The quantity and quality of Quad questions

The Quad is more notable for the questions it provokes than the answers it offers. The informal dialogue between the US, Japan, Australia and India is a discussion groping towards a grouping. ASPI’s paper Quad …

ASPI suggests

The world Three of Australia’s major political parties and the parliament have been hacked by a ‘sophisticated state actor’. For the details see the New York Times. Writing in The Strategist, Peter Jennings outlines why …

The ideology trap

President Donald Trump has declared a national emergency at the southern border of the United States—where there is no emergency at all—in order to access funding to build the wall that he promised his supporters …

Policy, Guns and Money: Episode 13

In this podcast, Tom Uren and Elise Thomas discuss the revelations that a ‘sophisticated state actor’ was behind cyberattacks on Australia’s parliament and major political parties and ask where we draw the line between espionage and …

The joint facilities: still the jewel in the crown

Since the 1980s, Australian defence ministers have made regular parliamentary statements about the roles and functions of the US–Australia joint defence facilities (at Pine Gap, North West Cape and, until 1999, Nurrungar). These are important …

Showdown in Munich

It was at the 2007 Munich Security Conference that Russian President Vladimir Putin first signalled a cooling of Russian–Western relations. Soon thereafter, Russia invaded Georgia; and in the years since, it has annexed Crimea, launched …

Suspicion for parliamentary hack must fall on China

Scott Morrison’s shock announcement in parliament that the three major political parties have had their computer systems hacked by a ‘sophisticated state actor’ will have impacts long after the federal election. There’s a lot that …

Why a US–China trade deal is not enough

As Chinese and American trade negotiators meet in Washington to try to forge an accord on trade, observers are largely focused on the countries’ economic disagreements, such as over China’s subsidies to its state-owned enterprises. …

All shipshape? Defence’s budget update

At first blush, the central narrative of the Defence Department’s 2018–19 budget, as presented in the Portfolio Additional Estimates Statements (PAES), appears to be about the falling Australian dollar. Defence’s estimated appropriation for 2018–19 has …

Kashmir attack a deadly blow to India–Pakistan ties

Last week’s terrorist attack about 20 kilometres from Srinagar, the capital of Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir, was the deadliest attack since 1989, when a militant insurgency against Indian rule began. Almost 50 paramilitary troops travelling …