How Australia Can Deter China

Two important military developments recently should give China pause for thought. The first one is the announcement by Prime Minister Scott Morrison of a $1.1 billion upgrade to the Royal Australian Air Force base at Tindal, which is about 300 kilometres south of Darwin, to lengthen the runway so that U.S. B-52 strategic bombers as well as our own KC-30 air-to-air refuelling aircraft can operate from there.

The significance of these two developments occurring at the same time should not be underestimated and certainly not in Beijing. Morrison described the upgrades to Tindal as being ‘the sharp end of the spear’ for Australian and U.S. air operations in the Indo-Pacific. As ASPI’s Peter Jennings observed, the decision to expand the Tindal airbase is a giant strategic step forward and could be the basis for a greater leadership role for Australia in the region.

When the upgrade, including major runway extensions, fuel stockpiles and engineering support, is completed, Tindal will be the most potent military base south of Guam. And—for the time being at least—it is beyond the reach of Chinese conventional ballistic missiles.

It’s claimed that these capabilities will enable positive target identification and target acquisition and engagement of moving ships in extremely hostile environments. The missile is designed with countermeasures to evade active defence systems. Apparently, multiple missiles can work together to share data to coordinate and attack in a swarm.

The LRASM is also capable of hitting land targets. Its own data link allows other military assets to feed the missile a real-time electronic picture of the battlespace.

This missile only achieved operational capability with U.S. Super Hornets in November last year. Its confirmation for sale to Australia so quickly reflects the closeness of the alliance.

This is a major new strike-deterrent acquisition for Australia. It reflects the concerns of the defence force about Australia’s strike capabilities since the retirement of the F-111 in 2010 and the fact that it takes time for the navy’s Collins-class submarines to transit to Southeast Asian or South Pacific waters.

We are now in an era in which China is contesting our strategic space in the ‘inner arc’ stretching from the Indonesian archipelago and Papua New Guinea down to Solomon Islands and Vanuatu (the latter of which are about 2,000 kilometres from our east coast military bases). For the first time since World War II, a major power is deploying military capabilities which could do us harm in our region of primary strategic concern. In that sense, we are now in a period of defence warning time because a change of intention is all that a potential adversary would need to do to transform a presence into a direct military threat.

It is therefore important that we have the capability to push back against those who would use their increasing military power to restrict our strategic space and coerce us.

In the coming years we will need to consider acquiring weapons systems with even longer range. The U.S. is developing a ground-launched version of the latest Tomahawk maritime strike missile, a boost glide anti-ship missile, a hypersonic cruise missile and potentially a Pershing III anti-ship intermediate-range ballistic missile. These could have ranges of around 1,000 kilometres to more than 3,000 kilometres. These sorts of weapons would enable Australia to strike at targets well into the South China Sea and the South Pacific.

Some previous RAAF chiefs have been strong proponents of acquiring Northrop Grumman’s B-21 Raider long-range strategic stealth bomber. The project is still in the development stage, but the planes have an estimated cost of around U.S.$550 million each and their maintenance costs will be huge. It would probably be cheaper and more cost-effective if Australia focused on long-range, land-based anti-ship missiles.

Taken together, then, the upgrading of Tindal and the acquisition of LRASMs reinforce the U.S. alliance and foreshadow a significantly more potent Australian deterrent capability to assert control over our own region of primary strategic concern.

Paul Dibb is professor of strategic studies at the Australian National University.

This article appeared originally at The Strategist (ASPI).