At 75, the Australia–US alliance remains fundamental to Australia’s security. But a more dangerous and unpredictable strategic environment, and a defence relationship now more deeply integrated than at any point in its history, reinforce the need for the alliance’s institutional machinery to evolve.
This ASPI Explainer argues that credible collective deterrence depends not only on combined capability, but on demonstrating the political resolve and practical capacity to plan and act together when required. Australia’s deterrence posture increasingly connects its self-reliant capacity to deter, its contribution to regional collective deterrence and its reliance on US extended deterrence, yet how these interact through the alliance remains insufficiently articulated.
Other US Indo-Pacific alliances use Defence Guidelines to translate longstanding treaty commitments into practical defence cooperation and coordination. Australia and the United States should develop bilateral Defence Guidelines under ANZUS to provide an overarching framework connecting political objectives to roles and missions, force posture, capability development, bilateral planning and crisis coordination.
Such a framework would give the alliance’s growing defence integration greater strategic and operational coherence, strengthen the credibility of collective deterrence and provide greater public clarity to the US extended deterrence commitment to Australia.
