Australia’s layered anxieties

At this week’s Indian Ocean Defence and Security Conference in Perth, the conversation was predictably filled with submarines, deterrence, AUKUS and China. Yet what stood out just as much was how often defence was discussed through the prism of industry, jobs, workforce training, advanced manufacturing, critical minerals and economic resilience.

These discussions echoed a broader shift already visible in Australia’s strategic debate, where defence is now intertwined with industrial policy and economic planning. This is where critiques of Australia’s defence turn through the lens of militarised neoliberalism have some force.

However, this explanation can feel somewhat mechanistic. It explains how Australia’s defence turn is taking shape, yet less fully why it has become politically persuasive at this particular moment. The picture from Perth felt more complex: a country trying to organise itself around uncertainty.

Seen from Indonesia, Australia today can perhaps be better understood through what might be called layered anxieties – strategic anxiety, dependence anxiety and identity anxiety.

These anxieties are not unique to Australia. Many countries are grappling with uncertainty, dependence and identity in a fractured world. But they carry particular weight for Australia because of its geography, alliance history, economic exposure and unresolved sense of regional belonging.

This anxiety is not merely anecdotal. A recent Australian National Security College survey points to rising public concern about national security, increasingly centred on cyber threats, artificial intelligence, supply chains, foreign interference, economic disruption and social cohesion rather than direct military invasion.

The first layer is strategic anxiety. Australia’s storied tyranny of distance continues to shape its worldview. Geography has always been paradoxical: distance offers protection, yet also vulnerability. Allies remain far away, supply chains are exposed, and crises elsewhere can quickly ripple through Australia’s economy and strategic thinking.

Australia is geographically insulated, yet psychologically exposed. Unlike countries living with immediate threats on their borders, Australia’s insecurity often feels serious but hypothetical. The country confronts mounting uncertainty in the Indo-Pacific, but not the daily proximity of danger faced by states in more contested neighbourhoods. The result is a distinct strategic culture, focused on preparedness rather than urgency, resilience rather than panic.

The second layer is dependence anxiety. Australia seeks greater strategic agency in an increasingly contested region, yet the reality remains paradoxical. Security still depends heavily on the United States – reflecting what Allan Gyngell described as Australia’s enduring “fear of abandonment” – while prosperity remains closely tied to China.

This tension was visible in Perth, where defence capability was framed not only through deterrence, but through sovereign industry, workforce capability, shipbuilding and economic diversification. Western Australia was presented as both a geostrategic hub and a site of long-term defence-industrial growth.

Yet the mechanisms intended to increase self-reliance often deepen dependence at the same time. AUKUS may strengthen Australian capability, but it also ties Australia more deeply to allied technologies, US-centred supply chains, industrial timelines, political continuity and strategic expectations.

It creates a paradox, where the path toward autonomy requires deeper dependence.

This is where militarised neoliberalism captures an important part of the story: the growing convergence between defence, industry, technology and state capacity. Large-scale strategic and industrial shifts rarely emerge from institutional logic alone. They require political legitimacy, public acceptance and a compelling sense of urgency. In Australia, uncertainty about regional security, economic vulnerability, alliance dependence and national identity has helped create the conditions in which a stronger defence-industrial state feels increasingly reasonable.

What begins as anxiety management is becoming industrial strategy. But if defence industry becomes a vehicle for economic diversification, Australia may also be assuming that global uncertainty will remain durable enough to sustain it.

Finally, there is identity anxiety. Nearly two decades ago, while studying in Australia, I sat in a university tutorial debating a deceptively simple question: what is Australian culture? Even something as ordinary as Australian food became contested. There was never a settled answer.

That question feels sharper today. Is Australia fundamentally a Western ally, an Indo-Pacific middle power, an Asian partner, or all three at once? Identity questions rarely dominate during stable periods. But when strategic and dependence anxieties deepen, questions of role, belonging and regional purpose become harder to avoid.

For Indonesia, understanding these anxieties matters. Australia’s growing engagement with Asia – and its increasing attention to Indonesia – can sometimes appear purely strategic. Yet viewed through this lens, Australia’s behaviour becomes easier to understand.

As someone who teaches Australian politics and foreign policy in Indonesia, I find this perspective useful in helping students understand why Australia today appears more deeply invested in Asia than before – and why Indonesia has become increasingly important in that engagement.

Australia’s anxieties may be understandable. But anxiety rarely resolves itself through capability alone. In an unsettled Indo-Pacific, trust may prove just as important as deterrence.