The strategy behind China’s emerging naval capability is subject to considerable debate. Most of the commentary concentrates on the People’s Liberation Army Navy’s (PLAN) capability development. Some commentators argue that the PLAN has shifted its …
The normalisation of tension on the Korean Peninsula is settling onto its foundations, with South Korea pledging US$7.3 million of humanitarian aid to North Korea over the weekend. The move came one day before South …
Canada could benefit from expanding its military presence in the Asia-Pacific. As I described in a previous Strategist post, the government faces certain budgetary constraints likely to limit the size of its future naval presence …
In some recent good news, the Piracy Reporting Centre (PRC) of the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) noted that the number of recorded sea piracy attacks worldwide was down by a third in the first quarter …
Japan has released Defence Of Japan 2013, its annual defence white paper—ASPI’s Ben Schreer had a piece on it earlier in the week. The document shows increasing tension in Tokyo over security in North East Asia. The …
Welcome back for another round of new reports, developments in regional and international security and upcoming events. First for today is a new report by the Center for a New American Security that studies the …
For a while now defence officials and analysts on both sides of the Tasman have been looking for ways to re-energise the Australia-New Zealand relationship. It’s almost as if the two neighbours were becoming too …
I liked Phil Radford’s piece on cyber security and the cloud this morning. In particular, I liked the parallel between cyber security and anti-submarine warfare (ASW), having spent a fair chunk of time in Russell …
Australia, like most nations, is happy to voice support at the UN for the total abolition of nuclear weapons. Even the P5 nuclear powers endorse this “ultimate” goal: in 2000 they famously made an “unequivocal …
Michael O’Hanlon from Brookings has some ideas on how the US might spend its defence dollars given current fiscal constraints in his book Healing the Wounded Giant, including cutting ground forces, buying half of the …
The Australian and Swedish Defence Ministers produced a joint communique today on the subject of intellectual property rights for submarine design and technology. That mightn’t sound like a ‘tear down the front page’ story, but …
In financially-constrained times we need to think of innovative ways to promote useful but low-cost security cooperation in our region. Developing Australia’s capacity to provide emergency food relief would enhance our international reputation and support …