This post is kicking off a series from ASPI’s International Cyber Policy Centre on Indigenous Australians in STEM and cyber policy. As a shy teenager growing up in Darwin in the 1980s, I was always …
There’s no shortage of books about the growing strategic and economic competition between China and the United States. Adding something distinctive and worthwhile to the literature, therefore, is no easy task. The Indo-Pacific: Trump, China, …
The ‘new normal’ of Australia’s relationship with China is that it will be marked by ‘enduring differences’. That’s the outlook offered by the secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Frances Adamson. It’s …
In this episode, Strategist editor Jack Norton covers this year’s Beersheba Dialogue, the annual conference between ASPI and the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, named after the World War I battle. He speaks to former …
The world With Tech Geek taking a week off, this ‘Suggests’ includes more on the world. The story of Wang Liqiang, who declared that he was a Chinese spy, broke this week with reporting in …
China’s global disinformation campaign—which recently painted Hong Kong’s democracy advocates as violent and unpopular radicals—should cause concern for democracies around the world. In addition to highlighting the many ways in which technology can be used …
On 1 December, Ursula von der Leyen will finally take office as president of the European Commission. She has promised to lead a commission that will avoid a scenario in which, as French President Emmanuel …
We are in an era when the risks of major-power conflict are growing. The most likely contenders are commonly seen to be China, the rising power, and the US, the formerly dominant power that’s now …
Australian political leaders and strategic thinkers have, rightly, dedicated considerable attention to Hong Kong and Xinjiang in recent months. It’s time to expand the discussion to another self-declared ‘core interest’ of the Chinese Communist Party: …
The beat Sri Lankan police barred from leaving the country The chief of Sri Lanka’s Criminal Investigation Department has issued a directive to the country’s airports to prevent police officers from leaving without permission. The …
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has outlasted the country. For the foreseeable future, Assad will be trying to restore central government control and manoeuvring between Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan over …
The choice for Australia is not the one we’re always being told we have to make—between America and China. It’s the choice between the status quo, a wilful complacency, on the one hand. And, on …
It’s difficult to see a convincing case on ‘national interest’ grounds for moving full-cycle docking of the Collins-class submarines from ASC’s Osborne shipyard to Fremantle in Western Australia. Indeed, doing so may put the navy’s …
The United States’ defence industrial base—Australia’s most significant source of military technology—is struggling to respond to a new era of strategic competition. Years of congressional budgetary instability and the US Department of Defense’s sluggish response …
When Xu Yanjun travelled to Belgium in April 2018, he wasn’t there as a tourist but as an officer of China’s Ministry of State Security. Xu had been lured to Belgium by US authorities who …
Given the global rise of authoritarian powers with very active repressive security and intelligence regimes that, as the European Commission noted in March this year, pose a systemic challenge to the liberal democratic model, it’s …
Scott Morrison likes using the phrase ‘delicate moment in time’ to describe the international dynamics Australia is now faced with. It’s a time to build friendships on many fronts, as the government understands well. But …
Sea state China’s first domestically built aircraft carrier, known as the Type 001A, has sailed into the South China Sea. The Chinese navy says the vessel is there to conduct ‘scientific tests and routine drills’. …
In many ways, the American label of ‘great wall of sand’ that was applied to the artificial islands in the South China Sea encapsulates a key element of Chinese thinking. The same desire to protect …
Melbourne car dealer Nick Zhao may or may not have been approached by Chinese state operatives offering $1 million for the Liberal Party member to run for parliament. He’s dead and a coronial inquiry is …