The geopolitical shock of Trump’s second presidency seized Australia – but it was long to come. The rise of China has turned our strategic environment upside down. The war in Ukraine has shown the contours of a world in which could be right. Trump 2.0 marked the arrival of the new world order that the Australians feared the most – a dictated by realpolitik and economic fragmentation. The statement of China and the assault of Russia were manageable if you were in the powerful camp led by the United States – the main guarantor of security in Australia. But the “fear of abandonment”, so eloquently described by the late Allan Gyngell, by a transactional and nationalist America is now a reality that gives to think. This is the end of the United States system as we know it. What comes then is fluidity and chaos, before the world moved to a new power balance, most likely less favorable to Australia.
For Australia, this means an uncomfortable change towards independence and autonomy – in economics, defense and diplomacy. The change will be long, expensive and painful. But we have to start now.
For Australia – a commercial nation dependent on global rules and standards – self -sufficiency does not correspond to protectionism and isolation. The sources of wealth and security of Australia are still free of charge, open markets and alliances with states sharing the same ideas.
The key to Australia’s autonomy is in our region. Canberra must now double the security, economic and societal links with Asia and invest in its expertise in Asia. Equally amazed by the new America, Asia remains the world’s economic power. Australia’s trade and supply chains are deeply integrated into the region, and Asia is the main source of its population growth. Given Trump’s disdain for alliances, Australia’s security will depend even more on a new power balance in Asia, or he could be forced to confront and negotiate a rampant Chinese hegemony in the region.
For generations, Australian politicians have debated the question of whether Australia should consider itself an integral part, although a distinct part of Asia. This debate has been largely settled. It is time to continue expansion and deepen economic and strategic partnerships in the region. In the process, Australians should learn to be harder and geopolitically agile, because the emerging world order will be intimately motivated by interest and compromise more than by loyalty and values.
Successive Australian governments have recognized the need for this change. However, their political response was an even deeper tangle in the American defense and alliance network while joining coalitions led by the United States to balance Chinese power. The sustainability of this policy will now be severely tested. Even if the United States’s commitment to the hard Alliance Anzus, Australia will be invited to be more independent to defend itself. This means bringing its defense budget greater than 3% of its GDP. At the same time, with Washington disinterested by regional leadership, Australia will have to intensify the construction and maintenance of its own defense partnerships with India, Japan, Southeast Asia and the Pacific. In the wake of Trump’s ambush, Australia must examine, but not abandon, its Indo-Pacific strategy to balance Chinese power through partnerships with a coalition of states with similar views. However, this should be supplemented by a credible and capable Australian defense strategy and deterrent.
The construction of this will require a strong economy, whose sources of growth are massively in Asia. Australia has already launched a long and painful route of expansion and commercial diversification, forced by recent diplomatic and commercial fallout with China. Shaken by Trump’s prices, all the neighbors of Australia in Asia will now be beyond the United States for economic opportunities and complementarities. The Australian policy premium and economic stability has just increased. This is a unique opportunity for Canberra to upgrade its regional economic commitment.
The economic strategies of the Government of Southeast and India have already injected an essential energy into Australian commercial engagement with the region. So far, the results have been modest and mixed. It is difficult to reclaim the Australian commercial mentality opposed to risk, but this important work must continue.
Australia must restart its investment and its commercial links already ripe and flourishing with Japan and South Korea. Both will seek to consolidate their economic and security alliances and see Australia as a trusted partner.
China remains the greatest economic opportunity in Australia and its main geostrategic risk. Despite the risks, China will be essential to the success of Australia in Asia, with its unrivaled market scale, its appetite for resources and energy, and the ecosystem of talent and world -class innovation. With the right controls, strategy and risk capacities, Australia is well positioned to maintain and develop its business and links from people to people with China.
To thrive in Asia, Australia must be better to learn it. For those of us who work in the Asia-Australia ecosystem, it was painful to see the progressive decline of our literacy in Asia since the beginning of the century. Not a single Australian university has made an important investment in Asian studies in the last decade. Australian reflection groups have an expertise in embarrassing Asia, and plea and capacity organizations, such as Asialink and Asia Society, are chronically underfunded. The credible expertise in Asia on the boards of directors and the management teams of the largest Australian companies and within the governments of the States is extremely rare. The mastery of Asia must be part of a national autonomy strategy.
Finally, also confronted that current American leadership seems to many Australians, the United States is more than the current administration. Australia should not underestimate the power of American innovation, business and talent. While Trump has triggered structural forces that will forever change America and the world, the United States will remain a major power in the predictable future. The relationship of Australia with America will also evolve – let us hope for romantic obedience to healthy pragmatism. But in the current period of shock and realignment, it is important to take into account the advice of another large Australian foreign policy, Dennis Richardson, who said: “Since when does a country have worth its sale at salt auctions its alliance to the most offering?” America will continue to appear prominently in the strategy in Australian Asia, and the world could still see another American reinvention.
But the future of Australia resides massively in Asia, and the region holds the key to the future of the Pragmatic self -sufficiency. In this sense, Trump has served Australia. He provided a moment of awakening, a historic opportunity to be a more confident and more resilient country and finally shake the fears of being a solitary pariah in the region.