Articles by: "Graeme Dobell"
Oz–India: interests not just leaders

The differences between Australia and India will be bridged by systemic needs and policy problems, not by leadership will. Instead of leadership chemistry, the drivers can be the convergence of strategic interests and the great …

Oz–India: Commonwealth to Chemistry

The slow and stuttering course of the Australia–India relationship over the last 70 years has been troubled by the Curse of the Cs. The Cs are about what the two Indian Ocean states seem to …

Singapore and Oz: mismatched mates

Singapore and Australia have nothing in common but share much. No similarities, yet multiple places where interests and attitudes touch or chime. Geographically, they are mismatched mates: the nation with a continent to itself shares …

Australia’s Indo–Pacific understanding

Australia is re-embracing the Indo–Pacific as the defining geographic expression of defence strategy. The Indo–Pacific was the big new theme of Labor’s 2013 Defence White Paper, and it’ll have the same status in the Coalition’s …

India and the Indo-Pacific

Australia is offering India a renewed geostrategic embrace and an economic deal—notable efforts by Canberra to strengthen geostrategic convergence with India and to deepen geo-economic linkages. The bilateral effort with India feeds the regionalist understanding …

Singapore’s 50th birthday

A few days after kicking Singapore out of the federation in 1965, Malaysia’s leader Tunku Abdul Rahman had a news conference to discuss the traumatic political divorce. The avuncular aristocrat was typically chirpy as he …

The contents and contests of The Alliance 

Australia’s nightmare about the US alliance has two versions: home alone or crushed by the embrace. Opposing dreads: Oz abandoned versus Oz abused. For decades, home alone was dominant. Oz would call but Washington would …

Fifty years of the Indonesia Project

Over the past 50 years there were many times when Australia and Indonesia found it difficult to talk to each other about politics, strategy or diplomacy. We’re having another episode now. Economics, though, has always …

Australia, India and strategic convergence

For India and Australia, a striking new reality is in view. One of the great negatives in India’s traditional view of Australia is turning into a positive. Suddenly Australia’s alliance with the US makes us …

Army: slouch hat plus jointery

The Australian Army has to do more than fight. It must carry a legend and serve the slouch hat mystique. The mythology’s a century old and is as much a part of the Army as …

Asia’s history challenge

ASEAN’s leaders are worried about what history tells them about the future of Southeast Asia. The fears about the lessons of history are a discordant note as ASEAN steps up to a great moment in …