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Editorial comment.

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Strong defence budgets: good for all regional powers

Reacting unofficially to the Rudd Government's new defence plans, Chinese military strategist Rear Admiral Yang Yi initially called them "stupid", "crazy", and anti-China; but official Chinese reaction has been positive, recognising that Australia's economic and strategic importance within the East Asian region demands that it have credible defence forces. Japan also reacted positively. Australia is ordering 100 of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, 12 additional submarines, 46 Tiger helicopters, boosting the number of its armoured vehicles by 100, and upgrading its high-tech capacity in electronic warfare.

This reflects the fact that American defence policy will increasingly be hamstrung by oceans of debt, and that America's role as global policeman is over. There are now six nuclear-armed powers in our Pacific/Indian Ocean region: the United States, Russia, China, India, Pakistan and North Korea. As China and India continue to boost defence spending to match their growing economic clout, and North Korea expands its nuclear weapons capability (it won't turn back), Japan will have to begin the long debate over whether it needs to become "nuclear-ready"--to have the necessary bits and pieces to assemble nuclear weapons within hours.

As Flavius Vegetius observed 1700 years ago, "If you desire peace, prepare for war". Most wars are triggered by the appearance of weakness in one of the sides. No one readily attacks another if he...

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