Australia’s Strategic Frontline Is Shifting West

Max Martin | Australian Foreign Policy Fellow

Image sourced from Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Land Rapid Response Team NASA GSFC via Wikimedia Commons.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Western Australia (WA) was widely labelled the “Hermit Kingdom” for its strict border closures and physical distance from the rest of Australia. That perception of remoteness has endured. Yet in the context of accelerating Indo-Pacific competition, WA’s significance can no longer be treated as peripheral. The state has become central to Australia’s economic resilience, defence posture and alliance architecture, even if our foreign policy thinking has not fully adjusted to this strategic shift.

A Geoeconomic Engine at the Centre of Strategic Competition

WA’s economic importance is long established, but its strategic value has sharpened as supply chains take on geopolitical consequences. China’s heavy reliance on Western Australian iron ore, which has made it an unlikely target of Chinese trade retaliation, underscores how central WA’s resources are to economic stability during periods of geoeconomic disruption.

At the same time, WA has become a global powerhouse in critical minerals, including lithium, rare earths and nickel, which are essential for defence technologies and clean energy transitions. The Australian Government’s Critical Minerals Strategy aims to position WA production at the heart of global supply chain resilience.

This strategic importance was reinforced through the recent Australia–United States (US) critical minerals agreement, which allows Australian minerals to be treated as “domestic” under US law. Reporting suggests that the agreement will overwhelmingly benefit WA producers who anchor US and allied supply chains. WA’s growing strategic importance appears to be shaped more by allied interest and external pull factors than by a coherent, domestically driven reassessment of its role in Australian foreign policy.

This dynamic is exemplified by recent reporting on Australia’s export of zirconium, a critical mineral essential for advanced military and nuclear technologies. WA producers, often with Beijing-linked ownership, have been supplying around 41 per cent of China’s imports. Despite the mineral’s clear strategic uses and the fact that its supply chains intersect with global security concerns, domestic export and foreign-investment controls have remained relatively permissive, underscoring how regulatory frameworks are trailing the sophistication of foreign powers’ strategic engagement in the state’s critical minerals sector.

AUKUS is Pushing Australia's Defence Frontier West

Defence planning has moved more decisively than Australia’s foreign policy articulation in recognising WA’s emerging strategic role. Under AUKUS, HMAS Stirling near Perth is being developed to host rotations of US and United Kingdom (UK) submarines under the Submarine Rotational Force–West.

Alongside this, the Henderson Defence Precinct near Perth is undergoing major expansions to support Australia’s future nuclear-powered submarines and strengthen Australia’s sovereign shipbuilding and sustainment capacity.

These shifts reflect growing recognition of the Indian Ocean’s strategic significance among defence planners and international partners. US Indo-Pacific Command has highlighted the region as a critical arena for energy flows, submarine activity, and power projection. Yet despite initiatives such as the appointment of a Special Envoy for Indian Ocean Affairs, Australia’s foreign policy has not elevated the region, where Perth is the natural anchor, to the same strategic priority as its eastern theatres.

The Indian Ocean Policy Gap

Despite these developments, Australia’s foreign policy attention remains concentrated eastward, leaving the Indian Ocean comparatively underdeveloped.

This gap is reflected in day-to-day maritime security. Northern WA has seen a rising number of illegal fishing incursions. In 2024, six Chinese nationals who had entered the region by sea were able to move inland and were ultimately detained after wandering onto an operational airbase near Kalumburu. Increased detections underscore sparse surveillance across a vast maritime zone. These episodes highlight how Australia’s Indian Ocean approaches remain less monitored and resourced than the eastern seaboard.

This growing disparity highlights a broader problem. AUKUS submarine rotations, US posture initiatives and the critical minerals agreement all rely heavily on WA’s geography, ports and resources. Yet national foreign policy discourse continues to prioritise east-coast issues, including the Pacific Step-Up, Southeast Asian diplomacy and Western Pacific deterrence, while the Indian Ocean and WA’s role within it remain comparatively underdeveloped. The result is a policy lag that risks leaving Australia underprepared. In a crisis, this lag would constrain Australia’s ability to coordinate diplomatically and operationally across the Indian Ocean, even as its defence posture and economic exposure in WA deepen.

A New Centre of Gravity

In any major Indo-Pacific conflict, WA would be central to Australia’s response. Independent analysis, including commentary from the Lowy Institute, has increasingly emphasised the growing importance of the Indian Ocean to regional security–WA sits at the centre of that shift. Its distance from the first island chain, the arc of islands closest to China’s coastline, offers greater survivability for bases and critical infrastructure. Its direct access to the open Indian Ocean provides operational freedom at a time when contested sea lanes could shape the ou

tcome of conflict. Its industrial base, strengthened through AUKUS investments and growing demand for critical minerals, would also be essential for sustainment in a prolonged crisis.

Australia’s foreign policy must now make a comparable adjustment, treating Western Australia not only as a defence hub, but as a strategic platform for diplomacy, economic statecraft, and crisis management in the Indian Ocean. This would require embedding senior federal capability in Perth and articulating a dedicated Indian Ocean Strategy that recognises WA as Australia’s primary anchor west of Indonesia, aligns geoeconomic policy with security priorities, and elevates the state to first-order strategic importance.

Max is completing his Master of Arts in International Relations at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), where he is a Ramsay Postgraduate Scholar. He spent his first year at SAIS Europe in Bologna before moving to the Washington, DC campus for his final year. Originally from Perth, he graduated from the University of Western Australia with a Bachelor of Commerce in Economics and Finance.

Max recently interned at the Australian Embassy in Bangkok, gaining experience in the political and economic sections at one of Australia’s largest overseas posts. His academic interests focus on the intersection of economics and strategy and how states respond to an evolving global landscape. Through this Fellowship, he hopes to contribute to public debate on Australia’s foreign policy priorities, challenges, and long-term strategic choices.

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Young Australians in International Affairs. All content is original, and no plagiarism has been used in the preparation of this article.