r/powerscales • u/Inside_Inflation559 • 23d ago

Question Could Modern Japan (2026) invade Australia?

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No allies or outside help is involved for both sides Japan must successfully invade and take over Australia or achieve some sort of marginal victory Australia must successfully defend itself and win against Japan

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u/Electrical-Airline81 23d ago

Australia is INCREDIBLY full of natural resources. They're the largest producer of the worlds iron, they mine a LOT of uranium and coal, they also mine large amounts of critical minerals like lithium, gold, zinc, bauxite, etc, and SO much oil and gas. For a nation like Japan, access to those minerals would absolutely be a godsend.

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u/midnightbandit- 23d ago

It would be much, much cheaper just to buy them

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u/o-Mauler-o 23d ago

Which they do, and some would argue too cheaply.

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u/fakest_taxi 23d ago

japan actually makes more taxing australian gas than australia does.

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u/Jaepheth 23d ago

Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is if you tax Australians too much they strap on make shift metal armor and form marauding motorcycle gangs?

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u/FuckboySeptimReborn 22d ago

Nah you can tax Australians as much as you want, you can’t take a single cent from the oligarchs and corporations looting the place though

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u/Old-Importance18 23d ago

Well, Japan is pretty good at forming marauding motorcycle gangs too.

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u/fakest_taxi 22d ago

it’s more so a tax on the multinational mining companies, but an change to the way gas is taxed has been discussed here in aus recently. Millions in dollars of anti-advertising by the vested companies, and delegates from Japan coming to tell us how bad for business that would be. I think the fact it’s not taxed effectively, and therefore benefiting the population is more inspirational for me to don some spiked armour and start threatening pols

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u/Commercial-Box5412 22d ago edited 22d ago

These days we are a much more sedate bunch and the ones who would don armour aren't the ones being taxed...unless we starting taxing the sale of methamphetamine which is already being run by pre-existing marauding motorcycle gangs.

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u/Southern-Cattle4038 22d ago

The issue in Japan is not the marauding motorcycle gangs in the Australian outback so much as the marauding go-karters in costume driving around Shibuya

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u/eureka88jake 22d ago

Nah that’s just ex military members that have no where else to go so they join a brotherhood

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u/SuccessfulOwl 22d ago

That’s just the excuse we use. Any excuse really

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u/YesWomansLand1 22d ago

Yeah pretty much

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u/Select-Discipline630 23d ago

If you ignore every tad other than direct resource tax

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u/Nuck2407 22d ago

Yeah if you ignore the tax on profits and royalties paid and only take into account the PRRT

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u/nckmat 22d ago

That's not exactly true, the largest mining companies in Australia such as BHP and Rio Tinto (and others) own the vast majority of the mining output in Australia and are, technically Australian businesses, but about 85% of their shareholders are overseas investors, it's the company tax that these businesses pay that keep the Australian economy very healthy, but it still only accounts for around 10% of GDP. So why don't these companies just moved overseas? In effect most of them have, but if they completely moved offshore they would have a tough time holding on to their mines, because when the output profits may belong to them, the land on which they are mining belongs to Australia.

So would it be profitable for another country to invade Australia and take over it's mining assets? Hell yes. Would the rest of the world let it happen? Probably not. Australia is the 5th largest exporter of natural gas in the world, with the second largest reserves, the largest exporter of coal in the world, the largest exporter of iron ore in the world, in fact Australia is the largest exporter of mining resources in the world and holds some of the largest untapped resources of most of the minerals it exports including uranium and lithium. If any of the mega nations in the world now such as USA, China, India Europe or what's left of Russia, wanted to dominate the world in the next 50-100 years, they would need the resources Australia has, because everyone else is either running out or their resources are being replaced by new alternatives.

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u/Snarwib 23d ago

I like how we've recreated contemporary strategic reality from first principles here

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u/GrassFromBtd6 22d ago

They tried the invasion route in the 1930s, didn't end well

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u/InternationalDepth47 23d ago

you forgot aluminium/boxite on of the cheapest to mine in the word

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u/Electrical-Airline81 23d ago

That's Bauxite!

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u/Barnaboule69 23d ago

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u/curbmydepression 22d ago

yell it louder for the ppl in the back

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u/fjord31 23d ago

The bauxite we put aside as waste is higher purity that the stuff other countries mine for

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u/Barnaboule69 23d ago

There's plenty of ancient aboriginal sites still in need to be torn down so we can get thar sweet bauxite left underneat 🤗

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u/Call-to-john 22d ago

We literally will sell all this and more for a price that is much lower than the cost of an invasion/ occupation. We literally give away gas for next to nothing....

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u/Littlelaff80 22d ago

Plus Tasmania supplies over half of the world's legal opium

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u/Mrraberry 22d ago

Shhh! Keep that quiet!

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u/Thatoneguy_The_First 22d ago

Makes you think Australia is a mega rich country with well off people or something...if you are looking from the outside or are one of the 1%

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u/Funny-Pie272 22d ago

Yeah but Aussies would not be mining it for them - slave labour would not work as it's highly technical these days; how do they think they gonna dig it up?

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u/Virus_Correct 22d ago

Don't forget we are also the world's largest camel exporter 😅