With a single squadron of F-16's, a couple of small frigates and a bunch of OPV's I don't think they could do much against the ADF militarily at sea.

Did anyone actually like Portugal enough to stick up for them?

spain had franco - portugal had salazar.

Pretty much what I thought, they were the basket case of Europe and only carried because they weren't communist.

 

Their military were a joke.

 

Their airforce operating T-38 as fighters, supplemented with hand me down Corsairs and Alfa Jets for strike into the 90's. Their Navy consisted of everyone elses obsolescent discards until the Meko 200PN's arrived mid 90's. Don't know much about their army but I do know their paramilitary police have lots of nice shiny toys to intimidate civilians with.

 

Even if they could have found a way to get the limited capability they did posses to our region what they had, which they could only afford through the charity of other NATO members, would not have made much of an impression on the ADF.

 

All together Indonesia would have been a far greater challenge for ADF in any dispute over the Timor Sea than Portugal could ever have been.

 

Interestingly Portugal and China are both trying to gain influence in Timor and may prove to be a thorn in our side in decades to come.

Actually after looking into the equipment status of the Portuguese in the late 70's and early 80's I'm not so sure that a bingle in the Timor Sea would have been a cakewalk for Australia. They had three Albacore class submarines (four until 1975 when they transferred one the Pakistan) so had they based one in ET it would have made it very hard for us to secure the Timor sea with sufficient surity to develop the gas reserves. The Portuguese A-7's would have also posed an all weather threat once they arrived in 1981. The gas reserves were at the edge of the range of the Mirage 111 so it would have been hard for us to operate major surface vessels there without exposing them to an unacceptably high risk of air attack. The A-7's also had the range to reach Darwin and I think at the outside Tindal, and had the warload to seriously degrade or even knock out an airbase. The only option for us would have been to pre-emptively hit their airbase with the Pigs, a risky move diplomatically.

I think that it would have been a case of neither country being able to secure the maritime AO sufficiently to develop the gas reserves. We certainly didn't have the capacity to invade ET and I can't imagine that the East Timorese would have been terribly amenable to engaging with us if we tried to turn them on the Portuguese when they knew that all we were after was the gas, so allies aside it could well have been a military stalemate which would have led to negitiations.

Interestingly Portugal and China are both trying to gain influence in Timor and may prove to be a thorn in our side in decades to come.

For old times sake, national pride, access to the gas reserves, to punish Australia for intervening (decdes after we should have) when they failed to?

 

Basically I don't know and am just guessing.

  

The alternative is that if Portugal began fortifying Timor during the 70's and 80's, Australia may have been forced to enhance its cababilities in a number of areas to counteract the threat. The threat of A-7's bombing Darwin may have gotten the F-14 or F-15 over line as well as a 1980's E-3 purchace instead of the F/A-18 . The submarine threat may have seen Melbourne replaced by two or three light carriers with Seakings and Seaharriers and the FFG's giving way to KIDD class DDG's. The Army would likely have retained its 9 Battalion Infantry Division Structure but with enhanced forced entry capability i.e. a full brigade being converted to Airborne, another to Marine Expeditionary and the third being Mechanised / Armoured  together with a beefed up CAV and regional surveilance force to defend against SF incursions.

 

All very expensive but probably along the lines of what we would have been forced to spend had Suharto not dragged Indonesia away from Soviet influence in to late 60's.

During the late 60's, when Indonesia was seen as a Soviet alligned threat, the ADF had a raft of new and enhanced capabilities on the cards. Suharto's coup turned Indonesia away from the Soviets allowing Australia to dramatically reduce defence spending and can these capabilities, however the Portugese challenge, suggested in this post, would have justified continuing some or even most of these programs.

 

The Starlifter / Galaxy strategic airlifter would probably still have been dropped, as would the nuclear power / weapons program. What may well have proceeded is the two ocean navy with 3 carriers, 23 frigates / destroyers, an AOE, a 12000t amphibious ship; the Army would have got their fast landing ships to replace their four LSM's, HAWK SAM's, AH-1 Gunships, a supersonic trainer / light strike aircraft as well as an inflight refueling capability.

 

What did go ahead was the formation of airborne and mech infrantry capabilities, the replacement of the Centurion tank, which was in doubt for a while, and eventually, the replacement of the Mirage with a multirole tactical fighter.

 

Cause and effect, the programs were cut as the threat that justified them went away; introduce a new, but similar, threat and the programs have new justification.