Australia is on track to spend a historic $A50 billion on defence expenditures in 2024. A new report from the European Leadership Network (ELN) and the Asia-Pacific Leadership Network (APLN) finds that Australia’s deterrence-heavy defence strategy may, in fact, heighten the risks of inadvertent escalation rather than mitigate them and, in doing so, is creating ripe conditions for conflict in the Asia-Pacific.
The policy brief, written by Australian strategic studies expert Brendan Taylor, identifies several potential flashpoints for conflict in the region, including a US-China conflict over Taiwan or a war on the Korean Peninsula. Despite general recognition that inadvertent escalation is the most likely trigger of major power conflict in Asia, Taylor argues that the Australian defence establishment continues to inadvertently undermine regional security by overly relying on defence capabilities. Excessive build-up of military capability, the paper argues, can steer countries towards a ‘crisis slide,’ in which leaders feel that their options are narrowed to the point where they must choose between war or a humiliating concession.
Deterrence strategies may, in fact, heighten the…
