"Sadly, under the Trump Administration it was all talk – and not much else!"

Sadly, under the Biden Administration, it is all demented gibberish and nothing else. America will be scratching to protect itself from China, given the appalling President that the Leftist Democrats have imposed on it.

Not that we Australians have anything to crow about when it comes to our 'leader'. He's the one smart-Aleck commentators should be geeing-up.

Who knows? It is waking away in Afganistan after wasting all those lives and for what!?

As to the Pacific and sharing the heavy lifting? That would require Congress, the Senate and the Biden administration agreeing on something, anything!?

And should they agree? Be prepared to go to war with China as the ultimate outcome of any decision to contain China's expansion!? And should that be the outcome? be prepared for a nuclear holocaust?

I don't see much more than the usual posturing and political bunfights, Jeffery. Or rational decisions by all political parties!

Rational decisions would see many more strategic military outposts and a massive surge in military spending on new equipment and boots on the ground!
Alan B.

Put yourself in American shoes - why sacrifice your own lives to help little Australia out there?

Americans cannot be trusted - just see how they deserted Afghanistan.
Perhaps they will air-lift some key Australian refugees, so Scott Morrison can find a new home in the company of Ashraf Ghani.

The author is dreaming on guard, still talking about yesterday, "Belt and Road" and "debt trap" - diplomacy and commerce are now something of the past, now only the guns speak. I do hope that we secretly have our own nukes.

Nevertheless, I do not think that China is going to invade Australia straight away, what they are more likely to do is to blockade all sea traffic, especially oil tankers, to bring Australia to its knees with starvation caused by fuel shortages. We must immediately drill for our own oil and rebuild our refineries.

Bit of a cheek suggesting Australia should help any other country on Earth! We are floundering economically, have the weakest cowardly bunch of bed wetting leaders and our governance is a joke.
Here is a thought, lets sort out our own country, tell Pacific leaders we are now financially on our knees and just keep out of things we cannot fix.
Being a lickspittle to the US has not done us any good.
Also China will leave us alone whilst we keep producing iron ore, coal and food for them.

I wonder what US soft power could do for Vietnam if a Vietnamese fishing boat was sunk by a Chinese coast guard ship or for Australia whose coal and wine China has refused to buy as I (Yoshimichi Moriyama) said in one of my three comments on Project Syndicate org. commentary, Joseph Nye/What Could Cause US-China War?, March 2, 2021. Aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln sailing near-by or a B-52 bomber flying above could do nothing to help.

China's tactic is flexible while US's is not. We've got to be more flexible.

China has weaknesses. Undeniably there has been in its history no time like now when it is so hugely dependent on economic contact with the outside world. (In a nutshell, to put it simply, its economy was autarkical in its history.) Its economic relations with the so-called developing countries are not very important thought they may serve China's political status very well as important part of its strategy for encircling the free world. Its economic relations with the so-called developed or free world count very much as very large part of its exports and imports. They are the life line of Chinese economy.
In this respect decoupling is very effective. For instance US financial sanctions on Hong Kong work very well if adopted.

But, as Japanese experts said, Wall Street banks do not want to lose a penny they can earn from Hong Kong; Wall Street banks have been engaging as ever in business in mainland China, unhampered and their business is protected by the CCP. The CCP seems to know very well.
(The Island of Hainan is being developed by China. The purpose may be, as some Japanese conjectured, to build pleasure parks to attract the dollar and Euro. In the island the CCP would not be bothered by democratic movements as in Hong Kong.)

P.S.
Xi Jinping has both external and internal weaknesses.
His hold on power is far from unassailable. He wants charisma such as Mao had but has strong grudges within the party.
We can harass and obstruct him. We should boycott the 2022 winter Olympics; we should shore up our commitment to Taiwan. NHK introduced Taiwanese participants simply as representing Taiwan in the opening and closing ceremonies in Tokyo.