We should look to Papua New Guinea as we open up Australian Defence Force recruitment to foreign citizens, and we may be able to learn from Britain on how to get the process right. Opening …
Even mindboggling actions typically have a logic that’s discoverable, whether Hitler declaring war on America after Pearl Harbor or Putin invading Ukraine. That’s why ‘strategic warning’—informed by ‘strategic warning intelligence’—is so important. Indeed, intelligence’s intuitive …
US Air Force chief of staff General David Allvin handed a surprise to industry on 13 June by suggesting that the service might not proceed as expected with its next combat aircraft, the one planned …
The recent visit by Premier Li Qiang was characteristic of what is becoming a clear trend in Chinese leaders’ travel, akin to the proverbial arsonist-cum-firefighter, who causes a problem they can then heroically fix. Li …
Against a gloomy strategic backdrop and painfully slow growth in Australian military capability, the government’s critics are urging it to commit more money on a tighter timescale to the nation’s defence. Money certainly matters, but …
Politicking by the Chinese Communist Party has blocked Taiwanese membership of Interpol since 1984, preventing the timely sharing of criminal information and intelligence. The absence of Taiwan in the world’s largest international police organisation weakens …
With the continuing implementation of AUKUS Pillar 1, it’s imperative that the culture of the budding Australian nuclear navy is built with care. Failure to lay the cultural foundation now would risk creating a force that’s …
Russia is developing a nuclear-weapons-based anti-satellite (ASAT) capability, and the Western democracies must work together to prevent Moscow from deploying such a weapon. This will be an immediate and important challenge, testing the next US …
While Australia and its critical-minerals partners agree that supply-chain diversity, security and sustainability are essential, inconsistent national policies continue to inhibit the development of the end-to-end supply chains they seek. In the dynamic landscape of …
Elevated to a military science during the Cold War, deterrence is a relatively new task for the Australian Defence Force. Traditionally, Australia’s armed forces have lacked the mass, range, lethality and ability to project force …
June has been a busy month for Russian President Vladimir Putin. In a speech at Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he outlined his terms for peace negotiations with Ukraine and proposed establishing an alternative international security system …
Scams are no longer just a consumer fraud problem. While responsibility for scams in Australia primarily resides with regulators, sophisticated scams have become issues of counter-terrorism (CT) and transnational serious and organised crime (TSOC) that …
As the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibet, visits the United States for medical treatment on his knees, concerns over who will succeed him have become acute. While Tibetans around the world pray that …
America’s allies in the Indo-Pacific are getting pretty familiar with China’s grey-zone maritime behaviour, but the United States itself is ill-prepared for dealing with it. Yet it should be prepared, experts warned a US House …
Drugs, human trafficking, illegal gambling, cyber scams and money laundering are among the most prevalent criminal activities reported in Pacific islands, which were once almost free of organised crime. While these crime types have a …
The Australian Defence Force is ill prepared for a modern conflict. It is not doing nearly enough to ensure dominance of the electromagnetic spectrum (EMS), the kind of energy used in communications and by many …
In this government’s National Defence Strategy, published in April, Defence Minister Richard Marles reaffirmed that ‘Australia no longer enjoys the benefit of a 10-year window of strategic warning time for conflict.’ This was one of …
The evolution of warfare in the 21st century has ushered in an era of cyber conflicts, artificial intelligence and autonomous systems. Those technological advances have fundamentally altered the nature of military engagement, demanding a profound …
When European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen took office in December 2019, she established a ‘new push for European democracy’ as one of her six policy priorities. After the European Parliament elections on June 6 to 9, one …
China has identified the beleaguered garrison at Second Thomas Shoal as a weak link among the South China Sea features physically occupied by the Philippines and, by extension, the US-Philippines alliance. While Manila has held …