Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, left, and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese shake hands in Canberra, Australia, on May 4, 2026. (Japan Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, left, and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese met in Canberra, Australia, on May 4, 2026. (Japan Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
Japan may gain more frequent access to Australian training areas under new defense commitments that experts say are turning military cooperation in the Indo-Pacific into something more operational.
The agreements reached May 4 in Canberra by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese commit both countries to opportunities for mutual weapons testing, military sustainment, defense production and supply chains.
“In a complex strategic environment, cooperation between Australia and Japan is essential to maintaining a peaceful, stable and prosperous region,” Albanese said in a news release that day.
The two nations are not military allies by treaty, although they have a strategic partnership with a visiting-forces agreement, mutual participation in military exercises and a mutual ally in the United States, among other features, according to an April 26 analysis by the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
The newest agreements go a step beyond previous security pacts between the two by introducing “strategic depth,” according to Alex Bristow, a senior analyst for the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.
The joint statement defines the term as leveraging the two countries’ advantages – such as their unique geography or their industrial capabilities – but also alludes to Japanese forces potentially moving to Australia in a crisis, Bristow said.
“This would help deter China by showing that Japan is not as susceptible to a first strike, as its geography suggests,” he said by email May 6.
The statements avoid identifying specific scenarios — such as a Chinese invasion of Taiwan or a conflict in the South China Sea — to “avoid wantonly annoying Beijing,” Bristow said.
However, “such flashpoints are never far from minds in either capital,” he said.
Stephen Nagy, a professor of international studies at International Christian University in Tokyo, said the agreement went “well beyond mere diplomatic rhetoric” and into concrete operational planning.
“Japan lacks geographic space and faces severe missile threats,” he said by email Thursday. Japan may benefit from Australia’s “vast geography for force dispersal, joint testing and secure logistics.”
The statement also lists securing “critical maritime traffic” as a key priority, which hints at potential plans for joint operations to secure the route between the Indian Ocean and northeast Asia, Bristow said.
“For resource-dependent nations like Japan, protecting sea lines of communication is an existential imperative,” Nagy said. “This signals serious, coordinated contingency planning for potential blockades or disruptions in the Indo-Pacific.”
In the event of a “high intensity conflict,” Japan must secure alternative waterways, something Australia could assist with, Benjamin Blandin, a research fellow for the Yokosuka Council on Asia Pacific Studies, said by email Thursday.
The two countries also pledged to cooperate on cyber defense and mineral supply chains, two areas “fundamentally inseparable from military readiness,” Nagy said.
The cyber defense plan includes sharing intelligence, building public and private partnerships and collaboration on “critical technology security” in relation to artificial intelligence, according to the statement.