Of all the credible contingencies facing Australia in the foreseeable future, the most challenging would undoubtedly be our involvement with the US in countering a major Chinese attack on Taiwan. For obvious reasons, our politicians …
Articles by: "Paul Dibb"
Australia’s deteriorating strategic outlook raises the question under what conditions should we develop a nuclear weapon of our own? This option was seriously considered by Australian governments in the 1960s, and the Department of Defence …
Australia’s international security outlook is starting to look very unpredictable and potentially threatening. Australian defence planners must now deal with a world which is very different from any they have known before. America is undermining …
Australia’s international security outlook is starting to look very threatening. The White House is undermining the international order, has started a trade war with China and the EU, and is threatening the unity of NATO. …
The revelation by the Fairfax Press—which hasn’t been confirmed by any other source—that China may be interested in building a military base in Vanuatu has raised a storm of negative commentary. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull …
How seriously should we take President Vladimir Putin’s address to the Russian Federal Assembly on 1 March 2018, where he boasted about radical breakthroughs with Russia’s new nuclear weapons? Were these merely the rantings of …
The US National Defense Strategy paper, which was unveiled by Defense Secretary James Mattis on 19 January, is a brutally frank statement of the threats facing America. This is the Pentagon’s first new defence strategy …
The 2017 foreign policy white paper is a well-crafted document that covers the key elements of Australia’s foreign-policy outlook. In addition—unlike its predecessors—it sets out Australia’s strategic priorities. It skilfully melds the geoeconomic and geostrategic …
Australia’s strategic outlook is deteriorating and, for the first time since World War II, we face an increased prospect of threat from a major power. This means that a major change in Australia’s approach to …
Following last week’s decision by an Indonesian court to jail the former governor of Jakarta—Basuki Tjahaja Purnama (Ahok)—for two years for blasphemy, we need to ask ourselves whether Indonesia is heading down the path of …
A senior US military general in South Korea recently advised Foreign Minister Julie Bishop that Australia would ‘soon be within range’ of a North Korean nuclear strike. That raises several crucial defence policy questions. First, …
Much of the commentary in Australia since the US election has reeked of dangerous platitudes. A lot of ‘experts’ (none of whom forecast a Trump victory) are asserting that nothing much will change: President Trump …