Richard Marles swats away need for meeting with Pentagon policy chief, claims US-Australia relationship ‘strongest it's ever been'

Sky News AU

16-07-2025

Defence Minister Richard Marles has remained defiant, claiming the United States-Australia relationship is the 'strongest it's ever been' despite mounting pressure from the Pentagon to considerably boost defence spending.
As Prime Minister Anthony Albanese tours China spruiking increased trade and collaboration on decarbonisation efforts, strategic analysts have argued the US-Australia alliance is in a critical condition, which the government vehemently denies.
There is intensifying rancour in Washington over Australia's stagnant defence budget, with US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth publicly demanding that Australia increase its spending to 3.5 per cent of gross domestic product 'as soon as possible'.
Under Secretary of defence policy Eldridge Colby, who is currently leading the Trump administrations review into the AUKUS submarine agreement, also hit the alliance with another curveball after demanding for Australia to pre-commit US-supplied submarines in the event of a potential conflict between China and Taiwan.
Mr Colby, who last year labelled himself an AUKUS 'agnostic', has recently met with a range of Asia-Pacific leaders including South Korea, the Philippines and Papua New Guinea with the Defence Minister questioned when he had last spoken to the top US strategist.
In response to Sky News host Peter Stefanovic, Mr Marles dismissed why he would hold discussions with the Pentagon policy chief when he had been 'talking with Elbridge Colby's boss', that being Mr Hegseth.
'The answer to that question would be I've met with Pete Hegseth on a couple of occasions and spoken extensively with him about our relationship, including AUKUS,' Mr Marles said.
Although Mr Colby is pioneering the US' review into the AUKUS pact, which has now passed its slated 30-day deadline, Mr Marles insisted that: 'I engage with my counterpart, and my counterpart is the Secretary of Defence.'
Despite a raft of geostrategic experts sounding the alarm about the dire state of relations between the US and Australia, Mr Marles proceeded to boast that Australia's relationship with the 'United States the strongest it's ever been'.
'I was the first international counterpart that Pete Hegseth the Secretary of Defence met with, the first in the world and I met with him again in Singapore at the Shangri La dialogue,' Mr Marles said.
When asked if Mr Colby was deliberately agitating the relationship, the Defence Minister resoundingly rejected the assertion and said there had been 'a lot speculated, but the fundamentals here are that we're talking about three countries who have worked very closely together'.
Meanwhile, foreign editor at The Australian, Greg Sheridan, lashed the Prime Minister for opting to travel to China for six days at a time when Australia's relationship with the US is in a precarious position.
'I think what on earth was going through the Prime Minister's mind to agree to a six-day trip to China while Operation Talisman Sabre was being conducted in Australia when the Australia-US alliance is under more strain and under more neglect from both sides,' Mr Sheridan said.
The foreign affairs expert also stated that Mr Colby had been 'marginally misinterpreted' on his submarine pre-commitment request, and that he was 'probably asking more for joint planning than a commitment to go to war'.
'All the other questions that Elbridge Colby is asking about AUKUS are valid questions and they're critical of his own nation, he's saying even the Americans are not building enough nuclear submarines," he said.