Patrolling Australia’s Trade Routes ‘Increasingly Risky’, Defence Minister Warns

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The work of the Australian Defence Force in protecting the country’s sea trade routes is “challenging, and in truth... increasingly risky,” said Defence Minister Richard Marles, in an address to the Indo Pacific Conference in Sydney.

“And in our contemporary world, literally, the daily work of the Royal Australian Navy is to assert the rules-based order,” he said, since open sea lanes, including those that go through the South China Sea and East China Sea, are at the core of Australia’s national interest.

“Today, be it in Eastern Europe and the Middle East or in the Indo Pacific, [that] order is under increasing pressure. The biggest military build-up in the world today is China, and [the fact that] that it is happening without strategic reassurance, means that for Australia and for so many countries, a response is demanded,” Marles said.

The next National Defence Strategy, in 2026, will lay out more detail on how Australia plans to have a more “amphibious army, to have longer range missiles, to have a more capable set of northern bases which enable our Air Force to project further,” he told attendees.

“But chief among those capabilities is having a long range, highly capable navy, both in terms of our service fleet and our submarines.”

Referring to the decision to procure new Mogami Class frigates, Ghost Shark long range underwater autonomous vehicles and to invest $12.5 billion in the Henderson Defence Precinct in Perth to enable continuous naval ship building, were all aimed at “building a much more capable, lethal, long range Navy,” Marles said.

“Relative to what we inherited when we came into office, in the last three and a half years, we have increased our defence spending by more than $70 billion over the decade, but that’s also investment in the here and now.  In each of the last two financial years, Defence has spent more on procurement than it ever has, a record has been established in each of those two years.”

Large numbers of navy and coast guard leaders, including those from the United States, Japan, the Philippines, Singapore and the Pacific Islands, are attending the conference, which includes an equipment expo.

About 100 people, including pro-Palestinian groups, protested outside the conference centre in Darling Harbour.

New South Wales state police said 13 people were arrested and pepper spray was used after clashes with officers. Several Israeli defence manufacturers are among the exhibitors.

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