ALBANESE GOES TO CHINA

A More Independent Australia

The transformation of Australia’s relationship with China from breakdown under Morrison in 2022 to restoration under Albanese in 2025 is one of the most remarkable reversals in Australian foreign policy. As China-watcher James Curran suggests, the Albanese visit may signal a maturing, more independent Australian foreign policy with the primary aim of doing everything possible to avoid a conflict, or  following the Americans into a war. This is best illustrated by Albanese’s refusal to provide an advance commitment to support the US in a conflict with China over Taiwan. Albanese has declared that Australia will speak for itself and its foreign policy will not be outsourced. [i]

A New Direction

On Saturday, 5 July  Prime Minister Albanese used the John Curtin Oration to set out the “Australian way”, describing how Curtin (Australia’s Prime Minister from 1941 to 1945) had restored the confidence and determination in Australia to shape our own future. Albanese spoke of rebuilding our standing as a leader and partner in the Pacific, working to stabilise our relationship with China, deepening our economic engagement across Southeast Asia and forging defence and security co-operation with our nearest neighbours, particularly Indonesia. As Mr Albanese said, “Australia cannot predict or control the challenges we will face, but we can determine how we respond. We can choose the way we engage with our region and deal with the world” and Australia will pursue its interests as a “sovereign nation” even when such interests diverge from those of Washington .[ii] 

Albanese’s recent six day visit to China included high-level talks with President Xi Jinping and the Chinese Premier, Li Qiang. The visit took place during tensions between Australia and the US over Albanese’s refusal to lift defence spending, and the Pentagon’s review of the  AUKUS program. During his China visit, the Prime Minister talked up the prospect of expanded business links between Australia and its biggest trading partner, underscored by the attendance of senior business leaders representing the Australian Business Council.  Albanese was on his fourth meeting with the Chinese President but has not yet had a face-to-face with Trump.

Australia as a Central Base of Operations                                                                       

Pine Gap and the Research Station in Alice Springs are joint Australian-US defence facilities. The new AUKUS Deep Space Advanced Radar Capability (DARC) which is under construction in the North-west Cape is the first tangible evidence of the AUKUS partnership. DARC’s radar dishes will track, identify and monitor space objects for the US, the UK and Australia. The US also relies on the Australian Defence Satellite Communications Station near Geraldton in Western Australia. These facilities “support” the extended deterrence commitments which the United States provides and are a fundamental contribution which Australia makes to the alliance. This also applies to the US “Force Posture initiatives” which commenced under the Gillard government in 2011 with 2,500 marines training in the Northern Territory for six months each year. Equally  significant are the US’s rotational bomber deployments from Australia’s Top End.

The US Defence Secretary, Pete Hegseth has said that “Beijing is preparing for war in the Indo-Pacific and the US is laser focused on strengthening deterrence” across the region. Republican congressman, Michael McCaul has declared that Australia has become “The central base of operations for America’s military to deter Chinese aggression in the Indo-Pacific”. All this makes these sites potential targets for Chinese ballistic missiles if war does break out.[iii]

Sheridan Is Hardly a Friend of Labor

Greg Sheridan writing in The Australian was in panic mode, claiming that greater Australian strategic distance from America would be welcomed in Beijing. For Sheridan, Australia’s two key interests are to preserve the US-Australia alliance and to maintain the deepest possible US involvement in our region. However, he believes Albanese is performing badly on both! Sheridan further claims that with the “Albanese Odyssey”, Australia is changing its strategic settings with Beijing which Sheridan claims, would be “a terrible mistake”.

Sheridan refers to observations by Defence Minister Marles that China had undertaken the biggest military buildup since World War II, including the most rapid expansion of its nuclear weapons arsenal and long-range missiles. That may well be true, but what Marles fails to say is that China, with a population four times that of the USA, spends only one third of what the US spends on its military and, even with the expansion of China’s nuclear weapons arsenal, China has only a fraction of the number of the US nukes.[iv]

In an extraordinary rant, Sheridan alleges that Australia got nothing from Albanese’s trip to China while Beijing got everything it wanted. He describes the Australian Prime Minister as “cringingly subservient and foolishly self-indulgent” and criticized him for “praising the wonders of the Chinese regime”. Sheridan failed to recognise that the Prime Minister was a visitor to China and his aim was to improve, not to destroy the relationship.

Sheridan went so far as to claim that the PRC is “deliberately destroying Australian industries” through “predatory pricing” adding that the OECD estimates that by 2030, the PRC will control 45% of global manufacturing. Sheridan correctly claims that nothing is more strategic than rare earths and critical minerals but cries out that the PRC completely dominates this trade saying it has “forced other suppliers out of business”. Sheridan also claims that “PRC industrial policies wipeout whole Australian industries” and he complains that  iron ore, coal and gas constitute nearly half Australia’s total exports making Australia a “dangerously narrow economy”.[v] One can only assume that Sheridan was having a really bad day!

More Diplomacy, Less Aggression

Geoff Raby served as Australia’s ambassador to China (2007-2011). Writing in the Australian Financial Review on 8 July, Raby suggests that Albanese’s visit to China provides an opportunity for exercising statesmanship in Australia’s national interest and he reminds Australia that much of our prosperity depends on the trading relationship with China. Raby added that there is a sound basis to take the relationship further in Australia’s interests.  Raby also noted that when three PLA Navy ships turned up in the Tasman Sea, it was Albanese who correctly said that Australia does the same in the South China Sea and in the Taiwan Strait!

Prof James Laurenceson is the Director of the Australia-China Relations Institute at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS). Writing on 11 July he reminds the reader that last year, Australian companies sold more to China than Australia’s next four largest markets combined and that China is by far, Australia’s biggest supplier. What is more, under the Australia-US Free Trade Agreement, the US faces an average tariff of only 0.1% while Washington now applies a baseline tariff of 10% on most Australian imports. In contrast, Beijing’s average tariff on Australia is a mere 1.1%.

As Trade Minister, Don Farrell has remarked, Australia’s China trade is worth nearly 10 times its trade with the US and it provides 25% of Australia’s export dollars. If anything, Australia wants more, not less business with China.[vi]

What Beijing Wants

President  Xi Jinping  told Prime Minister Anthony Albanese that China stood ready to work with Australia “to push the bilateral relationship further”. Given that one out of four Australian jobs depends on trade and since China is by far Australia’s largest trading partner, it is very much in the interest of the Australian economy to have a positive and constructive relationship with China.[vii]

President Xi Jinping has pressed Albanese to adopt a more accommodating foreign investment regime for China and will seek the Prime Minister’s support for China’s accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, while seeking to enlist Australia’s Prime Minister to Xi’s vision of a world order based on a “community of common destiny”. China has repeatedly complained over Australia’s intention to take back the Port of Darwin and has suggested that ending Chinese ownership of the Port could hurt the relationship.

Australia’s Confidant Prime Minister

 Returning to Canberra after a record six-night visit to China, Prime Minister Albanese vowed to draw clear lines on the limits  of the nation’s partnership with the US when he meets with Donald Trump, saying he would show respect for Mr Trump  “by engaging in a clear, forward manner, and being clear about what we can do, and what we cannot do”.  Albanese has rejected US calls  for  Canberra to nearly double the nation’s defence budget and he made it clear that he was planning to have a defence policy which would be in Australia’s  national interest.[viii] 

AUDI ALTERAM PARTEM – HEAR THE OTHER SIDE

[i] Albanese signals a shift from friction to realism, The Conversation 18/7/25

[ii] Why labour is ready to build on John Curtin's ambition, The Australian (AU), 7 July 2025

[iii] Central base of Operations, Ben Packham, AU, 11/7/25

[iv] Six days in China, Albanese is making a big statement without saying anything, AU 12 July 25

[v] Albanese spends the week praising the regime, AU,19/7/25

[vi] Xi’s charm offensive traps Albanese between an old ally and a new friend, AU, 19/7/25

[vii] Michelle Grattan, Xi, ready to push China-Australia relationship further, Asia Times, 16/7/25

[viii] Ben Packham, Inspired by China, Albanese sets red lines for Trump meeting, AU 21/7/25