Dedicated to my wife, who sees a future and is not buying the tickets.
The Great Distraction
On April 16, 2026, Defence Minister Richard Marles stood before the National Press Club and announced the biggest military spending spree in Australian history. An extra $14 billion over four years. An additional $53 billion over the next decade. Defence spending to rise to 3% of GDP by 2033.
“Australia faces its most complex and threatening strategic circumstances since the end of World War II,” Marles declared. “International norms that once constrained the use of force and military coercion continue to erode.”
On the same day, the Prime Minister was flying to Brunei to beg for fertiliser and diesel.
The juxtaposition is obscene. While Marles was marketing the apocalypse, Anthony Albanese was scrambling to secure the basic necessities of Australian life – fuel for trucks, fertiliser for crops, the stuff that keeps the country running.
The 100 million litres of diesel from Brunei and South Korea is not a solution. It is a distraction. The government is hoping that Australians will see the headline, breathe a sigh of relief, and stop asking the hard questions.
But the questions remain. And they are damning.
The Severity of the Crisis
The situation is far worse than the government has admitted.
As of April 11, 2026, Australia had 31 days’ worth of diesel, 28 days of jet fuel, and 38 days’ of petrol. These figures are dangerously close to the point where the government would be forced to implement nationwide fuel rationing.
In early April, Energy Minister Chris Bowen disclosed that 144 service stations across the country had completely run out of fuel, with a further 283 stations reporting no diesel supplies. The shortages have been most acute in rural and regional areas – precisely where farmers and truck drivers need fuel the most.
The Geelong refinery fire has compounded the problem. Viva Energy’s refinery is one of only two remaining refineries in Australia. The blaze shut down production at the worst possible moment.
As one Taiwanese media outlet starkly put it, Australia is living a “real-life Mad Max” scenario. The comparison is not hyperbolic. The film franchise depicted a world brought to its knees by fuel scarcity. Australia is now staring into that abyss.
The Root Cause: Structural Failure, Not Bad Luck
This crisis is not a bolt from the blue. It is the predictable consequence of decades of policy neglect.
Australia now imports over 90% of its refined fuel needs. In 2000, the country was almost entirely self-sufficient in petroleum products, meeting nearly 98% of its own demand. That figure has collapsed to just 5.6% for crude oil production.
The Just-in-Time model that has governed Australia’s fuel supply for decades is a house of cards. It prioritises efficiency and low costs over resilience and security. The Asian refineries that supply Australia are themselves dependent on crude oil shipped through the Strait of Hormuz, which has been effectively closed since late February.
The government has known about this vulnerability for years. In 2010, the NRMA warned that Australia was becoming dangerously dependent on fuel imports from “some of the most politically unstable corners of the globe.” Those warnings were ignored.
The same pattern applies to fertiliser. Australia imports 65% of its urea – the key ingredient in crop fertiliser – from the Middle East. The Strait of Hormuz closure has sent prices skyrocketing by 60%. Urea now costs more than $1,550 per tonne, up from $700 before the war.
Farmers are now on “boat watch”, anxiously tracking ships that may not arrive in time for winter planting. “Nothing grows without fertiliser and water,” said canegrower Dean Cayley. He is not exaggerating. Without urea, crop yields can drop by 40%.
The crisis is not a natural disaster. It is a policy choice.
The 100 Million Litre Announcement: Too Little, Too Late
The shipment secured by Prime Minister Albanese from Brunei and South Korea totals approximately 100 million litres.
Opposition sources have been quick to point out that this volume represents little more than a single day’s supply. Australia consumes roughly 90 million litres of fuel daily. The announcement is not a solution. It is a photo opportunity.
The government has also signed “no surprises” energy agreements with Malaysia, Singapore, and Brunei. These agreements are not legally binding supply guarantees. They are diplomatic assurances that Australia will be given advance notice if any of these nations consider restricting fuel exports.
Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim of Malaysia was frank about the limitations of the arrangement. “The world looks very different to when you were here last year,” he said. “Global energy markets are under serious stress.” He did not promise that Malaysia would continue supplying Australia indefinitely. He promised that the two nations would talk.
Meanwhile, Australia has no national strategic fuel reserve. The International Energy Agency recommends that member countries hold reserves equivalent to 90 days of net imports. Australia holds approximately 30 days.
The Hidden Story: The Fuel Tax Credit Scheme
The most egregious aspect of this crisis is the one the mainstream media has almost entirely ignored.
Australia’s largest mining companies – BHP, Rio Tinto, Glencore, Fortescue, and Yancoal – continue to receive billions of dollars in fuel tax credits while ordinary Australians struggle to fill their tanks.
The Fuel Tax Credit Scheme is Australia’s largest taxpayer-funded fossil fuel subsidy, costing the budget $11 billion annually. In the 2025 financial year alone, the five largest mining companies were collectively refunded $1.94 billion:
- BHP: $622 million
- Rio Tinto: $423 million
- Glencore: $349 million
- Fortescue: $290 million
- South32: $140 million
Climate Energy Finance has calculated that 18 of the largest diesel consumers in Australia received $3.36 billion in fuel tax credits in the 2025 financial year alone.
The scheme refunds the full customs duty – currently 51.6 cents per litre – paid on imported diesel used off-road in industry. It is a direct transfer of wealth from Australian taxpayers to some of the largest corporations on the planet.
The government is simultaneously pleading with Australians to conserve fuel, subsidising the import of diesel from Asia, and handing billions of dollars to mining companies to continue burning the stuff.
Climate Energy Finance founder Tim Buckley has called for urgent reform, warning that without change, Australia will hand back almost $84 billion in fuel tax credits to major miners by 2030.
The silence from the government is deafening.
The Opportunity Cost: Defence vs. Everything Else
While Marles was marketing the apocalypse, the opportunity cost to Australia became staggering.
The government has announced an extra $14 billion in defence spending over the next four years, with a further $53 billion over the next decade. Total defence spending over the next decade will top out at $887 billion.
Meanwhile, the government has committed a paltry $386 million to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, for 2026–2030. Gavi has helped vaccinate more than 1.1 billion children globally, saving more than 18.8 million lives. It is one of the most cost‑effective health interventions in history.
The government has provided just $5 million to the Australian Partnership for Preparedness Research on Infectious Disease Emergencies (APPRISE).
The message is unmistakable: the government is prepared for war. It is not prepared for the next pandemic.
The trade‑offs are not theoretical. Every dollar spent on defence is a dollar not spent on:
- Aged care: The aged care system is underfunded. The Royal Commission’s recommendations remain partially unimplemented.
- Education: Class sizes are increasing. Teacher shortages are worsening. University funding is being cut.
- Healthcare: Public hospitals are underfunded. Elective surgery waiting lists are growing.
- Housing: The affordability crisis deepens. Social housing waiting lists grow.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has acknowledged that the fastest‑growing pressures on the budget are defence and interest on debt – while the “care economy” (aged care, NDIS, health) accounts for the majority of spending increases. The defence spending surge will only widen the gap.
The Manufactured Threat
Marles identified China as the primary threat to peace. He spoke of the need to project Australian military force “anywhere on the planet” to police global trade.
But China has no history of being an aggressor against Australia. It has never threatened Australia. It has never invaded Australian territory. It has never attacked Australian forces.
The only “threat” is that China might replace the United States as a trading partner by offering quality products at better prices and better trading conditions. This is not a military threat. It is an economic threat – to the profits of the defence contractors, to the hegemony of the United States, to the permanent war economy.
Former prime minister Paul Keating, no stranger to plain speaking, previously accused Marles of a “careless betrayal of the country’s policy agency and independence.” Keating said:
“A moment when an Australian Labor government intellectually ceded Australia to the United States as a platform for the US and, by implication, Australia, for military engagement against the Chinese state in response to a threat China is alleged to be making.”
Keating noted the obvious:
“China has not threatened Australia militarily, nor indeed has it threatened the United States. And it has no intention of so threatening.”
The Revolving Door
The frequency with which political advisers revolve from the Albanese government into the private sector is striking. In March 2026, Defence Minister Richard Marles’s former policy adviser, Kieran Ingrey, left his position and immediately landed at the lobby shop GRACosway.
This is not an isolated incident. It is the revolving door – the mechanism by which public servants and political advisers convert their access into private-sector profit. The same mechanism that has been documented in the United States.
The Australian Financial Review notes that the practice “is starting to give the impression they’re using parliament as a halfway house.” The impression is correct. The halfway house is not a failure. It is a feature.
Ingrey’s new employer, GRACosway, is a lobbying and strategic communications firm. It represents corporate clients. It does not represent the Australian people. The revolving door ensures that the interests of the defence contractors are well represented – not only in the minister’s office, but in the minister’s mind.
The Silence of the Mainstream Media
The mainstream media has been complicit in downplaying the severity of the crisis. The government’s “no surprises” agreements have been reported as diplomatic victories. The 100 million litre purchase has been framed as a success. The underlying structural vulnerabilities have been glossed over.
The fuel tax credit scheme has received almost no coverage. The billions of dollars flowing to mining companies have been ignored. The fact that Australia has no strategic fuel reserve has been mentioned in passing, then forgotten.
The media is not neutral. It is captured.
A Final Word
Richard Marles did not deliver a defence strategy. He delivered a sales pitch.
The target is China. The enemy is abstract. The threat is manufactured.
The real purpose is the wealth transfer. The real beneficiaries are the defence contractors. The real losers are the Australian people, who will pay for this escalation with their taxes, their security, and their future.
The tickets to the Apocalypse Circus keep hitting the marketplace. The government is selling them. The media is promoting them. The opposition is cheering them on.
And the fuel crisis is not a natural disaster. It is a policy choice.
Keep Independent Journalism Alive – Support The AIMN
Dear Reader,
Since 2013, The Australian Independent Media Network has been a fearless voice for truth, giving public interest journalists a platform to hold power to account. From expert analysis on national and global events to uncovering issues that matter to you, we’re here because of your support.
Running an independent site isn’t cheap, and rising costs mean we need you now more than ever. Your donation – big or small – keeps our servers humming, our writers digging, and our stories free for all.
Join our community of truth-seekers. Please consider donating now via:
PayPal or credit card – just click on the Donate button below
Direct bank transfer: BSB: 062500; A/c no: 10495969
We’ve also set up a GoFundMe as a dedicated reserve fund to help secure the future of our site.
Your support will go directly toward covering essential costs like web hosting renewals and helping us bring new features to life. Every contribution, no matter the size, helps us keep improving and growing.
Thank you for standing with us – we truly couldn’t do this without you.
With gratitude, The AIMN Team
Sadly the respected Andrew Klein has provided an atypical slander of current LABOR government policy by brushing aside the history of foundation policies of the irresponsible, unthinking, uncaring COALition misgovernments.
Without a doubt Retched Mediocrity is the least talented current LABOR personage and properly unsuited for such a senior Ministry as Defence. But his faction leadership exposes the problem of factions where internal promotion is controlled by ”skulduggery” rather than elected as ”talented”.
Keating is correct ….. PRC China is less concern that the USA (Undemocratic Sewer of Apartheid) for Asian countries, where Australia belongs as a non-aligned middle power.
Balancing the Australian budget is easily facilitated by ceasing both the Fossil Fuel Exploration tax credits, worth BILLIONS, and this Fuel Tax Credit Scheme worth a mere $1.824 BILLION PER YEAR to the above five (5) corporations foreign owned multinational mining corporations alone.
How much free health care could be provided by that amount of government spending on health infrastructure, equipment and staffing??
The root cause of structural failure of government policy ignores the fact that since 2010 NRMA warning the COALition was in power for nine (9) do-nothing years, especially the NOtional$ allegedly representing the best interests of the agricultural sector.
The ”revolving door” of senior government advisors into corporations again ignores the post-politics careers of too many mainly COALition ministers retiring from politics on Friday afternoon to commence work the following Monday for a foreign owned multinational corporations that they worked for when a politician. Think, Scummo, Andrew Downer, Pine for example.
Gee, if only we had a government committed to weaning us off fossil fuel dependency and transitioning to EVs as a matter of national emergency. Twenty years ago!
Maybe I miss something, but is the question ever asked about whether our need for enhanced defense spending is due solely to our accommodating the USA front line. Has anyone noticed what happened to the US military bases in the middle east over the last few weeks!!
Aussie taxpayers paying the protection money for Americans who defend their home land from invasion by either Mexico, or Canada. Their choice of picking China as an adversary is their decision, and entirely unnecessary unless your economy depends on perpetual war.
If the brown stuff ever hits the fan between USA and China we can expect Pine Gap to be reduced to ruble along with maybe 5 or 6 other hot spots of US presence.
That will happen immediately, and if we are spending huge sums of Aussie dollars to prevent this then its a pure waste of our resources. Keating makes sense when asking taxpayers to imagine the shape of a Chinese invasion of our continent. Its ludicrous.
If we severed this “joined at the hip” relationship with USA (and Israel), and treated them as simply a friend who has hit bad times and is now disabled, then we can review OUR approach to defence, what risks really are, and how much we spend to cover the situation.
This Amy Remeikis article first published in The New Daily then the Australian Institute, lays out the historical causes of many/most of the current Australian economic problems and attributes the causal ”blame” squarely to successive COALition misgovernments.
Nothing will change if Australians vote for the LIARBRAL$ (Corporation ”political donations” before representing voters” or
NOtional$ (the party you have when you want nothing changed) or
ON (hate, hate, hate anybody who is different or more competent than a former fishmonger).
Anus Faylure is looking for a 19th century future where the grazier class of his forebears require workers to touch the forelock acknowledging their inferior social position. This makes his fragile ego feel so much better ….. just like his ”hero” TACO Trumpery.
https://thepoint.com.au/opinions/260416-taylor-has-only-vibes-and-fumes-no-answers-on-migration
Regional INDEPENDENTS get things done for their communities.
What do LIARBRAL$, NOtional$ and ON do?? As little as possible.
Just heard on ABC RN (180426): What is impeding the uptake of electric vehicles?
There is a 40% tariff on electric vehicles to encourage market demand for fossil fuel powered heavy transport vehicles that are less efficient on the highways, especially hills.
Now which American vehicle manufacturers would have an interest in this matter??
Back in the 60s Australia received the first ship load of Japanese vehicles that included all the bells & whistles desired by car owners but excluded from American based cars.
Just little things, like a working radio, windscreen washers, car heaters etc , etc. The market swung to the Japanese manufacturers while the Americans eventually caught up.
Now the Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) mob are using government policy to work against the best interests of Australian voters while Australia is impacted by foreign wars in which we have little direct interest.
Perhaps the optimal strategy is to eliminate the demand for fossil fuels so that Australia industries are isolated from the American warmongering overseas.
We want a cleaner environment so it is in our best interest to switch to E-Vehicles ASAP. Then further improvement follow renovating and reopening regional passenger rail services by reducing passenger vehicle numbers on the degrading highways and putting inter-city freight on rail.
idiots should be encourage to vote
At the time when the 4 big consultancy bodies were found to have been in league with big American firms, it happened that the AUKUS deal was just being made, locking Australia into the $368 billion nuclear submarine purchase deal. Richard Marles was highly involved in that deal, and in relation to this, announced a nauseatingly message of praise and thanks to KPMG, the most prominent of those crooked consultancy firms. I read that article in The Age print version. It did not appear in the online Age version, and was subsequently nowhere to be found on the Internet. Nowhere any mention of Marles and KPMG co-oerating on this. It had suddenly become very much “classified information”
It seems that many politicians, in particular those from the two major parties – or do we include the Nats and One Nation as well? – spend major efforts on getting elected or reelected, and then forget about the voters who gave them their seats in the first instance. How else to explain the considerable raft of policy decisions which are anathema to the people of this country… the wretched AUKUS commitment, the unbending alliance with the USA, the cruel policies in regard to refugees and asylum seekers such as sending them into limbo in offshore detention, the lack of visible and practical action with respect to the housing crisis, the scandal of the tertiary education sector being turned into a money-making mill for executives within universities, the failure of TAFE across the nation, the incapacity of the health sector to deal with demand, the wretched state of affairs in regard to early-age childcare, the lack of affordability of housing at all levels and the consequent social stressors, the almost exponential rate of environmental decline along with almost next to nothing being done to combat this disaster… where does one stop in this rueful analysis of the state of the nation, and why, why, has it gotten to this parlous state? It’s simply not good enough to state that those that should be awake, aware, responsible, have been and are asleep at the wheel… a condition that everyone knows can lead to fatal consequences.
Why wasn’t Donald Horne made compulsory reading for everyone who aspired to a political career? From 1964 onwards, The Lucky Country has never been out of print and it’s more salient today then it’s ever been.
Why do we gift miners like Hancock Prospecting, BHP, Rio Tinto, Woodside et al the rights to reap billions in profits and pay pennies in taxation, while at the same time their businesses destroy landscape and ecosystems at scale? Or the salmon farming in Tasmania, all foreign-owned, profits off-shored, with death & destruction to Tasmanian marine environments?
Somethings very very wrong in the zeitgeist, and we don’t know how to fix it.
@ Canguro: it is called ”free market economics” written by Adam Whats-his-name about 150 years ago when it was legal to own slaves.
Free market economics identifies that the rich always win because they have the financial power to buy the political power to write the laws that favour their own enterprises.
@ Dr Andrew Klein: “….But his faction leadership exposes the problem of factions where internal promotion is controlled by ”skulduggery” rather than elected as ”talented….”.
Thus did Marles eliminate Ed Husic, an inconvenient Bosnian Muslim, from participating in the current Albanese Government.
Happened upon an article from Mirage that says it very well as well:
‘As stated by Greens Senator and Defence Spokesperson David Shoebridge:
“It is astonishing that nowhere in his “landmark” defence speech did Defence Minister Richard Marles even mention Donald Trump or the chaotic behaviour of the US and its military. That tells you everything about how detached this strategy is from the world we actually live in.
“Minister Marles has looked at the last twelve months of global chaos and decided China is the main threat to peace. Someone should check if he owns a television.
“Minister Marles still talks of “impactful projection” with his plan to project Australian military force anywhere on the planet to police global trade. This is a foolish and dangerous strategy that inevitably embeds us into global US military deployments.
“At its core this new strategy is doubling down on the US alliance, while still pretending it is based on a “shared commitment to rules, sovereignty and self respect.” You can only deliver this message if you actively ignore all the evidence of the US actively trashing international law and peaceful norms.
“For all the trumpeting of increased spending it’s worth noting it’s primarily delivered by an accounting trick where defence pensions get rebadged as defence spending and most of actual budget increases are being sunk straight into the AUKUS submarine black hole.
“This current strategy is a frantic attempt to convince News Corp and the US leadership of our unquestioning loyalty, it has nothing to do with pivoting towards a genuinely sovereign defence force that would protect us here at home.
“The US is an increasingly rogue actor pursuing its own interests, not ours and any rational review of national defence needs to acknowledge this.
“Real human security means investment in defensive capacity plus investment in renewable energy, housing, health and education. The things that actually keep Australians safe.”‘
https://www.miragenews.com/aukus-gamble-on-trump-risks-australias-security-1656473/
I think the main points to take out of what David Shoebridge says is, as Andrew covered so well, that Marles inverts reality by saying China is the main threat to peace – spare us the flat earthers!!
The most significant point for me is this projection of power overseas of Marles, I believe we have no place doing that, should have no part and having any part in that, and having a part in that would be a security risk to ourselves and ,when done in conjunction with the USA, the world at large.
The most significant point for me is this projection of power overseas of Marles,
Exactly Thommo, could not agree more.
They don’t seem to realise that this diminishes Oz in the eyes of our neighbours.
Or perhaps they still like the Howard fantasy of being the region’s Deputy Sherrif.
Either way it’s pathetic.
“Howard fantasy of being the region’s Deputy Sherrif”
Yes Steve, I think you’re right, that is where this sycophancy to US aggression emanated from.
What I’d like to see happen is our government consult countries worldwide to give support for the ICJ and ICC so that they can act effectively irrespective of US sanction and then consult with Global South countries and stand up and say that the Trump regime is committing war crimes and refer Trump to the ICJ or ICC whichever is appropriate.
I say Global South at the exclusion of the West because the obvious thing to come next is that Biden, Merz, Starmer, Macron and Albanese would be referred to the ICJ for complicity in genocide and the West ain’t going to support that.
I say consult with other countries as a country acting alone is not likely to succeed but would still be happy, not overjoyed, if our government acted alone and simply got up and called a spade a spade and left it at that.