Australian governments at all levels have learned a lot between the onset of the bushfire season and the first stages of the novel coronavirus pandemic. There’s a clear understanding that national crises require coherent national …
The new coronavirus, Covid-19, has spread to more than 130 countries—bringing social disruption, economic damage, sickness and death—largely because authorities in China, where it emerged, initially suppressed information about it. And yet China is now …
Australia is doing a lot of thinking about what steps to take in the South Pacific. How high does the ‘Pacific step-up’ have to go? How many different steps? Step style? Step hierarchy? How to …
Recently I met with a former right-wing extremist in Australia who had become deradicalised. This Australian had once believed, proudly, that given the mere fact they were born white made them superior to other races, …
The world One couldn’t be blamed for believing that the end of the world is nigh as the World Health Organization declares a coronavirus pandemic and coverage of the outbreak takes over just about every …
While Australia looked to America in 1941–42 to defeat a military threat, the post-war vision of Prime Minister John Curtin and his successor Ben Chifley was to restore the British Commonwealth to bind and strengthen …
Both the title and Peter Greste’s endorsement on the front cover suggest that Brian Toohey’s book is a ‘history of the Australian government’s love affair with secrecy and state power’. Toohey would be well placed …
In four days of madness from 23 to 26 February, rioters ran unchecked and destroyed entire neighbourhoods of northeast Delhi in the deadliest outbreak of violence since the anti-Sikh pogrom of 1984. By 6 March, …
Two important military developments recently should give China pause for thought. The first one is the announcement by Prime Minister Scott Morrison of a $1.1 billion upgrade to the Royal Australian Air Force base at …
The beat Australian police use facial recognition system Buzzfeed News obtained a list of clients of facial recognition company Clearview AI that revealed Australian state and federal law enforcement agencies have signed up for its …
In the 1959 Alfred Hitchcock thriller North by Northwest, the hero (played by Cary Grant) is drawn in a northwesterly direction to the movie’s climax on Mount Rushmore. The movement is inexorable and inevitable. In …
Poker games get no bigger than this. Saudi Arabia’s Prince Mohammed bin Salman has gambled that a threatened cut of almost US$1 trillion to global oil revenue will force Russia’s President Vladimir Putin back into …
At this stage of Australia’s future submarine project, there is absolutely zero chance of the government adopting a Plan B. Realistically, I doubt that the government—or the opposition if by some alternate miracle they were …
Those of us who were in the defence sector in the late 2000s will remember the challenges that both the Department of Defence and the defence industry experienced in attracting and retaining workers in what …
Every day, we’re surrounded by a sea of radiofrequency signals—from our smartphones, GPS, vehicle proximity sensors, and TV and radio broadcasts. All of these systems use the radiofrequency spectrum, on an exclusive or shared basis. …
This article is the first in a series on women, peace and security that The Strategist will be publishing over coming weeks in recognition of International Women’s Day. On International Women’s Day on Sunday, Foreign Minister Marise …
In this episode, Michael Shoebridge and Marcus Hellyer discuss the implications of the decision to pause production of the Triton unmanned aerial vehicles that Australia is buying from the US. After that, Kelly Smith speaks …
At a recent US Air Force Association conference, Elon Musk, creator of the SpaceX reusable rocket, told thousands of fighter pilots that ‘the fighter jet era has passed’. This declaration on the future of unmanned …
Sea state Japan’s Maritime Self-Defense Force has commissioned its first Soryu-class diesel–electric submarine equipped with lithium-ion batteries. The lithium-ion batteries store significantly more energy than the lead-acid batteries used in earlier subs. The 4,100-tonne JS …
Many Americans say they want a moral foreign policy but disagree on what that means. Using a three-dimensional scorecard encourages us to avoid simplistic answers and to look at the motives, means and consequences of …