The beat Corruption at home and abroad The Australian Border Force was shaken last week by the revelation that two of its officers were involved in an organised crime syndicate that was allegedly planning to …
On Friday 18 August, around 300 people will gather at the former site of HMAS Platypus in Sydney Harbour. On that date 50 years ago, the HMAS Oxley arrived in Australia, marking the start of …
For much of the past decade, observers have praised Indonesian democracy. Elections have been competitive, the country boasts a vibrant civil society, and the press enjoys far more freedom than in most Asian states. An …
President Trump’s excitable rhetoric about US military options in relation to North Korea—‘fire and fury’, ‘locked and loaded’—has attracted considerable media attention in recent days. But look behind the rhetoric. Allied decision-makers are starting to …
Getting a handle on the ‘cyber’ It’s been a big week in internet regulation, with unsavoury activities being plugged left and right. GoDaddy, a major domain registration service, evicted the Daily Stormer from its platform, …
As North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un’s and US President Donald Trump’s war of words escalated, Independence Day celebrations—commemorating the Korean peninsula’s 1945 liberation from Japanese colonial rule—was unfolding in both North and South Korea. The …
On 3 July, two of the planet’s three most powerful leaders met in Moscow. It was their 20th encounter at least since March 2013 and the latest in a long Sino-Russian discourse that began in …
On 1 August, the parliament of Pakistan overwhelmingly elected Shahid Khaqan Abbasi as the new prime minister following the Supreme Court’s decision to unanimously declare that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was not ‘honest’ and that …
Sea state It looks like the Russian government might have spoofed naval GPS in the Baltic Sea. A report from an American ship says that the GPS placed the ship at an airport 25 nautical …
If our domestic security agencies’ past operational achievements (see, for example, here and here) are anything to go by, the success of Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s Home Affairs portfolio seems inevitable. Turnbull could be forgiven …
The Trump administration’s evolving UN policy is a case study in how policymaking in the administration remains a work in progress amid competing worldviews, absent or unclear guidance, and an idiosyncratic president. There are deep …
In July 2017, North Korea tested two intercontinental ballistic missiles that it claims can deliver a nuclear payload anywhere in the world. Pyongyang tends to exaggerate its military capabilities, but its nuclear and missile programs …
I agree with Peter Jennings’ assessment that the 2017 Independent Intelligence Review seems to have been almost overshadowed by the Turnbull government’s announcement of the new Home Affairs portfolio. The 23 major recommendations of the …
The more power China has accumulated, the more it has attempted to achieve its foreign-policy objectives with bluff, bluster, and bullying. But, as its Himalayan border standoff with India’s military continues, the limits of this …
The snow on the Brindabella Range was icing Canberra’s wind as I slipped into Old Parliament House to take the temperature of Oz international policy and check the strategic weather forecasts. The prophets of the …
Welcome back, dear readers, for another ‘ASPI suggests’ full of ‘fire, fury and, frankly, power’. And a big thanks to M’sieur James Mugg for diligently shepherding this feature for the past couple of weeks … …
China looks set to add a ‘Space Silk Road’ to its proposed land-based Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century Maritime Silk Road, expanding the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI; formerly known as One Belt, …
When cyber-security professionals were polled recently at their annual Black Hat conference in Las Vegas, 60% said they expected the United States to suffer a successful attack against its critical infrastructure in the next two …
At the 50th ASEAN Ministerial Meeting last week, Vietnam attracted international media attention for its struggle to insert strong language on the South China Sea into the ministers’ joint communiqué. The episode highlights an enormous …
The Sino-Indian standoff in the Doklam (Donglang in Chinese) region of the Himalayas where the borders of China, India and Bhutan converge is now nearly two months old. The dispute arose in mid-June when China …