Australia’s strategic objectives in a changing regional order

Australia has long viewed itself as a middle power anchored in the liberal rules-based order, global markets, its wider neighborhood and its alliance with the United States. Yet today it confronts a regional order in flux that tests these foundations. This Asia Policy roundtable contains eight essays that examine Australia’s strategic priorities and challenges in a range of international relations areas and with its most important partners - the United States, China, Southeast Asia and the Pacific Island countries.

UTS:ACRI Director James Laurenceson writes on 'Australia's strategic objectives and challenges in relations with China'.

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Australia’s strategic objectives with respect to China have long been animated by two critical assessments: the trajectory of China’s economic rise and the reliability of the United States as a bilateral security ally and strategic presence in Asia.

In 1976, two years before the People’s Republic of China’s ‘reform and opening up’ policy officially commenced, Australia’s first ambassador to the country, Stephen FitzGerald, cabled back to Canberra that China’s economy could realise ‘annual growth in the vicinity of 10 percent over a period of 25 years.’ The implications, according to his embassy team, would be twofold. One was that ‘the last quarter of this [twentieth] century will see the extension of dominant Chinese power and influence throughout the region.’ The other was that if the structure of China’s trade followed the path established by its Northeast Asian neighbor Japan, then ‘by the year 2000 China would have a dominant role in the expansion of the Australian economy.’¹ These foresights proved impeccable, and the objectives of Australia’s strategic policy toward China ever since have been to reap the benefits of the two countries’ extraordinary economic complementarities, while seeking to limit the ability of Beijing to use China’s expanding power to potentially harm other Australian interests, notably in the security realm. In this latter endeavor, the role of the United States has been, and continues to be, regarded as vital.

This essay highlights how China’s ongoing economic rise, as well as perceptions of US reliability, continue to shape Australia’s contemporary strategic thinking. It begins by delving into a period of unprecedented turbulence between Canberra and Beijing that stretched from July 2016 to April 2022. This stemmed from a switch by Canberra to deprioritising the strategic objective of benefiting from economic complementarities and elevating that of confronting and challenging applications of Chinese power. It then analyses the subsequent period of ‘stabilisation’ from May 2022 to April 2025 in which Canberra did not acquiesce to Chinese power but also confronted and challenged it with less flamboyance and a recognition that the United States no longer has the power, and perhaps the willingness, to backstop Australian interests. An extended six-day, three-city visit by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to China in July 2025 has raised the prospect of the Australia-China relationship moving beyond stabilisation into a new period of growth.

What is clear since July 2016 is that the gravity associated with the implications of China’s economic rise and the ambivalence toward U.S. reliability is such that it has never been possible for Canberra to allow one strategic objective to entirely dominate the other. Whatever pressure that Beijing or Washington might bring to bear, there is little reason to expect this will change in the foreseeable future.

Out in Front: Confronting and Challenging Chinese Power, July 2016– April 2022

With a wary eye on China’s expanding power and the potential for Beijing to use it to threaten Australian interests, efforts by Canberra to deepen its security alliance with the United States and secure Washington’s commitment to the Asia-Pacific region are not new. In 2011, for example, Labor prime minister Julia Gillard struck a deal with the Obama administration that saw US Marines begin regular rotations through Darwin, Australia’s northern-most capital city.² Nonetheless, until the mid-2010s, the consensus in Canberra was that the United States maintained regional primacy, and, accordingly, the strategic objective of reaping the benefits of economic complementarities with China could be confidently prioritised. This bent was exemplified in 2014 by Canberra and Beijing agreeing to describe their relationship as a ‘comprehensive strategic partnership’ and by the signing of the China-Australia Free Trade Agreement (ChAFTA) the following year. In 2015 the Liberal-National Coalition government also signed Australia up to the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. This was despite a direct personal request from President Barack Obama to Prime Minister Tony Abbott not to do so.³ By the end of 2015, however, it was clear that many in Washington’s and Canberra’s national security communities were becoming alarmed by the extent to which Australia was prioritising the economic relationship with China.⁴ In hindsight, July 2016 served as a breaking point in Canberra’s approach when an Australian federal election saw a Malcolm Turnbull–led Coalition government return to power but with a razor-thin, one-seat majority. National security had long been regarded as a Coalition strength, and ministers and advisers were quick to sense that amplifying a ‘China threat’ narrative might deliver domestic political advantage.⁵ The same month Beijing handed those wanting to deprioritise the economic relationship greater substance to push their agenda with when it rejected an international arbitration decision against its territorial claims and island building in the South China Sea. A local ‘securitising coalition’ of intelligence officials, politicians, and advisers from the conservative side of Australian politics, as well as journalists, coalesced to elevate the strategic objective of confronting and challenging applications of Chinese power that were seen as threatening Australian interests.⁶ Nominally nonpartisan departmental secretaries, subsequently revealed to be actively advancing conservative political objectives, were also part of the mix.⁷ As one leading member of the coalition explained to China studies scholars at the Australian National University: ‘there’s been a fundamental change in the approach we are taking to China and people needed to realise this.’⁸

What quickly came to dominate the national discussion were public warnings from the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), the domestic intelligence agency, that foreign interference was occurring at an ‘unprecedented scale’ and putting the nation’s sovereignty at risk.⁹ In September 2016 the outgoing US ambassador chimed in with public comments that he was ‘surprised, quite frankly, at the extent of the Chinese government involvement in Australian politics.’¹⁰ These warnings from officials were given greater color by a torrent of reporting, often citing anonymous security sources, that alleged specific instances of covert interference by Beijing in Australian domestic politics and other institutions, such as universities, as well as claiming security risks associated with Chinese investments. In several cases there was clear evidence that classified information was being leaked.¹¹ The more fevered national discussion spurred policy responses by the government, such as the introduction of new foreign interference laws at the end of 2018 and increased resources for security agencies.

The start of 2017 also saw the arrival of the first Trump administration, heightening decades-long fears within Australia’s foreign policy and national security establishment that the United States might take an isolationist turn.¹² Local anxieties were further spiked by accusations that Australia had been slacking in its commitment to its much larger alliance partner. In early 2017, one former senior Obama administration official offered the barbed remark that ‘Australia is a great ally of the U.S. everywhere in the world, except in Asia.’¹³ Confronting and challenging Chinese power came to be seen in Canberra not only as necessary for protecting Australian sovereignty directly, such as by countering foreign interference, but also as an exercise in ‘alliance maintenance.’¹⁴ That is, as the United States converged on ‘strategic competition’ as the principal framing for its relations with China, there was a belief among the ‘securitising coalition’ that ‘calling out’ and ‘pushing back’ against Beijing’s strategic ambitions could help to earn the United States’ ongoing commitment to its security treaty with Australia and its broader regional presence.¹⁵ In one extraordinary example in March 2017, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop delivered a speech in Singapore asserting that China could not be trusted to resolve its disagreements in accordance with international law and rules because it was not a democracy. She also remarked that it would be unable to reach its economic potential for the same reason.¹⁶ Despite being located at the bottom edge of Southeast Asia, Australian diplomats ‘crisscrossed Europe connecting China critics in smaller nations with counterparts elsewhere’ in efforts that ‘buttressed similar ones by Washington.’¹⁷ Senior Australian ministers and officials went ‘out in front,’ not only of other U.S. allies and partners in the region but even of the first Trump administration, in airing the prospect of war with China and on policies such as banning Chinese technology companies from participating in the country’s 5G telecommunications rollout.¹⁸

By the end of 2019, former Australian ambassador to China, Geoff Raby judged that the relationship between Canberra and Beijing had slumped to its ‘lowest ebb’ since diplomatic ties were struck in 1972.¹⁹ In 2020, it plumbed even lower depths when the Coalition government, now led by Scott Morrison, overtly aligned itself with the Trump administration to launch what Beijing regarded as a political attack over the Covid-19 pandemic.²⁰ Beijing responded by both cutting off all senior political dialogue with Canberra and unleashing a campaign of economic punishment that disrupted the access of around a dozen Australian goods to the Chinese market, worth a combined $A20 billion.

Yet even during this period that prioritised the strategic objective of confronting and challenging Chinese power, the Australian government’s commitment was far from absolute. Cognisance of the benefits of economic complementarities remained, as did doubts around U.S. reliability. Canberra rebuffed requests from Washington to undertake freedom of navigation patrols within twelve nautical miles of Chinese-claimed features in the South China Sea. Prime Minister Turnbull later explained:

If the Americans backed us in, then the Chinese would back off. But if Washington hesitated or, for whatever reasons, decided not to or was unable immediately to intervene, then China would have achieved an enormous propaganda win, exposing the USA as a paper tiger not to be relied on by its allies.

Australian intelligence agencies would also have no doubt been aware that, despite the enormous growth in China’s military capability, there had been no substantial change in US troop numbers and equipment levels in Asia since the end of the Cold War, even after the announcement of a ‘pivot to Asia’ by the Obama administration in 2011.²¹

Another illustration of Australia’s unwillingness to fully embrace Washington’s framing of China took place during a joint press conference in the Oval Office in September 2019. President Donald Trump described China as a ‘threat to the world’ and invited Prime Minister Morrison to express his ‘very strong opinions on China.’ Morrison responded, ‘We work well with China…we have a great relationship with China. China’s growth has been great for Australia.’²² More than a year later, during a visit to Japan and with Beijing’s campaign of trade punishment in full flight, Morrison further declared: ‘Both Japan and Australia agree and always have, that the economic success of China is a good thing for Australia and Japan. Now not all countries have that view, and some countries are in strategic competition with China. Australia is not one of those.’²³ In March 2022, just weeks after warning that an ‘arc of autocracy’ that included China was undermining the rules-based order upon which Australia relied to protect its interests, Morrison continued nonetheless to tout the benefits of the economic relationship: ‘The ongoing engagement between private industry and business with markets like China is very important and I will continue to encourage that, but obviously the political and diplomatic situation is very, very different.’²⁴ The government also went on record to state that it did ‘not approve or support’ unilateral U.S. trade actions against China being pursued outside of World Trade Organization processes.²⁵

During this period Australia was handed further reality checks on U.S. reliability in the economic domain. First, Canberra was not consulted when the first Trump administration struck a ‘Phase 1’ trade deal with China in January 2020. When the US ambassador in Canberra was asked in the lead up to the deal whether demanding that China grant preferential access to

US goods might see Australia’s trade interests harmed, the response was far from reassuring: ‘I am hopeful that the concerns and the interests of the Australians are being taken into consideration. But ultimately it’s a…decision by my people in Washington, so let’s keep our fingers crossed.’²⁶ Second, after Beijing began its campaign of trade punishment, Washington extended enthusiastic rhetorical support. The immediate reaction of Australia’s trade minister at the time, Dan Tehan, was to contend that ‘all Australians should be reassured by the fact that the Americans have come out and said that they’ve got our back.’²⁷ Yet trade data soon revealed that it was US companies that were snapping up the largest proportion of lost Australian sales in China. Nor did the United States emerge as a larger market for the Australian goods that Beijing had struck.²⁸ Industrial policies during the Biden administration, such as the Inflation Reduction Act, also proved more suited to incentivising the ‘onshoring’ of supply chains rather than ‘friend-shoring’ them with countries like Australia.²⁹

Stabilisation: Managing Chinese Power, May 2022–April 2025

By 2021 there were warnings from official sources that the ‘China threat’ narrative the securitising coalition had orchestrated had run too far. Duncan Lewis, the recently retired ASIO director-general, warned that while he was proud about ‘bringing to the Australian community’s consciousness the issues of foreign interference,’ there had been ‘an over-egging of some of the claims.’ He said it was ‘very easy’ for a sensible discussion to ‘slip off the rails’ and for erroneous assertions to start flying that there were ‘spies under every bed.’³⁰ Australia’s Chinese diaspora communities had borne the brunt of the exaggeration.³¹ Similarly, in February 2022, Mike Burgess, the current ASIO head, noted it was important to put foreign interference ‘in context,’ explaining: ‘While attempts to interfere in our democratic processes are common, successful interference is not. Our democracy remains robust, our parliaments remain sovereign.’³²

In the lead up to the 2022 election, the opposition Labor Party was explicit in accusing the Coalition government of unnecessarily putting Australian prosperity and jobs at risk, as well as threatening social cohesion with Chinese diaspora communities. The alternative Labor presented was two-pronged. On the one hand, in an effort to ease tensions with Beijing, greater emphasis would be placed on message discipline and diplomatic tone. On the other hand, in recognition that Chinese power was genuinely threatening some Australian interests, and also a domestic political calculus that it did not wish to be wedged on national security, Labor proposed no major policy shifts. Chinese technology companies would remain barred from participating in Australia’s 5G telecommunications network, bipartisan support would be extended to the AUKUS technology-sharing partnership with the United Kingdom and United States, and so on.³³ By then it was also clear to Beijing that its trade punishment campaign was proving counterproductive and damaging its own economic interests, as well as cratering public opinion in Australia and harming its global reputation—all without shifting political decision-making in Canberra.

Combined with the arrival in January 2022 of a new Chinese ambassador speaking in positive terms about the outlook for the relationship, the stage was set for a postelection course change.

Labor’s election win in May 2022 confirmed that the Coalition’s political calculus around amplifying the ‘China threat’ narrative had in fact backfired. Polling showed that while the public had concerns about China, the benefits of the economic relationship were also widely understood. Three in five respondents agreed that Australia should build stronger ties with China, compared with fewer than one in five who disagreed with that proposition.³⁴ At least four federal seats with large Chinese-Australian communities also flipped from the Coalition to Labor or independent candidates.³⁵ Upon establishment of the new government, Foreign Minister Penny Wong quickly settled on describing the goal as being to stabilise relations with China.³⁶ This was a goal that Beijing could live with, but it also had the effect of blunting opposition criticism that the new Labor government was excessively enthusiastic about mending ties with a government that had subjected Australia to economic coercion. Beijing consented to restarting senior political dialogue almost immediately and then began removing its disruptive trade measures, albeit the last of these were not eliminated until December 2024. Nonetheless, by the middle of 2023, polling showed that the Albanese Labor government had opened a large lead over the opposition as the party ‘best placed’ to manage China policy.³⁷

The exuberance around confronting and challenging Chinese power that had characterised the preceding years moderated. In part, this reflected Canberra’s recognition that the era of U.S. strategic primacy was over. In April 2023, Wong pointedly observed that while the United States remained an ‘indispensable’ Australian partner, ‘the nature of that indispensability has changed.’³⁸ Nowadays, the United States ‘is central to balancing a multipolar region.’ Similarly, the Defence Strategic Review commissioned by the Australian government in 2023 stated matter-of-factly, ‘Our alliance partner, the United States, is no longer the unipolar leader’ of the region.³⁹ The government also took a largely unsentimental view of Beijing’s behavior, with Wong remarking that she expected ‘China will do what great powers do,’ which included using ‘every tool at its disposal to maximise its own resilience and influence.’⁴⁰ Meanwhile, Australia ‘need not waste energy with shock or outrage at China seeking to maximise its own advantage.’⁴¹

This is not to suggest that Canberra began acquiescing to Chinese power. Among the neighboring Pacific Islands countries, for example, Wong is frank that Australia is actively engaged in a ‘state of permanent contest.’⁴² Nonetheless, instead of imagining that Chinese power can be rolled back, or that there is benefit in confronting and challenging every demonstration of it, greater weight than ever is placed on ‘calm and professional diplomacy’ to manage the inevitable tensions. The government’s go-to phrase for its approach to China is that Australia will ‘cooperate where we can, disagree where we must, and engage in the national interest.’ Talk of an ‘arc of autocracies’ has also been replaced by more regularly highlighting the pragmatic benefits of engagement. Upon arriving in Shanghai in November 2023 for the first visit by an Australian prime minister in more than seven years, Albanese led his remarks with a recognition that ‘one in four of Australian jobs depends on exports, and more than one in four of Australia’s export dollars are from China. And therefore, this is a critical relationship.’⁴³

Beyond Stabilisation to Growth? May 2025 to the Present

At least since 2023, Beijing has signaled that it wishes to move the relationship ‘beyond stabilisation.’⁴⁴ This suggestion met with a lukewarm response during the first term of the Albanese government.

Following Labor’s resounding re-election victory in May 2025, however, there are reasons to think that the government’s appetite to chart a more ambitious approach to China policy might have increased. As the opposition Coalition once again attempted to elevate a ‘China threat’ narrative in the lead up to the election, polling found that the Albanese government was regarded as ‘more competent’ than the Coalition in handling Australia’s foreign policy generally—and better at managing the China relationship specifically.⁴⁵ Just one in five respondents saw the relationship with China principally as ‘a threat to be confronted’; rather, a clear two-thirds majority regarded it as ‘a complex relationship to be managed.’⁴⁶ Postelection analysis found that the Coalition bled further federal seats in regions with large Chinese diaspora communities.⁴⁷

The fact that China remains Australia’s most important economic partner and perceptions of U.S. reliability under a second Trump administration have slumped inevitably feeds into the government’s calculus. Owing to ChAFTA, Australian exports to China now attract an average tariff of just 1 percent. In contrast, despite the United States having a trade surplus with Australia, Washington has walked away from its own free trade agreement with Canberra that was struck more than two decades ago and now levies a baseline tariff of 10 percent—a move that Albanese has described as ‘not the act of a friend.’⁴⁸ More Australians now say that China is a more reliable trading partner than the United States.⁴⁹ When asked in April whether he would support Trump’s trade war against China, Albanese replied, ‘It would be extraordinary if the Australian response was ‘thank you’ and we will help to further hurt our economy.’⁵⁰ After the election, Trade Minister Don Farrell observed that compared with the United States, ‘Chinese trade is almost 10 times more valuable to Australia.’ He elaborated: ‘We don’t want to do less business with China, we want to do more business with China. We’ll make decisions about how we continue to engage with China based on our national interests and not on what the Americans may or may not want.’⁵¹

In July 2025, Albanese embarked on an unusually long six-day, three-city visit to China. In Washington the frame of ‘engagement’ with China is seen as naïve and discredited. In contrast, when Albanese was asked in Beijing whether for his government ‘the premise is engagement,’ he replied: ‘Our engagement is constructive. It’s not just about trade. It’s about people-to-people links, it’s about a range of engagement in our region and we’ll continue to do that.’⁵² The joint statement of outcomes produced by the two sides included an agreement ‘to grow the bilateral relationship’ and ‘to continue or expand engagement’ across multiple areas.⁵³ Yet, while it might now seem that the strategic objective of reaping the benefits of economic complementarities is once again being elevated, Canberra’s other objective of limiting China’s ability to use its expanding power to potentially harm Australian interests will inevitably continue to serve as a check on any such inclinations.

Endnotes

1  John Fitzgerald, Australia-China Relations 1976, Looking Forward, RG Neale Lecture Series (Canberra: National Archives of Australia, 2007), 3.

2  Matt Siegal, ‘As Part of New Pact, U.S. Marines Arrive in Australia, in China’s Strategic Backyard,’ New York Times, April 4, 2012.

3  Jane Perlez, ‘With Plan to Join China-Led Bank, Britain Opens Door for Others,’ New York Times, March 13, 2015.

4  Chris Uhlmann and Jane Norman, ‘Senior Defence Official Raises Security Concerns over Darwin Port Lease to Chinese-Owned Company Landbridge,’ ABC News (Australia), October 15, 2015 u <https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-10-15/adf-concerned-over-darwin-port-sale-to-chinese-owned-company/6855182>; Amos Akiman, ‘Secret U.S. Poll on China Darwin Port Deal,’ Australian, March 9, 2016; Aaron Patrick, ‘Security Services Worry Malcolm Turnbull Isn’t Heeding China Warning,’ Australian Financial Review, September 2, 2016; and Aaron Patrick, ‘Australia is Losing Its Battle Against China’s ‘Citizen Spies,’’ Australian Financial Review, September 3, 2016.

5  Max Suich, ‘How Australia Got Badly Out in Front on China,’ Australian Financial Review, May 17, 2021; Max Suich, ‘China Confrontation: What Were We Thinking?’ Australian Financial Review, May 18, 2021; and Max Suich, ‘U.S.-Australia Alliance on China Shows It’s Best to Go Early, Go Hard,’ Australian Financial Review, May 19, 2021.

6  Andrew Chubb, ‘The Securitization of ‘Chinese Influence’ in Australia,’ Journal of Contemporary China 32, no. 139 (2022): 17–34.

7  Andrew Greene, ‘Home Affairs Secretary Mike Pezzullo Warns ‘Drums of War’ Are Beating in a Message to Staff,’ ABC News (Australia), April 26, 2021; and Olivia Ireland and James Massola, ‘Home Affairs Secretary Michael Pezzullo Sacked,’ Sydney Morning Herald, November 27, 2023.

8  Hamish McDonald, ‘China, Spies and the PM’s New Fight,’ Saturday Paper, June 2, 2018.

9  Duncan Lewis, ‘Australian Security Intelligence Organisation,’ testimony before the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee (Australia), Canberra, May 25, 2017.

10  Paul Kelly, ‘U.S. Alarm at China’s Sway through Donations,’ Australian, September 14, 2016.

11  Nick McKenzie, ‘Australia’s Spy Agency Raids the Home of Politician Target by China,’ 60 Minutes Australia, June 28, 2020; and John Ferguson, ‘Assassin Federal Labor MP Anthony Byrne Used Media Pals to ‘Destroy’ Rivals,’ Australian, June 18, 2020.

12  Allan Gyngell, Fear of Abandonment: Australia in the World Since 1942 (Melbourne: La Trobe University Press, 2017); and Henry Belot and Francis Keany, ‘Trump Election has ‘Serious Ramifications’ for Australian Security Interests,’ ABC News (Australia), November 10, 2016 <https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-10/trump-election-has-serious-ramifications-for-australian-security/8011520>.

13  Quoted in James Curran, ‘Foreign Policy White Paper Sees a New Asia but Pleads for the Old,’ Lowy Institute, Interpreter, November 27, 2017 <https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/foreign-policy-white-paper-sees-new-asia-pleads-old>.

14  James Curran, ‘Continental Gift: Trump and Australia’s Place in the World,’ Australian Foreign Affairs, no. 23 (2025): 6–25.

15  Suich, ‘How Australia Got Badly Out in Front on China;’ Suich, ‘China Confrontation;’ and Suich, ‘U.S.-Australia Alliance.’

16  Julie Bishop, ‘Change and Uncertainty in the Indo-Pacific: Strategic Challenges and Opportunities,’ Minister for Foreign Affairs the Hon Julie Bishop MP, March 13, 2017 <https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/julie-bishop/speech/ change-and-uncertainty-indo-pacific-strategic-challenges-and-opportunities>.

17  Drew Hinshaw, Sha Hua, and Laurence Norman, ‘Pushback on Xi’s Vision for China Spreads Beyond U.S.,’ Wall Street Journal, December 28, 2020.

18  Suich, ‘How Australia Got Badly Out in Front on China;’ Suich, ‘China Confrontation;’ and Suich, ‘U.S.-Australia Alliance.’

19  Geoff Raby, ‘The Lowest Ebb: The Fall and Fall of Australia’s Relationship with China,’ La Trobe University, Annual China Oration, October 29, 2019.

20  Weihuan Zhou and James Laurenceson, ‘Demystifying Australia-China Trade Tensions,’ Journal of World Trade 56, no. 1 (2022): 51–86; and James Laurenceson and Shiro Armstrong, ‘Learning the Right Policy Lessons from Beijing’s Campaign of Trade Disruption Against Australia,’ Australian Journal of International Affairs 77, no. 3 (2023): 258–75.

21  Sam Roggeveen, ‘The New Asian Order,’ Inside Story, August 23, 2024 <https://insidestory.org. au/the-new-asian-order>.

22  Scott Morrison, ‘Bilateral Meeting with the President of the United States of America,’ Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (Australia), PM Transcripts, September 20, 2019 <https:// pmtranscripts.pmc.gov.au/release/transcript-42426>.

23  Scott Morrison, ‘Doorstop Interview—Tokyo, Japan,’ Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (Australia), PM Transcripts, November 18, 2020 <https://pmtranscripts.pmc.gov.au/ release/transcript-43136>.

24  Scott Morrison, ‘Q&A, Chamber of Commerce and Industry WA,’ Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (Australia), PM Transcripts, March 16, 2022 <https://pmtranscripts.pmc. gov.au/release/transcript-43862>.

25  Simon Birmingham, ‘Interview on RN Breakfast with Fran Kelly,’ Simon Birmingham, November 6, 2018 <https://www.senatorbirmingham.com.au/interview-on-rn-breakfast-with-fran-kelly-2>.

26  Stephen Dziedzic, ‘China’s ‘Payday Loans’ Attacked by Arthur B Culvahouse Jr, New U.S. Diplomat to Australia,’ ABC News (Australia), March 14, 2019 <https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-03-14/ china-accused-payday-loans-pacific-us-ambassador-australia/10896280>.

27  Nour Haydar, ‘The U.S. Has ‘Got Our Back’ on Chinese Diplomatic Disputes, Says Australian Trade Minister Dan Tehan,’ ABC News (Australia), March 20, 2021 <https://www.abc.net.au/ news/2021-03-20/us-has-our-back-says-trade-minister-dan-tehan-on-china-relations/100019392>.

28  Laurenceson and Armstrong, ‘Learning the Right Policy Lessons,’ 258–75.

29  James Laurenceson, ‘Ambiguous Alignment: Australia Navigating U.S.-China Rivalry in the Post-AUKUS Era,’ China International Strategy Review 7 (2025): 16–30.

30  Stephen Dziedzic, ‘Former ASIO Chief Duncan Lewis Warns Australia Not to ‘Inflate’ Foreign Interference Threats,’ ABC News (Australia), July 7, 2021 <https://www.abc.net.au/ news/2021-07-07/duncan-lewis-asio-downplays-foreign-interference/100275304>.

31  Danielle Li, Jason Fang, and Michael Li, ‘Chinese Australians Still Encounter Racism and Questions of Loyalty from Both Countries,’ ABC News (Australia), March 20, 2022 <https://www. abc.net.au/news/2022-03-20/mavis-yen-book-chinese-australians-face-discrimination/100816246>.

32  Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, ‘Annual Threat Assessment 2022—Director-General of Security,’ February 9, 2022, available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IL2xZhN1vnM.

33  Penny Wong, ‘Expanding Australia’s Power and Influence: Speech to the National Security College,’ Penny Wong Labor Senator for South Australia, November 23, 2021 <https://www. pennywong.com.au/media-hub/speeches/expanding-australia-s-power-and-influence-speech-to-the-national-security-college-australian-national-university-canberra-23-11-2021>; and Elena Collinson, ‘The China Consensus: A Pre-election Survey of Coalition Government and Australian Labor Party Policy on the People’s Republic of China,’ Australia-China Relations Institute, University of Technology Sydney, March 14, 2022.

34  Elena Collinson and Paul Burke, ‘UTS: ACRI/BIDA Poll 2024—the Australia-China Relationship: What Do Australians Think?’ University of Technology Sydney, June 2024 <https://www.uts.edu. au/globalassets/sites/default/files/2024-06/20240612-utsacri-bida-poll-2024---australian-views-on- the-australia-china-relationship_elena-collinson-and-paul-burke_0.pdf>.

35  Matthew Knott and Paul Sakkal, ‘Chinese-Australian Voters Punished Coalition for Hostile Rhetoric,’ Sydney Morning Herald, May 25, 2022.

36  ‘Australia Seeks Stable Ties with ‘Great Power’ China, Minister Says,’ Reuters, September 23, 2022 <https://www.reuters.com/world/china/ australia-seeks-stable-ties-with-great-power-china-minister-says-2022-09-23>.

37  Collinson and Burke, ‘UTS:ACRI/BIDA Poll 2024.’

38  Penny Wong, ‘National Press Club Address, Australian Interests in a Regional Balance of Power,’ Minister for Foreign Affairs the Hon Penny Wong, April 17, 2023 <https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/ minister/penny-wong/speech/national-press-club-address-australian-interests-regional-balance-power>.

39  Australian Government Defence, National Defence: Defence Strategic Review (Canberra, April 2023), 17 <https://online.flippingbook.com/view/909943058/i>.

40  Penny Wong, ‘Speech to the Australia-China Business Council Canberra Networking Day,’ Minister for Foreign Affairs the Hon Penny Wong, September 12, 2024 <https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/ minister/penny-wong/speech/speech-australia-china-business-council-canberra-networking-day>.

41  Wong, ‘National Press Club Address, Australian Interests in a Regional Balance of Power.’

42  Penny Wong, ‘Interview with David Speers, ABC Insiders,’ Minister for Foreign Affairs Senator the Hon Penny Wong (Australia), June 16, 2024 <https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/penny-wong/transcript/interview-david-speers-abc-insiders-0>.

43  Anthony Albanese, ‘Press Conference,’ Prime Minister of Australia the Hon Anthony Albanese, November 5, 2023 <https://www.pm.gov.au/media/press-conference-3>.

44  ‘Chinese Envoy Eyes New Start of China-Australia Ties,’ People’s Daily, October 12, 2023 <https:// en.people.cn/n3/2023/1012/c90000-20082708.html>.

45  Ryan Neelam, ‘Lowy Institute Poll: 2025 Preview,’ Lowy Institute, April 16, 2025.

46  ‘Australia’s Relationship with China,’ Essential Research, March 12, 2024 <https://essentialreport. com.au/questions/australias-relationship-with-china-4>.

47  Wanning Sun, ‘Dutton Wanted the Chinese-Australian Vote…and the Anti-China Vote. It Screwed His Candidates,’ Crikey, May 5, 2025 <https://www.crikey.com.au/2025/05/05/peter-dutton-coalition-chinese-australian-vote-2025-election>.

48  Anthony Albanese, ‘Statement on USA Tariffs,’ Labor, April 3, 2025 <https://www.alp.org.au/ news/statement-on-usa-tariffs>.

49  ‘Mood of the Nation Federal Election Edition,’ SEC Newgate, April 2025.

50  Paul Kelly and Dennis Shanahan, ‘Election 2025: Anthony Albanese’s Red Button Diplomacy on Defence Spending, Donald Trump and Russia,’ Australian, April 25, 2025.