More firepower on Australian Defence Force shopping list

Australia is looking to push ahead with the expansion of its F-35 stealth fighter fleet and may buy US B-21 bombers to give us new long-range strike capability.

Royal Australian Air Force F-35A Lightning ll aircraft. Picture: Defence Imagery / Annika Smit

Australia is looking to push ahead with the expansion of its F-35 stealth fighter fleet and is considering buying US B-21 bombers to give the nation a new long-range strike capability, in a strategic review framed around the regional fallout from a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

The Albanese government is also yet to lock in the former Morrison government’s decision to buy US Black Hawk helicopters, and could overturn the decision in favour of a next-generation ­rotary capability.

Defence Minister Richard Marles said the RAAF’s F-35As had proven themselves “indispensable”, and the government’s Defence Strategic Review would decide whether to lift Australia’s joint strike fighter order from 72 to 100 aircraft.

“The question about our fighter capability will form part of the strategic review that we are undertaking,” he said en route to the Northern Territory for the air force’s biggest drill, Exercise Pitch Black.

“Having a fifth-generation fighter capability is critically important – they can just do things the Super Hornets can’t. It is an utterly essential component to our air force and the potency of our defence force.”

Days after a senior American defence chief confirmed the US would consider selling its in-­development B-21 bomber to Australia, Mr Marles said the stealth aircraft were also being examined to give the ADF the ability to hold adversaries at bay over long distances.

The capability would be examined as the review considered the wider purpose of the Defence Force, and what it needed to do, Mr Marles said.

The review, being undertaken by former defence minister Stephen Smith and former ADF chief Angus Houston, is running against a backdrop of Chinese aggression towards Taiwan that will form the central scenario for the force posture plans developed under the ­process. A conflict over Taiwan is being examined by the reviewers as the most likely potential flashpoint for a war between China, with the review looking at how Australia can defend its interests and be taken seriously as a military power.

Mr Marles’ trip to Darwin comes ahead of an official trip to the UK, Germany and France to meet his ministerial counterparts, and inspect Britain’s frigate and submarine building operations.

The US State Department on Thursday approved the sale of 40 Black Hawks to Australia for $2.8bn, to replace the ADF’s trouble-prone MRH-90 Taipans as the army’s workhorse helicopter.

But the decision comes as the US Army considers replacing its own Black Hawks with a yet-to-be-designed rotary aircraft, developed specifically for Indo-Pacific operations, that will be faster and have a longer better range.

Mr Marles said that former ­defence minister Peter Dutton’s announcement last December that Australia would buy new Black Hawks was a “pretty fuzzy commitment”.

He said the tried and tested utility helicopter was “clearly” under consideration, but the purchase was not a done deal.

“A process is under way that is evaluating that capability in terms of what we have now and what we need in the future. I’m not going to pre-empt it now,” Mr Marles said.

At Pitch Black, Mr Marles met Australian and international participants and inspected Australian F-35s, German Eurofighters, US F15Es, and French Rafales.

This year’s exercise includes 2500 personnel from 17 countries including Australia, and features realistic combat simulations in one of the biggest air training ­spaces in the world. Germany, Japan, and South Korea are participating in the ­exercise for the first time.

Australia has 50 F-35As and is due to receive its full compliment next year before it can exercise its right to buy a further 28.

“It has taken a long time to come to fruition, but now that it is in significant numbers – most of them are in play – they are just indispensable,” Mr Marles.

When asked during a visit to Canberra this week whether the US would consider selling B-21s to Australia, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said his country “would be willing to talk to Australia about anything that there was an interest in from the Australian perspective that we could help them with”.

The ADF has not had a long-range aerial-strike capability since the retirement of the F111s in 2010.

Strategists believe Australia needs the B-21 to provide greater deterrence against potential adversaries such as China, particularly given the looming capability gap following the retirement of the Collins-class submarines from the mid-2030s.

The Defence Strategic Review is expected to release its final ­report in February, coinciding with the ­release of a report that will identify which nuclear submarine Australia will acquire, and whether an interim submarine capability will be required.

After weeks of tensions ­between China and the West over Taiwan, Mr Marles said Australia would not be deterred by Beijing’s heightened military posture in the region, and would continue to ­exercise its rights to freedom of navigation in the South China Sea.

“Australia’s national interest lies in protecting the global rules based order,” he said. “That includes in the South China Seas, that includes around Taiwan.

“Most of our trade goes through the South China Sea. And whatever the level of activity is from China it is critically important for Australia’s national interests that we continue to assert those rules. It is not an esoteric question for us.”

Mr Marles confirmed his ­department was re-examining whether to overturn the lease of the Port of Darwin to Chinese company Landbridge, after a ­Coalition review that Labor had not seen.

“We want to understand what risk is given rise to by virtue of the current set of circumstances and on the basis of that will then make our decision,” he said.