Sea State The 2015 Shangri-La Dialogue ran over the weekend, and maritime security issues featured prominently in the wake of escalating tensions in the South China Sea. In his keynote address, US Secretary of Defense …
The Asian security dialogue is about verbal jabs and thought balloons. And policy signalling and point scoring. And, ideally, some meeting of minds, reaching towards actual agreement. The Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, the 14th Asia Security …
The nature of ISIS’s online presence is intended to do three things. Firstly, and most importantly for the longevity of its existence, it’s intended as a mechanism to attract and recruit members to its ranks. …
In his undergraduate years the US Defence Secretary, Ashton Carter, did a double major in Medieval History and Physics. It was perfect preparation for Asia today—arcane and complex history speaking directly to modern mysteries. At …
The IISS Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore is the place to be this weekend. The stage is set for a fiery (cross) dialogue this year, with US Defense Secretary Ash Carter recently emphasising that the US won’t be recognising China’s …
It’s hard to say which is worse: the Navy’s attempt to hide its performance behind a cloak of secrecy or its abject failure to do so effectively. Back in late 2012, it was possible to …
Next month, Indonesia’s president Joko Widodo will visit Washington—one of several trips he’s made this year including to Beijing and Tokyo. With major powers in the Indo-Pacific seeking enhanced bilateral ties with Indonesia, Jakarta’s attention …
Was Australian strategy in the third quarter of the twentieth century, generally known as forward defence, a strategic disaster? After the fall of Saigon in 1975 the concept of ‘forward defence’ was widely discredited, along …
As the ‘war of words’ between China and the US in the South China Sea escalates, questions arise as to exactly what are Australia’s interests in this contested maritime zone. Bonnie Glaser has recently …
The Beat Agreement on firearms information The Law, Crime and Community Safety Council—a forum for national Attorneys-General, police and emergency services ministers—met last Friday to fast-track a new firearms database. The National Firearms Interface will …
On the morning after the Federal Budget I posted a version of the above graph along with some basic numbers describing what’s going on. Today, my final analysis of the budget is launched. Not much …
Hanoi is one of the best settings in which to contemplate the limits of American power. The Vietnam War showed that a determined adversary (with substantial help from two major powers) can resist even a …
When Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi used the term ‘pull factor’ in a recent interview, she was reprising an expression coined four decades ago to describe how the promise of resettlement was the reason for …
The Japanese government has released a draft version of the country’s updated cyber strategy, due for release in June 2015 (PDF – Japanese only). The strategy, presented at a cyber security taskforce meeting on Monday …
The rumour doing the rounds last year was that the Prime Minister had contemplated a unilateral deployment of a battalion of Australian soldiers to Ukraine to secure the crash site of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17, …
To properly understand last week’s announcement from the government about the beleaguered Air Warfare Destroyer (AWD) project, some background is needed. Back in June 2014, the government received the independent ‘White–Winter report’ into the project. …
A recently released Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade evaluation details some successes but also highlights shortcomings in Australia’s humanitarian response to the Syrian crisis. While Australia was an early-responder to events in Syria, overall …
Sea State Last week, TKMS opened its dockyards in Kiel to visiting Australian defence writers to discuss its submarine and surface fleet operations. The Germans have displayed a transparency in the competitive evaluation process that …
The adjectives applied by the government to describe the forthcoming Defence White Paper and its accompanying plan for the ADF include ‘fully costed’, ‘externally assured’, ‘achievable’, ‘affordable’, ‘credible’, ‘realistic’, ‘properly funded’ and ‘enduring’. This is …
I’ve recently discussed two trends in military technology. The week before lasts’ post on the 1990s non-revolution in military affairs argued that low-tech adversaries simply make themselves scarce when faced with a technologically superior foe. …