ABSTRACT
Under the Trump administration, US engagement with allies in Europe and the Indo-Pacific has been turbulent and characterized by a resurgent transactionalism on the part of Washington. US political commitments to alliances may have weakened under the Trump administration, but on the ground America’s alliances have in fact been strengthened since 2017. As Australia’s security environment continues to evolve in ways that are hard to predict, policy makers may be tempted to recalibrate the country’s strategic posture, and with it the nature of the alliance with the United States. Despite the long-standing alliance with the US, the concept of armed neutrality has a well-established presence in the history of Australian strategic discourse. Bandwagoning has traditionally been defined among realists as weaker states submitting to rising great powers and is typically juxtaposed with balancing, where states either unilaterally or with other likeminded states seek to constrain the rise of the new great power.
