Originally published 27 April 2015. Picked by David Lang. Malcolm Fraser’s greatest contribution to foreign policy was the new consensus on Asia that he embraced, fostered and cemented. Fraser’s Asia policy drew large elements of …
Originally published 1 July 2015. Picked by Amelia Long. Below is an extract from ASPI’s publication Gen Y jihadists: preventing radicalisation in Australia, launched 30 June 2015. In 2014, the Terrorism Research and Analysis Consortium …
Originally published 11 September 2015. Picked by Patrick Walters and Natalie Sambhi. ‘Things are seldom what they seem’—so wrote the librettist W.S. Gilbert in HMS Pinafore. The current refugee crisis in Europe looks like a …
Originally published 18 August 2015. Picked by Natalie Sambhi. Warfare is changing, and not just in the most obvious and visible ways. Yes, there are new technologies, newly assertive foes, and new ideologies. But to …
Thanks for joining us for a big 2015! The editorial team would like to thank all of the readers who’ve helped establish our blog as an informed source of opinion and analysis on defence and …
Originally published 27 January 2015. Picked by David Lang. No Australian minister has made a full-blooded speech on nuclear deterrence for many a long year—not since the early 1990s, I suspect. In truth, that’s not …
When I first moved from China to Australia in 2011 I was surprised to hear rumblings about the perils of Australian complacency in the face of rapid changes taking place across the Indo–Pacific. Australia’s destiny …
China hosted the second World Internet Conference (WIC) in Wuzhen, Zhejiang province this week with President Xi Jinping delivering a keynote address at the opening ceremony. He called for international respect of ‘cyber sovereignty’, which …
Political controversy, design issues and a logistics foul up, including a failure to allocate the resources to sustain the capability—there are some strikingly familiar themes in the acquisition of Australia’s first submarines, two 700-tonne E-class …
This year saw the 40th anniversary of the dismissal of the Whitlam government on 11 November 1975 by the governor-general, Sir John Kerr. It also marks the 40th anniversary of an enduring conspiracy theory—that Kerr’s …
Sea State Last week, China’s military carried out war games in the disputed South China Sea, with warships, submarines and fighter jets simulating cruise missile strikes on ships. The warships simulated the defeat of anti-ship …
The Australian Government recently announced plans to invest $26 million in the development of quantum computing technology as part of the National Innovation and Science Agenda (NISA). Prime Minister Turnbull has argued that NISA is …
Twice now, within the space of a month, the government has signalled an unhealthy submissiveness to its security advisers. The first signal occurred in the National Security Statement. The second swirls through the recent media …
Indonesia is the world’s largest Muslim state, and because of the previous activities of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) it’s the Southeast Asia country with the most extensive experience of dealing with trans-border jihadist-inspired terrorism. It’s now …
Australia’s coup culture isn’t about generals rolling over politicians and tanks rolling through the streets. The Oz coup culture is concerned with what political party rooms do to unpopular leaders. The willingness of parties to …
Although it took place a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, Star Wars has again been making headlines this week, not only due to the release of The Force Awakens, but also …
President Joko Widodo knows better than anyone that the reason he chose Sudirman Said as mines and energy minister last October wasn’t because of Said’s knowledge of mining and oil and gas but because Widodo …
The NSW Police Force’s revised approach to violent armed offenders represents a necessary alteration of Australian police response tactics. While bladed weapons, homemade explosives, and even cars have featured in jihadist plots during 2015, there …
Exactly one hundred years ago, one of the most remarkable operations in military history occurred at the Dardanelles with the evacuation in December 1915 of 83,000 Australian, New Zealand, British and Indian troops from the …
The Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague has been hearing arguments recently in The Republic of Philippines v The People’s Republic of China case over competing claims in the South China Sea. The …