China’s strategic goals in the Pacific are emerging and Australia must be concerned, or alarmed!

What makes this issue even more important is that as with the Vanuatu project, the Chinese proposal is economically unviable. Samoa is a small nation and its main port in the capital was recently totally redeveloped and expanded thanks to a grant provided by Japan's international assistance agency.

China clearly wants to undermine Japan's contribution and building a second port funded by a loan Samoa cannot afford drives its strategy. Almost half of the Samoa government debt is owed to China and it is common knowledge it is struggling to meet repayments of the existing loans the current government signed up to.

When as seems inevitable the FAST Party led by Faime Naomi Mata'afa assumes office Australia and New Zealand will have to be very alert to how China will respond of the new government cancels the port project. China will almost certainly call in other loans it has advanced to Samoa – and there is no way the new government could repay them on its own.

Australia, and New Zealand, are going to have to seriously consider coming to Samoa's aid in these circumstances. The loans advanced to Samoa by China total around $500 million.

Because of Samoa's strategic location, and the significant Samoan communities in Australia and New Zealand, helping Samoa prevent China taking over assets is justifiable. And it would send a clear message to China – debt trap diplomacy can be defeated!

In recent weeks an even more suspicious PRC "infrastructure project" in the Pacific has emerged – and this one ought to alarm the United States even more than it should alarm Australia.

The Republic of Kiribati is a vast in terms of area but small in terms of population nation in the Central Pacific. Australia has enjoyed good relations with Kiribati and the federal budget contains direct Australian assistance in 2021-22 worth $40 million. For a country with a population of around 120,000 that is not an insignificant amount.

Some years ago Kiribati shifted its alliance from Taiwan to the Peoples Republic of China. The President of Kiribati visited Beijing and was fated personally by President Ji.

One of the dozens of islands in the Kiribati group is Kanton. It has a population of just 20! It makes no real economic contribution to Kiribati.

It has recently been reported that as part of its relationship with Kiribati, China is proposing the upgrade of a wartime airstrip on Kanton built by the Americans during World War Two. It has hardly been used since the war, and certainly not commercially.

Why would China want to upgrade an airstrip that is economically unviable, remote and largely disused?

There can be no doubt about the answer – in any dispute, or worse, with the United States or Australia the airstrip would give China a significant strategic advantage, just as the port in Vanuatu would and the proposed ports in Daru and Samoa would.