National Defence Strategy 2026: What’s in, what’s out and where to from here?

This trajectory has been shaped by changing threat perceptions, alliance dynamics, technological transformation and the erosion of the assumptions that once underpinned Australia’s geographic security.

The modern policy baseline can generally be traced to the 1987 Defence white paper, The Defence of Australia, which formalised the “Defence of Australia” (DOA) doctrine. This framework emphasised self-reliance within the alliance with the United States, prioritising the defence of the Australian continent and its northern maritime approaches, the long celebrated “air–sea gap”, and what became broadly seen as a “strategic moat” adding a further layer of national defence.

In turn, this thinking reflected an assessment that Australia faced no credible direct military threat in the near term and therefore required a force structure optimised for surveillance, denial and strike within its immediate region rather than expeditionary operations.

Ultimately, this strategic logic directly influenced acquisition and force posture decisions throughout the late Cold War and immediate post-Cold War period. Investment prioritised maritime and air capabilities, such as submarines, maritime patrol aircraft and surveillance systems, while the Army was relatively deprioritised.

The retirement of capabilities suited to the early-Cold War era, policy of “forward defence”, including the nation’s remaining aircraft carrier, HMAS Melbourne, reinforced a force designed for defence in depth from Australian bases, rather than sustained offshore operations.

However, the 1990s and early 2000s marked a gradual but decisive shift. Operations in East Timor, the Middle East and Afghanistan exposed the limitations of a strictly continental defence posture.

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The 2000 Defence white paper and subsequent updates began to rebalance the force towards expeditionary and joint operations, reflecting the need to lead regional stabilisation missions and contribute to coalition warfare. By the 2009 white paper, Defending Australia in the Asia Pacific Century: Force 2030, this shift was explicit: Australia sought to maintain continental defence while also developing the capacity to project power and shape its strategic environment, particularly in the Indo-Pacific.

The 2010s only served to further accelerate this evolution. The 2016 Defence White Paper introduced a more integrated concept of national security, articulating objectives of a “secure, resilient Australia” and emphasising deterrence, regional engagement and global rules-based order support.

It was accompanied by a significant long-term funding commitment and a comprehensive Integrated Investment Program, embedding capability acquisition within a more structured strategic framework.

By the early 2020s, the strategic environment had deteriorated markedly. The rise of great-power competition, particularly involving China alongside rapid advances in missile technology, cyber warfare and space capabilities undermined the foundational assumptions of the DOA era, notably the protective value of geography and extended warning times.

As a result, the then Morrison government developed and released the 2020 Defence Strategic Update and supporting Force Structure Plan, which built on the key findings of its 2016 predecessor with $270 billion specifically designated for capability investment and a further $305 billion set aside to cover operational costs, personnel and estate maintenance over the next decade.

Eventually, however, this would culminate in the 2023 Defence Strategic Review and subsequent policy updates, which reoriented Australia towards a strategy of “impactful projection” and deterrence by denial. The emphasis shifted to long-range strike, northern base hardening, integrated air and missile defence and deeper alliance integration, including initiatives such as AUKUS.

Each phase has directly shaped acquisition priorities, from surveillance and denial capabilities in the 1980s to expeditionary enablers in the 2000s and now to long-range precision strike, undersea warfare and integrated multi-domain systems. In parallel, force posture has shifted northward and outward, reflecting both the strategic weight of the Indo-Pacific and the diminishing buffer once provided by distance.

Across this four-decade period, a clear pattern emerged: Australian defence policy has moved from a geographically bounded, threat-minimisation model to a dynamic, regionally engaged deterrence posture, but this evolution is continuously bringing us to the 2024 National Defence Strategy and supporting Integrated Investment Program, with an additional $53 billion earmarked for Defence over the next decade, which would see Australia’s defence spending reach 3 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2033.

Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles sought to reassure Australians, saying, “The Integrated Investment Program – the IIP – which sits alongside NDS 26, contains an increase in defence spending of $14 billion over the forward estimates and $53 billion over the next decade. This will be contained in next month’s federal budget. And in turn, this means that since coming to office, the Albanese government has increased defence spending by a total of $30 billion over the next forward estimates and $117 billion over the next decade.”

He added: “To place this in context, the former Coalition government, which governed during a period when all the trends we are wrestling with today were just as present then, increased defence spending by just $10 billion over the decade. Which is to say, this Labor government has done 12 times as much in four years as the Liberals did in nine.”

But as with all things, the devil is in the detail.

Real money, never-never money or something that would make Exon blush?

As part of this expected additional $53 billion earmarked for Defence over the next decade is an additional $14 billion over the next four years, both of which come on the back of an additional $50 billion in funding announced as part of the 2024 National Defence Strategy and supporting Integrated Investment Program under the justification that Australia faces its most dangerous strategic environment since the Second World War.

The Deputy Prime Minister said at the time: “As a consequence, for the first time in 80 years, we must go back to fundamentals, to take a first-principles approach as to how we manage and seek to avoid the highest level of strategic risk we now face as a nation: the prospect of major conflict in the region that directly threatens our national interest.

“The most complex strategic circumstances since the end of World War II has demanded the biggest reassessment of our strategic posture in 35 years: the foundational thinking about the fundamental task of the Australian Defence Force and what kind of an ADF we need to perform it,” he told the National Press Club on 17 April 2024.

Despite this rhetoric and the successive promises over the past two years, analysts and media pundits have repeatedly flagged serious concerns not only about the quantum and quality of spending but also the timing of the spending identified and outlined as part of the 2024 National Defence Strategy and supporting Integrated Investment Program, particularly as the situation in the Middle East and Europe continue to deteriorate.

While the government has moved to recognise this with the increase of the nation’s defence budget by an additional $53 billion, the reality is over the period of a decade, broken down per year, this amounts to approximately $5.3 billion. But let’s not kid ourselves, this funding won’t be evenly spent on a year-by-year basis, rather it will see some peaks and troughs, or dare I say it, “valleys of death” in defence spending.

But if we take into account that the government plans to initially spend approximately $14 billion over the first four years, this spending amounts to little more than a rounding error despite the bluster struggles to meaningfully lift the real material outcome for the nation’s defence capabilities, particularly as the regional and global environment continues to deteriorate, our primary security benefactor becomes increasingly unpredictable and the development, acquisition, sustainment and personnel costs continue to rise.

Minister Marles was quick to defend the government’s current defence spending levels, saying, “Indeed today we are spending 2.8 per cent of GDP on defence. That is the most of any comparable like-minded country in the Indo‑Pacific and it is more than most of the countries of NATO, including the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Canada. Based on current GDP projections, we now have spending committed in the budget that will take us to a defence spend of 3 per cent of GDP by 2033. And it is much more than this when you include other supporting investments in critical infrastructure, the defence of networks, civil preparedness and resilience, innovation and the full strengthening of our defence industrial base.”

The question becomes, is this real money or something that is far more ethereal in its nature? Because as it stands, the money doesn’t look quite real yet, especially when one considers there seems to be some weird and wonderful accounting when it comes to the capabilities delivered and money is spent.

Up to $60bn investment for Army

Following the release of the 2023 Defence Strategic Review and its central findings, the 2024 National Defence Strategy and the supporting Integrated Investment Program, Army found itself in a state of tactical and strategic limbo as it began to accelerate its shift away from the counterinsurgency heavy operations of the Afghanistan and Iraq Global War on Terror period towards a greater emphasis on littoral manoeuvre and long-range fires acquisition.

This necessitated a series of scale-backs for Army, particularly in the wake of AUKUS and the reprioritisation towards Navy through programs like LAND 400 Phase 3 and LAND 8113 Phase 2, seeking to offset some of these concerns that have emerged, with the Government committing to spend between $48–59 billion over the next decade, with $11–12 billion over the decade to deliver Army’s future littoral manoeuvre capabilities, with an additional $$5–7 billion for related infrastructure.

However, on closer interrogation, it appears that little is materially changing for Army, with the government committing to the continued delivery and fielding of established platforms, including the M1A2 SepV3, Hawkei and Bushmaster fleets, the continued acquisition of the reduced number of Redback infantry fighting vehicles and the “as planned” 211 Boxer combat reconnaissance vehicles.

Additionally, the government is committed to continuing the delivery and fielding of the Army’s next-generation aviation fleet of AH-64E Apache, UH-60M Black Hawk and CH-47F Chinook helicopters, with vagaries around future special operations capabilities valued at between $2.3–3.3 billion over the decade, alongside the development and fielding of uncrewed air and ground systems to “strengthen surveillance, reconnaissance, targeting and logistics capabilities”.

So at first pass, it looks as though little has changed for Army.

Navy, the golden child

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Navy has once again emerged as the clear winner from the 2024 National Defence Strategy and the supporting Integrated Investment Program, with the government investing between $94–130 billion over the next decade to deliver undersea warfare capabilities and between an additional $52–65 billion to support the delivery of Navy’s enhanced lethality surface combatant fleet.

For the surface combatant fleet, this seems to firm the numbers of evolved/upgraded Mogami Class frigates as the replacement for the venerable but ageing Anzac Class frigates at 11, with the Hunter Class anti-submarine frigates figure remaining at six as outlined in the 2024 Independent Analysis into Navy’s Surface Combatant Fleet, to serve alongside the three upgraded Hobart Class destroyers.

The government also remains committed to the six Large Optionally Crewed Surface Vessels, six Arafura Class patrol vessels and 10 Evolved Cape Class patrol boats, alongside the continued operation of the expanded, three-dozen strong fleet of MH-60R Romeo anti-submarine helicopter fleet. These capabilities will also be supported by continued investment in critical air defence and decoy upgrades, along with the continued acquisition of the Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles for the Hobart class destroyers as well as continued exploration into the “suitability of fitting the system onto the Hunter Class frigates”.

Shifting to the undersea domain, Australia’s pursuit of conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarines under the optimal pathway for AUKUS through continued support, investment and collaboration with the United States and United Kingdom’s respective submarine industrial base and submarine fleets respectively. This sees an expansion of investment in the required submarine infrastructure, namely, in Western Australia, with no mention of the East Coast submarine base.

Building on this, the government has confirmed that it will continue to spend between $7.8–11 billion over the next decade to ensure that the Collins Class fleet remains a viable, survivable strike asset for the Royal Australian Navy, including through ongoing sustainment, full-cycle docking to support deep maintenance and “selected capability upgrades” aligned with the material state of each respective hull.

In addition, the government will invest $4.8–5.8 billion over the next decade to continue the development and acquisition of autonomous and uncrewed undersea warfare vessels, including Anduril’s Ghost Shark and the C2 Robotics, Speartooth, to be supported by an expanded fleet of Bluebottle uncrewed surface vessels recently announced by the government.

Finally, the government has confirmed that it will invest between $1.1–1.2 billion over the decade to modernise the nation’s hydrographic surveying, data collection and underwater depth mapping capabilities, while there appears to be little to no growth in the nation’s mine countermeasures capabilities and fleet, raising questions about the lives of the mine hunter and hydrographic survey fleets.

Few changes for Air Force but big bucks for air defence

Shifting to the air domain, the government has committed $34–41 billion over the decade to, as it stated: “Enable Air Force to undertake expeditionary air operations to project force, sustain protracted combat operations and maintain situational awareness in our primary air of military interest” largely through the $11–13 billion investment in “ongoing projects”, including the new and expanded fleet of C-130J-30 Super Hercules airlift aircraft.

This will be supported by the continued sustainment and maintenance of the C-17A and KC-30A fleets, respectively, along with the replacement of the troubled C-27J Spartan fleet of aircraft to allow the nation to continue supporting the “sovereign airlift and surveillance needs of Pacific partners”. Finally, the government has articulated the continued investment in the nation’s northern air bases to improve their resilience against attack.

The government will also continue with the fielding of the nation’s airborne reconnaissance, surveillance and intelligence fleet with the P-8A Poseidon fleet set to receive its final aircraft this year, alongside the continued deployment of the MC-55A Peregrine aircraft and the MQ-4C Triton fleet as part of $4.5–5.5 billion worth of continued investment in these capabilities.

In the air combat domain, the government has committed $11–13 billion over the decade to enhance the Air Force’s fleet of F-35A Lightning II aircraft, equipping them with a host of new long-range air-to-surface missiles. This will be supported by the continued investment and life extension of the F/A-18 E/F Super Hornet and E/A-18G Growler fleets out to 2040. The biggest ticket item in the air combat domain is the government’s $6.1–8.1 billion investment over the next decade to develop and acquire a suite of advanced, low-cost, expendable and uncrewed air systems to complement the crewed fleet.

This includes investments in the MQ-28A Ghost Bat fleet to “multiply lethality and survivability of the crew fleet through sensing, electronic warfare, strike and missile defence capabilities” as well as “exploring opportunities” to integrate future uncrewed systems into the ADF’s force structure.

Lessons from both Ukraine and the Middle East have revealed significant shortfalls for Australia’s integrated air and missile defence capabilities, with the government committing $21–30 billion over the decade to, as it described: “deliver a layered, integrated air and missile defence capability to detect, track, counter, withstand and recover from missile attacks”.

This investment includes a $14–20 billion investment in resilient and networked sensor capabilities, supporting enhance command and control platforms including the Jindalee Operational Radar Network, as well as critical investment to “maintain the effectiveness” of the E-7A Wedgetail fleet, as well as continue the development and planning of their scheduled replacement alongside international partners.

Building on this sensing network, the government has committed an “initial” $7.2–10 billion over the decade to deliver “active” missile defence capabilities across, air, land and maritime domains, including the continued introduction of the National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile System capability with Army’s 10th Brigade based in South Australia. This will also support the acquisition and fielding of “dismounted and vehicle-mounted systems to protect deployed forces from low-altitude aerial threats”, including autonomous systems and helicopters.

As a matter of urgency, the government will launch the development of a medium-range, ground based air defence system designed to defeat advanced aircraft and missile threats, with the system to serve as a “resilient, networked capability” and a “core component of the National Integrated Air and Missile Defence System”. Navy will also see some of this investment, benefitting from the continued acquisition of the Evolved Sea Sparrow Missile Block II, Standard Missile 2 and 6, respectively, while the F-35A, F/A-18E/F and MQ-28A fleets will also benefit from advanced integration of airborne detection technologies.

Space and cyber – by far the biggest winners

By far the biggest winners are Australia’s space and cyber warfighting capabilities, with the government committing $27–38 billion over the decade in resilient space, cyber and electronic warfare capabilities, once again drawing on the lessons of the Ukrainian and Middle East conflicts and the pivotal role these on-traditional, asymmetric capabilities have played in levelling the battlefield.

As part of this monumental investment, the government has committed $9–12 billion to deliver a suite of enhanced space capabilities, with emphasis being placed on resilient satellite communications following the cancellation and “rescoping” of JP 9102 in favour of developing and fielding a “resilient, multi-orbit Australian Defence Satellite Communications capability” that has been optimised for our specific operational requirements in the Indo-Pacific.

Further to this, the government has committed to enhance space-domain awareness through closer collaboration with the United States and United Kingdom via the Deep Space Advanced Radar Capability, enabling the continuous global tracking, detection and identification of satellites and other space-based infrastructure. This will equally be supported by the delivery of an “advanced geospatial intelligence satellite capability”.

In cyber space, the government has committed to investing $15–21 billion over the decade to support both defensive and offensive operations through the continuation of critical programs like the Australian Signals Directorate’s REDSPICE program, which is designed to significantly enhance the tactical and strategic cyber capabilities of the Australian Defence Force and its constituent components.

The proliferation of advanced electronic warfare capabilities, particularly in Ukraine, has prompted a significant investment in these capabilities, with the Integrated Investment Program earmarking between $2.4 and $3.4 billion to uplift the ADF’s electronic warfare capabilities.

Each of these components is designed to ensure that the Australian Defence Force is greater than the sum of its parts, with an aggregated capability to ensure that as we enter into this current “period of disorder”, as described by the Deputy Prime Minister during his address to the National Press Club, we can act decisively in our own interests. The question now becomes: is what has been outlined, particularly given how much has been “known-knowns”, really moves the needle?

Because if we’re to believe the Deputy Prime Minister – “Australia must contribute to this and we are. And we will work with all our like-minded partners to better shape our region’s strategic trajectory. We will double down on middle power cooperation. But let’s also be clear: there is no effective balance of power in the Indo-Pacific absent the continued presence of the United States” – Australia doesn’t have a Plan B.

Final thoughts

I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: Australia needs a massive wake-up call, and we need it now. We owe it to our kids, my own included, to stop drifting and start leading.

The world is moving faster than our national conversation. We’re stuck in a mindset that doesn’t fit the current map. It’s time for a “factory reset” on how we view our economy, our security and our ambition.

The Indo-Pacific is no longer just a “neighbourhood”; it’s the global engine room. This isn’t just about the rise of China or India or that middle powers like Vietnam and Thailand are surging, while Japan and South Korea are upping the ante. This isn’t a future trend; it’s the reality we’re already living in.

Our national strategy is lagging. For decades, we’ve prioritised the next election cycle over the next generation, relying on reactive policies that don’t work in a world where technology and trade are used as weapons. If we keep coasting, our kids will inherit a country that looks wealthy on paper but is a powerless bystander in its own backyard.

To thrive, we must stop being passengers. We need true strategic autonomy, the backbone to act in our own interests, independent of legacy constraints.

Canberra has two choices:

• Remain a polite bystander while others dictate our future.
• Step up as a nation determined to shape the region.

Incremental shifts won’t cut it. We need the foresight to anticipate shocks and the ambition to lead. The next decade will decide whether Australia is a player or just a prize. It’s time to choose.

Get involved with the discussion and let us know your thoughts on Australia’s future role and position in the Indo-Pacific region and what you would like to see from Australia’s political leaders in terms of partisan and bipartisan agenda setting in the comments section below, or get in touch at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Stephen Kuper

Steve has an extensive career across government, defence industry and advocacy, having previously worked for cabinet ministers at both Federal and State levels.