Transcript Document
Japan and Australia: sustainable and unsustainable
options for security partnership
Richard Tanter
Australia and Japan: anxious allies
• Both emphasizing military responses to
security problems
• Both hardening and growing military
capacities
• Both moved closer to the United States
• Both contributed to Iraq and Afghanistan
• Deep and growing security cooperation
• Both have deepening involvement with US
space war planning
Expansion of old bases and building new
ones (announced 2004-2010)
•
•
•
•
•
Bradshaw Training Area (Western Australia, 2004)
Shoalwater Bay Training Area (Queensland) (2004)
Joint Combined Training Centre (Western Australia, 2004)
Yampi Sound Training Area (Western Australia, 2004)
Delamere Air Training Range (Northern Territory) (2005)
(B-2 bombers)
• Australian Defence Satellite Communications Station,
Kojarena, Geraldton, (Western Australia, 2007)
• Harold E. Holt Naval Communications Base [North West
Cape] (Western Australia, 2008, 2010) : (Space Situational
Awareness Partnership)
Michael Leunig on Delamere
Geraldton/Kojarena: Australian Defence
Satellite Communications Station
Joint
Defence
Facility
Pine
Gap
(Google Earth,
August
2005)
“U.S. to Build Up Military in Australia - Move
Aimed at Countering China in Asia,Clarifying
Free Access to South China Sea”, Wall Street
Journal, November 11
Mike Green:
''They want to
be able to fly
helicopters,
drop out of
planes and
shoot at things,
and you can't
do that in
crowded
Okinawa.''
Robertson Barracks, Darwin, Northern Territory
After US hegemony in Asia: two versions
• Shiraishi Takashi, Umi no
Teikoku [Empire of the
Seas]
• 「海の帝国」白石隆(著)、
中央公論新社 (2000年)
• Steve Chan, China, the US
and the Power-Transition
Theory: A Critique, (2007)
Hugh White on Australia and the rise of
China (2010)
“We can hardly imagine what
it would be like to live in an
Asia that is not led by the US.
All our history and instincts
therefore incline us to push
the US to contest China's
challenge and maintain the
status quo for as long as
possible.
Yet our interests and our
future should incline us to
push the other way.”
• “[Professor Hugh White
has written the single,
stupidest strategic
document ever prepared
in Australian history by
someone who once held a
position of some
responsibility in our
system (White was once
deputy secretary of the
Defence Department).”
• Greg Sheridan, Foreign
Editor, The Australian, 11
September 2010
Hugh White: five Australian alternatives in a
more contested Asia.
• “We can
– remain allied to America,
– seek another great and
powerful friend,
– opt for armed neutrality,
– build a regional alliance with
our Southeast Asian neighbours,
or
– do nothing and hope for the
best.
• David Martin, Armed
Neutrality for Australia (1984)
A call from former P.M. Hosokawa
Morihiro, 1996:
“De-construct the alliance, and remove
the US troops”:
• “The single most important determining factor in Japan's
national interest is the relationship between Japan, China,
and the United States. We must build and maintain
friendly relations with China in the future just as we have
with the United States.
• the bases now much more important than in the Cold
War
• the Ampo treaty is now “a military cooperation treaty
on a global scale”
• there has been “no dialogue from the Japanese side
with America in the past 50 years”
Identity, balance and hegemony
•
Richard Tanter
• http://www.nautilus.org/about/associates/richar
d-tanter/publications
• [email protected]
Australian Defence Facilities, Nautilus Institute
• http://www.nautilus.org/publications/books/aust
ralian-forces-abroad/defence-facilities