Aletho News

Analysts warn of ‘colonization’ as US ‘saturates’ Australia with 110 bases

Press TV – September 7, 2026

The United States reportedly wields control over, or has access to, 110 military facilities belonging to Australia — a presence so extensive that analysts now describe it as a “saturation” and even a “colonization” of the Australian continent.

The Guardian, citing information gathered from the database of the Nautilus Institute, reported that the US military or US defense corporations have access to more than half of Australia’s military facilities.

According to the database, the United States controls 17 military facilities on mainland Australia, has access to 75 more Australian-run military installations elsewhere, while US defense corporations have access to an additional 18 facilities.

“This is not a matter of penetration, it’s a matter of saturation,” said Prof Richard Tanter, the database’s author.

“Over half of the defense facilities that we have looked at have some level of American access: that means American personnel, it means American corporations, some of the biggest armaments companies in the world.”

The US military in Australia engages in gathering intelligence, accessing satellite data for targeting information, and communications intercepts.

Other military activities include training for some 2,500 marines on dry-season rotation in the Northern Territory, as well as the pre-positioning of warfighting assets, weapons, munitions, and fuel, stored in case of a regional war in the Pacific.

The US now practically owns Australia’s human, soil, and mineral resources through its control of the nation’s military, according to critics.

The US military presence will continue to expand. From next year up to 1,200 uniformed military personnel will operate from the HMAS Stirling submarine base just off Fremantle.

The government insists that technically this will not be a US base — rather a “rotation” — but there is little contestation of its actual implication.

The AUKUS nuclear submarine agreement, described by former defense minister Christopher Pyne as “a lot more than the submarine procurement,” effectively establishes a new United States submarine base in the Indian Ocean.

“For the Americans, being able to have a submarine base in the Indian Ocean is a massive strategic advantage,” Pyne told a public inquiry.

Dr Vince Scappatura, author of The US Lobby and Australian Defense Policy, described US base access across Australia as a kind of “second wave of colonization.”

“Today we are shaping up to be the ‘tip of the spear’ for US power projection into the region — that’s what the sprawling US base access represents,” he said.

“Each one of those dots on the map represents a point of leverage Washington has over Canberra when it comes to matters of defense and foreign policy.”

Scappatura noted that the phrase “empire by invitation” was originally coined to describe US hegemony over western Europe “but it is applicable equally here. I sometimes describe it as ‘voluntary subordination’.”

The United States has been escalating militarization in the Pacific by resetting ties with regional countries in an attempt to form a coalition against China.

Beyond Australia, US bases and military access points are expanding across Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, and other regional nations, effectively drawing them into Washington’s orbit.

Critics say this is a desperate bid by Washington to arrest the rise of China, with Australia and other regional countries being used as forward operating bases in what could become a larger confrontation.

Tanter says that the acceptance of the US military presence has become so ingrained within the government and defense that unwinding Australia’s enmeshment within the world’s most powerful military is increasingly difficult.

“This is a massive institutional failure in Australia, a kind of learned incapacity at a political, parliamentary and bureaucratic level,” he said. “We’ve learned how not to ask those questions.”

Dr Emma Shortis, director of international and security affairs at the Australia Institute, says Australia’s increasing integration with the US military has resulted in “an accelerating erosion of Australia’s independent, sovereign, decision-making power.”

“Instead of having the option of saying ‘no’ to involvement in United States wars, involvement becomes the default position,” she said.

She cited the March attack by a US nuclear-powered submarine on an Iranian frigate, sinking it and killing more than 100 people. Three Australian naval personnel were onboard, part of the submarine’s crew: the US did not forewarn Australia of the attack.

“Australia might maintain the pretense of sovereign decision-making power, but that’s not the reality,” Shortis said.

Dr Albert Palazzo, an adjunct professor at the University of New South Wales Canberra and formerly the director of war studies for the Australian army, told the Guardian the US military’s accelerating buildup carries danger for Australian security.

“The Australian government seems to be waltzing its way into a war between the United States and China, by allowing this country to become an outpost or bastion of the US military, and as a platform from which they will launch military force against China,” he said.

Australians’ faith in the US is fragile and fracturing. A Lowy Institute poll showed Australians’ “trust in the United States to act responsibly in the world” has fallen to 31%, the lowest level in its polling history.

Just 21% of Australians have confidence in Donald Trump to do the right thing in world affairs, the lowest level of confidence in a US president yet.

More than twice as many Australians (59%) now believe Australia’s interests are best served by a more independent foreign policy rather than a closer alliance with the US (23%). Just 13% of Australians believe the US is a “very reliable” security ally.

This represents, Shortis says, a “seismic shift” in Australia’s perception of its once-great and powerful friend.

“After following the US into nearly every war since World War II, Australians have had enough. They see tangible risks in being so close to President Trump’s bleak and violent version of America.”

September 7, 2026 - Posted by aletho | Militarism | Australia, United States