The idea of awarding medals retrospectively to soldiers, sailors and fliers who died courageously decades ago is fraught and complex because wars have left in their wake so many whose heroic deaths were unseen and …
For several years, Japan has been investing heavily in its diplomatic engagement with Indian Ocean island states and may now need to consider how to better extend that engagement to environmental security challenges. A recent …
When Joe Biden made his first speech as president-elect of the United States, he declared that a revived America would ‘lead not by the example of our power, but by the power of our example’. …
In less than four years, outgoing US President Donald Trump has achieved what, historically, only devastating wars had done: recasting the global order. With his isolationism, wannabe authoritarianism and sheer capriciousness, Trump gleefully took a …
The inauguration of Joe Biden as president on 20 January 2021 will usher in another chapter in the United States’ fraught relations with North Korea. The Trump administration tried summit diplomacy from 2018 through to 2019, after a year …
As the political and economic centre of the world shifts from the Atlantic to the Indo-Pacific, and geostrategic competition increases, Germany, the EU and NATO want closer defence cooperation with nations such as Australia. Germany’s …
By making Vietnam and Indonesia his first overseas ports of call, Japan’s Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga signalled that he intends to adhere closely to his predecessor Shinzo Abe’s ‘free and open Indo-Pacific’ strategy. Seeing that occur …
An Australian ministerial visit to Brunei Darussalam normally triggers little strategic interest. But there may be more than meets the eye to Defence Minister Linda Reynolds’s meeting this week with Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, sandwiched in …
Sea state Australia has been invited to join the Malabar naval exercise with America, India and Japan. This year will be the first since 2007 that Australia has participated in the drills, having previously withdrawn …
The World Bank predicts that the Maldives will be the South Asian nation hardest hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. That’s not surprising given that 70% of the country’s GDP flows from tourism. The cancellation of …
In a midnight military parade to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the country’s rule under the despotic Kim family, North Korea revealed a new monster intercontinental ballistic missile—perhaps one of the world’s largest—on the back …
Shinzo Abe was born into Japan’s political royalty. His maternal grandfather, Nobusuke Kishi, barely escaped trial as a Class-A war criminal yet he served as prime minister from 1957 to 1960. His paternal grandfather, Kan …