Sam Roggeveen

La Trobe University Press 2023     RRP $32.99

If you thought that this book, with such an intriguing title, was a treatise concerned with protecting Australia’s spiny ant-eating, egg laying monotremes, then you will be disappointed.

It’s solely about Australia’s foreign policy, and the best way to ensure its security in the face of the meteoric rise of China as a world power challenging the pre-eminence of the United States, particularly in the region of South East Asia.

The marketing blurb accompanying this fascinating book neatly summarises the author’s main point when it says this:

“The Echidna Strategy overturns the conventional wisdom about Australia’s security. Australia will need to defend itself without American help, but this doesn’t need to cost more.

The truth, which no Australian political leader is willing to confront, is that America’s security is not threated by China’s rise. Once we accept that conclusion, the entire edifice on which our security has been built crumbles, and we need to start afresh.”

Over 211 pages Roggeveen presents his well-reasoned argument, and although the book deals with several complex issues, it is “designed to be approachable and understandable to non-expert readers” untutored in the niceties of foreign affairs. In my opinion it achieves that purpose.

Roggeveen is director of the Lowy Institute’s International Security Program, and before joining the Lowy Institute he was a senior analyst with the Office of National Assessments, (now called the Office of National Intelligence). With this background, the author seems well qualified to write about Australia’s national security, although I imagine his views might not be universally accepted by others in the Intelligence community.

Interestingly, Roggeveen is no left-wing radical, telling us that he regards himself as a liberal-conservative, although carefully distancing himself from the Trump-type of conservatism to which we have recently become accustomed, which he says is “a toxic brew of culture wars and ideological obsessions.” He adds:

“The conservatism I defend is marked, not by any specific ideological or policy agenda, but merely by a preference for moderation over extremism, tradition over ideology, evolution over revolution, and a deep suspicion of utopianism.”

How on earth did Roggeveen come up with the title for his book? In the introduction he says this:

“An echidna is no threat to anything other than ants and termites, so cannot induce fear among larger creatures. But by its sharp quills, it does warn them to keep their distance. It does signal to them that, should they decide to attack, the costs are likely to exceed the benefits…. It is also an Australian original and this book lays out an approach to Australian defence and foreign policy unique to Australia.”

The book’s introduction introduces the reader to a set of moral and political principles upon which the thesis of the book is grounded.

The first is the belief that “defence spending, on any scale, while necessary, is a tragic waste”. Here the author quotes someone with impeccable conservative (in the traditional sense) credentials, former General and United States president, Dwight Eisenhower who said:

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.”

The second principle is that there is a moral imperative in protecting Australia from predation and exploitation by foreign powers, and even that “it would be a moral crime not to defend Australia against aggression.”

The third is that “Australia ought to take reasonable measures to reduce the risk of war”. This, the author argues, does not mean that there is an absolute injunction against war, pointing to the recent example of Ukraine, where the unpalatable alternative to war was subjugation.

Chapter 1 asks, and then seeks to answer, this huge, and for Australia, vitally important question:

“Will the United States commit itself to a contest with China for strategic leadership in Asia?”

During his presidency Donald Trump was not known for his diplomacy, and sometimes seemed to show contempt for America’s traditional alliances. But sometimes his utterances were an indication of what was inevitable about the direction of American foreign policy. Even without another Trump presidency the author suggests that “the complete absence of threats to American territory, the weak link between America’s security presence in Asia and its economic security, the absence of an ideological threat to America’s political institutions – will be enough to sap American motivation to defend its leadership in Asia whoever is in office.”

Where will the absence of American dominance in Asia leave Australia, and what should we do about it to protect our security?

In partial answer to this question Roggeveen argues that “Australia’s alliance with the US is slowly drained of credibility”, and that the US will not be committed to defending Australia, which means that Australia will need to become much more self-reliant and look at the best way to defend itself without the direct military help of our big brother, the US.

After analysing the likely future role of the US in relation to any defence of Australia the author then turns his attention to the dramatic economic and military rise of China and what threat this might be to Australia in the years ahead. Two important questions are considered:

How could China attack Australia? and,

Why would China want to attack Australia?

In relation to the first question, the book looks at options from such things as cyber-attacks and economic coercion to blockades, bombing and invasion. We read that:

“The overwhelming theme that emerges from this discussion of Chinese military operations against Australia is distance: the sheer scale of the operating environment will exercise massive constraints on China should it contemplate military action against Australia. Put simply, distance is Australia’s single biggest defence asset.”

The book then proceeds to look at the steps Australia should take to protects itself, arguing that diplomatic actions are more important than military ones. Not that military action is not needed.

One important diplomatic action would be for Australia to up its aid contribution to the Pacific, reminding us of the scare Australia received when China signed agreements with the Solomon Islands. Another is to ensure good relations with Indonesia.

In recent times Australia has entered into the arrangement with the US and Great Britain known as AUKUS. If this deal goes ahead as planned it will give Australia the capacity to project military power well beyond our immediate region, partly via nuclear submarines. The author is clearly no fan of this arrangement suggesting that:

“It’s a project of vaulting ambition that is out of step with Australian tradition as a military middle power, wildly at odds with our international status and, most importantly, a wasteful expenditure of public money that will make Australia less safe.”

The reader will then quite properly might ask; “If not AUKUS then what?” And this is where Roggeveen explains what he means by the Echidna Strategy. The key principles of this strategy are:

Deter but don’t provoke, and

Exploit distance.

Roggeveen goes to some length to flesh out the details of these principles and, near the end of the book has this to say:

“The truth – which ought to be comforting, but which discomforts so many who clamour to raise its status with the US – is that defending Australia from the Chinese military is not particularly difficult. Straightforward solutions are there for the taking, but our leaders insist on making it expensive and hard.”

Unfortunately, as in relation to law-and-order, so it seems with defence issues, that our politicians seem to delight in chest beating and appearing to be “tough”. This timely book demonstrates that such attitudes are often counter-productive and sometimes, downright dangerous.

This is a tremendously well written and well-reasoned book which makes a significant contribution to an important debate of vital interest to Australia’s future.

It is highly recommended.

John Watts