Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said Tuesday that the US will increase its military presence in Australia in a buildup aimed at China.

In a joint press conference with Australia’s defense minister and foreign minister, Austin said that the US will increase its rotational forces in Australia. “That includes rotations of bomber task forces, fighters, and future rotations of US Navy and US Army capabilities,” Austin said.

Many countries in the region are not eager to get on board with the US’s confrontational approach to China. The prime minister of Papua New Guinea said this week that his country can’t afford to get caught between the US and China and said he told the US your “enemy is not my enemy.”

Indonesia’s president expressed similar concerns during a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in November, saying the ASEAN must not let the region turn into a frontline for a new Cold War.

Details on the rotational deployments aren’t clear, but they will likely focus on the Australian city of Darwin in the Northern Territory, where US Marines have been rotating through for years.

The government will not say exactly what it has considered or proposed to Defence, but says it is reviewing the Northern Territory's "suitability and readiness" as plans for the nuclear-powered submarine fleet progress.

Deputy Chief Minister Nicole Manison was asked whether the deployment would put the Northern Territory at greater risk from potential adversaries.

She said the territory had "a very long and proud defence history" and listed the upgrades and new construction of new facilities currently underway in the Top End.

"I think territorians are very comfortable with that, they understand our strategic location and generally are very supportive of that defence investment," she said.

To help maximise defence investment in the Top End, Labor created the Canberra-based position of Defence and National Security Advocate to lobby government and industry on the Northern Territory's behalf.

The current advocate, defence analyst Alan Dupont, has previously argued for a Nothern Territory role in the transition to nuclear boats, which may not be ready before Australia's current conventional fleet needs replacing.

a Defence spokesperson said "the development of maritime services and support in Darwin harbour" was covered in "regular, productive discussions with the Northern Territory government on a range of initiatives".

Experts say a new port could replace the US military’s main fuelling station in the Pacific region after the closure of a storage facility at Pearl Harbour in Hawaii.

The federal budget allocated $1.5 billion to build “new port infrastructure, such as a wharf, an offloading facility and dredging of the shipping channel” in the Northern Territory.

Mr Dutton said in November that stability in the Indo-Pacific “requires the United States to be completely engaged in the region”. He indicated in June he was open to increasing the US marine presence in Darwin and said it was in both countries’ interest for the US to expand its presence in the region.

The federal budget allocated an extra $2 billion to the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility and expanded its remit to include the Commonwealth territory of Christmas Island and Cocos (Keeling) Islands. The Defence Department announced in 2020 it was upgrading the Cocos Island runway to accommodate surveillance and response aircraft.

The government is also investing $300 million in an industry precinct at Darwin for gas, hydrogen and critical minerals.

“Additional fuel storage, additional logistics, support and port facilities will enable greater flow through of American units, and conceivably stationing on a longer-term basis. Not basing, but possibly stationing at least for periods of time.

In 2021 the AUSMIN communiqué agreed to ‘establish a combined logistics, sustainment, and maintenance enterprise to support high-end warfighting and combined military operations in the region’. The location wasn’t specified, but look at a map. It won’t be Hobart.

Just south of Darwin the US is installing a fuel farm planned by September 2023 to hold over 300 million litres of military jet fuel. Although the government is reluctant to say what is in prospect, it’s obvious the Americans are going to be here in much larger numbers soon.

This all points to a need for a radical rethink about Darwin’s role in the defence of Australia and what we need to do to rebuild our threadbare military infrastructure across the north. The PLA threat is pushing south, and we need a response to it.

I understand the prime minister doesn’t want a new defence white paper or a national security strategy. There’s a view that written policies constrain freewheeling decision-making. So be it, but something must be done to instil a disciplined focus around Defence’s strategic planning, jolting it away from its fantasies about the late 2030s and towards the tough realities of today.

When there’s no time left to change the structure of the military, the need is to look instead at force posture

Experts say a new port could replace the USA military’s main fuelling station in the Pacific region after the closure of a storage facility at Pearl Harbour in Hawaii.

The federal budget allocated $1.5 billion to build “new port infrastructure, such as a wharf, an offloading facility and dredging of the shipping channel” in the Northern Territory.

Infrastructure Department Secretary Simon Atkinson told a Senate estimates hearing on Thursday the new port would be built at Middle Arm in Darwin Harbour.

The government has been in discussion with Defence officials for five months, the hearing was told, and the new port would be open to naval ships as well as private industry for minerals exports and energy exports.

Australian National University professor of defence studies, John Blaxland, said the USA would “no doubt” be looking to locations such as Darwin to bolster its fuel storage.

“It’s not unreasonable to say that additional facilities in and around Darwin will be dual-roled, they will be available for use by US forces,” Professor Blaxland said.

“Darwin is a frequently visited port for US warships transiting from East Coast USA to the Middle East, through the Pacific, across the Indian Ocean, as well as visits from the Seventh Fleet based in Japan.”

The USA military’s massive Red Hill facility, which stored 950 million litre of fuel in underground tanks, was closed down earlier this month due to groundwater contamination.