Australia should join NATO-style Pacific alliance, says former top adviser to Joe Biden
Australia, the United States, Japan and the Philippines should form a formal NATO-style defense alliance to counter China’s growing military power in Asia, according to a former top adviser to Joe Biden.
Ely Ratner, who serves as Biden’s deputy assistant secretary of defense for Indo-Pacific security affairs, also called on the Albanian government to significantly increase military spending to ensure AUKUS does not cannibalize the defense budget and drain resources for other important investments.
He said he was concerned about Donald Trump’s lack of focus on competing with China and feared the US president might make damaging concessions to Beijing when he meets Chinese President Xi Jinping this year.
“The threat from China is increasing. China’s ambitions have not diminished. It is building a military to dominate the Indo-Pacific, and it has ambitions that only credible deterrence to war will prevent conflict in the Indo-Pacific,” Ratner said in an interview.
Ratner, who is visiting Australia for a series of conferences organized by the Lowy Institute, said the so-called “squad” nations of the United States, Australia, Japan and the Philippines shared a common perspective on the need to work more closely together to respond to China’s rapid military build-up.
He said that although the United States and Australia had recently strengthened ties with Japan and the Philippines, those arrangements were “too ad hoc and informal.”
Expanding on his argument, he said, “You’re going to need more formal regulations to really get the level of integration that you’re going to need to maintain long-term deterrence.” first time he did it Foreign affairs daily.
“At every decision point – whether it’s building infrastructure, a communications network, or acquiring a particular capability – my advice is that the decision be made with a view to ensuring that it is used collectively among a close-knit group of partners, rather than having the Frankenstein alliance model where we have all these different types of systems and capabilities that don’t work well together.”
He said the pact should include a common defense article similar to NATO’s fifth article, which requires that an armed attack against one member be considered an attack on all members and a joint response.
The countries will also hold joint military exercises, conduct integrated war planning and prioritize the use of joint military equipment.
Ratner said that unlike NATO, which includes 32 countries spread across Europe and North America, his proposed alliance group would include a handful of like-minded countries in the Pacific. Other countries such as New Zealand and South Korea could potentially join at a later date.
He said Australia would retain the final decision on whether to engage in any conflict.
While Trump appeared exasperated about Australian defense spending during a meeting with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese at the White House in October, Ratner said the federal government would remain under US pressure to spend more.
The US National Defense Strategy, released in January, says the Trump administration expects allies to spend at least 3.5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) on core military spending.
Australia currently spends approximately 2.03 per cent of GDP on defence.
“I don’t think President Trump’s body language on this should be read as a diminished desire for Australia to spend more on defence,” Ratner said.
“I think there is still an open question in Washington about whether Australia has sufficient funding to fully fund AUKUS, which is a key priority, while also meeting other significant commitments around missile defence, infrastructure upgrades and other capability investments… It will be important for Australia to find the resources to do all of this and not pull resources from other priority areas to fund AUKUS.”
Think tank Strategic Analysis Australia warned last year that spending on the AUKUS submarine program had increased so dramatically that it was approaching the size of an independent branch of the Defense Force and was eating into funding for other key military equipment.
Ratner criticized the Trump administration’s “messy” approach to China, saying it lacked consistency and toughness.
Trump angered China hawks and backtracked on his most significant tariff threats against Beijing by announcing last December that he would allow AI chip giant Nvidia to sell advanced chips to China.
“There is a dramatic softening in the U.S. approach to China, from an approach focused on competition to one focused on compromise,” Ratner said.
With Trump and Xi expected to meet in Beijing in early April and possibly three more times this year, Ratner said: “There are concerns that the Trump administration might make concessions on technology or security issues that don’t really mean anything in return.”
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