Also, in the event the USA and China went to war, one would be asked if they realistically expected that the USA, who would be understandably trying to wall up the entire latitudinal width of the Pacific Ocean from a naval attack, would kindly decrease their chances of NOT leaving a weak enough defense for some Chinese battleships and aircraft carriers to launch a long-range attack through and reign havoc on the mainland, and kindly divert a couple hundred ships along the Java sea to keep us safe too, remembering how we would always send a hefty couple of hundred guys to help their tens of thousands in the many wars they fought.

Even the 'we make a good stop-off base for the USA to want to protect' isn't quite going to weigh up 'not-getting-bombed-by-China-launching-an-Easterly-Assault' as a list of strategic priorities.

Once again China is the boogy man, building their army and arsenal, what a load of American alarmist bull scheiser all meant to keep the military industrial complex in the money.

Consider the twentieth century, Russia and America fought wars or aided one faction over another in countless foreign lands for most of that century. China got involved in two major conflicts that were virtually on their door step so to speak, Korea and Vietnam, hardly the economic expansionist and control agendas that the Ruskies and the Yanks practiced for half a century.

In any future world-wide conflict there won't be a winner. The whole world will lose. Those with the least dependency on computer related technology in the event of a conflict will have the best chance of surviving. I fail to see Australia having any strenghts whatsoever. The only factor in Australia's favour is that due to the limited people holding capacity no-one will seriously bother to actually fight a war here. Why fight a war with Labor's immigration policy anyway, just jump on an old boat & that's it. We're being invaded now & we don't try & stop anyone. What hope is there if someone used force ?

we should have our own nukes.

Only then could we go it alone.

Austin Powerless,
Are you serious ? I wouldn't trust any of them with a slingshot !

Well said Austin, and more succinct that I can say it.

It's a big country and the only way to defend it, is to have a serious strike capability or capacity
to deter interested possible future aggressors from attempting acquistion.

But your right Individual it could be a worry, to think about who might get control of this capability, in times of pressure.
It is a big responsibility.