the combined field of mining, metallurgy and petroleum engineering was in ‘clear decline’.

The study found that the number of domestic graduates with bachelor’s degrees dropped by 40% to just 141 in the four years to 2019. The number graduating with master’s degrees had halved to only nine. The figures are better in chemical engineering, and much of the processing of critical minerals draws on that expertise, but the numbers are still tiny. Immediate metallurgy vacancies are being filled by Indian migrants, but that is hardly enough.

The comparison is invidious, but while Australia had a total of 6,900 engineering graduates in 2020, China recorded 1.4 million in 2021, up from 840,000 a decade earlier.

A ranking of the world’s top 100 universities for the study of metallurgical engineering listed 28 Chinese institutions, including 10 of the top 20. The list included just three Australian universities: the University of Queensland (ranked 15th), the University of New South Wales (79th) and Deakin University (86th). UNSW complained in 2018 that enrolments in its mining engineering course had dropped from 120 to six over the previous four years.

China has made the build-up of expertise in new materials a state priority for almost 40 years. China’s focus in the area long predates the realisation that critical minerals, particularly the 17 rare-earth elements, would supplant steel and oil as the drivers of economic development in the 22nd century.

In 1986, China’s then leader, Deng Xiaoping, approved what became known as the ‘863 program’ for high-technology research and development (it was launched in March 1986).

It specified seven fields of common interest to both national security and commercial development that would receive priority research funding. The sectors selected were automation, biotechnology, energy, information technology, lasers, new materials and space technology.

In the 1970s, an eminent Chinese chemical scientist, Xu Guangxian, who had been pivotal in the development of China’s nuclear weapons, invented a simplified process for separating the rare-earth elements from the iron ore obtained from the Bayan Obo mine in northern China.

The first specialist rare-earths research institute was established adjacent to the mine in 1962. In 1987, China established the State Key Laboratory on Rare Earths Chemistry and Physics, under the direct supervision of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Other state laboratories specialising in rare earths followed.

Today the Chinese Society of Rare Earths, established in 1980 as a research network, boasts more than 100,000 affiliated researchers. Its subcommittees cover every conceivable field of rare-earths research. In 2003 China overtook the United States in the number of scientific papers on rare earths published annually, and it has accounted for more than half the patents awarded for rare earths globally since 2011.

Deng’s aphorism that ‘the Middle East has its oil, China has rare earth’ is often quoted; however, China has moved well beyond an aspiration to monopolise the production of rare earths. It aims for leadership in the production of the full range of goods making use of rare earths—from electric cars to wind turbines, MRI scanners, lasers and rocket motors. China is increasingly turning to imports of the raw or lightly processed rare earths to supply its industry. Although China possesses the world’s largest reserves of rare earths, its production is not enough to satisfy its needs.

As well as the end products, China dominates all the associated inputs, ranging from chemicals and gases to tantalum crucibles and other specialised equipment.

Separating rare-earth elements is complex, with each orebody having a unique combination. It took Australian company Lynas, its shareholders and Japanese bankers eight years of patience to get its plant in Malaysia producing rare earths to the specifications of its customers. Turning rare-earth oxides into metals is also complex metallurgy, and little of it is done outside China.

The Australian government sees building a critical minerals industry as a matter of national economic sovereignty. Its ambition is that, first, precursor products will be manufactured in Australia, and then that Australia eventually becomes a significant producer of technologies like solar panels, permanent magnets and batteries.

As a first step, it is subsidising the construction of a $1.2 billion rare-earths processing plant, extending a non-recourse loan to long-established mineral sands miner Illuka. The plant will be built drawing on French expertise and design.

Perhaps a more urgent priority should be to develop a national strategy to stabilise Australia’s basic metals manufacturing capability so there is some sort of industrial base upon which a new industry could be built. As it is, it’s left to state governments—which may be impelled by the ad hoc need to ‘save jobs’ when closures loom—to step into the breach.

Next month, ASPI, with the Northern Territory government’s ‘Investment Territory’ program, will host the inaugural Darwin Dialogue. The 1.5 track dialogue will bring together government, industry and academia representatives, including delegations from Japan and the United States, to discuss establishing secure supply and value chains for mining, processing and refining critical minerals outside China.

Over the past few years, Covid-19, climate change and Chinese economic coercion have catalysed rapid global economic, foreign relations and national security policy changes. In Australia, the public discourse on sovereignty, national capacity and secure supply chains is one area where this change is particularly evident. These discussions have more recently prioritised the supply and value chains for critical minerals and rare-earth elements because of their links with advanced and low-emissions technologies.

In some countries, these policy challenges have given rise to responses based on a new version of economic nationalism. Sovereign critical mineral and rare-earth resilience is beyond the reach of any one country. Unilateral responses will not produce secure or reliable supply chains. Indeed, economic nationalism may actually aggravate the problem.

A critical mineral is a metallic or non-metallic element that is essential for modern technologies, economies or national security and has a supply chain at risk of disruption. Geoscience Australia lists 26 critical minerals ranging from graphite to magnesium.

The rare earths are a subset of critical minerals and comprise 17 metals—15 elements from the lanthanide series and two chemically similar elements, scandium and yttrium. All have unique properties that make them vital for various commercial and defence technologies, including batteries, high-powered magnets and electronic equipment.

Chinese economic coercion and ham-fisted domestic policy have highlighted the risk of disruption to global rare-earth and critical mineral supply chains.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian was right when he said: ‘No one should use the economy as a political tool or weapon, destabilise the global industrial and supply chains or punch the existing world economic system.’ Yet that is precisely what the Chinese Communist Party has been doing for the past decade with rare earths.

In 2010, the CCP effectively restricted rare-earth exports to Japan after a Chinese fishing trawler collided with a Japanese coastguard vessel near the disputed Senkaku Islands.

More recently, it threatened to limit rare-earth supplies to US defence contractors, including Lockheed Martin, over US arms sales to Taiwan.

But the problem isn’t just about economic coercion; the CCP’s domestic policy has had other serious consequences. In 2021, the central government began actively monitoring energy consumption across China. Later that year, Shaanxi province fell victim to the country’s ‘double control’ when it failed to meet energy consumption targets. The CCP swiftly shut down high-energy-intensity industries, including aluminium production. An international supply crisis ensued, and prices have soared.

China’s coercive actions and domestic policies represent unacceptable economic and resilience risks to rare-earth and critical mineral supply chains. Diversified supply chains are now needed to mitigate the economic and national security risks associated with disruption.

Japan has led the way in responding to China’s dominance of the rare-earth market. Its investment in Australian company Lynas Rare Earths should provide confidence in an alternative, resilient supply chain. And its approach reveals the superiority of collaborative responses over economic nationalism.

Other nations, like the US, have been slower to recognise the benefits of a coordinated response, showing early signs of a preference for an America-first approach. However, in doing so, the US may deny itself and its allies the opportunity to achieve resilience through approaches that engage with such concepts as near-shoring and friend-shoring.

The landmark US Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA, is a case in point. The act is intended to catalyse investments in domestic manufacturing capacity; encourage procurement of critical supplies domestically or from free-trade partners; and jump-start research, development and commercialisation of leading-edge technologies such as carbon capture and storage and clean hydrogen. It was passed by the US Congress and signed into law by President Joe Biden in August 2022.

Many of the IRA’s tax incentives are aimed at quickly scaling up domestic production and domestic procurement. For example, to unlock the full tax credit for an electric vehicle, a percentage of critical minerals in the vehicle’s battery must have been extracted or processed in the US or in country that is a US free-trade partner. The percentage will increase by 10 percentage points each year, from 40% in 2023 to 80% in 2026.

The IRA, even with its reference to free-trade partners, creates advantages for domestic US rare-earth and critical mineral supply and value chains that will impact Australian industry.

In its submission to the IRA, Australia encouraged the US to consider policy measures that acknowledged Australia’s role as a secure, reliable and trusted free-trade partner that can support achieving the IRA’s objectives.

The IRA could be a disincentive for North American companies to enter into mineral offtake or processing agreements with Australian companies or battery manufacturers. BHP CEO Mike Henry argues that the IRA ‘has improved quite markedly the attractiveness of the US as an investment destination’. He also notes that the act has ‘stimulated other countries into the race, and they’re now trying to compete in their own way’. The rapid growth of the US sector is also likely to intensify competition for labour, materials and capital.

In the face of great-power competition, geostrategic uncertainty, more regular global disruption and domestic narcissism, the US must avoid reflexively responding with economic nationalism. Recent reports have indicated that the US government is exploring the development of ‘narrowly focused trade pacts on critical minerals with Japan and the UK, in addition to talks with the European Union’.

Australia is investing heavily in growing its manufacturing capability and should be a partner of choice for the US industry to support diversified and resilient supply chains. Given Australia’s important role in the Indo-Pacific and its enormous potential to supply rare-earth elements and critical minerals, the US should be looking in our direction as a matter of priority.

Next month, ASPI, with the Northern Territory government’s ‘Investment Territory’ program, will host the inaugural Darwin Dialogue. The 1.5 track dialogue will bring together government, industry and academia representatives, including delegations from Japan and the United States, to discuss establishing secure supply and value chains for mining, processing and refining critical minerals outside China.

Deterring an aggressive China will take creative use of all the art, science, diplomacy and other capabilities the United States and Australia can muster, says the general commanding the US Marines.

In a discussion at ASPI, US Marine Corps Commandant David Berger notes that ‘we haven’t been in a competition at this level since I was a kid.’

On the threat posed by China to Taiwan, Berger’s view is that it is going to take ‘everything in the cupboard’ to prevent a conflict. ‘When the other side has stated openly: “We will do this if they don’t voluntarily reintegrate with China, if Taiwan doesn’t come back, then we have no choice”, then we’d better look in the cupboard and bring out everything and make sure it’s meshed together. And then mesh all of our tools with all of your tools and figure out how to use all of that to prevent a conflict,’ Berger says.

‘If there’s art in there, science in there, a lot of diplomacy in there, we’ll need all aspects of it. We’re pretty capable. Both countries have done this before, and we will do it again. It would be hard to imagine that’s possible if we were starting from scratch, but because we’ve got 100 years working together this is all possible.’

Later Berger tells The Strategist the US and Australia must be able to deter a nation from carrying out damaging action, short of open warfare, in the so-called ‘grey zone’. There, conventional deterrence will not be enough because there’s not an open conflict, but there’s definitely a competition going on, he says.

‘I would agree with the notion that it’s much more than military and you have to have a clear understanding of what the other side’s goals are, and that they may make incremental advances, half a step at a time. Deterrence may be a calculus of how to prevent those half steps from happening,’ Berger says.

The general has just completed his second visit to Australia in less than a year and says that indicates how important the bilateral defence relationship is. You use your time where it matters most, he says, especially in a rapidly evolving security environment. The alliance is built on personal friendships and professional relationships that are not easily replicated, he says.

Because the US Marine Corps is inherently a joint force, it works with many elements of the Australian Defence Force. ‘I think we’re headed in the same direction in terms of reassurance of allies and partners in the region, and deterring the main challenges to both of our countries.’

With that comes modernisation which both countries are managing in parallel.

Berger’s sweeping redesign of Marine Corps war-fighting concepts has brought a strong focus on keeping maritime choke points open to allow commerce to flow freely, and to allow military forces to manoeuvre. ‘If you can’t manoeuvre through that, then you’re restricted,’ he says. A key marines contribution to the joint force is to keep control over such key terrain.

At an ASPI masterclass on space and national security last year, futurist Jeffrey Becker described a military mindset where things continue to be done in a certain way because they’ve always been done in that way. He said that imposed an inertia that could stop military organisations adapting fast enough to keep up with technological advances. Becker spoke of the need for the military to be open-minded to the advantages of, for instance, equipping small independent units with the latest communications, robotics, artificial Intelligence, laser systems, electric vehicles and the like to make them more lethal and mobile.

Berger says the notion of empowering small tactical units to give them an outsized influence will ‘absolutely matter’. It means giving such units increased training and capability at lower tactical levels than when he was a young officer—possibly moving those capabilities from battalion to platoon level.

‘So, the focus for us is not just the technical capabilities. It’s the training. It’s the marine himself or herself, the level of decision-making that they can have, the capabilities that we can deliver to them—and do they have the experience to make the right tactical decisions. That’s going to be the magic of it.’ The Ukraine conflict, Berger says, has demonstrated how much small unit leadership matters.

Berger says marines will operate forward to remain alongside allies and partners and will be mobile and difficult to detect and track. ‘We’re staying forward in a way that can paint a picture of what’s in front of us and hopefully prevent the other side from collecting [intelligence] against us.’ To survive, such units need to be able to lower their signatures, be mobile and operate alongside allies in a way that makes it difficult to target them and to discern what their intentions are. ‘The key is to do all that in an austere expeditionary environment.’

He says sophisticated equipment ranging from drones to surveillance devices and logistical tools that once existed in small numbers are now plentiful, and available at the squad level. ‘It requires a level of decision-making at a lower level that was held at higher levels before, but we’re plenty capable of that as long as we train in the way we’re headed right now.’

Australia will purchase the HIMARS mobile rocket launcher that has proved so effective in the hands of Ukrainian forces fighting the Russians. Berger says the ADF will find it particularly valuable when combined with a helicopter or fixed-wing aircraft to move it. ‘Long-range precision weaponry you can relocate quickly gives you a great advantage.’

On lessons to be learned from the Ukraine conflict, Berger notes that the war began when Russia invaded the east of the country and annexed Crimea in 2014. It has demonstrated, he says, that ‘logistics matters, small unit leadership matters, the ability to see the other side and understand what they are doing matters. The basics, camouflage, deception, tactical mobility, all that matters. The importance of information, who can gain an advantage in moving it and hiding it and distributing it matters. All those I think are going to be lessons learned that all our forces will apply.’

In terms of challenges the marines will face in future conflicts, Berger says a crucial one will be handling logistics, a priority that had not changed over 100 or 200 years. ‘You skip past that step, you know you’re in trouble. So, plan for logistics up front, especially in a region like this where there are large distances to cover over great expanses of ocean.’

Aside from that, says Berger, the close relationship between the US and Australia would be crucial in a conflict. ‘I think we have to work very hard at understanding each other’s capabilities and how they can complement each other, which is why we’re here—to get an update from the Australian Defence Force. Where are you now? Where are you headed? We have to understand both of our capabilities and how we can mesh them together in a complementary way.’

The roles of artificial intelligence and autonomous systems are still being determined, Berger says.

While some focus on autonomous weapons, other such systems could move supplies and transport patients. ‘If it can help us solve logistics, why would we not work hard on the application of autonomy to logistics at the tactical level?’

For two centuries, US marines have gone to war on ships and Berger says that is unlikely to stop despite the sophistication of weapons ranged against the surface fleet.

‘It’s not the end of ships, absolutely no,’ says Berger. ‘The art of it, I think, will be finding ways so that the ship, as part of a formation, becomes harder to track, harder to detect, harder to identify, and sometimes that’s as simple as getting lost in clutter.’

The US needs to work very closely with Australia to use and to protect space-based systems crucial to timing, positioning and navigation on operations, Berger says. ‘This this is an area of contest between nations where we have to figure out the rules of the road in advance and work very closely with Australia, the UK and other nations that have space-based capabilities in terms of how to protect, how to make sure that we preserve the capabilities we need.’

US and Australian forces will learn from each other on space-based command and control networks and share ideas on redundancy in systems to ensure there’s enough resilience built in to avoid a single point of failure.

And sometimes, he says, it makes sense to reveal a capability to a potential enemy as part of the process of deterrence. ‘You bet’.