"Come in, Article 5... Where are you?"

An observation...

Jul 11, 2022

It may surprise you to learn that we Australians are technically on our own should an adversary launch an invasion. Which adversary? Okay, ya got me. The People’s Republic of China.

The North American Treaty Organisation — NATO — assures its 30-member countries with a trigger called Article 5 that states all will come to the aid of one in the event of an attack. NATO offers the strongest, most technically advanced military force the world has ever known. It’s one hell of a deterrent.

Australia’s traditional and longest-standing defense instrument has been the ANZUS treaty, an agreement between us (Australia) and New Zealand, and separately, between us and the United States, signed off in 1951. However, the agreement holds no equivalent to Article 5. The treaty merely recognizes that an attack on one is a threat to the others and that we should all join to meet that common threat. Does it sound a little kumbaya? Indeed, the interesting word in the essence of the treaty is “should”. Should is a loophole big enough to sail the USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier through if the US decides it shouldn’t because coming to our aid might adversely affect some other aspect of its national interests

“Captain, we’re getting reports of a loop-hole dead ahead.”

More recently, Australia has joined in a trilateral security pact with the UK and the US called AUKUS. “Aukus,” though, is more focused on the exchange of military and other technology. Aukus, for Australia, is about those nuclear submarines that should arrive, oh, any time between 2035 and 2050.

The American Virginia class attack submarine, 9 to be built for Australia in…er...the fullness of time.

Then there’s the QUAD, a four-way “strategic security dialogue” between Australia, India, Japan, and the United States which, again, holds no Article 5 in Australia’s favor. The agreement is merely an acknowledged response to China’s growing economic and strategic power. It has, though, led to some significant joint military exercises.

There’s also the “Five Eyes” (FVEY) security arrangement between Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK, and the United States. It’s a powerful intelligence-sharing alliance. Great. When China does come for us, at least we’ll be provided with fair warning.

There are several additional security arrangements between Australia and other countries, most notably with Indonesia and also Japan, but there is a lot of fine print that comes with these mechanisms.

Nowhere, however, is there anything like an Article 5.

In 1991, Ukraine agreed to hand over its Soviet nuclear weapons to Russia on the proviso that security guarantees were provided by the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, and others. Ukraine’s concern was, essentially, that without nukes, it would have no worthwhile deterrent. A document called the Budapest Memorandum outlining those security guarantees was duly signed by all parties and Ukraine handed over its nukes.

“Goodbye security.” Ukraine gives up its Soviet nukes. Russia promises to never invade. Right.

Cut to 2022 and Russia’s sudden unprovoked — at least in military terms — invasion of its neighbor. And where are the militaries of the US and the UK that should be rushing to Ukraine’s defense? Turns out the Budapest Memorandum was not a security guarantee but rather merely an “assurance” of assistance. The devil is in the detail with these things.

The plain fact is that we in Australia have no idea who will answer the call if a shooting war is launched against us.

Where’s our “big stick?”

It was Theodore Roosevelt who, in 1905, said, “Speak softly and carry a big stick.” The big sticks these days are intercontinental nuclear missiles (ICBMs) with Multiple Independently targetable Re-entry Vehicles (MIRVs). Almost nothing will guarantee your survival as a nation-state more wholeheartedly than a clutch of these babies, which is why North Korea has bankrupted itself in pursuit of them, and why Iran is doing everything it can to forestall international oversite until it can announce that it has them.

Australia, thankfully, would never go down this route. What the world needs now is love, sweet love. Not more MIRVs.

Back in WWII, Australia relied in part on its massive size and relative emptiness. There was an allegation made at the time and never substantiated that Australia was prepared to abandon the defense of northern Australia to the Japanese, pull back to roughly Brisbane, and defend the more populous southern parts of the continent. Thankfully that was a strategy never put to the test.

Today’s technology renders null and void our great distances and emptiness as instruments of passive defense. China’s military is crushingly huge, and its arsenal of high-tech weaponry is second only to that of the United States and NATO.

A conventional shooting war between China and Australia would be no contest. Standing alone, to use a boxing reference, we’d be kissing the canvas long before the bell ended round one.

There’s NATO, but where’s PATO?

Australia, the luscious low-hanging geopolitical fruit that it currently is, needs its Article 5 or equivalent.

NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, established as a bulwark against a potential Soviet invasion of Europe after WWII, largely found its purpose drifting following the collapse of Communist Russia and its Eastern Bloc (Warsaw Pact) empire. But the recent invasion of Ukraine by Russia has acted like a pair of paddles on NATO’s fading heartbeat. It once again has a purpose. You can almost see the Organisation crackling with newfound enthusiasm and relevance.

But what if NATO had a still wider purpose? To begin with, NATO is, in reality, far more than a European defense pact as two of its founding members, the United States and Canada, are North American rather than European nations, and both (like Australia) have coastlines washed by the Pacific.

Perhaps with the number and scope of state autocracies growing after years of decline[1], NATO should consider a charter that supports not just European nations, but the defense of liberal democracies. Democracies like Australia.

Alternatively, perhaps a separate organization, a sister to NATO, could secure the defense of liberal democracies in the Pacific region with founding members the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, Singapore, Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Pacific Islands. Call it PATO – the Pacific Area Treaty Organization — complete with an equivalent Article 5.

Recently, as late as 2022, representatives from Australia (headed by the newly minted Prime Minister of Australia, Anthony Albanese), Japan, New Zealand, and the Republic of Korea attended the NATO conference in Madrid, Spain. Foremost in the discussions among delegates was the invasion of Ukraine. With the inclusion of Australia and the other Pacific nations in this forum, clearly also uppermost in the Organisation’s mind is the potential for a major conflict arising in the Indo-Pacific Region. In short, concerns about China.

News from author David Rollins

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