'Australia is surprisingly defenceless': Former foreign minister Alexander Downer urges government to boost essential military spending to avoid 'free riding' America
Former foreign minister Alexander Downer fears Australia's lack of defence spending could give the impression the country is "free riding" America like "Europeans have been doing for a long time".
The claims come after the United States called on Australia to boost its military budget to 3.5 per cent of GDP 'as soon as possible', but Prime Minister Anthony Albanese refused to succumb to the pressure.
In a US Department of Defence readout released on Sunday, the figure requested of Australia was revealed, with the key focus areas being advancing defence industrial base cooperation, creating supply chain resilience and accelerating US force posture initiatives in Australia.
The US has been telling allies around the world, in Europe and across the Indo-Pacific, to increase defence spending instead of relying on the American military.
On Wednesday evening, Mr Downer appeared on Sky News to discuss the latest debate on defence spending and labelled Australia a "surprisingly defenceless" country.
"At the moment, Australia is surprisingly defenceless as we divert more and more of our defence budget into our ambition, apparently, to build submarines in Adelaide," he told Sky News host Chris Kenny.
"And so that money is being increasingly diverted into that task and away from essential military equipment we need to defend Australia and possibly quite soon."
Mr Downer also drew lessons from the Russia-Ukraine war and suggested Australia should not find itself in a position where the country is dependent on America for its military resources during times of conflict.
"Europe, if you like, is at war, and they are totally dependent on the Americans," he said.
"So on the one hand, they criticise the Americans and don't like President Trump, but on the other hand, they're dependent on them."
Mr Downer urged Australia to make a "serious contribution" to defence and the balance of power in the Indo-Pacific region to avoid dependency on America when it comes to global threats.
"That means investing substantially in things like missile defence, submarines of course, drones, other forms of new technology, as well as traditional technology," he added.
However, Sky News Sunday Agenda revealed Mr Albanese would not bend to the US request and stood by Labor's existing policy of increasing defence funding to 2.33 per cent of GDP by 2033.
'What we'll do is we'll determine our defence policy, and we've invested just across the forwards, an additional $10 billion in defence,' Mr Albanese said on Sunday.
'What we'll do is continue to do is continue to provide for investing in our capability but also investing in our relationships in the region.'
Mr Albanese's highly-anticipated meeting with US President Donald Trump appears likely to occur at the G7 Summit in Kananaskis, Canada from June 15 to 17, 2025.
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