Global governance in the Pacific
Aukus and the ‘Quad summit’ – a Pacific NATO?
In September 2021, a trilateral security pact for the Indo-Pacific region, the Aukus, was signed between Australia, the United States of America (US), and the UK. Under the pact, the US and UK will help Australia acquire up to 8 nuclear-powered submarines over a period not specified, at a cost of at least US$350 billion to Australia. In the interim, Australia may consider leasing or buying such submarines from the US or UK, and Australia will have regular visits by US and UK nuclear submarines from 2027, which more than likely will include patrols in the Pacific Ocean region.
At a subsequent meeting with President Biden and UK PM Rishi Sunak in San Diego, California in April 2023, the Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said that the Aukus plan marks a new chapter in the relationship between the three countries. He said it ‘represents the biggest single investment in Australia’s defence capability in our history’.
Then, in May 2023, the third Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QSD) - commonly known as the Quad, which brought together President Biden, PM Albanese, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida took place in Sydney. The Quad was established in 2017 by the US, India, Japan, and Australia to ‘promote stability, resilience, and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific’. This aim can be interpreted as diplomatic shorthand for countering China’s military expansionist policies in the South China Sea and the western Pacific Ocean.
To many, taken together, the Aukus and Quad look like an Indo-Pacific replica of NATO but with a single aim: to deter China’s militarised ambitions in the region, while at the same time maintaining trade ties with the Asian superpower. It is a juggling act of extreme difficulty that makes strategic decision making in Washington DC, London, New Delhi, Tokyo, and Canberra a challenge.
Australia fears the likelihood of being dragged into a war against China over Taiwan, even though China is the largest buyer of Australian exports, having bought almost $140 billion worth of goods, primarily raw and rare-earth minerals, in the last 12 months. As with the other countries, they perceive China to be threatening and menacing its Asian neighbours under the authoritarian rule of Xi Jinping, who has not only arrested and jailed more than a million political opponents at home but more than five million ethnic Uyghurs in the semi-autonomous territory of Xinjiang. Under Xi’s leadership, China has also stolen Indian territory in the Himalayas and in Bhutan, and annexed maritime territory belonging to the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Indonesia in the South China Sea. The latter may cause serious issues for global economic and trading systems as whoever dominates the South China Sea controls more than 20% of global trade.
In April 2023, several Chinese warships and hundreds of warplanes encircled Taiwan for three days, while simulating missile attacks on the sovereign island’s cities and rehearsing ship-launched strikes from the east.
The challenge facing Aukus and Quad member nations is that China’s economic and military power has grown exponentially during the last two decades. China now possesses the world’s largest economy and navy - presenting a threat to several Pacific nations. ‘Australia faces the real prospect of a war with China within three years that could involve a direct attack on our mainland, but Australia’s defence force is woefully unprepared, the population complacent and the nation’s political leaders unwilling to address the dire threats we face,’ stated a panel of five of Australia’s top security experts, assembled by the Sydney Morning Herald in March 2023. A further issue is the sheer size of the submarine digital cabling infrastructure. Some estimate that this carries up to $1 trillion worth of internet economic activity.
Is the Indo-Pacific region becoming the next ‘Ukraine’ – yet another global powder keg?