Sea State The South China Sea’s about to get more crowded, with the Russia–China naval exercise—fittingly named Joint Sea 2016—scheduled for 11–19 September. Russia has sent a task force of anti-submarine warfare destroyers, support ships …
The 2016 Defence White Paper represents the most ambitious plan to regenerate Royal Australian Navy since World War II—at least according to the Turnbull government. The Navy will receive approximately $48.75 billion for defence capability …
Part of my summer reading has been British naval historian Geoffrey Till’s excellent 2014 book Understanding victory: naval operations from Trafalgar to the Falklands. At first glance it doesn’t seem to offer much to anyone …
This week’s release in the ADF capability snapshot series takes a look at the Royal Australian Navy. (Here’s a link to last week’s RAAF paper.) Again, there’s a lot more good news than bad in …
Claims that a destabilising ‘arms race’ is underway in the Asia–Pacific have become commonplace and are supported by reports that regional defence spending has surpassed Europe for the third consecutive year. As my ASPI report released …




