There is no way Australia could ever build enough warships to counter the hundreds of warships owned by the superpowers, but we could have thousands of anti-ship missiles.
The PRC alone has over 750 warships with over 4,300 missiles silos.
Hidden anti-ship missiles
In an age of ubiquitous surveillance, thousands of hidden truck-mounted anti-ship missiles would be a powerful deterrent.
Given Australia’s excellent road network we don’t need these missile systems to be on obvious 8×8 or 10×10 military launchers. There are intermediate range (1,000km+) anti-ship missiles that would fit in 12 meter shipping container-shaped launchers. We should be able to make our own.
More on the X-BAT UAV here.