It is clear that for Australians, the United States is the key military partner for their own defense efforts. But it is also clear, that reworking the relationship in light of the dynamics of the current and last Administration have put a spotlight on what Australia needs to do to enhance its own flexibility in dealing with threats in the Pacific and to rework the Alliance in part along these lines.

The last Williams Foundation seminars have highlighted some of the key aspects of change required as perceived by Australian strategists and national security officials.

But it is less about whether the United States is reliable enough but much more about shaping Australian benchmarks with regard to what they perceive to be legitimate policy goals which Australia needs to pursue and to encourage their great power ally to consider following as well.

It is a dialogue to be based on enhanced Australian capabilities and Australian actions, to shape a way ahead.

Recently, the new Australian Ambassador to the United States provide an overview on how he viewed the way ahead.

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If read carefully, a number of Australian objectives with regard to the United States and its dealings with China are identified as well.

Brendan Nicholson, defence editor of The Strategist has written a very helpful overview on the Ambassador’s recent speech.

Washington’s ambassador to Australia, Arthur Culvahouse, has used a speech to ASPI to stress the strength of the alliance with the United States and to reject suggestions that China and America are involved in a new cold war.

Ambassador Culvahouse said the view of Americans he’d spoken to, including the president, vice president, secretary of state and defense secretary, was that the US commitment to Australia was incredibly strong.

‘Let me assure you that the United States is a Pacific nation that is here to stay, and that our Alliance with Australia is indeed unbreakable,’ he said in an address to an ASPI seminar on Wednesday.

‘We’re Pacific nations. We care deeply about what happens here and we’re here to stay. We’re both continental democracies and champions for the rule of law and human rights. And we’re both nations of strivers and innovators. We believe that everyone deserves a fair go, and that by working hard and playing by the rules, everyone should have a fair shot at prosperity.

‘These are the values that make the US–Australia alliance unbreakable and will carry it into our next century of partnership.’

Culvahouse said Australia could always rely on the US, and so could the rest of the Indo-Pacific region. The pivot to the Pacific was a reality.

He rejected suggestions that the US and China were involved in a new cold war and recalled serving in the Reagan White House and taking part in evacuation drills where he had five minutes to get onto a helicopter in the event of a nuclear attack. That was a ‘long, tough slog, an expensive and dangerous situation’ and anyone who lived through it was not looking for a new cold war at all, the ambassador said.

The US preference was to engage with China but it also had to call out malign conduct where it appeared.

Culvahouse said regional nations were not being asked to choose between the US and China. ‘That’s not how we operate. As the president has made clear, we seek a constructive relationship with China where our prosperity and security grow together, not apart. Indeed, we would welcome China to get onside and join the US, Australia and the other nations in efforts to create the conditions for rules-based growth in the region.’

But the US, Australia and other Pacific nations also agreed it was important to shine a spotlight on bad behaviour, however and wherever it occurred.

‘That includes speaking out in defence of democracy in Hong Kong and calling out the Chinese government’s human rights abuses against its own citizens, including detaining hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs in Xinjiang province.’

It also meant standing up for freedom of navigation and overflight and condemning China’s militarisation and disruptive activities in the South China Sea, including poaching fisheries belonging to others and disrupting longstanding oil and gas projects.

‘And that includes supporting the pressure campaign against North Korea’s nuclear program,’ the ambassador said. ‘The challenges we face call for strong leadership on behalf of the principles we hold dear.’

Australian Defence Force chief Angus Campbell gave a similar response to the cold war question, saying the fact that China was America’s largest trading partner made the situation profoundly different from the post–World War II decades of tense strategic rivalry between the Soviet Union and the West. ‘I think there are a lot of options and a lot of space to see better paths emerge,’ General Campbell told the seminar.

The ambassador said the US welcomed Australia’s expanding leadership role in the region.  ‘That’s not only a good thing for the region, but for the world.’

He said the time was right for the US and Australia to do much more together in the region and beyond. ‘Our Indo-Pacific visions are closely entwined, and we support Prime Minister Morrison’s Pacific Step Up program to help Pacific peoples lift living standards, increase their independence and sovereignty over their economic futures, and improve the wellbeing and stability of the region overall.

‘Australia’s $2 billion infrastructure financing initiative for the Pacific is a great, tangible step forward. The US and Australia want our friends to achieve prosperity through responsible economic development, as well as through fair and reciprocal trade and investment.  We’re committed to creating the conditions for that to happen.’

Cooperation with the US and Australia brought mutual benefits, not zero-sum deals and not ‘payday loan diplomacy’ where one side would win big and the others risked losing big.

The ambassador said that along with what he described as the ‘well-established triad’ of Japan, Australia and the United States, there’d been significant, tangible steps towards the Quad with India and the start of positive conversations with other countries in the region.

During consultations in Washington before coming out, he’d heard a lot about the Quad and other partnerships, only to find that what sounded good in concept had yet to take place in reality.

‘Five months later, as our discussions with our Australian counterparts at AUSMIN made clear, now we find that a network of like-minded countries that share our values, principles and vision for the Indo-Pacific region is taking shape.’

Australia did not get enough credit for its leadership in areas where it was out in front of the US and other countries, the ambassador said. ‘And we all need to follow Australia’s lead in safeguarding our 5G networks and taking a hard look at state-sponsored election interference and what Confucius Institutes are really up to on university campuses.’

Gnarly challenges immediately ahead included working out how to stop foreign fighters returning from Syria and setting up camp in Southeast Asia.

Asked how the United States would react if Australia decided it could no longer rely on the American nuclear umbrella and opted to develop its own nuclear weapons, Culvahouse said that was a matter for Australia.

‘But let me also say that our alliance is unbreakable, our commitments to Australia are solid and profound, and I would not be out here unless I believed that. I would not be giving the speeches I’ve been giving unless I believed that.’

Also, see the following:

https://www.defenceconnect.com.au/key-enablers/4610-us-studies-centre-study-calls-for-greater-australian-indo-pacific-pivot

We argued in our 2103 book on Pacific strategy, that Japan would work to enhance its perimeter defense and move eventually towards what we called a two anchor appraoch.

We argued that expanded perimeter defense is a key part of what we referred to as the “dynamic defense” phase in Japanese policy. We argued that “this meant greater reach of Japanese systems., better integration of those systems within the Japanese forces themselves, more investments in C2 and ISR, and a long-term strategy of reworking the U.S.-Japanese military relationship to have much greater reach and presence.

“The dynamic defense phase carries with it the seeds for the next phase — the shaping of a twin-anchor policy of having reach in the Arctic and the Indian Ocean.

“Obviously, such reach is beyond the capabilities of the Japanese themselves and requires close integration with the United States and other allies.  And such reach requires much greater C2, ISR and weapons integration across the Japanese and allied force structure.”

One of the key features of our appraoch was and continues to be how to leverage the new systems we are already bringing on line which allows us to expand our deterrence in depth capabilities.

There is way too much emphasis Inside the Beltway on potential and hypethetical future systems and significant denigration of how the newly being introduced systems when much more effectively integrated with robust C2 rather than some hegemonic Amazon cloud like system can deliver the capabilities we need in the evolving five year period in front of our forces.

It too often seems that the approach is shaping dense briefings of the world in 2030 as a deterrent to our adversaries rather than building out the capabilities which are within reach as new systems enter the force.

If we were to write this book now we would expand significantly the Australian role in what is becoming a Japanese-Australian-United States creative process in reshaping full spectrum crisis management forces.

A good example of how the future is being shaped now has been the work done in Tailsman Sabre 2019..

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The Japanese fully participated in the exercise and brought some of their perimeter defense capabilities to the exercise effort.

According to the Japanese Ministry of Defence:

From June 3rd to August 21st, the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force (JGSDF) and the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) are participating in the Talisman Sabre 2019 with the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps in Australia. It is the first time the JMSDF participates in this exercise.

This exercise aims to improve the tactical capabilities of the JGSDF and JMSDF in amphibious operation and land battle as well as interoperability between Japan and the U.S., and to contribute to maintaining peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific region.

Approx. 330 personnel from the JGSDF’s Amphibious Rapid Deployment Brigade and 1st Helicopter Brigade as well as approx. 500 JMSDF personnel from the JS Ise and JS Kunisaki are participating in the exercise.

And in an article by Seth Robson published by Stars and Stripes on July 24, 2019, the Japanese engagement in the exercise was highlighted:

Members of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force began observing and participating in amphibious training with U.S. Marines on Okinawa in 2012.

The training, which was off limits to media, was part of a multiyear effort to develop amphibious capability that included new helicopter carriers and landing craft.

The buildup has taken place amid tensions in the East China Sea, where China has challenged Japan’s claim to the Senkaku Islands (known as Daioyu by the Chinese) and the nearby oil and gas resources.

Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force Capt. Hiroshi Watanabe, who was on the ground at Bowen, said 300 out of the now 2,000-strong amphibious brigade are participating in Talisman Sabre.

The force transited north from Brisbane in a pair of warships, the JS Ise and JS Kunasaki before conducting an amphibious landing, he said.

“It’s a very good exercise to improve our skill level,” he added.

“We think interoperability between Japan and the U.S. will improve through this exercise,” Watanabe said, using a military buzzword describing the ability of one nation’s armed forces to use another country’s training methods and equipment. “Also, there is relationship building between Japan and Australia.”

Conor was on Okinawa from 2014 to 2017 and watched the Japanese amphibious capability grow in strength.

Troops from the Amphibious Rapid Deployment Brigade trained at Camp Pendleton earlier this year, said Conor, whose unit is part of Marine Rotational Force – Darwin in Australia’s Northern Territory this summer.

“It gives [the Japanese] the ability to respond within Japan’s island chain in a very rapid manner,” he said of the new force.

Marine Col. Matthew Sieber, an exchange officer who is helping the Australian army grow its own amphibious capability, said Talisman Sabre had put the Japanese troops a long way from their homeland.

“They are getting some great training in new training areas that they can’t get in Japan,” he said. “The number of repetitions they can get here in Australia is far more than they can do in Japan.”

In 2016, Vice Admiral James Foggo III, currently commander of U.S. Naval Forces Europe, spoke of the current situation in the North Atlantic as the arrival of the fourth battle of the Atlantic.

“In the early 1990s, the end of the Cold War, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and commentary such as Francis Fukuyama’s landmark essay “The End of History?” led us to believe that our strategic rivalry with Russia and our need to stay one step ahead of Russian capabilities had faded. It has not. Once again, an effective, skilled, and technologically advanced Russian submarine force is challenging us. Russian submarines are prowling the Atlantic, testing our defenses, confronting our command of the seas, and preparing the complex underwater battlespace to give them an edge in any future conflict.”¹

In his timely new book, Magnus Nordenman has provided a very comprehensive overview to the fourth battle of the Atlantic.

And in so doing, he does a solid job providing an understanding of how the Russian challenge is both different from and similar to that posed by the Soviet challenge. ²

There are similarities in terms of the importance of the U.S. and Canada being able to project power to reinforce Nordic allies in dealing with the air and naval forces coming from the Kola Peninsula to cut Europe off from its North Atlantic partners. The Kola Peninsula then and now has the highest concentration of military force on the planet. And as such, the priority for both the Soviets and the Russians is the same – provide for anti-access and area denial of the Kola Peninsula.

But the differences are more pronounced. With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact countries joining NATO much of the sea and land support capabilities available to the Soviet navy are now not available.

“Today, Russia’s geostrategic situation has changed considerably since the end of the Cold War, but its ambition to be a major maritime power has not. Geographic conditions, however, funnels that maritime ambition toward the north. Post-Soviet Russia has lost much of its littoral territory around the Baltic Sea, with Poland and the Baltic states now fully integrated NATO members. What remains is the outlet at Saint Petersburg through the Gulf of Finland and the Kaliningrad enclave in the southeastern corner of the Baltic Sea.

“The Baltic Sea no longer provides Russia with assured access to the broader maritime domain, given that the other Baltic littoral states are either members of NATO or close partners of the alliance. In a war, the Russian Baltic Sea Fleet would find it impossible to exit the Baltic Sea, but it could, on the other hand, certainly cause NATO and the United States significant frustration if they attempted to reach the Baltic States across the sea.”³

This means that the Kola Peninsula has become even more important, despite an Arctic opening. 

And the latter can be seen from a military standpoint as expanding the perimeter of defense for the Kola Peninsula.

The Russian force is also quite different from the Soviet Union. 

The Russians have built and are modernizing an integrated missile and subsurface and surface fleet, reinforced by airpower, to provide an expand zone of defense for the Kola Peninsula.  They are also shaping more capabilities to ensure that the much reduced port structure, which could receive reinforcements from the U.S. or Canada, could be destroyed in times of severe conflict.

“If a crisis comes, the Russian navy is increasingly well placed and equipped to operate in the far North Atlantic to strike at vital ports, airfields, and command-and-control centers that are needed to bring in U.S. and NATO reinforcements coming across the North Atlantic. If those cross-Atlantic reinforcements were stopped or delayed in coming ashore, NATO and the United States could very well lose a confrontation with Russia in Europe’s east, far away from the shores of the Atlantic.” ⁴

The arrival of the new Russian capabilities – cruise missiles throughout the fleet with higher quality platforms to deliver missile strikes – has come with the procurement holiday and shift of focus by the U.S. and allies to the land wars in the Middle East. Much of the infrastructure built ashore to support maritime power in the North Atlantic has atrophied or simply disappeared.

“The network of bases and sensors that were established throughout the North Atlantic region and beyond to deal with the challenge of the Soviet navy was truly impressive, and by the end of the Cold War these nodes in NATO’s defense of the North Atlantic ranged from Bermuda in the west and Sigonella in Italy, far into the Mediterranean, and from Iceland and Norway in the north to the Azores in the south. Keflavik, however, stood out as a hub among the other spokes for North Atlantic ASW operations.”⁵

This has been accompanied by a dramatic shrinkage of air and naval capabilities available to prosecute a Russian fleet as well.

“In aggregate, twenty-five years after the end of the Cold War the naval picture in the North Atlantic had changed radically. European navies were smaller than ever before, but primed and ready to take on missions and threats far from their European waters. The U.S. naval presence in Europe had been more than halved and reoriented toward the Mediterranean and the turbulent Middle East. Sensor networks, basing infrastructure, and command structures intended for the Atlantic and Europe’s north had been reduced or scrapped during the same period. And ASW training was far from the minds of Western navies. Then, in 2014, great-power competition and the specter of future war returned to Europe and the North Atlantic.”⁶

This state of affairs, the return of the Russian challenge, and the disappearance of the defense systems for the West to deal with a Russian challenge, has led to a a significant challenge for the West. On the one hand, the Nordics have re-focused on their direct defense, and are building out new capabilities to deal with a 21^stcentury Russian challenge.  And on the other hand, the NATO allies not present in continental Europe, the UK, Canada, and the United States, have refocused on the challenge and are starting the process of rebuilding the capabilities.

The challenge will be to ensure that the two efforts, those by the Nordics and those by the offshore powers, converge to create a credible deterrent capability for North Atlantic defense.

Recent Russian exercises have highlighted the exact nature of the military challenge posed by the Russians. In blunt terms, Russia is seeking to expand its ability to deny the sea and air domain to the United States and its allies well into the North Atlantic. The extended bastion system is not a theoretical construct for it is being exercised by the Russians as well.

“In mid-March 2015, Russia launched an unannounced snap exercise that developed into one of the most far-ranging ever put on by the Russian military. All in all, it included some 80,000 personnel with exercise activities from the Baltic Sea region to the Black Sea and the Pacific. The exercise clearly simulated a conflict with NATO, and the first stage of the exercise was concentrated in and around the Kola Peninsula, where the Northern Fleet was deployed to conduct ASW and surface warfare exercises in the Barents Sea.

“At the same time, Russian strategic bombers performed strikes against simulated targets on the Kola Peninsula, while air defense units simulated defense against incoming air threats. Marine infantry assigned to the Northern Fleet were also mobilized and moved into the Arctic.

“During the second and third phase of the exercise, Russian ground, air, and naval units in the Baltic Sea region and around the Black Sea joined in the exercise to conduct live-fire drills in their area of responsibility.34 General interest media outlets called the Russian focus on the Kola Peninsula during the exercise “utterly baffling,” since the territory there is well away from the heart of Europe and with a low NATO presence in the surrounding region.”

“It is not so baffling if one transplants the events in and around the Kola Peninsula and the Barents Sea in mid-March 2015 into the Atlantic and the Norwegian Sea at some future date. The first phase of the exercise was clearly a rehearsal on how to deploy the extended bastion in order to deter and hinder NATO reinforcements coming into Europe across the Atlantic, strike land-based targets that would support NATO operations in the Atlantic (e.g., as ports, command centers, and intelligence nodes), and provide strategic cover for Russian ground, air, and maritime operations elsewhere. The same type of operation in the North Atlantic was rehearsed again during Russia’s major and recurring exercise Zapad in September 2017.”⁷

Nordenman provided some core principles when thinking through how to deter the Russians in the context of the fourth battle of the Atlantic and these principles are important ones not just for the maritime domain but in terms of rethinking how to provide for direct defense of Europe in the new global strategic context.

He argued that the return of the great power competition in the North Atlantic was not so much about the American-Russian rivalry as it was about the Euro-North Atlantic working relationship to put relevant capabilities into play, and ones which could be usefully used in crisis management.

“The United States could also help move along naval coalitions of the willing under the umbrella of NATO. Here America could help encourage regional naval leadership by its European friends and allies by having the United Kingdom take a leadership role in the North Atlantic, while, for example, Germany leads in the Baltic Sea and France or Italy takes on a leading role in the Mediterranean.

“This would allow the navies of Europe to more directly specialize and focus on the maritime domains of greatest concern to them. In the case of the North Atlantic, a maritime framework could be imagined that would include the United States, the United Kingdom, Norway, Iceland, Denmark, the Netherlands, and, occasionally, Germany and France.

“This notion of clearer regional responsibility for the maritime domains around Europe is further merited by the many war games that have been played in Washington and elsewhere since 2014, which have all shown that a first response to a crisis with Russia will likely not be a NATO one, but a regional coalition of the willing led by the United States.

“NATO would come into play a short while later as the alliance reaches political consensus that is required for collective action. The North Atlantic Treaty, however, does not bar any one nation or group of nations from coming to the aid of an ally without alliance consensus.”⁸

This is especially necessary given the different character of the fourth battle of the Atlantic.

“The fourth battle of the Atlantic, like the other three earlier contests, will hinge on the ability to bring to bear high-end naval power in the maritime domain. The fourth battle, however, will also include hybrid elements, with potential attacks against the vital submarine cables across the North Atlantic, disinformation campaigns, aggression in cyberspace in peacetime with implications in the maritime domain, and disruptions of GPS and communications gear by electronic means.It may also include the use of nonmilitary vessels for military purposes, including coast guard ships, fishing boats, and merchantman.”

“Hybrid warfare has proven to be a tough challenge to deal with for the United States and NATO, as the alliance is, at heart, an institution focused on traditional military challenges. In the case of hybrid warfare in the maritime domain, NATO must focus on building maritime infrastructure resilience, find ways to clearly identify and attribute attacks and provocations, and help educate senior leaders on robust decision-making during unclear circumstances. The latter can be accomplished by rigorous political-military wargaming, which would confront decision makers with situations and decision points they may face during a real-world crisis.”⁹

In short, a key part of shaping a new approach to direct defense in Europe is winning the fourth battle of the Atlantic.

And here the West, although it has significant challenges to face in doing so, has a clear opportunity to leverage new technologies and its collaborative working relationships to win that battle.

“Change is also coming to ASW sensors and the equipment used to interpret and exploit the data collected by them. Big data analytics, using software to process and systematize the immense amounts of information and data points being generated by everything from everyday gadgets to advanced sensors, is rapidly changing businesses and everyday life. Using big data analytics can help decision makers and analysts pick out previously unknown patterns of behavior or irregularities, help predict coming events, or better organize an industrial process.”¹⁰

This means that if the U.S. and its allies can provide the territory from which to operate, deploy the new data rich platforms like P-8s, Tritons, F-35s, Aegis and various European systems, as well, then the revolution in sensor technologies, C2 and distributed warfare can play to their benefit. But this will not happen if clear focus is not kept on the nature of the challenge.

Nordenman highlights a key aspect of dealing with the Russian challenge, which is crucial for the Nordics, namely the need to hold the Russian bastion at risk. 

For the United States and Canada, it is about reinforcing Europe and holding the Russians at bay, notably with Putin threatening a nuclear strike via his projected new hypersonic missile to be launched via a submarine. But for the Nordics, it is about homeland defense, and not letting the Russians have a free ride to use the Kola peninsula and its extended perimeter defense without a significant capability by the West to attrite and destroy the Russian bastion.  When you come out from the land into the air and sea corridors. That is where the West for sure needs to be able to operate its own anti-access and area denial capability.  Two can play at this game.

“NATO faces an urgent challenge in the Baltic Sea region, where the Baltic states are small, exposed, and difficult to defend against Russian military aggression. One way to deter Russia from ever seizing one or all of the Baltic states would be to hold key territory or capabilities of high value to Russia at risk.

“One such region is the Kola Peninsula, with the Northern Fleet and the submarine-based nuclear deterrent. The United States should give serious thought to a naval strategy in the far North Atlantic that in many ways harks back to the maritime strategy of the 1980s.

“This approach, however, is not without its potential shortcomings. Many NATO allies would be uneasy with this concept, and there is the real risk of pushing Russia into a “use or lose” decision with its submarine-based nuclear deterrent. Still, the concept bears careful consideration and quiet U.S. conversations with key European allies.”¹¹ Magnus Nordenman, New Battle for the Atlantic(Naval Institute Press. Kindle Edition, p. 201).

The featured photo:

NORTH SEA (Mar. 11, 2019) The guided-missile destroyer USS Gravely (DDG 107) and the guided-missile frigate ORP General K. Pulaski (FrR 232) conduct a replenishment at sea with the German navy replenishment tanker FGS Spessart (A 1442).

Gravely is underway on a regularly-scheduled deployment as the flagship of Standing NATO Maritime Group 1 to conduct maritime operations and provide a continuous maritime capability for NATO in the northern Atlantic.

(U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Mark Andrew Hays/Released)