Peta Credlin: Australia must turbocharge its defence capabilities

Australia should not assume what’s happening in Ukraine will never happen here, writes Peta Credlin. We can hope for the best, but need to prepare for the worst.

With bombs and missiles now raining down on Ukrainian cities, my sense is that Australians feel outraged and want to help but aren’t sure what’s best done, given that no one wants to turn Russia’s brutal assault on a smaller neighbour into World War III.

It’s been impossible to watch the news without cheering the brave Ukrainian people: whether it’s their President refusing Joe Biden’s offer of a helicopter ride out, saying he wanted weapons not safety; the Ukrainian defenders telling their attacker to “go f..k yourself” as they made their last stand; or the civilians standing in front of tanks, defying them to do their worst.

We feel that the Ukrainians are fighting on our behalf, too, as freedom crushed somewhere is freedom diminished everywhere, especially as the new tsar seems to want as colonies all the countries that were once part of greater Russia.

Shelling in the city of Chernihiv on Friday hit residential areas, including schools and a high-rise apartment building. Picture: AFP

Still, the issue remains how to help the Ukrainians without making a bad situation worse. While the Ukrainians have heavily disrupted the Russian advance, it’s still hard to see how this won’t end badly, given Russia’s massive numerical and technological edge.

Even now, there’s a chance that the Russians could get bogged down in house-to-house fighting, or that their supply lines could fail, especially if the Ukrainians are getting covert cyber help.

But Vladimir Putin knows only too well that dictators who lose wars don’t last, that’s why the likelihood is that he’ll keep escalating until Russia wins.

In echoes of an earlier dictator, he’ll then likely claim that he has “no further territorial demands in Europe”, while plotting to take the Baltic States and join them up to Russia.

While Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia are members of NATO, they all have significant ethnic Russian minorities that Putin can claim are being persecuted.

And because they’re small, unlike Ukraine, they could be gobbled up quickly, leaving NATO with the dreadful task of fighting a war of liberation against a nuclear power.

Ukrainian refugees and their dogs are happy to have made it to safety in Poland. Picture: AFP

There’s still a small clique of intellectuals arguing that NATO has “provoked” Putin by expanding to the east, even though it’s obvious it never expanded to threaten Russia; NATO expanded because Russia’s neighbours could never trust it.

This is where the United Nations has yet again proven itself to be a toothless tiger, good at words but not much use at stopping the destruction of an innocent people’s freedom and massive loss of civilian lives.

The only UN entity that can authorise the use of force is the Security Council, and the resolution condemning Russian aggression was vetoed by the aggressor itself.

The UN general assembly then voted 141 to 5 to condemn Russia’s unprovoked invasion, but China, India and 33 others abstained in a demonstration of short-term self-interest.

This week the US President again declared that there would be no American boots on the ground.

The UK Defence Minister ruled out the imposition of a no-fly zone to stop Russian air superiority, although the UK foreign minister did green light British citizens joining the fight, if they wanted to.

An evacuation train ferries women and children to safety. Picture: Getty Images

Even though this war is a long way away, we can’t assume that it won’t touch us here in Australia.

Energy prices will soar. Supply chains will be disrupted. And Russian success will embolden the other nuclear-armed superpower that feels ripped-off by history — in this case a China that’s still smarting over the “century of humiliation” and itching to take Taiwan.

This is where the Morrison government’s commendable defence build-up needs to be accelerated. We need the AUKUS nuclear powered submarines now, not in 10 or 20 years.

The naval ships we’re currently building in Australia need heavier armament; and while we’re waiting a decade for the next generation of big frigates, why not buy some more off-the-shelf US jets and missiles?

Through the Taiwan Relations Act, the US has committed itself to “resist any resort to force … that would jeopardise the security … of the people on Taiwan”.

Recently, the State Department has reaffirmed that the US commitment to Taiwan is “rock solid”. And under the ANZUS treaty, in the event of any attack on US forces, Australia is committed to “act to meet the common danger”.

We can’t assume the near future is going to be as peaceful and prosper­ous. It’s hard to avoid the conclusion we should be preparing for the worst while hoping for the best.

Watch Peta on Credlin on Sky News, weeknights at 6pm

Originally published as Peta Credlin: Australia must turbocharge its defence capabilities