American and Japanese Deployments to Australia to be Expanded
Throughout December, an Australian delegation including Defense Mnister Richard Marles and Foreign Minister Penny Wong has been visiting capitals across the Pacific. This included trips to the US and Japan for bilateral ministerial-level talks which resulted in significant agreements to bolster bilateral cooperation.
On 6 December, US Secretary of State Blinken and Secretary of Defense Austin welcomed their Australian counterparts to the 32nd Australia-U.S. Ministerial Consultations (AUSMIN) consultations. The talks concluded with a US pledge to increase its rotational army and marine presence in Australia. Both sides also agreed that pre-positioned stores of American fuel, munitions and other equipment will be expanded on the continent. Besides deeper bilateral defense ties, the allies promised to invest more money and effort into regional aid and development initiatives concerning a number of areas like humanitarian aid, green energy, infrastructure and Covid-19.
After the bilateral meeting, the Australians and Americans were joined by British counterparts for AUKUS talks. The Australians then proceeded to Japan for a 2+2 conference including Japanese Foreign Minister Hayashi Yoshimasa and Defense Minister Hamada Yasukazu.
As with the Americans, the Australians agreed to a number of general points of continued cooperation across areas like foreign aid and technology cooperation as well as more specific avenues for furthering defense relations. These include new submarine exercises, amphibious warfare exercises and coordinating cyber assets. The most notable of these was arguably an early-stage plan for rotational Japanese deployments of F-35s to Australia and the participation of Aussie F-35s in Japanese exercises. In the words of the official Australian release:
“Committing to unit exchanges and more complex exercises, including accelerating the consideration of […] manoeuvre deployment training of Japan’s F-35s with an eye to future rotational deployment of Japan’s fighters including F-35s in Australia while welcoming Royal Australian Air Force F-35s coming to Japan next year for the first time to participate in Exercise Bushido Guardian.”
AUSMIN and the 2+2 talks with Japan also encouraged further trilateral coordination among all three partners. For example, the ADF will be given more opportunities to participate in bilateral US-Japan exercises and the JSDF will be incited to train more alongside Australian and American troops in Australia.
Following the visit to Japan, Australian officials visited a number of South Pacific island states including Vanuatu. This week, Foreign Minister Penny Wong will continue her chain of high profile overseas visits by traveling to China for the 50th anniversary of Sino-Australian relations.