Looking to Each Other

While the lion’s share of Indo-Pacific geopolitical attention is captured by the maneuvering of nuclear-armed great powers, Australia and Japan have been steadily deepening their bilateral security partnership. The two countries are still feeling their way, but Canberra and Tokyo clearly see advantages in intensifying and institutionalizing security cooperation and embracing more significant mutual commitments.

The process predates the turbulence of Trump 2.0, but its pace has quickened since January as both countries look for sources of stability. Japan’s Foreign Minister Iwaya Takeshi put it bluntly at policy talks in September: “The international community has entered into an era of drastic transformation and the severity of the security environment is rising in the Indo-Pacific. In this context, both Japan and Australia are countries with the will and capability to play leading roles in the realization of a free and open Indo-Pacific.” Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong added, “We know Australia and Japan share common interests, and we now know, more than ever, that we look to each other.” Her colleague, Deputy Prime Minister and Defense Minister Richard Marles, was more emphatic, pointedly noting that “There is no country in the world with whom we have greater strategic trust.”

Cutting Steel … and Security Agreements

The most tangible demonstration that the relationship has shifted to a higher level was Australia’s selection in August of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries’ Mogami-class frigate as its new general-purpose warship. This was a first-of-its-kind defense sale/acquisition for both countries and will enmesh important elements of Japanese and Australian naval defense industry and capability development as the new frigates are constructed in both countries.

Rising momentum in Australia-Japan strategic cooperation can be traced back to the early 2000s. A growing awareness of shared interests—and increasing agency on Japan’s part—produced a security cooperation agreement in 2007, a security of information agreement in 2012, and elevation of the bilateral relationship to a special strategic partnership in 2014.

Steadily increasing engagement, closer policy alignment, greater cognizance of a more perilous strategic environment (both in the Indo-Pacific and following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine), and Japan’s embrace of collective self-defense led to a stronger and more ambitious joint declaration on security cooperation in 2022. That declaration committed the two countries to deepen policy and strategic exchanges, intelligence cooperation, and interoperability. Most significantly, Canberra and Tokyo undertook to consult on contingencies that may affect sovereignty and regional security interests and to “consider measures in response”. While well short of NATO’s Article 5, it marked a major shift in mutual expectations.

The 2022 joint declaration was followed by a regional access agreement in 2023—Japan’s first defense treaty since 1960. That agreement has since facilitated a rapid expansion of joint activities and embedded liaison officers in respective joint operations commands.

Collective Security?

The latest foreign and defense ministers “2+2” talks in September foreshadowed a further expansion of collaboration and, perhaps more importantly, formalized an explicit deterrence concept in the ministers’ joint statement: “In efforts to deter unilateral attempts to change the status quo by force or coercion, we welcomed joint cooperation including through increased information sharing, further alignment of activities, and deepening discussions on current and future deterrence activities such as Flexible Deterrent Options [operational planning for deterrence-focused actions].” Iwaya stated in his read-out, “We will further strengthen collective deterrence.”

Neither country’s defense and foreign policy institutions—or public opinion—are likely ready to embrace a formalized collective deterrence model any time soon. But these developments suggest that both countries are willing to move substantively in that direction.

Opportunities Abound …

As Tokyo and Canberra press ahead, there are opportunities to make more meaningful contributions to shared capabilities. For example, as Australia has demonstrated in hosting training facilities for up to 14,000 Singaporean military personnel, it can offer space for partners to train and develop. A similar arrangement with Japan would be beneficial for both countries and mitigate some of the regional sensitivities Japan faces at it increases its military heft.

After initial Australian reluctance to accept additional involvement in the nascent AUKUS (Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) technology partnership track (and mixed views in Japan on the desirability of joining a “JAUKUS” arrangement), Japan participated earlier this year in the group’s underwater autonomous systems test. Both countries have since committed to discussing further opportunities for Japanese involvement in AUKUS advanced capability projects. This would add further impetus to rapidly expanding trilateral capability development cooperation with the United States.

The United States is likely to see greater “cross-spoke” bilateral cooperation between two of its closest Indo-Pacific allies as laudable and as a vindication of its efforts to encourage partners to take greater responsibility for their security interests. Given Australia’s and Japan’s deep connections and dependencies with the United States, especially in high-end capabilities and intelligence, Washington will maintain substantial influence over the parameters of cooperation. Japan and Australia have taken great pains to emphasize the centrality and indispensability of their respective US alliances. They will also be careful to maintain a “no surprises” approach with Washington. Nonetheless, greater bilateral cooperation means there will be more substantive conversations and coordination between Japan and Australia without the United States at the table.

Within Limits

Notwithstanding the potential for further collaboration, both countries will be wary of commitments that expose them to risks in each other’s neighborhoods. Australia will not want to be snared in Japan’s territorial disputes, and Japan will want to manage its own relationships in Southeast Asia independently of Australia.

Australia can reasonably claim to punch above its weight in geostrategic terms, grounded in its sophisticated military/intelligence capabilities and strong governmental institutions. If all goes to plan, the AUKUS program, across all its dimensions, will provide a further multiplier. But, with a population of 27 million and an economy less than 40% the size of Japan’s, Australia will be a junior partner in many respects. There will come a time when the geostrategic goods Australia can offer Japan will plateau. Conversely, while there is much Japan can offer Australia, not least through its technology and heavy industries, Australia is likely to remain reliant on the United States, given the enormity of the AUKUS project and Australia’s entrenched capability preferences.

For its part, Japan remains constrained in its strategic normalization by persisting legacies of World War II and its pacifist postwar disposition. It, too, will continue to place greatest weight on its US alliance and have much of its policymaking bandwidth consumed by Washington-focused alliance management.

Even so, at this still-early stage in the relationship, the point of diminishing returns is a long way off. The potential for significant growth is substantial if both partners can stay the course and avoid domestic and international headwinds.

Presaging an Asian NATO?

Could Japan and Australia’s burgeoning security relationship play a similar foundational role to the 1947 Dunkirk Treaty between the United Kingdom and France, which paved the way for wider transatlantic mutual security arrangements?

That seems unlikely: While Iwaya and former Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba initially promoted the idea of an Asian NATO, it has not gained traction domestically or among other, hedging-focused regional actors instinctively wary of security entanglements, choosing sides, or putting their economic relationships with Beijing at risk. Japan’s own shaky domestic politics make it less likely to have the focus and policy persistence needed to pursue such a goal. Australia would be extremely wary of taking a prominent role in any push to institutionalize collective defense across the region, fearing counterproductive impacts on relations with many Asian countries still uneasy about Canberra’s intentions for its planned nuclear submarine capability.

There are also important reasons to be skeptical that even other US treaty allies in East Asia would be enthusiastic about such a process, despite a growing sense of shared purpose. Setting aside questions about US reliability, South Korea’s slow pace of reconciliation with Japan (notwithstanding a positive leaders’ meeting in August) remains an encumbrance—as well as a huge gift to Beijing. And immediate peninsula concerns will continue to absorb Seoul’s security policy attention. The Philippines and Thailand face capability constraints and anchors to an increasingly anachronistic ASEAN policy architecture.

A narrower pact that connected the United States with the most likeminded of its partners, Japan, Australia, and the Philippines, as a core grouping that others could join over time (as former senior Biden administration official Ely Ratner proposed), thus also is unlikely and would represent a “coalition of outsiders” to many in the rest of East Asia.

China’s Response

A rough rule of thumb has emerged in Indo-Pacific security policymaking that if Beijing reacts negatively to an initiative, then it must be on the right track. So it was in response to the 2022 Australia-Japan joint declaration when a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson warned that “the Asia-Pacific region does not need military blocs, still less groupings that could provoke bloc confrontation or stoke a new Cold War.” Despite this reflexive, hyperbolic critique—and given the early stage of practical deliverables from the partnership—China is likely to judge pragmatically that there is little prospect that deepening Australia-Japan strategic cooperation will produce an early or rapid shift in the regional balance. On this basis, such collaboration should not provoke a sharply hostile Chinese response, at least in the near term.

Beijing will be concerned, however, if this cooperation facilitates a more durable and determined revitalization of Japan’s military capability and confidence, or if it provides strategic space for other regional actors to push back on Beijing’s ambitions more assertively. So, we can expect China to dial up pressure on Canberra and Tokyo, as well as others in the region, to keep these risks in check.