US, Australia Boost Space and Cyber Co-Operation To Counter China: FT

The U.S. and Australia are boosting safety cooperation in space and the cyber area because the Indo-Pacific allies strengthen efforts to counter China, which is investing closely in space and weapons akin to hypersonic missiles, reported Financial Times.

Admiral John "Lung" Aquilino, head of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, was joined by General James Dickinson, head of U.S. Space Command, and Lieutenant General Charles "Tuna" Moore, an Air Force fighter pilot and deputy head of U.S. Cyber Command.

What Happened: The three flag officers have been talking forward of conferences with the Australian army and intelligence officers at Pine Gap, a top-secret joint US-Australia intelligence facility.

Aquilino mentioned the nations needed to speed up what the Pentagon known as "integrated deterrence," combining all the weather of the army energy of the U.S. and its allies. He said, "We've come a long way in a short time to be able to integrate the space and cyber domains," and added that Australia had capabilities that made it an "extremely high-end partner."

Dickinson mentioned Australia, which has launched its personal Space Command, was a vital accomplice in efforts to enhance "space domain awareness" and monitor Chinese space operations. He mentioned Australia helped allies overcome what the army calls the "tyranny of distance."

Aquilino noted enhanced visibility in space would assist in countering Chinese hypersonic weapons. The Financial Times reported that China flew a hypersonic weapon across the earth utilizing a system that made it more challenging to monitor due to the place of U.S. sensors and radars.

"The ability to identify and track, and defend against those hypersonics is really the key," mentioned Aquilino, including that Indo-Pacom relied on SpaceCom and CyberCom to enhance "battlespace awareness" when it got here to such weapons.

Why It's Important: "Digital convergence is necessary from a defense standpoint, but it also gives us the potential to perform offensive operations, trying to stop capabilities like hypersonic weapons," mentioned Moore, including that cooperation with allies created an "asymmetric advantage" over China, which lacks related partnerships.

While the improved US-Australia collaboration was pitched as defending a "free and open Indo-Pacific," a lot of the exercise was geared toward China.

The augmented US-Australia army relationship adopted the Aukus safety pact final year, allowing Australia to get nuclear-powered submarines.