The Chinese government has urged countries not to “hype up the so-called China threat narrative” after a major Australian defence review criticised its activities in the South China Sea.
The Australian government’s defence strategic review, released on Monday, labelled the intense competition between China and the United States as “the defining feature of our region and our time”.
The public version of the final report did not label China a direct military threat to Australia, but said its assertion of sovereignty over the contested South China Sea “threatens the global rules-based order in the Indo-Pacific in a way that adversely impacts Australia’s national interests”.
The document also described China’s military buildup as “the largest and most ambitious of any country since the end of the second world war” and said it was “occurring without transparency or reassurance to the Indo-Pacific region of China’s strategic intent”.
A Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson, Mao Ning, was asked to respond to Australia’s plans at the daily press conference in Beijing on Monday.
Mao said China was “committed to maintaining peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific and the whole world”.
“We do not pose any challenge to any country and hope relevant countries will not hype up the so-called China threat narrative,” Mao said.
Mao’s relatively cautious response did not include any direct criticism of the Australian government, which has attempted to “stabilise” the relationship since coming to office last year.
The defence minister, Richard Marles, told the ABC’s 7.30 program that the world was “witnessing the biggest conventional military build-up we have seen in the world since the end of the second world war”.
“It’s true that is China,” Marles said. He said this build-up was “part of the landscape” but “far from the only factor here”.
Some observers of the relationship have argued the broad contours of Australia’s defence policy – including Aukus – were already factored in to Beijing’s calculations when it ended the freeze on high-level dialogue after the May election.
Sources confirmed that an official from the Chinese embassy attended a briefing on the defence strategic review in Canberra on Monday.
Guardian Australia understands more than 30 countries were offered briefings by the Australian government. Officials from China and other countries including Indonesia were briefed on Monday.
A spokesperson for Marles said the government had “engaged comprehensively with our regional neighbours and key partners about the release of the defence strategic review”.
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, gave a cautious response when asked on Monday about a possible future conflict over Taiwan, which Beijing claims as a province despite that being rejected by Taiwan’s government and people.
Albanese said there was no shift in Australia’s position of opposing any unilateral changes to the status quo. “We call for peaceful resolution through dialogue,” he said. “That’s not changed by this.”
Albanese said Australia faced “the most challenging strategic circumstances since the second world war”. But he said at the same time the government was investing in its military capabilities, it was also investing “in our relationships to build a more secure Australia and a more stable and prosperous region”.
Review warns of ‘radically different’ security environment
The report, by the former defence force chief Angus Houston and former Labor defence minister Stephen Smith, warned that the Australian defence force was structured for “a bygone era”. It said the security environment was now “radically different” from the period at the end of the cold war.
The review called for the ADF to develop the ability to precisely strike targets at longer range and develop a stronger network of bases, ports and barracks across northern Australia.
The government estimated the cost of implementing the review would be about $19bn over the initial four-year budget period.
But it said this initial amount was fully funded, through a combination of existing budget allocations and $7.8bn in new savings within the defence portfolio.
That funding shuffle sparked criticism from the Coalition, which said the government was engaging in “strategic doublespeak” by talking up the threats without adding a single dollar in the four-year budget period.
The Coalition’s defence spokesperson, Andrew Hastie, said the government had “failed to deliver the sort of action that our circumstances require”.
He took aim at the decision to slash the number of infantry fighting vehicles to be ordered from 450 to 129, saying “army capability is being cannibalised”.
“Our troops will have less protection in close combat,” Hastie said.
“Even with the promised expansion of long range strike capability, you still need to provide security to those assets and forces.”
The government has promised to increase overall defence spending over the medium to long term.
The Greens senator David Shoebridge, the party’s defence spokesperson, said the review has Australia spending “countless billions on projecting lethal force into the South China Sea apparently to keep us safe, but it fails to explain how our key national interests are served by Australia joining a US-led war in the South China Sea”.
“The ‘threat’ from China’s increased military capabilities is said to be its assertion of sovereignty over the South China Sea. This is doubtless a serious issue but how is it an existential threat to Australia’s sovereignty and why are we gambling our future on a US-led war there?”
