Tag Archive for: US Alliances

ASPI’s Critical Technology Tracker

ASPI’s Critical Technology Tracker – The global race for future power

The Critical Technology Tracker is a large data-driven project that now covers 64 critical technologies spanning defence, space, energy, the environment, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, robotics, cyber, computing, advanced materials and key quantum technology areas. It provides a leading indicator of a country’s research performance, strategic intent and potential future science and technology capability.

It first launched 1 March 2023 and underwent a major expansion on 28 August 2024 which took the dataset from five years (previously, 2018–2022) to 21 years (2003–2023). Explore the website and the broader project here.

Governments and organisations interested in supporting this ongoing program of work, including further expansions and the addition of new technologies, can contact: criticaltech@aspi.org.au.

What’s the problem?

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.1 The Critical Technology Tracker shows that, for some technologies, all of the world’s top 10 leading research institutions are based in China and are collectively generating nine times more high-impact research papers than the second-ranked country (most often the US). Notably, the Chinese Academy of Sciences ranks highly (and often first or second) across many of the 44 technologies included in the Critical Technology Tracker. We also see China’s efforts being bolstered through talent and knowledge import: one-fifth of its high-impact papers are being authored by researchers with postgraduate training in a Five-Eyes country.2 China’s lead is the product of deliberate design and long-term policy planning, as repeatedly outlined by Xi Jinping and his predecessors.3

A key area in which China excels is defence and space-related technologies. China’s strides in nuclear-capable hypersonic missiles reportedly took US intelligence by surprise in August 2021.4

Had a tool such as ASPI’s Critical Technology Tracker been collecting and analysing this data two years ago, Beijing’s strong interest and leading research performance in this area would have been more easily identified…

Had a tool such as ASPI’s Critical Technology Tracker been collecting and analysing this data two years ago, Beijing’s strong interest and leading research performance in this area would have been more easily identified, and such technological advances would have been less surprising. That’s because, according to our data analysis, over the past five years, China generated 48.49% of the world’s high-impact research papers into advanced aircraft engines, including hypersonics, and it hosts seven of the world’s top 10 research institutions in this topic area.

The US comes second in the majority of the 44 technologies examined in the Critical Technology Tracker. The US currently leads in areas such as high performance computing, quantum computing and vaccines. Our dataset reveals that there’s a large gap between China and the US, as the leading two countries, and everyone else. The data then indicates a small, second-tier group of countries led by India and the UK: other countries that regularly appear in this group—in many technological fields— include South Korea, Germany, Australia, Italy, and less often, Japan.

This project—including some of its more surprising findings—further highlights the gap in our understanding of the critical technology ecosystem, including its current trajectory. It’s important that we seek to fill this gap so we don’t face a future in which one or two countries dominate new and emerging industries (something that recently occurred in 5G technologies) and so countries have ongoing access to trusted and secure critical technology supply chains.

China’s overall research lead, and its dominant concentration of expertise across a range of strategic sectors, has short and long term implications for democratic nations. In the long term, China’s leading research position means that it has set itself up to excel not just in current technological development in almost all sectors, but in future technologies that don’t yet exist. Unchecked, this could shift not just technological development and control but global power and influence to an authoritarian state where the development, testing and application of emerging, critical and military technologies isn’t open and transparent and where it can’t be scrutinised by independent civil society and media.

In the more immediate term, that lead—coupled with successful strategies for translating research breakthroughs to commercial systems and products that are fed into an efficient manufacturing base—could allow China to gain a stranglehold on the global supply of certain critical technologies.

Such risks are exacerbated because of the willingness of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to use coercive techniques5 outside of the global rules-based order to punish governments and businesses, including withholding the supply of critical technologies.6

What’s the solution?

These findings should be a wake-up call for democratic nations, who must rapidly pursue a strategic critical technology step-up.

Governments around the world should work both collaboratively and individually to catch up to China and, more broadly, they must pay greater attention to the world’s centre of technological innovation and strategic competition: the Indo-Pacific. While China is in front, it’s important for democracies to take stock of the power of their potential aggregate lead and the collective strengths of regions and groupings (for example the EU, the Quad and AUKUS, to name just a few examples). But such aggregate leads will only be fully realised through far deeper collaboration between partners and allies, greater investment in areas including R&D, talent and commercialisation, and more focused intelligence strategies. And, finally, governments must make more space for new, bigger and more creative policy ideas – the step-up in performance required demands no less.

Partners and allies need to step up and seriously consider things such as sovereign wealth funds at 0.5%–0.7% of gross national income providing venture capital, research and scale-up funding, with a sizable portion reserved for high-risk, high-reward ‘moonshots’ (big ideas). Governments should plan for:

  • technology visas, ‘friend-shoring’ and R&D grants between allies
  • a revitalisation of the university sector through specialised scholarships for students and technologists working at the forefront of critical technology research
  • restructuring taxation systems to divert private capital towards venture capital and scale-up efforts for promising new technologies
  • new public–private partnerships and centres of excellence to help to foster greater commercialisation opportunities.

Intelligence communities have a pivotal role to play in both informing decision-makers and building capability. One recommendation we make is that Five-Eyes countries, along with Japan, build an intelligence analytical centre focused on China and technology (starting with open-source intelligence).

We outline 23 policy recommendations for partners and allies to act on collaboratively and individually. They span across the four themes of investment and talent; global partnerships; intelligence; and moonshots. While China is in front, it’s important for democracies to take stock of their combined and complementary strengths. When added up, they have the aggregate lead in many technology areas.

  1. Visit the Critical Technology Tracker site for a list and explanation of these 44 technologies: techtracker.aspi.org.au/list-of-technologies. ↩︎
  2. Australian Signals Directorate, ‘Intelligence partnerships’, Australian Government, 2023 ↩︎
  3. See ‘China’s science and technology vision’ on page 14. ↩︎
  4. Demetri Sevastopulo, Kathrin Hille, ‘China tests new space capability with hypersonic missile’, Financial Times, 17 October 2021 ↩︎
  5. Fergus Hunter, Daria Impiombato, Yvonne Lau, Adam Triggs, Albert Zhang, Urmika Deb, ‘Countering China’s coercive diplomacy: prioritising economic security, sovereignty and the rules-based order’, ASPI, Canberra, 22 February 2023 ↩︎
  6. Fergus Hanson, Emilia Currey, Tracy Beattie, The Chinese Communist Party’s coercive diplomacy, ASPI, Canberra, 1 September 2020, online; State Department, China’s coercive tactics abroad, US Government, no date, online; Bonnie S Glaser, Time for collective pushback against China’s economic coercion, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), 13 January 2021, online; Marcin Szczepanski, China’s economic coercion: evolution, characteristics and countermeasures, briefing, European Parliament, 15 November 2022, online; Mercy A Kuo, ‘Understanding (and managing) China’s economic coercion’, The Diplomat, 17 October 2022. ↩︎

Tag Archive for: US Alliances

Elbridge Colby’s vision: blocking China

Elbridge Colby’s senate confirmation hearing in early March holds more important implications for US partners than most observers in Canberra, Wellington or Suva realise. As President Donald Trump’s nominee for under secretary of defence for policy—the Pentagon’s chief strategist—Colby gave testimony that is a window into the administration’s approach to China and what that means for allies and partners across Oceania.

Colby commands attention not as a partisan operator but as a genuine analytical thinker. As the chief architect of the 2018 National Defense Strategy, he orchestrated the United States’ pivot to Asia through changes to force posture, acquisition priorities and strategic focus. His 2021 book The Strategy of Denial has become required reading for defence planners. In it, Colby argues that the US must direct its military power to deny China hegemony over Asia, rather than pursue global primacy or retrenchment.

The vision he laid out before the Senate Armed Services Committee was neither the primacy-obsessed neoconservatism of the Bush era nor the strategic restraint and belt-tightening advocated by US progressives and libertarians. Instead, Colby argued for ‘prioritised engagement’—a strategy that recognises the limits of US power while refusing to abandon core commitments.

This ranking is important for Australia and Pacific island nations.

First, Colby’s confirmation suggests strategic prioritisation of the Indo-Pacific. Throughout the testimony, he stressed that China is ‘the biggest, most powerful rival we have faced in probably 150 years.’ While other theatres might command attention, Colby made clear that resources must flow to deter Beijing first. The unfunded $11 billion priority list from the US military’s Indo-Pacific Command is, in his words, a strategic failure that demands rectification.

Colby’s testimony also flashed warning signs for allies hoping Washington would shoulder the burden of regional security. His insistence that ‘we have a one-war military and change’ reflects a hard-nosed pragmatism—a stance that reinforces calls for allies to increase defence spending. These demands may prove challenging even for Australia, which has already committed to defence spending increases, provides key regional intelligence and offers the US military access to Australian ports and airfields. They are probably more challenging for smaller Pacific Island countries or other regional partners with limited resources.

Colby expressed reservations about AUKUS, despite describing Australia as ‘perhaps our closest ally in the world’ that has ‘been with us even in our less advisable wars’. His concern was that the arrangement could potentially reduce the US’s submarine availability during a crucial period.

This concern reflects a common Trump administration line that support for alliance commitments must not come at the expense of the US’s ability to deter China. This tension between alliance building and direct deterrence capability is not new. Colby has consistently emphasised re-assessment and re-organisation of alliances around the paramount goal of preventing Chinese hegemony.

Such an America First position creates both challenges and opportunities for Australia. The challenge lies in potential timeline slippage for submarine delivery; the opportunity comes from Colby’s desire to ‘do everything we can to make this work’ by revitalising the US’s industrial base to produce more submarines for the US and its allies. Australian defence planners understand this dual message from Washington, but Australian taxpayers also deserve an explanation from their government.

For Pacific island states caught between Washington and Beijing, Colby’s approach suggests more direct US engagement. When questioned about regional coalitions, he expressed scepticism of a ‘NATO-like alliance’ in the Indo-Pacific, preferring more tailored bilateral relationships. This points to a strategy of supporting critical nodes in the US’s defensive perimeter, rather than building expansive regional architectures. Colby argued in his book that the US should cultivate and strengthen capabilities among a ‘deny China’ coalition rather than pursue diffuse multilateral frameworks.

The issue underpinning Colby’s testimony is the mismatch between the US’s global commitments and its current military capabilities. He repeatedly invoked the Lippmann gap—a disparity between strategic ends and available means.

Colby presents prioritisation not as a choice but as a necessity, recognising that the US industrial base has atrophied while China’s has bloomed. Noting that China has ‘a shipbuilding capacity over 230 times that of the United States’, he underscored a US industrial deficit that must be addressed.

If confirmed, Colby would seek tailored deterrence approaches for specific contingencies rather than general regional dominance. He would also want better stewardship of US resources and stronger allied defence capabilities. He understands the industrial limitations and recognises that resources—including decisionmakers’ and strategists’ time and attention spans—directed toward one theatre necessarily come at the expense of another.

With Colby at the Pentagon’s strategic wheel, allies should expect more US demands. Australia, with its resources and strategic location, will face increased pressure to accelerate its defence buildup and repeated asks from the US to step into the breach. Pacific island states will need to navigate even more carefully between economic enticements and competing security guarantees that may come with more explicit conditions than in the past.

Some US allies contribute, some loaf. Here’s a numerical assessment

Which US allies have paid their bills, as President Donald Trump would see things? Which, having given the United States little support in return for its security guarantee, now risk losing it?

The short answer, derived from our numerical methodology, is that only nine countries in the US’s main European and Indo-Pacific alliance networks are genuine net contributors to their partnerships with Washington. Australia, Britain and the Netherlands rank highest. Poland, Norway and France are also pulling their weight.

Sixteen countries in those alliances, though not quite free-riders, can fairly be called cheap-riders, according to our assessment, which measures allies’ commitments of blood and treasure. Another 12 may be classified as blatant cheap-riders, notably including Japan, which has the largest economy among the US’s friends.

Our assessment does not focus on Washington’s Latin American and Caribbean allies, but, if it did, they’d all be classed as cheap-riders or blatant cheap-riders.

With Trump taking the unprecedented step of linking protection with payment, our analysis aims to clarify allies’ risks of US abandonment. For the NATO and Indo-Pacific allies, this is no mere academic exercise. European NATO members face an aggressive Russia that has threatened to expand its war against Ukraine. And US allies in the Indo-Pacific confront an increasingly assertive and powerful Beijing, alongside growing nuclear and missile threats from Pyongyang.

Contrary to expectations, we found that proximity to these threats did not necessarily correlate with higher contribution to the US alliance, especially in Europe.

Within alliances that are asymmetric, as any with the US must be, weaker partners cannot fully compensate the stronger partner for protection. They’re not rich enough. But they can contribute (or, in Trump’s parlance, ‘pay’) through such actions as providing international diplomatic support, forward bases or niche military capabilities.

Trump generally attaches greater weight to more readily quantifiable measures, such as defence spending as a percentage of GDP. So we follow him, answering the bottom-line question ‘Who’s paid?’ by asking five component questions with readily quantifiable insights. We aggregate the results into an overall payment score.

First, has the ally met its defence spending targets over the lifetime of the alliance? Washington expects allies to spend at least 2 percent of GDP on defence (though Trump has floated higher standards). By doing so, allies develop properly funded independent military capabilities, reducing the US’s burden of guaranteeing their security. Higher spending also makes them more useful potential partners in US-led coalitions operating outside the alliance areas. Consistently meeting the 2 percent target, amid constant pressures on the public purse, also demonstrates a domestic political resolve that enhances the alliance’s deterrent potential. So we assess lifetime spending by comparing each ally’s total defence expenditure and GDP during its time in alliance with the US. Net contributors meet the 2 percent threshold, whereas net cheap-riders fall short.

Second, has the ally met its defence spending targets over the past decade? Military capabilities, accrued over time, atrophy without sufficient ongoing funding. Washington, for example, built a world-class navy in the American Civil War—which, after years of underinvestment, amounted to just ‘an alphabet of floating washtubs’. Correspondingly, recent defence spending provides insight into which allies have maintained the military capability and preparedness that Washington values. And, again, it shows political resolve. We assess recent spending by considering allies’ defence expenditures and GDPs since 2015 (when combat operations in the last US-led ground-war ended and when Trump’s full engagement in politics began). Net contributors meet the 2 percent threshold, whereas those falling short have either been persistent cheap-riders or, having formerly paid their dues, have now decided to take it easy.

Third, how much US weaponry has the ally purchased? Allied acquisitions of US military equipment, such as aircraft, give Washington several benefits: revenue from and longer production runs of existing systems (for example, F-16s); more work from their maintenance programs; savings from cooperative development of new systems (such as the F-35); and improved US and allied fighting strength thanks to the ease of operating common equipment. We assess weapons purchases by considering allies’ relative shares of US arms transfers and global GDP during their alliance tenure. Scores under 1 indicate comparatively limited purchases, whereas those exceeding 1 denote outsized purchases, and those above 2 show purchases that greatly favour US suppliers.

Fourth, has the ally supported US-led combat coalitions? Allied participation in military operations benefits Washington by providing international legitimation for the action and reducing the burden on the US. Alliances, however, are not wellsprings of guaranteed support: as self-interested actors, allies can decline to render aid or even defect to opposing blocs. Correspondingly, joining US-led coalitions builds good faith with Washington (and implicitly serves as down payment on reciprocal assistance). We assess participation by considering five ground-war coalitions (those for the wars in Korea, Vietnam, Persian Gulf, Afghanistan and Iraq) and five primarily air-war coalitions (in the Iraqi No-Fly Zones and campaigns in Bosnia, Kosovo and Libya and against ISIS). We allocate points according to the burden undertaken: for ground-wars, 8 points for providing frontline combat forces, 4 for supporting units, and 2 for financial assistance. For air wars (which involve less cost and risk), point values are halved. We count allies as consistently supportive if their points exceed 17 points and as reliable combat partners if they exceed 30.

Fifth, has the ally paid a blood price? Allied personnel losses, incurred while furthering Washington’s security interests, represent a shared sacrifice, one that demonstrates the highest form of loyalty (a value cherished by Trump) and implicitly serve as further down payment on reciprocal assistance. Since US-led air wars have featured minimal casualties, we assess losses by counting the number of US-led ground wars after World War II in which allies have suffered service deaths.

We generate overall payment scores by aggregating allies’ performances across all five measures. Each measure receives a 20 percent weighting, and we grant maximum points for:

—Meeting the 2 percent defence expenditure target during the period of alliance;

—Meeting it in the past 10 years;

—Greatly favouring the US in weapons purchases;

—Providing frontline combat forces for each US-led combat coalition; and

—Incurring personnel losses in each US-led coalition ground war.

Partial points are awarded relative to these maximums. Scores below 50 indicate blatant cheap-riding. Those exceeding 70 denote genuine net contributors—for example, 40 for meeting both spending targets, 20 for joining and suffering losses in more US-led coalitions than not, and 10 for outsized weapons purchases.

So, who’s paid?

The US alliance network contains few genuine net contributors, with only nine of 38 NATO and Indo-Pacific allies exceeding 70 points. Moreover, three net contributors deserve qualification: Greece and Turkey generally prioritise each other as a threat rather than NATO’s common adversary, Russia, and South Korea owes the US for its ongoing protection along with its defence during the Korean War.

The Indo-Pacific allies contribute relatively more than their NATO counterparts, averaging higher overall and component scores (apart from participation in operations, among which were three NATO-centric air-war coalitions). Compared with NATO, the Indo-Pacific alliance network also includes a greater percentage of genuine net contributors (28 percent versus 22 percent) and a much lower percentage of blatant cheap-riders (14 percent versus 35 percent).

Notable cheap-riders include Germany and Japan, because they have large economies and therefore great potential military might.

It’s also remarkable that cheap-riding is common in the countries of NATO’s Eastern European expansion. Apart from Poland, Romania and the Baltics, all are blatant cheap-riders, even though their membership has brought added burdens and risks to the alliance, including the US.

Australia is well insulated against Trump’s potential revisions to US alliance policy, which largely (and, in light of our findings, rightly) concentrate on redressing NATO’s relative underpayment. Canberra is immune to similar charges: no other ally has given Washington comparatively more blood and treasure than Australia, and the Albanese government has already begun reversing recent dips in defence spending, pledging to spend 2.3 percent of GDP by 2034. Moreover, Australia’s ‘indispensable’ strategic partnerships with other US allies remain relatively safe: Britain ranks second in terms of its alliance contributions (which bodes well for AUKUS solvency), and Japan, though a definite laggard, has been steadily boosting what Trump would see as its payments. It’s greatly lifting defence spending, increasing host-nation financial support and reinterpreting its constitution to permit collective military action.

How, or whether, Canberra’s unrivalled contributions will affect its bargaining position with Washington remains to be seen and needs supplementing with qualitive analyses (as given here for the first Trump presidency).

Leveraging Australia’s alliances on critical minerals

Rare, valuable and with unpronounceable names like praseodymium, critical minerals are the foundations of the technologies on which much modern life depends. Packed into the circuit boards of our smartphones and tablets are chemical elements and rare earths at the heart of a tightening environmental and geoeconomic race. It is one that Australia and its partners are well placed not only to compete in, but to win.

This new gold rush is driven by the global climate-change target to reach net-zero emissions by 2050. To succeed, the world needs vastly more electric vehicles, batteries, permanent magnets, wind turbines, solar photovoltaics, hydrogen electrolysers and energy-efficient technologies. The critical minerals that are core components of all these technologies are central to the energy transition.

Demand for these minerals is booming and is set to quadruple by 2040. An additional 50 new lithium mines, 60 new nickel mines and 17 new cobalt mines will be needed to meet the 2050 target. This is great news for Australia since we have some of the world’s largest recoverable reserves of critical minerals, with 81 major projects underway worth up to $42 billion.

Modelling in the government’s 2023 critical minerals strategy projects that global demand for critical resources could add $71.2 billion in GDP to the Australian economy and create an extra 115,100 jobs by 2040. Those figures soar to $133.5 billion and 262,600 jobs if we capture a larger share of refining and processing in Australia. That’s a serious economic opportunity.

An equally strong national security imperative for exploiting Australia’s abundance of critical minerals is their use in sensitive defence technologies. As a recent ASPI report by Ben Halton and Kim Beazley noted, 3,000 items of US military equipment, almost every weapon used in Ukraine, and ‘every fighter jet, navy vessel and nuclear weapon on Earth’ relies on rare earths, and there are few known substitutes.

Their vulnerability to supply-chain shocks is part of what makes minerals ‘critical’, according to Geoscience Australia, which is a concern because of the heavy concentration of the market around a single buyer. China controls 94% of the world’s supply of rare earths and therefore largely controls the price of these and other minerals.

Because of its central role in minerals processing, China dominates Australia’s exports. Last year, for example, China bought 96% of our spodumene, up 28.5% from 2021. But there are few alternatives to the Chinese market. Incredibly, as Halton and Beazley explain, Western Australia’s Japan-backed Lynas Rare Earths is the only producer in the world that is independent of China’s supply chains.

Diversification is a costly endeavour. It would take $1 billion to build a new processing plant in Australia. But there are plenty of opportunities for project proponents, including financing under the $2 billion Critical Minerals Facility through Export Finance Australia. Another $4 billion is available for resources and renewables through the National Reconstruction Fund and $500 million will be available through the Northern Australia Infrastructure Fund.

Northern Australia has an important role to play in securing Australia’s and our partners’ critical-mineral supply chains, with its hosting of a large number of deposits. While the 2023 strategy did not expand the critical minerals list, it established a process to update the list. This is important for the Northern Territory, which has a large number of deposits of minerals that are not all captured by the current list.

Critical minerals opportunities abound in the Northern Territory. Arafura Rare Earth’s Nolans project, for example, could supply 10% of the world’s demand for the metals used in rare-earth magnets. A $1.5 billion Commonwealth investment in the planned Middle Arm sustainable development precinct will boost Darwin’s role in manufacturing and exporting critical minerals as well as hydrogen.

Well-designed government interventions are crucial to de-risk investment, encourage private-sector funding and attract trusted foreign investment. The government has a role to play, as we’ve seen with the Quad’s growing engagement in clean energy and with the ambitious Climate, Critical Minerals and Clean Energy Transformation Compact that made securing minerals supply chains a US alliance objective.

Australia needs to continue to bolster its engagement with close partners. Halton and Beazley propose making critical minerals core to the AUKUS partnership with the US and UK. They call for AUKUS to quantify needs for each mineral, map foreign ownership, co-invest up to US$5 billion in projects, and even become ‘the supreme central command of allied effort to diversify critical-minerals supply’.

Australia can win the critical-minerals race by strengthening its supply chains, capturing a larger share of downstream processing and supplying emerging markets and trusted partners like the US, UK, Japan, Korea, India and the EU. Fortunately, Australia’s unmatched geological richness, mining expertise and good business practices make us a partner of choice on critical minerals.

Policy, Guns and Money: Deterrence special

In this special episode, ASPI Executive Director Justin Bassi speaks to Lisa Curtis, senior fellow and director of the Indo-Pacific security program at the Center for a New American Security and former senior director for South and Central Asia on the US National Security Council, and Bec Shrimpton, director of ASPI’s Sydney Dialogue and a former senior adviser to an Australian foreign minister and minister for women. They discuss deterrence—what it is, how it works, whether we have or lack it—and how the US and Australia can work together to achieve their deterrence goals.

Shangri-La Dialogue: sovereignty means being free to choose 

The first Shangri-La Dialogue since 2019 is a chance for world leaders and ministers to discuss urgent and long-term international security questions, including a focus on whether rules and sovereignty matter anymore.

The answer has been a resounding ‘yes’, but much discussion has focused on what words we shouldn’t use and what actions we shouldn’t take.

Don’t refer to ‘the West’ as it will upset the East. Don’t use the word ‘democracy’ as it will upset non-democratic countries. Don’t say ‘strategic competition’ as it frightens the non-aligned movement. Don’t say you support the US as it will be seen as provoking major-power rivalry. Don’t call out Chinese Communist Party aggression as that is asking countries to make a binary choice between China and the US. Don’t let the US change its strategic-ambiguity approach to Taiwan as it might provoke China. Don’t talk about security components of the Quad as the region won’t like it. Don’t have clear foreign policy and defence strategies. Don’t ask countries to choose.

It left a sense of needing to apologise for being democratic and for expecting countries and their governments to have and follow international standards. Oh, by the way, don’t mention international standards as they are Western standards driven by the US that are anti-China.

All of this is, of course, only serving authoritarian regimes because it enables the narrative that anyone calling out their malicious actions is being provocative. Don’t ask me to stop hitting you or I’ll punish you by hitting you harder.

Such discussions about what we cannot or should not do also distracts from many of the urgent issues at hand. It means the discussion doesn’t have to fully recognise the reality of what is happening around us—economic coercion, military expansion, cyber intrusions, foreign interference, human rights abuses, misuse of technologies. Don’t talk about these things as it might upset some nations, and the people doing them, or those hoping to ignore them.

It is of course always important to adapt to different audiences, to understand different interests and to not impose our values on others. But we need to shift from a foreign policy of ‘don’ts’ to a foreign and strategic policy of what we must and can do—ourselves, and with others. And in doing so we should not be apologetic about what we are—democratic—and what our principles are: standing up for our freedoms, security and sovereignty and holding to account those responsible for breaching our freedom, security and sovereignty.

It’s easier to say what not to do, or what we don’t like, than what should be done. So, what actions should Australia, our allies and likeminded partners take that advance our interests, protect our values and promote a peaceful and prosperous Indo-Pacific?

First, recognise that being true to our own values doesn’t have to mean diverging from the interests of those we want to partner with, across Southeast Asia, Europe and the Pacific islands. We have proven that our democratic values are consistent with our aligned interests with Vietnam and Philippines on issues such as trade and the South China Sea. Freedom of navigation and resilient supply chains are in all our collective interests.

Second, the Australia–US–Japan Trilateral Strategic Dialogue should be revamped. Understandably, this dialogue has taken a back seat to the important development of the Quad, but it needs to be viewed as a vital cog for our long-term security. It can, for example, discuss key issues, such as Taiwan, in a way that the Quad is currently unable to. This is not a criticism of the Quad, which is among the most important partnerships for Australia.

Third, Australia should make clear that human rights matter. We should show that we can maintain relations with countries while addressing human rights and, where necessary, calling out crimes against humanity. Too often nations only call out the bad behaviour of those countries with which they do not have a significant economic relationship. This has enabled some to argue that trade reduces the potential for conflict. But this is a falsehood, seen not just by Russia’s war in Ukraine or even World War I, but because this mentality has meant that China has been winning a contest and conflict, one that simply hasn’t involved bullets and missiles.

We should ensure that even where we are economically entwined we are able to maintain our principles. In this regard, the new Australian government should use the Magnitsky powers to sanction those responsible for human rights abuses against Muslim minorities in Xinjiang. All other Magnitsky countries—the US, the UK and Canada—and the EU did so last year and it was a mistake for the previous Australian government to have left it to the new government. Notwithstanding this omission, the new government should join our partners and make it clear that we will also stand up for those unable to do so themselves due to oppression, coercion and subjugation.

Fourth, just as we should call out the bad behaviour of authoritarian states, we should be up-front with our allies, friends and partners. While being realistic that it won’t be reversed in the short term, Australia should continue to tell the US that it was a strategic mistake to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Although there can be many other positive initiatives, such as the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity, nothing will equate to the strategic heft of the US joining the TPP’s successor, the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership. In the meantime, we should fast-track those keen to join that meet the high standards of trade and economic investment. That means making the UK and Taiwan new members.

Fifth, European countries, in particular collectively as the EU, have significant power and we should encourage them to be more actively aligned. For too long, key European countries have inconsistently countered—and often outright avoided countering—malicious authoritarian behaviour. The EU response to China’s economic coercion of Lithuania demonstrated the collective power of the EU. Imagine the collective power of the EU with the US, Japan, Australia and others to both deter such behaviour and respond to it. Consistent, aligned approaches deter malicious authoritarian behaviour. It is the current inconsistency that encourages the bad behaviour we too often see today.

In this regard, head of the International Institute for Strategic Studies think tank in Berlin and former ASPI scholar Ben Schreer correctly told the dialogue on Friday that the ‘middle way’ in which Europe benefits from US security without joining strategic competition against China and Russia is no longer the right approach, because European values and interests are more aligned to those of the US, rather than those of China or Russia. The malign activities of China and Russia will continue and this will eventually force their hand, as we’ve seen with the illegal war against Ukraine.

Which brings us back to the don’ts—don’t ask anyone to choose. We should be clear that not choosing is actually making a choice. And that, instead, the key is being free to choose.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, in the dialogue’s keynote address, asked and answered this key question for Australia and our partners:

Can the rules-based international order we have built through hard work, dialogue and consensus be upheld and the march of peace and prosperity continue? Or will we return to a lawless world where rules are ignored and broken, where unilateral changes to the status quo by force are unchallenged and accepted, and where the strong coerce the weak militarily or economically?

That is the choice we have to make today.

Kennedy brings Washington closer to Canberra

It was Prime Minister Robert Menzies who told President Lyndon B. Johnson bluntly but accurately what the simple requirement happened to be for an effective US ambassador to Australia. The ambassador had to have the ability, Menzies told LBJ, to pick up the phone and talk directly to the US president. After all, under the US system, ambassadors represent their presidents and serve at their discretion.

LBJ understood Menzies’ advice. His chosen ambassador to Australia was one Texan, Ed Clark, known colloquially within the Austin political establishment as ‘Mr Ed’. The Australian media tended to regard Clark as something of a yokel. After all, didn’t the folksy ambassador turn up at the opening of Pine Gap carrying one peppercorn to pay the annual rent? But Clark was very significant in LBJ’s political universe and more than once he had literally carried the bag of campaign cash for Johnson during his congressional and presidential campaigns. He enjoyed the president’s absolute confidence.

This had been tested during one campaign where the future ambassador left his briefcase under the table in a remote Texas roadhouse in the early hours of the morning. Returning to the road, Clark realised his mistake and frantically drove back to find the briefcase intact. It contained $50,000.

My favourite story of Clark was told to me by a later US ambassador to Australia. Delivering a valedictory address for a retiring Texas legislator, ambassador Clark paid him the ultimate compliment: ‘He is as honest as the times will allow.’

Australia has been well served by US ambassadors in Canberra. Mel Sembler was close to George H.W. Bush and Tom Schieffer remained close to his partner in the Texas Rangers baseball team, George W. Bush. While most US ambassadors are political appointees, one excellent Foreign Service Officer was Ed Perkins, who had a distinguished career in the US diplomatic service in South Africa and at the UN.

But the main current problem for the US diplomatic service is the appallingly slow process by which nominees are confirmed or rejected by the US Senate. Delaying tactics are practised by both sides of the aisle in Washington, but it has assumed disturbing proportions of late as Senator Ted Cruz holds up nominations until he can strike a deal on an issue of concern to him. At the end of last year, some 30-odd nominees were released from Senate gridlock after majority leader Senator Chuck Schumer agreed to bring to a vote Cruz’s opposition to the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline from Russia to Germany. In Washington, it is sometimes called the Molotov–Ribbentrop pipeline to register maximum distaste. But Cruz won the point.

It’s appalling that at a time when the US is required to demonstrate greater political and diplomatic leadership its Senate treats the appointment of its representatives abroad with such cavalier disdain. Such capricious indulgence is a stain upon Washington.

Australia lacked a US ambassador for years until the appointment of the thoughtful Arthur B. Culvahouse Jr as Donald Trump’s ambassador. Fortunately, the embassy in Canberra fell back upon its chargé d’affaires, James Carouso, who stepped effortlessly into the breach. But we cannot always rely upon this diplomatic depth.

It was Ambassador Culvahouse who made the perceptive observation that Americans had more confidence in Australia than perhaps Australians did.

This is why the impending arrival of Caroline Kennedy is such undiluted good news. A lawyer and author, Kennedy has already served successfully in Tokyo as the US ambassador for Barack Obama. Given the closeness of the relationship with the US and the growing closeness of relations between Japan and Australia, it is difficult to think of a better person to take up residence in Canberra. It can be hoped the ambassadorial nomination is not stymied in recriminations on Capitol Hill, born of the most pathetic impulses to score points.

Kennedy obviously comes from a renowned political family, which has achieved much and sacrificed much in service to the American republic. But the ambassador herself has displayed astute political judgement in endorsing Obama and Joe Biden for president early, when many other Democrats were looking elsewhere. This kind of judgement is of inestimable value.

Unfortunately, her grandfather, Joseph P. Kennedy, did not have her astute capacity for careful political assessment. This is documented in an excellent biography of Joe Kennedy, titled The ambassador: Joseph P. Kennedy at the Court of St James’s, 1938–1940, by Susan Ronald. It is the best political biography of this Australian summer.

Kennedy arrived in London on the eve of World War II, having contributed materially to Franklin D. Roosevelt’s election in 1932 and 1936. But his political skills deserted him and his period at the Court of St James’s was not a happy one. Disregarding US foreign policy and committed to appeasement, Joe Kennedy became a defeatist and by the time he returned home he was being sidelined by Washington and ignored by the British. Contrast this performance with the masterful contribution to the war effort of Ivan Maisky, Stalin’s long-term ambassador to Britain, who was obliged to not only navigate Tory ruling circles but avoid an ignominious end in the cellars of the Lubyanka in Moscow. The Maisky diaries: red ambassador to the Court of St James’s, 1932–1943 makes riveting reading.

Australia has every reason to be pleased by Biden’s decision to send Kennedy to Canberra. We’re a little unlucky not to have had the forceful Admiral Harry Harris posted here years ago by Trump. Instead, Harris went to Seoul, where his presence was very reassuring to the Korean allies.

It is not too much to say the present time represents the greatest strategic challenge to Australia since World War. The dictators make no secret of their aggressive ambitions. As counterbalance, the ANZUS alliance is entering its 71st year, but the new latticework, to quote US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, requires sustained diplomacy.

The Quad, with the US, Japan and India, and AUKUS, with the US and Britain, are major shifts and will occupy serious diplomatic time in the respective capitals of the participants. Appropriately, Kennedy brings real diplomatic gravitas to Canberra. Her appointment will add serious weight to US and Australian capacity to make a difference for the better. She will be able to do far more than pick up the phone.

Editors’ picks for 2021: ‘Limiting the nuclear-proliferation blowback from the AUKUS submarine deal’

Originally published 21 September 2021.

If the architects of the AUKUS pact and its headline initiative to supply Australia with nuclear-powered submarines imagined it would be seen as proliferation neutral, the reality might not be so straightforward. The announcement was extremely sketchy on many critical details, particularly from a non-proliferation perspective.

Of course, how nuclear non-proliferation issues are addressed isn’t the sole test of this deal, but it will be part of managing its future trajectory. It’s notable that the State Department doesn’t seem to have been in the loop on negotiations. It has carriage of US non-proliferation commitments, so some of the proliferation consequences may not have been front of mind.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has said the deal will comply with Australia’s international non-proliferation commitments. That’s true, as there’s a massive loophole in Article III of the United Nations Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons that exempts naval reactors from nuclear safeguards. However, the non-proliferation community has long seen the loophole as a major threat to one of the treaty’s key aims—to limit the production and use of highly enriched uranium (HEU), which can be used to make nuclear weapons.

Morrison’s statement is less certain when it comes to transfers of Tomahawk cruise missiles to the Royal Australian Navy’s Hobart-class destroyers and Australia’s commitments under the Missile Technology and Control Regime.

This non-treaty association of states aims to limit the risks of nuclear proliferation arising from the sale and transfer of nuclear-capable delivery systems. In the past, the US has backed the MTCR with stringent sanctions for non-compliance.

The last time a country transferred missiles with a range of more than 600 kilometres to another country (not counting US sales of Polaris, Trident and Tomahawk missiles to the UK) was in 1988 when China sold 3,000-kilometre-range missiles to the Saudis. The backlash was immediate and helped consolidate MTCR norms. The Tomahawk family of missiles has at least a 1,000-kilometre range and can be configured for either a nuclear or conventional payload. Some analysts suggest that the transfer of Tomahawks to Australia may erode the MTCR norm of denying transfers of missiles with ranges over 300 kilometres.

There could also be implications for negotiations on the proposed fissile material cut-off treaty, historically supported by Australia, which aims to strictly limit the amount of fissile material that nucelar-weapon states can manufacture. Negotiations are locked in a stalemate, largely thanks to Pakistan. Nonetheless, the treaty’s goals have broad international support and the manufacture of more weapons-grade uranium to power Australia’s submarines will likely also set those goals back.

There seems to be an emerging consensus in the global arms-control community that the AUKUS submarine deal could have a hugely negative effect on non-proliferation norms and practices. Depending on how Washington responds, this could have an impact on how the program unfolds.

Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists, says that the deal ‘will further intensify the arms race in the region and dynamics that fuel military competition’. Pointing to the sparse strategic rationale offered so far, he adds, ‘Other than fielding more and better weapons, does anyone have a plan?’

Similar views have rippled across non-proliferation and arms-control circles, driven by fears that the deal will set a precedent ushering in a dangerous era of loosened nuclear restraints.

Daryl Kimball, director of the Arms Control Association, points out that if Australia gets a HEU submarine like the US Virginia class, it will be the first non-nuclear-weapon state to have such a capability.

What will Washington say to other allies, such as Israel, that might want the same technology? What normative leverage will the US have if China and Russia decide to proliferate naval reactor technology and long-range nuclear-capable missiles, or if other nations—let’s say Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazil—seize on this precedent as an excuse to develop HEU for naval purposes?

Others have pointed out that the deal could be inconsistent with the US–Australia 123 agreement on nuclear transfers, as well as the US Nuclear Non-proliferation Act and Atomic Energy Act. If that proves correct, there’ll need to be a legislative component to make the deal legal from the US side.

All of this depends on the nature of the technology transfer on naval reactor design and HEU enrichment—whether it’s a ‘black box’, with no Australian involvement in the nuclear side of the submarine project, or if Australia will have to develop some capability on reactor repair, fuel manufacture, storage and refuelling to accommodate a wartime scenario where total dependence on the US might not be feasible.

In either case, Australia will probably need to modify its safeguard agreements with the International Atomic Energy Agency, given all the questions this deal raises about how the American HEU nuclear fuel cycle will extend to Australia.

Australia has said that it doesn’t want to develop either nuclear weapons or an indigenous nuclear fuel cycle, but other countries will be asking whether that will remain true over time.

Verbal assurances won’t be enough, argues Kimball. He and other arms-control advocates suggest that the US needs to develop legislation ensuring that Australia won’t use this agreement to develop an indigenous enrichment capability.

The non-proliferation community, and other nations, could decide to lobby for another legislative requirement—that the Australian naval reactors be designed for low enriched uranium (LEU) rather than HEU.

HEU is anything above 20% enrichment, but US naval reactors on submarines and aircraft carriers use fuel that is 93–97% enriched weapons-grade uranium.

Transferring HEU technology to a non-nuclear-weapon state is seen as a grave proliferation risk, because it could enable that state to move closer to a nuclear weapons breakout capability without penalty and because it increases the risk of nuclear theft by non-state actors for use in a basic gun-type nuclear device.

The international community went through this issue with Brazil from the late 1970s, when the military junta developed HEU for use in naval rectors, and probably for nuclear weapons. After sanctions and the signing of a special Brazil–Argentina nuclear non-proliferation agreement, Brazil has been developing nuclear-powered submarines with France, which are believed to be LEU fuelled.

There’s been a push in the US Congress to phase out HEU in US naval reactors, consistent with domestic legislation on non-proliferation and Washington’s international non-proliferation commitments.

In 2020, the House Armed Services Committee, controlled by the Democrats, called for continued study into the use of LEU in the next generation of US submarines.

The Republican-controlled Senate Armed Services Committee disagreed and recommended banning the use of public funds to explore the option. It cited a 2016 JASON defence advisory panel report which found that the use of LEU reactors wasn’t feasible in current submarine designs. Using LEU requires bigger reactors as around 4.7% more enriched uranium is needed than for HEU. Submarines using LEU must be refuelled every one to three years. The Virginia-class HEU fuel lasts for 33 years—the life of the submarine.

But the JASON report also recommends a compromise, using what it calls LEU+. This is 25% enriched uranium, technically HEU but well below the enrichment level needed for nuclear weapons. It would provide roughly the same performance as higher enriched HEU.

The first opportunity to use LEU or LEU+ would be in the Virginia class’s replacement, the SSN(X) or Improved Virginia class, to be designed before 2030.

There are many reasons Australia might want to explore LEU+ as well as working towards best-practice nuclear safeguards. A deal that was meant to demonstrate unified resolve to China has generated considerable blowback, opening up divisions in NATO and the Five Eyes and generating distrust of Australia’s motives—all of which adversaries will be quick to exploit. Working to ameliorate the non-proliferation harms of this deal could help manage some of these effects.

And continuing to discourage a proliferation-permissive environment by upholding global rules is definitely in Australia’s interest, especially in a geopolitical environment where potential adversaries are fielding ever-increasing numbers of weapons.

The US and Australia both recognise the importance of strengthening global rules and the institutions that allow existential nuclear-proliferation issues to be mediated. Conventional nuclear and military deterrence might make state adversaries think twice before using nuclear weapons, but it’s of little use in stopping acquisition and the attendant risks of catastrophic miscalculation.

Caroline Kennedy will be an empowered, optimistic US ambassador to Australia

President Joe Biden has nominated Caroline Kennedy as the new US ambassador to Australia.

Her time as ambassador to Japan from 2013 to 2017 gives us insights into how she will approach the role here in Canberra. From that, we can expect she will bring a strong historical understanding, including in the areas of defence and national security, to her role. Critically, though, she will bring energy and a sense of purpose.

The next four years for Australia and the US is a time of activity and purpose. That’s true bilaterally, but it’s even more the case because our nations are in two hugely important, fast-moving ‘minilateral’ partnerships—the Quad of Australia, India, Japan and the US, and the AUKUS technology-acceleration partnership of Australia, the UK and the US.

Minilaterals like the Quad and AUKUS are the answer to two problems: large multilateral forums are unwieldy and slow, and even the most capable nation acting alone is less powerful than a combination of nations with shared purpose, resources and urgency.

Kennedy will understand this and already has a deep appreciation of the Quad because of her work with Japan’s former prime minister Shinzo Abe. Abe originated much of the thinking on the Indo-Pacific and the Quad that has become core Australian and US policy over the past few years. He remains an active thinker and voice on these issues, as we saw at ASPI’s Sydney Dialogue in November.

The ambassador-designate is an energetic and optimistic voice and mind, whether that’s on issues like democracy, innovation, climate change and nuclear non-proliferation or public health, innovation, space and renewable energy. These are all areas to which she brings experience and knowledge from her time in Japan. John Berry, ambassador to Australia while Kennedy was his counterpart in Japan, has said, ‘Ambassador Kennedy is the best face of America: resilient, optimistic, caring and very hard working.’

Kennedy is an articulate public speaker with a way of weaving personal and Kennedy family stories and history into topics. One example is her account of meeting the family of the Japanese destroyer captain who sank her father John F. Kennedy’s patrol boat during World War II. She quoted her dad’s inscription on a photo he gave the captain: ‘To Captain Hanami—late enemy, present friend’, saying it was ‘a powerful reminder that even during times of conflict, we have more in common than divides us’.

This will make her effective and well liked, as it will be obvious to Australians that Ambassador Kennedy is not just doing her job—she has a sense of purpose that matters.

Most importantly, though, Caroline Kennedy has the one absolutely critical attribute that any US ambassador to Canberra absolutely must possess: she can call the US president and he’ll pick up the phone.

Her predecessor, Arthur B. Culvahouse, had a direct line to Donald Trump, and both nations benefited in complicated times. Ambassador Kennedy will need to use this access in a different way: with AUKUS and the Quad, the Australia–US relationship is all about momentum, implementation, results and speed. So, Kennedy’s job will be spotting and removing roadblocks to success, and using her presidential access, political networks and public voice here in Australia, and back into the US, to do so.

Australia’s ambassador in Washington, Arthur Sinodinos, has this same access back into Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s office and the Lodge when he needs it.

The Kennedy–Sinodinos connection may prove to be a valuable partnership for trouble-shooting and opportunity-spotting in the deep bilateral weave that is the US–Australia strategic, technological, economic and people-to-people relationship. A conspiracy of activism for joint national benefit between these two ambassadors can make our respective bureaucracies uncomfortable, but it can also get things done that an Australian prime minister and US president want to happen.

Biden’s choice of Kennedy is a personal one, just like with his key and most influential staff and other appointees. We know that when Biden does this, it means he will trust and empower that person. For rapid implementation of the new AUKUS technology partnership with all that it can do for Australian, US UK and Indo-Pacific security, that’s a very powerful thing.

It looks like 2022 is starting well in the Australia–US relationship.

Appeasement is not the solution to the China problem

Hugh White seems seized by anxiety in his latest and arguably most pessimistic assessment of US–China tensions over Taiwan and the strategic choices facing Australia.

White argues that the risk of war between the US and China is ‘quite high’ and that recent remarks by Defence Minister Peter Dutton suggest that Australia will follow America to war against China if China attacks Taiwan.

The most likely outcome of a US–China war, he says, would be ‘a costly and inconclusive stalemate’, with the chances of the war going nuclear ‘quite high’ and the chances of US victory ‘very low’.

A war, White argues, would likely destroy the liberal rules-based order. The cost in blood and treasure would be ‘almost unthinkably large … probably far higher than living under a new Chinese-led regional order’. These few words are the core of his argument.

White acknowledges that it’s credible to argue that Taiwan’s democracy shouldn’t be subjugated to Beijing’s increasingly authoritarian rule. But he nevertheless argues that there’s ‘a mortal [presumably moral] imperative to avoid war, and perhaps especially to avoid nuclear war’, which has to be balanced against the imperative to support democracy against authoritarianism.

He concludes that Australia needs to start debating the competing claims of these ‘seemingly incompatible imperatives’. His analysis and argument are, as always, elegantly expressed, but they ignore some fundamental questions and leave others unclear or ambiguous.

First, contrary to White’s assertion, balancing the imperatives of avoiding war and supporting democracy have long been a key focus of Australian debates on the US alliance, China policy and Taiwan. The issue is fraught and intensified when politicians make provocative remarks crafted for domestic electoral advantage.

Second, and more importantly, White’s own position is profoundly ambiguous. He sees the prospect of nuclear war as high, the prospect of US victory as low and the cost of war as probably higher than living under a new Chinese-led order. Given these conclusions, any balancing debate on avoiding war versus supporting democracy would seem irrelevant. White seems at least close to convinced that the game is up, that China has won, and that we must all surrender and settle down to live under a Chinese-led order after conceding or sacrificing Taiwan and ousting US maritime power from the region.

Two questions arise. Would such an outcome restore tranquillity, amity and peace to the region? And would life under a Chinese-led regional order be acceptable or even bearable to Australia and its democratic neighbours?

Far from being satisfied, China would be more likely to seek new territories to reclaim and to rule. That has always been the way of expansionist bully-boy powers when pusillanimous competitors appease them; think Czechoslovakia and Poland in the late 1930s. China is pursuing regional hegemony by moving to drive US power from the region. Stability and peace are not high on its international agenda. Its business is disruption and pressure.

Recent events in China leave little doubt about the quality of life under Beijing’s authoritarian rule. Hong Kong’s democracy has been trampled and violated, the ethnic cleansing of the Xinjiang Uyghurs is far advanced, dissident citizens are disappearing with an efficiency unmatched since the days of Stalin’s USSR. Democratic Taiwan would doubtless be similarly treated if ‘reunited’ with the mainland. So much for amity and peace under a Chinese order led by Xi Jinping.

Australia and its democratic neighbours would suffer too. If Canberra buckled to China’s published list of ‘14 grievances’, Australia’s independence, sovereignty and liberal democratic political culture would be destroyed and it would become a vassal client state.

It’s a pity that White, founding executive director of ASPI, barely canvassed these issues beyond observing in passing that it was ‘credible’ to argue that Taiwan’s democracy shouldn’t be subjugated. There are moral imperatives here, and issues of national interest, culture and alliance relations. White clearly recognises them but apparently sets them aside in hopes of avoiding a war.

Yet avoiding war often requires alliances of like-minded powers to balance, and to deter, potential aggressors by raising the cost of conflict higher than an aggressor is willing to pay. Australia’s alliance with the United States has served Canberra well despite its high and sometimes tragic costs. It has also given Australia access to superior US military technologies. If China succeeded in displacing the US in the region, the US alliance with Australia would inevitably collapse.

That would be a potentially fatal blow to Australia’s vital security interests and leave the nation much more vulnerable to aggressors while facing higher defence spending on possibly inferior equipment. Strong alliances—like the new and evolving AUKUS grouping—seem far more likely to deter war with China than appeasement policies based on misplaced optimism about Chinese benevolence once its demands are met.

Of course, as White notes, China is an increasingly formidable and nuclear-armed US competitor with impressive and growing military power. It is catching up fast. But White’s grim assessment of the course of any conflict ignores the ongoing military superiority of the US in both conventional and nuclear arms—a reality well understood by China. This point was emphasised in the powerful response to White by ASPI’s current executive director Peter Jennings and it needs no further elaboration here.

One hundred and twenty years ago, US president Theodore Roosevelt based his foreign policy on an African aphorism: ‘Speak softly and carry a big stick.’ Add ‘and maintain balancing alliances’ and you have the foundations for a policy to manage the Chinese challenge. It is a pity that White seems to prefer a policy of ‘Stay quiet and carry a feather duster.’

Limiting the nuclear-proliferation blowback from the AUKUS submarine deal

If the architects of the AUKUS pact and its headline initiative to supply Australia with nuclear-powered submarines imagined it would be seen as proliferation neutral, the reality might not be so straightforward. The announcement was extremely sketchy on many critical details, particularly from a non-proliferation perspective.

Of course, how nuclear non-proliferation issues are addressed isn’t the sole test of this deal, but it will be part of managing its future trajectory. It’s notable that the State Department doesn’t seem to have been in the loop on negotiations. It has carriage of US non-proliferation commitments, so some of the proliferation consequences may not have been front of mind.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has said the deal will comply with Australia’s international non-proliferation commitments. That’s true, as there’s a massive loophole in Article III of the United Nations Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons that exempts naval reactors from nuclear safeguards. However, the non-proliferation community has long seen the loophole as a major threat to one of the treaty’s key aims—to limit the production and use of highly enriched uranium (HEU), which can be used to make nuclear weapons.

Morrison’s statement is less certain when it comes to transfers of Tomahawk cruise missiles to the Royal Australian Navy’s Hobart-class destroyers and Australia’s commitments under the Missile Technology and Control Regime.

This non-treaty association of states aims to limit the risks of nuclear proliferation arising from the sale and transfer of nuclear-capable delivery systems. In the past, the US has backed the MTCR with stringent sanctions for non-compliance.

The last time a country transferred missiles with a range of more than 600 kilometres to another country (not counting US sales of Polaris, Trident and Tomahawk missiles to the UK) was in 1988 when China sold 3,000-kilometre-range missiles to the Saudis. The backlash was immediate and helped consolidate MTCR norms. The Tomahawk family of missiles has at least a 1,000-kilometre range and can be configured for either a nuclear or conventional payload. Some analysts suggest that the transfer of Tomahawks to Australia may erode the MTCR norm of denying transfers of missiles with ranges over 300 kilometres.

There could also be implications for negotiations on the proposed fissile material cut-off treaty, historically supported by Australia, which aims to strictly limit the amount of fissile material that nucelar-weapon states can manufacture. Negotiations are locked in a stalemate, largely thanks to Pakistan. Nonetheless, the treaty’s goals have broad international support and the manufacture of more weapons-grade uranium to power Australia’s submarines will likely also set those goals back.

There seems to be an emerging consensus in the global arms-control community that the AUKUS submarine deal could have a hugely negative effect on non-proliferation norms and practices. Depending on how Washington responds, this could have an impact on how the program unfolds.

Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists, says that the deal ‘will further intensify the arms race in the region and dynamics that fuel military competition’. Pointing to the sparse strategic rationale offered so far, he adds, ‘Other than fielding more and better weapons, does anyone have a plan?’

Similar views have rippled across non-proliferation and arms-control circles, driven by fears that the deal will set a precedent ushering in a dangerous era of loosened nuclear restraints.

Daryl Kimball, director of the Arms Control Association, points out that if Australia gets a HEU submarine like the US Virginia class, it will be the first non-nuclear-weapon state to have such a capability.

What will Washington say to other allies, such as Israel, that might want the same technology? What normative leverage will the US have if China and Russia decide to proliferate naval reactor technology and long-range nuclear-capable missiles, or if other nations—let’s say Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazil—seize on this precedent as an excuse to develop HEU for naval purposes?

Others have pointed out that the deal could be inconsistent with the US–Australia 123 agreement on nuclear transfers, as well as the US Nuclear Non-proliferation Act and Atomic Energy Act. If that proves correct, there’ll need to be a legislative component to make the deal legal from the US side.

All of this depends on the nature of the technology transfer on naval reactor design and HEU enrichment—whether it’s a ‘black box’, with no Australian involvement in the nuclear side of the submarine project, or if Australia will have to develop some capability on reactor repair, fuel manufacture, storage and refuelling to accommodate a wartime scenario where total dependence on the US might not be feasible.

In either case, Australia will probably need to modify its safeguard agreements with the International Atomic Energy Agency, given all the questions this deal raises about how the American HEU nuclear fuel cycle will extend to Australia.

Australia has said that it doesn’t want to develop either nuclear weapons or an indigenous nuclear fuel cycle, but other countries will be asking whether that will remain true over time.

Verbal assurances won’t be enough, argues Kimball. He and other arms-control advocates suggest that the US needs to develop legislation ensuring that Australia won’t use this agreement to develop an indigenous enrichment capability.

The non-proliferation community, and other nations, could decide to lobby for another legislative requirement—that the Australian naval reactors be designed for low enriched uranium (LEU) rather than HEU.

HEU is anything above 20% enrichment, but US naval reactors on submarines and aircraft carriers use fuel that is 93–97% enriched weapons-grade uranium.

Transferring HEU technology to a non-nuclear-weapon state is seen as a grave proliferation risk, because it could enable that state to move closer to a nuclear weapons breakout capability without penalty and because it increases the risk of nuclear theft by non-state actors for use in a basic gun-type nuclear device.

The international community went through this issue with Brazil from the late 1970s, when the military junta developed HEU for use in naval rectors, and probably for nuclear weapons. After sanctions and the signing of a special Brazil–Argentina nuclear non-proliferation agreement, Brazil has been developing nuclear-powered submarines with France, which are believed to be LEU fuelled.

There’s been a push in the US Congress to phase out HEU in US naval reactors, consistent with domestic legislation on non-proliferation and Washington’s international non-proliferation commitments.

In 2020, the House Armed Services Committee, controlled by the Democrats, called for continued study into the use of LEU in the next generation of US submarines.

The Republican-controlled Senate Armed Services Committee disagreed and recommended banning the use of public funds to explore the option. It cited a 2016 JASON defence advisory panel report which found that the use of LEU reactors wasn’t feasible in current submarine designs. Using LEU requires bigger reactors as around 4.7% more enriched uranium is needed than for HEU. Submarines using LEU must be refuelled every one to three years. The Virginia-class HEU fuel lasts for 33 years—the life of the submarine.

But the JASON report also recommends a compromise, using what it calls LEU+. This is 25% enriched uranium, technically HEU but well below the enrichment level needed for nuclear weapons. It would provide roughly the same performance as higher enriched HEU.

The first opportunity to use LEU or LEU+ would be in the Virginia class’s replacement, the SSN(X) or Improved Virginia class, to be designed before 2030.

There are many reasons Australia might want to explore LEU+ as well as working towards best-practice nuclear safeguards. A deal that was meant to demonstrate unified resolve to China has generated considerable blowback, opening up divisions in NATO and the Five Eyes and generating distrust of Australia’s motives—all of which adversaries will be quick to exploit. Working to ameliorate the non-proliferation harms of this deal could help manage some of these effects.

And continuing to discourage a proliferation-permissive environment by upholding global rules is definitely in Australia’s interest, especially in a geopolitical environment where potential adversaries are fielding ever-increasing numbers of weapons.

The US and Australia both recognise the importance of strengthening global rules and the institutions that allow existential nuclear-proliferation issues to be mediated. Conventional nuclear and military deterrence might make state adversaries think twice before using nuclear weapons, but it’s of little use in stopping acquisition and the attendant risks of catastrophic miscalculation.

Tag Archive for: US Alliances

Third AUKUS TriLateral Dialogue

Read more

AUKUS as an Avenue for Tech Diplomacy

Read more