Australia is facing a very serious and likely long lasting fuel crisis as a result of
#Iran closing the Straits of Hormuz.
Now consider the scenario of a future war in the Indo Pacific region, perhaps as a result of a
#Taiwan straits crisis, where
#China deliberately targets our oil and natural gas supply through the archipelago to our north, specifically to coerce Australia into not supporting the United States or it’s allies in defending the liberal democracy of
#Taiwan.
This scenario could also see direct attacks on our ports and other infrastructure in the north of Australia to starve us of essential fuel supplies. Rather than a distant war, it would see daily attacks directly on Australia itself.
Such a scenario is likely if China decides to use military force to impose unification on Taiwan, against the wishes of the Taiwanese people. This could happen within this decade or early in the next.
With this future scenario in mind, the key lesson for government emerging from the
#IranWar of 2026 is that Australia cannot be resilient so long as it is so dependent on distant energy supplies, and is not able to defend vital maritime trade routes, choke points and narrows through which our essential trade flows.
Bottom line: we need greater self sufficiency in energy and fuel by increasing sovereign fuel reserves to the IEA minimum of 90 days and we need to build additional onshore refineries. We need to harden our critical infrastructure associated with energy and fuel. And we need to have a means to defend this infrastructure including with investment into Integrated Air and Missile Defence (IAMD) systems for the north.
Oh, and we need a larger and more powerful ADF than is currently planned and budgeted for by government in the 2024 National Defence Strategy and Integrated Investment Program. We need to be able to project greater power and sustain larger forward presence, rather than waiting for the adversary to gain the initiative in a crisis, as we sit behind our northern approaches in the ‘Sea-Air Gap’. The ‘strategic moat’ is no longer a barrier to attack.
That demands government significantly increase defence spending to a floor of 3.5% and 1.5% for national security and do so NOW - not in ten years time.
