Robyn Lim discusses the changing strategic ambitions of China, North Korea, India, Japan and Indonesia and questions Australia’s dependence on the US for extended deterrence if it ever came into conflict, particularly with Indonesia.

‘The balance of power in Northeast Asia is not only brittle, but indigenous. That is, great power tensions are now being generated within the region, rather than being manifestations of clashes of strategic interest whose locus is elsewhere.’

‘Indonesia, the largest and most important of the Southeast Asian states, is now confronted by a ‘rising’ China and a ‘rising’ India. Both these nuclear-armed great powers are manifesting strategic ambition. Indonesia, unlike Australia, cannot rely on a great power for nuclear protection. What would it take for Indonesia to decide it needed nuclear weapons? How would Australia respond?

Thus, the nuclear threat could come to Australia ‘from or through Indonesia’, even though its roots would be in the disturbance of the distant balance of power in Northeast Asia—principally among China, Japan and the US.

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