Since his return to office less than two months ago, President Donald Trump has trashed America’s reputation among liberal democratic allies, including Australia. He has sided with Vladimir Putin’s Russia, voted with the world’s most repressive autocracies in the United Nations General Assembly, and thrown into question basic tenets of the post-Second World War order.
So, it’s not surprising that we are now hearing calls for Australia to develop a “Plan B”. Analyst Alan Dupont, for example, has urged a four-part “Plan B” focused on increased sovereign defence capabilities with less reliance on the United States and strengthened regional relationships. Independent MP Zoe Daniel argued in The Guardian that Australia’s lack of a Plan B was “downright derelict” and that voters needed to know how Australia would defend itself, if the US wouldn’t. Other commentators fall short of urging a Plan B but advocate greater alarm or urgency in Australia’s response to the Trump administration.
Australia, although in a comparatively favourable position to European countries or other targets of Trump’s ire, like Canada, cannot afford to be complacent. But Australia’s current policies are already focused on the two main elements that any contingency plan would involve: building greater sovereign defence capability (the 2024 National Defence Strategy calls for just this), and deeper security partnerships with countries in our region.
On regional partnerships, the Albanese government has shored up relationships with Pacific Island and Southeast Asian countries. This includes a series of security agreements across the Pacific in what my Lowy Institute colleague Mihai Sora calls a “Sisyphean struggle to keep China out of Pacific critical infrastructure and sensitive security partnerships”. Australia has also stepped-up cooperation with several countries in Southeast Asia, including signing a notable defence agreement with Indonesia. Practical defence cooperation with Jakarta now far exceeds what many observers would have expected even five years ago. Australia is pushing others to participate more, too: last year Vietnam deployed a People’s Navy Vessel to Australia for a multilateral exercise, the first such deployment to a Western country.
It is still unclear at this point whether MAGA restrainers or China hawks will carry the day.
The obvious limitation of these partnerships, however, is that for the most part countries in our region have neither the capability nor the shared strategic outlook to genuinely align with Australia in response to shared threat perceptions. Put simply, almost none of our neighbours share our concerns about China. In pursuing closer strategic ties with regional countries, the onus would therefore be on Australia to adopt more accommodating policies towards China. Under our current policies, pursuing closer security ties with them can serve important objectives, including reducing the risk of misunderstanding, building strategic trust or even creating the foundations that could one day foster alignment. However, it cannot be viewed in any way as equivalent or fungible with the kind of security cooperation that we have with the United States.
So instead of talking about a fictional plan B, Australia’s response to the Trump administration should focus on three questions.
First, to what extent will the United States continue to support stability in the Indo-Pacific? Much debate focuses on US policy towards China, and it is still unclear at this point whether MAGA restrainers or China hawks will carry the day. But focusing too much on this question risks missing the point that a range of policies towards China could serve Australia’s interests. Instead, we should ask ourselves whether the Trump administration sees a vital interest in sustaining the current regional order in Asia. This requires the United States to retain its security commitments to its five Asian security allies as well as its broader support for what Australia’s foreign minister has called “the character of the region”, i.e. the rules and norms that have helped underpin stability.
Second, what actions, if any, can Australia take to encourage the United States to support stability in the Indo-Pacific – that is, to remain committed to its Asian allies and show its support important regional norms? Policies to encourage the United States to focus on and prioritise Asia have been a mainstay of Australian foreign policy – the Quad and arguably AUKUS are efforts to bind the United States to the Indo-Pacific. It’s worth recalling that a legacy of the Biden administration is much strengthened defence and security alliances in Asia, including with Japan and the Philippines. These alliances are better institutionalised, with a higher frequency of combined exercises and policy exchanges than was the case four years ago. This institutionalisation would have to be deliberately undone, and it is far from certain that this is the intention of the Trump administration.
The third question we should focus on is what actions Australia and others can take collectively and individually to support regional stability. This broad frame opens us up to working with a wide range of regional partners, including the United States where it still wishes to engage, and to exercising both hard power and soft power in pursuit of our interests. Minilateral cooperative arrangements both with and without the United States will become more important – for example, the India-Australia-Indonesia trilateral needs to be reinvigorated and meet at defence minister level. Maritime cooperative activities in the South China Sea with and without the United States are also useful signals, as is practical cooperation between Australia, South Korea and Japan.
There is no doubt that the United States has changed, and Australia needs to respond with urgency. But the way we frame that conversation matters. Our response should focus on continuing to work flexibility with the United States and a wide range of partners in pursuit of regional security. A narrowly focused Plan B aimed at reducing reliance on the United States would be self-defeating in that it would hasten the advent of precisely the scenario we wish to avert: a region without the United States.