Andrew Bolt: Albanese government’s response to Chinese warships has been a debacle

The response of the Albanese government and our navy to the three Chinese ships firing guns off our coast has been a debacle. Lies are being told, and the Prime Minister seems astonishingly disengaged.

The response of the Albanese government and our navy to the three Chinese ships firing guns off our coast has been a debacle.

Lies are being told.

Australia has been exposed as weak and almost defenceless, led by a Prime Minister who seems clueless about how to respond to a clear threat from the Chinese dictatorship.

Worse, Anthony Albanese seems astonishingly disengaged, playing down the disruption caused by this Chinese task force and the failure of our navy to know promptly what it was up to.

He’s falsely suggested China played by the rules, falsely suggested China’s live-fire exercise was no big deal, falsely suggested no planes were in danger and falsely suggested our navy didn’t have to be tipped off by a Virgin pilot to what was going on.

China will be laughing, knowing the havoc caused by just two of its 234 warships, plus one support vessel.

The Chinese navy’s Zunyi destroyer is one of the ships belonging to a naval task force spotted off the northeast coast of Australia. Photo: China Central Television (CCTV)

Australians should be frightened about the conclusions it draws as it prepares for war over Taiwan.

China sent these three ships to cruise from our north coast to the seas off Hobart, cruising to within 150 nautical miles off the NSW coast.

That’s when the government started its deceptive spin, if not outright lies.

Don’t worry, Defence Minister Richard Marles said last week: “We are watching very closely what the activities of the task force are.”

Yes, indeed, said Albanese on Tuesday this week: “Australia has had frigates, both monitoring by sea and by air, of the presence in the region of these Chinese vessels.”

Both statements turned out to be false or exaggerated.

By last Friday, the Chinese task force was being tailed only by a New Zealand frigate.

We didn’t have one to spare.

And this monitoring was far from being very close.

For one, Admiral David Johnston, Chief of our Defence Force, now admits he doesn’t know, for instance, if the Chinese task force includes a submarine.

Even worse, on Friday, the Chinese task force started a live firing exercise without warning the Australian government, and our defence force didn’t hear about it until half an hour after its started, and then only from a tip-off.

China sent three ships to cruise from our north coast to the seas off Hobart.

Airservices Australia, in charge of our safety, didn’t know the Chinese task force was holding a weapons drill until Virgin flight 161 from Sydney to Queenstown reported at 9:58am on Friday that it had just been warned to stay away.

Airservices Australia chief executive Rob Sharp confirmed that to a Senate estimates hearing on Monday: “It was in fact a Virgin Australia aircraft that advised one of our air traffic controllers that a foreign warship was broadcasting, that they were conducting live firing 300 nautical miles east off our coast. So that’s how we first found out about the issue.”

On Wednesday morning, Admiral Johnston confirmed to the same Senate committee it was another hour before the New Zealand frigate passed on that, yes, the Chinese were doing a live fire drill.

By then, passenger jets were already changing flight paths to stay out of danger.

It turns out 49 planes had to take evasive action, some in mid-flight.

This is a significant disruption, and China’s failure to even warn us in advance was reckless and dangerous – or a deliberate intimidation.

Anthony Albanese played down the Chinese action. Picture: Martin Ollman

But see how Albanese first played down the Chinese action and then falsely claimed his government had been all over it.

On Friday, Albanese insisted no aircraft had been in danger and defended the Chinese warships: “China issued, in accordance with practice, an alert that it would be conducting these activities.”

False. China gave no official notice, and much less warning to aircraft than the customary 12 hours or more. Even the unofficial warning to aircraft came only after the exercise started.

Then on Wednesday, Albanese contradicted his own Defence Force chief, claiming that the “New Zealand vessels” – actually a single frigate – tailing the Chinese task force reported the live fire “around the same time” as Virgin flight 161.

What? An hour later is “around the same time”?

But to the big questions: how could Albanese be all over the shop about this serious act of intimidation of Australia by China’s military?

And how prepared is our navy if it’s struggling to cope with monitoring just three Chinese ships, probing our defences as they sail further down our coast than ever before.

Imagine how our government and navy would struggle with not three Chinese ships but 30, perhaps blockading Australia.

If this doesn’t put a rocket up our government and defence chiefs, a real Chinese rocket may one day follow.