Australia needs to defend itself, PM Albanese says, amid Trump policy volatility

CANBERRA – Australia needs to defend itself, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on April 30 when asked whether Mr Donald Trump’s return as President of the United States meant that Australia should review its defence strategy.

Australia deepened its longstanding military alliance with the US under Mr Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden, including through the Aukus agreement, a four-decade defence project to buy and build nuclear-powered submarines.

Aukus is supported by both major Australian political parties, and Mr Albanese said on April 30 that it would not be up for negotiation if the election on May 3 resulted in a minority government.

Mr Trump’s hefty tariffs and volatile diplomacy, including upending US policy towards Russia’s war in Ukraine, has sparked debate over whether Australia should increase defence spending to increase self-reliance.

Asked after delivering a speech at the National Press Club in Canberra if change was needed, Mr Albanese said Australia was building its independent defence capability, including through the establishment of domestic missile production.

“We need to defend ourselves,” he said, referring to Mr John Curtin, a Labor prime minister during World War II who he said understood that “kowtowing to the UK... wasn’t going to defend Australia”.

Mr Curtin rejected a British strategy to deploy Australian troops in South-east Asia and demanded that they defend New Guinea and Australia.

“People (at the time) thought they needed the national interest defended,” Mr Albanese said. “It was Labor who did it then, and it is Labor that will do it now.”

Australia holds a national election on May 3 that polls predict will give Mr Albanese’s Labor party a majority or near-majority.

Mr Trump has loomed over the campaign, with voters unnerved by US politics since he regained the White House and switching support away from Australia’s conservative opposition.

Labor has said it is spending A$50 billion (S$41.8 billion) more over a decade on defence, in what it has described as the most significant increase in defence spending since the end of World War II. However, it has not pledged any new money in the 2025 national budget.

Conservative leader Peter Dutton last week said he would boost defence spending to 3 per cent of gross domestic product within a decade. REUTERS