Australian Defence The new Australian armaments programme, which is to
cost Li ti millions in the coming year, has no doubt been influenced to some extent by discussions at the Imperial Conference. Its expansions are mainly naval and aerial ; on the military side the chief change is a very necessary increase in the anti-aircraft defences of the principal towns, for attacks from hostile aircraft-carriers are quite possible. One of the features of most general interest is the expansion (at considerable cost) of the manufacture of arms and munitions in Australia itself. If it may be said that today no nation is fully self-defended unless it can keep up an arms supply on the spot, this seems particularly true of a nation occupying so remote and isolated a geographical position as Australia. But the chief contribution which the Commonwealth will make to Imperial as distinct from local defence lies elsewhere. It is the powerful wireless station to be erected at Canberra, which will maintain touch with ships over a great part of the Indian and Pacific Oceans. Canberra is far inland and cannot easily be raided or bombed. For such security the great size of Australia offers possibilities not to be found elsewhere in the Pacific.
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