Andrew Bolt: Australia still blind to threat of bully China

As China’s ultranationalist dictator Xi Jinping eyes a war to conquer Taiwan, we in Australia still seem dangerously slow to realise the danger.

A Chinese aircraft carrier sailing during a drill at sea. Picture: AFP

China looks ready to start a war as soon as 2027 — possibly a world war, and just to our north. Do we look at all ready to fight?

Every week comes a fresh warning of a war in our region that senior US defence figures tell us the US could now lose.

But we in Australia still seem dangerously slow to realise we could soon be fighting for our freedom … or our lives.

Chinese dictator Xi Jinping has been ramping up China’s aggression for years, stealing the South China Sea and warning his armed forces last year to “prepare for war”.

In recent months, Chinese soldiers have had bloody clashes with Indian troops along the disputed border in the Himalayas.

China last month authorised its coast guard to fire on foreign vessels in territory it claims, and has since sent its ships on almost daily patrols of the Japanese-controlled Diaoyu islands that China says it owns.

But China’s big aim under its ultranationalist dictator is to take control of the island democracy of Taiwan, just 130km off the Chinese coast.

Chinese dictator Xi Jinping has been ramping up China’s aggression for years. Picture: Getty Images

Chinese war planes screamed into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone almost daily in the last four months of last year, to practice for an attack, test Taiwan’s defences and send a message. This week it sent over jets in a night exercise.

The election of US president Joe Biden seems to have made China bolder, as if it thinks its main strategic rival now has a weak leader.

President Xi told his military this month to be prepared for “complex and difficult situations”, and his defence minister said “we must comprehensively improve military training and preparedness for battle” now that “the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is at a critical stage”.

How many warnings do we need?

American officials are sure taking Xi at his word — and worrying whether they can stop him.

Admiral Phil Davidson, in charge of the powerful US Indo-Pacific Command, said last week that reconquering Taiwan was “clearly” China’s ambition, “and I think the threat is manifest during this decade, in fact, in the next six years”.

US President Joe Biden. Picture: AFP

If China does invade or otherwise overpower Taiwan, just on its doorstep, what can the US do to defend it from 12,000km away?

The US armed forces have war-gamed any clash with China over Taiwan and the answers are ugly. It would lose.

David Ochmanek, a former deputy assistant secretary of defence, said: “Whenever we war-gamed a Taiwan scenario over the years, our Blue Team routinely got its ass handed to it.”

Lieutenant General S. Clinton Hinote, the US Air Force’s deputy chief of staff for strategy, integration, and requirements, said last week: “The definitive answer if the US military doesn’t change course is that we’re going to lose fast.”

The US Marines are already scrambling to prepare for a war against China, last year ditching its Abrams tanks to switch instead to long-endurance unmanned air vehicles and electronic warfare, and other weapons more suitable for an enemy half a world away.

The US has also stepped up an informal security alliance, the Quad, with other countries threatened by China — Australia, Japan and India. France will join the Quad in naval exercises this year in the Bay of Bengal.

But how prepared is Australia for any war?

Yes, Prime Minister Scott Morrison sees the danger, and is trying to make common cause with Vietnam as well as the Quad.

He, too, last year ordered a switch to weapons better for a long-distance war with a superpower, including longer-range strike weapons and cyber capabilities.

But now we see how dumb our politicians were to treat our biggest defence project as a job-creation scheme.

We are still more than a decade from getting just the first of the 12 new submarines which the Turnbull government insisted be non-nuclear and built in Australia.

We also have limited fuel supplies if our sea lanes are cut off — fewer than 90 days worth — and we’ll soon be down to just two of the eight fuel refineries we had 15 years ago.

Meanwhile, our economy is desperately dependent on a China that is already trying to use that weakness against us by banning some imports to punish us for not kowtowing.

China is our biggest trade partner, taking a quarter of our exports, so bet on many Australians thinking they’d rather give in to China than lose their business or their job.

Ready for war?

No, we’re not even close.