When US officials of the calibre of Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Locklear and Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell say they are worried about Australian defence spending, you can take it as read that they …
Debate: "General"
Last week, with the Asian Century White Paper, it was all about Australia’s relationship to Asia. This week it will be all about our security relationship with the US as the 2012 AUSMIN meets in …
This week’s graphs illustrate the importance of data in settling some historical debates. I was fortunate recently to have a chat with US military historian Williamson Murray. We got talking about some of his early …
Military organisations have a formalism for describing capability that involves a number of factors but there’s distressing tendency to focus on equipment and systems at the expense of some of the others. This focus is …
Here’s our weekly round-up of articles, reports and events in the strategy, defence and security world. The latest issue of Foreign Affairs sports a Linda Robinson piece on the future of special operations. Back in …
Our Antarctic claim is about the size of Australia, minus Queensland. So it’s pleasing to see that the new Asian Century White Paper gave a decent acknowledgement to the cold continent (p. 248): The development …
Strategist reader Linsday Dorman, an associate at Future Directions International, has submitted this comment: I enjoyed the report by Peter Jennings of 1 November. However, I note that he stresses ‘that our primary focus should …
Have we been sold a dummy pass on the impact of the defence budget cuts? Statements by the Defence Minister that that future plans are merely delayed may seem reasonable when money is tight and …
If today was the day after a major nuclear terrorist attack in your country, what would your government wish it had done to prevent it? This was the opening question at a roundtable discussion on …
The Prime Minister’s statement to the Parliament yesterday on Australia’s Afghanistan strategy continues to demonstrate planning for a relatively quick ADF exit from Uruzgan province. Any international pretence about nation building in Afghanistan has long …
At the launch of the Australia in the Asian Century White Paper, Lowy Institute Executive Director Michael Fullilove made an interesting observation during question time about the level of attention paid in Australia to developments in …
Recent contributions to The Strategist have provided valuable insights on the extent and limits of India’s willingness and capacity to assert itself as a nascent great power. Implicit in these discussions lies a deeper issue, …