The devastating wildfires in California have turned the City of Stars into a scene from an apocalyptic Hollywood movie. It’s hard to fathom that a disaster of this magnitude could strike a major coastal city …
Articles by: "Raelene Lockhorst"
On Christmas morning in 1974, Cyclone Tracy unleashed catastrophic destruction on Darwin, forever altering the city and Australia’s approach to disaster resilience. As the intensity of climate-driven catastrophes grows, the main lesson of Cyclone Tracy …
The Royal Australian Navy needs missile reloading facilities in the north of the country, most obviously at Darwin and Cairns. The southern ports where Australian warships now take on munitions are too far from where …
Chinese companies own or operate at least one port on every continent except Antarctica. These investments present more than immediate security concerns; they position China to fully exploit the economic potential of ports at the …
The 2024 Defence Fuel Symposium, held in early September in Canberra, highlighted the urgent need for a strategic overhaul of Australia’s fuel security in response to increasing global instability. The rules-based international order that has …
Capacity constraints in the construction industry and its reluctance to take on defence contracts are threatening the building up of northern and western defence bases, a key element of the 2024 National Defence Strategy (NDS). …
The Department of Defence is the largest single landholder in the Commonwealth and one of the largest overall landholders in Australia. The Defence estate comprises 70 major bases, 100-plus training ranges and more than 1000 …
The September 2023 announcement designating Townsville as the hub for armoured vehicles and Army attack and medium-lift aviation triggers a sense of déjà vu—about Plan Beersheba. This strategic shift, a direct outcome of the 2023 …
Climate change’s threat to national security has been widely examined by security agencies, researchers and thought leaders across the world. Much of this analysis has focused on adaption and operational considerations associated with the destabilisation …
The quest for independence signals a nation’s pursuit of sovereignty and control over its internal and external affairs. Sovereignty serves as the cornerstone upon which a country’s identity, governance, security, and international relationships are built. …
The government has commissioned an audit of the Defence estate to look at whether it ‘reflects contemporary needs in light of the decision to prioritise investment in Australia’s northern network of bases, ports and barracks’. …
Security weaknesses and cyber ‘doors left open’, employees turned rogue, and hackers demanding ransom, all demonstrate dramatically the need for strong critical infrastructure risk management. Examples of how vulnerabilities will be exploited were highlighted in …