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Articles by: "Andrew Davies"
Last week the Defence Ministers announced that the government would approach the United States to get cost and availability information for a second tranche of 24 Super Hornets. It doesn’t commit Australia to such a …
Yesterday’s release of the Coles review report into the availability of Collins Class submarines was very illuminating. As well as telling us that the Collins has some life in it yet, it shed a bit …
Before the second part of the Coles review into submarine availability had even been released, ‘sources’ were telling the press that the report should scuttle the idea of using the Collins design as a basis …
A few years ago, I estimated the per ship costs of the Air Warfare Destroyer program. The conclusion I came to, based on conservative assumptions, was that we were getting three ships for the price …
When I’m lecturing on strategic policy or Australian force structure issues, I often make a comment about the ‘defence of Australia’ (DOA) doctrine along those lines of ‘of course, the defence of Australia has been …
This week’s graph is a case of a picture that is worth $200 billion. Produced by the US Congressional Budget Office (CBO) in 2009, it shows the number of tactical aircraft procured by the US …
In our Mind the gap paper earlier this year, Mark Thomson and I made the comment that a successful program to extend the life of the Collins class submarines would give the future submarine program …
As you read this, the Submarine Institute of Australia will be starting to think about putting the chairs on the table at the end of its 2012 conference. As expected, given the level of interest …
I gave a talk today on the subject of ‘the defence maritime budget and industry opportunities and impacts’ at the Maritime Environment Working Group here in Canberra. In this case, it was hard to know …
This week’s graphs illustrate the importance of data in settling some historical debates. I was fortunate recently to have a chat with US military historian Williamson Murray. We got talking about some of his early …
Having had the privilege this week of participating in the United States Study Centre’s Alliance 21 workshop, I’ve had a good chance to think about the fundamentals of the alliance, and why Australians consistently value …