The visit to Australia this week by Kimi Onoda, Japan’s minister responsible for science, technology and economic security, is a reminder that the strength of the Australia–Japan relationship depends on the depth of its economic …
This week’s visit to Australia by Japanese Minister of State for Economic Security Kimi Onoda offers the country an opportunity to ensure its natural abundance of critical minerals can play a key role in Japan’s …
From 2027, Australia will host under the AUKUS agreement a US submarine force at HMAS Stirling, near Perth. It will be known as Submarine Rotational Force–West (SRF–W) and will consist of up to four US …
Throughout the Russia–Ukraine war, special operations forces (SOF, or SSO in Ukrainian) have conducted many raids and missions to probe enemy defensive positions. Examples include Ukraine’s use of SOF probing operations in Bryansk and Kursk …
Australian foreign minister Penny Wong didn’t just pledge valuable surveillance drones to the Philippines this week; she pledged technology made in Australia and the United States, not in China. This means a decision was made …
At the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore in May, Defence Minister Richard Marles described attacks on global subsea cable infrastructure as ‘historically unprecedented’ in scale and frequency. Since November 2024, vessels have severed fibre optic cables …
When Indo-Pacific democratic governments unite in publicly criticising China’s military provocations, the European Union should join – just as countries such as Australia and Japan do in response to Russia’s ongoing aggression. When a Chinese …
Perception is now part of strategy in the Indo-Pacific. The United States’ partners must not only contribute more but be seen to be contributing more if they want it to stay invested in regional stability. …
Australia should build more of its AI data centres in the north. The physical infrastructure that powers AI has become a strategic national security issue, not simply a collection of commercial assets but a critical …
Just hours after Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visited Fiji on 6 July to agree enhance cooperation with the island state, Beijing fired a ballistic missile into the Pacific Ocean. Australia swiftly deplored the ‘provocative …
Foreign Minister Penny Wong has publicly put the full weight of Australia’s strategic messaging, funding and capabilities behind strengthening the Philippines and defending international rules. In an era in which international rules have been declared …
Top AI company OpenAI has just frightened the heck out of everyone. It announced that its top models, while being tested in a digital cage on their cyber skills, had broken out of the cage, …
A debate is raging among close observers of Chinese AI: will it stay open-source, or will it close off? The most likely answer is that there’ll be a bit of both. Chinese AI labs are …
In February, an Indonesian naval officer publicly acknowledged what had long been understood in the service: foreign submarines routinely transited Indonesian waters, including through passages such as the Wetar Strait, often with little warning to …
In his dismissal of middle power strategy on 15 June, US Under Secretary of Defense Elbridge Colby may have made the strategy’s importance clearer. In a series of posts on X, Colby criticised the emergence …
Chinese AI labs have stunned the world, again. In the space of about a month, Chinese AI start-up labs Z.ai and Moonshot have each launched a model that is nearly as intelligent as competitors from …
China is telling us what to do and, for once, our complying would be rather helpful. In fact, China is telling us to do what it does. With its new tariff on Australian beef, which …
Beijing’s intensifying efforts to shape international norms on AI are calibrated to promote itself as a responsible global leader, but they are largely self-serving, aimed at catching up on the technology and exporting China’s illiberal …
Australia needs to talk less about critical-mineral supply chains and more about specific minerals. Generic discussions about supply-chain resilience have become a substitute for strategic thinking. They encourage governments to speak in broad concepts while …
Indonesian fishers recovered three curious unidentified underwater objects from the country’s waters in April. First, on 6 April, fishers found a 3.7-metre, torpedo-shaped device north of Gili Trawangan in the Lombok Strait. It bore the …