USA Space Force eyes prime Australian real estate for future warfare

Visiting senior US military officers believe Australia is a "pot of gold at the end of the rainbow", as they eye off this continent's "prime" geography for future space operations.

General Shaw has warned a conflict in space in the next few years is a very real prospect, saying potential adversaries have already shown they can successfully shoot down satellites.

Australia's own Defence Space Command was only formally stood up in March, but General Armagno says this country already has the natural advantage of its southern-hemisphere geography and potential launch sites close to the equator.

Sending a signal to China, USA deploys B-52s to Tindal

The USA Air Force is planning to deploy up to six nuclear-capable B-52 bombers to Tindal air base near Darwin, as fears grow that China is preparing for an assault on Taiwan. 

"It's a great expansion of Australian commitment to the United States' war plan with China," says Richard Tanter, a senior research associate at the Nautilus Institute and a long-time, anti-nuclear activist.

"It's very hard to think of a more open commitment that we could make. A more open signal to the Chinese that we are going along with American planning for a war with China," Mr Tanter says.

Pine Gap is also undergoing a major upgrade

US military’s footprint is expanding in northern Australia to meet a rising China

Major construction, funded by the U.S. and Australian governments, is underway in Australia’s Northern Territory for facilities that will be used by the U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps.

The facilities will support U.S. and Australian forces training to defend chains of small islands that would likely be an arena for any future conflict with China, according to former Australian assistant defense secretary Ross Babbage.

The allies are learning to conduct dispersed operations and deploy anti-ship missiles to island chains in the Western Pacific “to make it extremely difficult and dangerous for Chinese operations in a crisis,” including a conflict over Taiwan, he said by phone Wednesday.

The Australian government will likely announce more initiatives in the northern Australia before the year is over, Babbage said.

USA, Australia discuss possibility of B-21 bomber deal

Following the AUKUS nuclear-powered submarine deal, a senior US official reportedly said recently that the US would consider providing Australia with nuclear-capable B-21 bombers, the in-development successor to the B-2 stealth bomber that experts said on Wednesday would enable Australia to launch long-range strikes against China, thus posing serious threats to China.

US Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall made the remark at a media briefing after meeting with newly minted Royal Australian Air Force chief Air Marshal Robert Chipman on August 22 in Canberra, The Strategist, a website affiliated with the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, reported on Tuesday.

Kendall again hyped the "China threat" theory, claiming the US and its allies were "concerned about Chinese behavior" in the South China Sea as well as China's military modernization program.

Song Zhongping, a Chinese military expert and TV commentator, said if Australia obtains the B-21, the country would essentially become an overseas bomber base of the US,

Australian troops not welcome in Japan, says Okinawa governor

The governor of the Japanese prefecture of Okinawa says Australian Defence Force personnel are not welcome on the 150 islands he administers, as fears grow that rising tensions between China and US allies will lead to conflict in the region.

Denny Tamaki, the top official in the region who is up for re-election this year, said in an interview that he was worried the existing concentration of US forces had already made the islands a target for hostile forces.

He said the Okinawan people did not support Australian or other foreign defence personnel holding joint military exercises in Okinawa. Australia and Japan signed a defence deal in January that will open the way for their forces to step up training and host each other’s military.

“As the governor here, I would say that many people in Okinawa would oppose having Australian Defence Forces being stationed here, even temporarily, or to use a base in Okinawa where 70 per cent of the US forces in Japan have already been concentrated.”