By making Vietnam and Indonesia his first overseas ports of call, Japan’s Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga signalled that he intends to adhere closely to his predecessor Shinzo Abe’s ‘free and open Indo-Pacific’ strategy. Seeing that occur …
Articles by: "Malcolm Cook"
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s announcement that he is standing down for health reasons is worrying many across the Indo-Pacific. The US, Australia and Southeast Asia have grown accustomed to Japan’s stronger and ‘sturdier’ leadership …
Long waits can let cooler heads prevail and reverse hot-headed decisions. In January, President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines threatened to terminate the 1998 Philippine–US Visiting Forces Agreement—a treaty-level pact that provides the operational framework …
Australia’s first foreign and trade policy white paper in 1997 was titled ‘In the national interest’ and its successor in 2003 was titled ‘Advancing the national interest’. The 2017 white paper dispensed with the catchy …
Dhruva Jaishankar’s recent Strategist post and Huong Le Thu’s ASPI special report are useful correctives to the widespread misreading of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue. That infrequent, irregular meetings of (not the most) senior officials from …
Fifteen years ago, a network linking Philippine terrorist groups with counterparts across Southeast Asia and the Middle East was found to be behind the Bali bombings that killed 202 people. Perpetrators found a haven for …
The new US–Japan Guidelines for Defense Cooperation (PDF) and the accompanying joint statement by the two countries’ foreign and defence ministers commit both sides to do more with each other in relation to third countries …
Peter Jennings’ recent post on the 2014 QDR led me to read the report—and its 50% longer, more ambitious and less focussed 2010 predecessor. I’ll adopt Peter’s format of worries and hopes/opportunities for Asia-Pacific allies and …
Just as the thumping victory by the conservative Liberal Democratic Party under Shinzo Abe in December 2011 over the ‘progressive’ Democratic Party of Japan is good for Japan–Australia relations, the thumping victory by the Liberal–National …
Brendan Taylor provides an eloquent critique of Ben Scheer’s recent post, but I don’t think I can agree with him. In his desire to ‘soften’ his former colleague’s line on China’s recent actions in the …
At first glance, it appears that the recent election results in Japan and the early policy pronouncements of the Abe government indicate that Japan has shifted significantly to the right and that this will increase …