{"id":72237,"date":"2022-04-28T10:00:48","date_gmt":"2022-04-28T00:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=72237"},"modified":"2022-04-28T09:51:01","modified_gmt":"2022-04-27T23:51:01","slug":"beyond-thought-bubbles-how-to-fix-australias-pacific-policy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/beyond-thought-bubbles-how-to-fix-australias-pacific-policy\/","title":{"rendered":"Beyond thought bubbles: how to fix Australia\u2019s Pacific policy"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/figure>\n

Australia\u2019s Pacific security problem is simple: we\u2019re not thinking big enough about our role and we have convinced ourselves that we\u2019re incapable of moving quickly to counter China.<\/p>\n

Canberra policymaking has dumbed down. Note how big policy announcements are made: decisions to double the size of our submarine fleet, stage a Pacific step-up, restart the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue and set up the AUKUS defence technology partnership\u2014these are political judgement calls, often made in haste and in some desperation.<\/p>\n

The thought bubble is handed to the public service, struggling with realities such as the absence of people and money to shape policy; procurement rules forcing endless delays for probity and value-for-money checks; and bothersome details such as the absence of a nuclear power industry, say, or the presence of other countries with their own ideas.<\/p>\n

Policy creativity has been banished from the public service. Risk reduction is the prized skill in a world where elegantly managing Australia\u2019s Pacific decline is what the smart brains settle for.<\/p>\n

Australia needs more than a whiff of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky\u2019s fighting spirit. Recall his response to US offers of evacuation: \u2018The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride.\u2019<\/p>\n

Australia doesn\u2019t get to ride away from its Pacific backyard, although US National Security Council Indo-Pacific affairs coordinator Kurt Campbell has done a powerful good in telling Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare that there are limits to American tolerance of Beijing\u2019s bad behaviour edging forward under the guise of Honiara\u2019s \u2018sovereign choices\u2019.<\/p>\n

There is a lot of good work being done under the Pacific step-up. The policy shows that Scott Morrison understands the problem China presents to the region, but we are being crippled by slow processes and a lack of imagination.<\/p>\n

The prime minister\u2019s plan for a joint initiative at the Papua New Guinea Defence Force\u2019s Lombrum Naval Base on Manus Island, announced in November 2018, is a case in point.<\/p>\n

The intent<\/a> was to \u2018deepen our maritime security cooperation, including through increased Australian ship visits\u2019. Preliminary work to rebuild the base didn\u2019t start until mid-2020, then focused on refurbishing a chapel and putting up security fencing. It took a further year to start main works in June 2021. Never enthusiastic about a naval presence at Manus, Defence adroitly ensured that \u2018operational facilities\u2019 (a wharf) would be large enough only for PNG\u2019s \u2018Guardian-class patrol boats and small boat operations\u2019. We are three and a half years down the track on the Manus plan, with little to show for it.<\/p>\n

In January, Morrison announced that Australia would provide loan financing worth $850\u00a0million to upgrade a range of commercial ports in PNG. That\u2019s a brilliant idea, but let\u2019s put it into context\u2014there is hardly a port or airport in the Pacific that isn\u2019t being built, refurbished or run by Chinese companies.<\/p>\n

This includes the new Momote International Airport that services Manus Island, built by the China Harbour Engineering Corporation and opened on Monday by PNG Prime Minister James Marape.<\/p>\n

Labor\u2019s proposals for development assistance, worker visas, extra fisheries patrols, and short-wave and TV broadcasting into the region all make sense, although the ABC shouldn\u2019t run the latter. But this is the same piecemeal approach, flinging money at sometimes worthy thought bubbles. Where\u2019s the strategy?<\/p>\n

What should Australia do? First, we need to convey to Pacific islands leaders the danger China presents. It\u2019s true that island governments prefer to focus on climate change, but they can\u2019t wish away strategic reality.<\/p>\n

As the functioning members of ANZUS, Australia and the US could invoke Article VIII of the treaty<\/a> \u2018to maintain a consultative relationship with States, Regional Organisations, Associations of States or other authorities in the Pacific Area in a position to further the purposes of this Treaty and to contribute to the security of that Area\u2019. An ANZUS \u2013 Pacific islands consultation group should be created at the prime ministerial level. That should be supported by a larger, constant Australian and US military presence throughout the region.<\/p>\n

Second, after the election a Pacific affairs minister should be in cabinet at least for that term of government. China didn\u2019t stop its leaders travelling to the region during Covid-19. Australia did. Now there\u2019s a need to rebuild ties at the most senior levels.<\/p>\n

The Pacific affairs minister needs to tone down the language about the \u2018Pacific family\u2019 because Pacific islanders know when they\u2019re being schmoozed. Instead let\u2019s focus on intelligence briefings about what is really happening in the region. We need to listen more carefully to Pacific leaders and we need to ask for a respectful hearing about our own security concerns.<\/p>\n

Most important, the minister will need top cover from the prime minister to be able to cut through Canberra process. We must not accept that it takes four years to build a small wharf.<\/p>\n

Third, let\u2019s work with Pacific islands leaders to form a response force, comprising units from Australia, the militaries from PNG, Tonga and Fiji, and police and agencies from the other Pacific islands countries. The Pacific response force could focus on disaster relief and mitigation, regional stabilisation and peacekeeping. Naturally, Australia will end up paying for much of this, but in so doing we are paying for our own security as well as that of the region.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s say this will cost about $5 billion annually on top of all other Pacific-related activities. That amounts to only about 41 days of current defence spending. It\u2019s worth the price to keep the Chinese military out of the region.<\/p>\n

Australia has grown used to getting security on the cheap, thanks largely to a benevolent US. But we are in fantasy land to imagine that 2.1% of GDP will cover our defence needs in the future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Australia\u2019s Pacific security problem is simple: we\u2019re not thinking big enough about our role and we have convinced ourselves that we\u2019re incapable of moving quickly to counter China. Canberra policymaking has dumbed down. 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