The 1998 project sent a delegation to Australia. Although the Japanese-Australian Politico-Military Talks started in 1996, it was first proposed by Australia. Throughout the delegation's discussions with its counterparts in Australia, there was the impression that Japan-Australia security relations are a sort of one-way communications from Australia to Japan. Australia's recognition of Japan as an important security partner is clearly stated in the country's defense and foreign/trade policy documents, but there seems to be no equivalent view on the part of Japan.
With regard to China, Australia's threat perception toward China remarkably differs from Japan's. The delegation felt that many Australian security experts underestimate the degree of China's security threat. The delegation concluded that geographical proximity plays a major role in forming threat perceptions and that for Japan- Australia security relations to be successful in the future, more dialogue and coordination between Japanese and Australian security experts are essential.
It is also noteworthy that there are two major currents in the Australian intellectual community in terms of maritime cooperation. While some maritime experts think that security cooperation can play the role of regional stabilizer, others say that traditional balance of power is still effective as an instrument of regional stabilization. The former seems to be inclined to multilateralism, while the latter to bilateralism. Furthermore, the delegation found that there are also both isolationism and internationalism in Australian foreign policy thinking, and these two opposite currents have always been in disagreement with each other. Thus, there seem to be various kinds of views on regional security in Australia.
However, five days was too short for the delegation to grasp all sides of Australia policy thinking. Therefore, for future maritime cooperation to be achieved between Australia and Japan, it is essential to increase Track II-level exchanges to further specify which intellectuals argue for which policy stance. If such cooperation is to grow into a larger framework involving the US and South Korea, further intellectual exchanges with Australia will be even more important.
In sum, the delegation was able to establish meaningful relations in Australia and also strengthened the existing ones. The next step should be to expand these relations into specific policy study programs to promote freedom of navigation.
