Australian nationalism has never been a romantic abstraction. It has always been grounded in a hard-headed calculation of survival. From the earliest settlements that clung to the edge of a vast and indifferent continent, through two world wars that proved the vulnerability of isolation, to the long post-war alliance that kept the peace while the nation grew rich, the constant has been clear: Australia cannot defend itself alone against a major power determined to reshape the region. The deepening American presence at HMAS Stirling in Western Australia is not a surrender of sovereignty. It is the latest expression of that same realist nationalism.
China's military modernisation is not theoretical. It has built the world's largest navy by hull count, expanded its nuclear arsenal, developed long-range conventional strike systems capable of reaching deep into the Indo-Pacific, and repeatedly demonstrated coercive behaviour in the South China Sea, around Taiwan, and toward smaller neighbours. Its strategic goal is clear enough: to push American power out of the western Pacific and establish a sphere of influence in which Australia would eventually have to accommodate Beijing's preferences or face the consequences. Geography offers no permanent shield. Distance that once protected us is shrinking under the range of modern missiles and the speed of modern fleets.
HMAS Stirling, on Garden Island near Perth, sits far enough from China's current primary missile arcs to offer genuine strategic depth. Hosting rotating US and British nuclear-powered submarines there, supported by the newly established Naval Support Activity, Stirling and the personnel and infrastructure that come with it, places capable undersea forces within reach of critical sea lanes while remaining outside the most immediate threat envelope that hangs over Guam or bases closer to the First Island Chain. In a crisis over Taiwan or the approaches to Australia, those submarines become an insurance policy: a force that can threaten Chinese naval operations, protect sea lines of communication on which our economy depends, and complicate any adversary's planning. That is not theoretical deterrence. It is practical power projection from Australian soil, under Australian invitation, in Australia's interest.
Critics will call it a "US base" and claim it makes us a target. The Albanese government prefers softer language of rotational presence and support activity. The distinction matters less than the reality. An enduring American submarine presence, with hundreds and eventually thousands of supporting personnel, maintenance capacity, and logistics, is a deliberate hardening of the alliance. Sovereignty is not measured by the absence of foreign uniforms. It is measured by the capacity to remain free and prosperous. Australia retains the right to decide the terms of access. The submarines and the support infrastructure exist because successive Australian governments judged that the alternative, facing a potential conflict with China without the full weight of the United States Navy, would be far more dangerous.
Nationalism that prioritises survival does not confuse independence with isolation. The same instinct that once sought British naval protection, then American alliance after 1941, now seeks deeper integration under AUKUS. A nation of 27 million people cannot match the scale of Chinese military industry or the reach of its rocket forces on its own. Alliance multiplies capability. Shared bases, shared maintenance, shared training, and shared operational concepts turn geography into an advantage rather than a liability. Western Australia's distance from Beijing becomes a feature, not a bug.
The bottom line remains survival. A China that successfully coerces Taiwan or dominates the approaches to our north would leave Australia strategically isolated and economically constrained. Hosting the means to deter that outcome is not anti-Australian. It is the opposite: a clear-eyed recognition that the first duty of any serious nationalism is to ensure the nation continues to exist on its own terms. The presence at Stirling is one concrete step toward that end.
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/defence/home-truth-us-touches-base-at-was-hmas-stirling/news-story/5a1ddcb7569aa880933535a2390ceadd