Perilous Times
US to station troops in northern Australia as fears of
China's Pacific presence grow
The United States is set to permanently base troops in Australia
amid concerns about the threat of China's growing military reach
across the region.
Barack Obama and Julia Gillard are expected to unveil their plans
as they mark the 60th anniversary of the alliance Photo: REUTERS
By Jonathan Pearlman in Sydney
1:59PM GMT 11 Nov 2011
President Barack Obama is expected to reveal plans to station
about 500 to 1000 Marines at a barracks in Darwin and to expand
the US navy's use of bases at the Northern Territory capital and
in Perth in Western Australia.
He will make the announcement in Australia next week during a
visit that includes Hawaii and Indonesia designed to assert
America's commitment to the Asia Pacific region.
The bases would be beyond the expanding range of new Chinese
missiles, which can reach the main US Pacific bases on Okinawa
island in Japan and the small island territory of Guam, east of
the Philippines.
The US Marines are reportedly due to be positioned at the
Robertson barracks in Darwin, effectively the nearest mainland
Australian military base to China. But the fresh US presence would
also involve additional use of aircraft of air bases in the north
west of the country and further access to training ranges.
The move comes amid a realignment of US forces across the
Asia-Pacific and growing pressure to lighten its presence on
Okinawa, where local politicians have called for a troop reduction
as part of a planned relocation of a controversial US base.
Kevin Rudd, the Australian foreign minister, said: "From the
Australian perspective, here we are with a vast coastline, a
population of just 23 million. It has always made national
security sense to have a strong security alliance with America."
But there are also heightened concerns across the region about
China's strengthening military capability and its apparent growing
willingness to assert its presence across the South China Sea,
Indian Ocean and Western Pacific. In June, China was accused of
harassing Vietnamese and Filipino vessels in the South China Sea,
while the arrest by Japan of a Chinese trawler last year led to a
diplomatic standoff between Beijing and Tokyo.
During a visit to Australia next week – his first as President –
Mr Obama and Prime Minister Julia Gillard are expected to unveil
their plans as they mark the 60th anniversary of the alliance. No
US troops are stationed in Australia – though forces have visited
since 1907 - and analysts say the move is likely to be badged as a
"rotation" rather than a permanent deployment.
"The US could build their forces up quickly in places like
Australia out of missile range from China," a professor of
international security at Sydney University, Alan Dupont, told the
Telegraph.
"A lot of Japanese facilities in Okinawa are quite vulnerable to
the new generation of Chinese missile capabilities. It is arguably
one of the most important shifts in both US and Australian
strategic policy in the past 20 years." Australia's defence
minister, Stephen Smith, said Australia would seek to expand
"practical cooperation" with the US but would not agree to a
Marine base in the country. At present, the main US military
presence in Australia is limited to a joint satellite tracking
station at Pine Gap, in the Northern Territory, and a naval
communication station in Western Australia.
President Obama, who was born in Hawaii and calls himself
"America's first Pacific president", has overseen a shift in focus
away from the Middle East to the Asia Pacific. The US has
signalled an expansion of defence ties across the region,
including with Vietnam and Singapore.
However, the plan to expand the US presence in Australia has
raised concerns among some analysts that it could escalate
regional tensions and damage relations with China.
Hugh White, a former senior Australian defence official, said a
dramatic expansion of US troops in the country was "a very
significant and potentially very risky move for Australia".
"In Washington and in Beijing, this will be seen as Australia
aligning itself with an American strategy to contain China," Dr
White, a professor at the Australian National University, told the
Sydney Morning Herald. "In the view from Beijing, everything the
US is doing in the western Pacific is designed to bolster
resistance to the Chinese challenge to US primac