Sea State How many sheep does it take to sink a Russian naval ship? Turns out, about 9,000. The “research ship” (read: intelligence collection vessel) Liman was sunk in the Black Sea on Thursday after …
US President Donald Trump’s approach to foreign policy—based on tactics and transactions, rather than strategic vision—has produced a series of dazzling flip-flops. Lacking any guiding convictions, much less clear priorities, Trump has confounded America’s allies …
Glen Rabie, the CEO of Australian technology start-up Yellowfin, wrote an op-ed in the Australian Financial Review a couple weeks ago that caught my attention. Decrying the ‘disconnect’ between the Australian Government’s rhetoric around promoting …
Three months ago, the American President insulted the Australian Prime Minister. In the now infamous telephone call, the Prime Minister might’ve managed the asylum seekers issue more nimbly. But he didn’t deserve what was dished …
When considering Australia’s future in Asia, many of us have had difficulty looking beyond China—but we have many better options in Asia. At the core of our misperceptions are six myths about the potential for …
Justice Minister Michael Keenan recently launched the Fintel Alliance, a public-private partnership combating money laundering and terrorism financing. The partnership is unique internationally, bringing together 19 public and private sector organisations to counter these dual threats. …
Long before the ABC abandoned shortwave broadcasting to PNG and the Pacific, its programming for indigenous audiences (as distinct from Australian expatriates) had become risible. For those concerned with Australia’s status as the region’s …
The Battle of the Coral Sea in May 1942 has become the touchstone for the Australian-American strategic relationship. The 75th anniversary provides an opportunity to reflect on why this engagement, in which for the first …
Like the World War One 9.2-inch siege howitzer, Dennis Richardson has been a mobile weapon, deployed across many fields of battle, able to deliver a lot of ordnance with maximum elevation in a single shot. …
While the ‘first 100 days’ are an unreliable indicator of what’s to come, it’s certainly a good opportunity to reflect on the period where a new leader is at their most powerful, which is exactly …
If you study or work in the biosciences, chances are that ‘CRISPR’ has been on your mind for the past five years. That’s Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats. Or, in plain-speak: the easiest, cheapest …
Later today US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson will preside over a ministerial-level meeting of the UN Security Council on North Korea. Most observers will closely focus on Tillerson’s remarks, yet there’s no doubt that …
Connecting the strategic dots between Afghanistan, Syria, and North Korea has become an unavoidable task. Only by doing so can the world begin to discern something resembling a coherent, if misguided, approach to US foreign …
Recently, a senior Vietnamese official asked Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi in Phnom Penh if negotiations with ASEAN on a South China Sea Code of Conduct (COC) would be completed by the end of the …
Relief and pride are the main emotions many French citizens are feeling after the first round of the French presidential election, in which Emmanuel Macron finished first. For once, the pollsters were right: the two …
The American missiles strike against regime targets in Syria represent a dramatic reversal of US policy. Just days before the 7 April attack, US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said the US priority …
The Beat Police as the first port of call The official annual assessment of UK policing released this week highlights issues around mental health in the community. Police are increasingly relied on as the …
Last week the Australian Government released its First Annual Update on the implementation of its 2016 Cyber Security Strategy. The government’s much anticipated self-assessment contains some useful elements, but also suffers some significant shortcomings. Cybersecurity …
Pick the anomaly in this list of what Australia does and desires in the South Pacific: Australia wants a leadership role in the South Pacific, a fundamental foreign policy interest explicitly stated in 1901 in …
In his recent public address at ASPI (excerpted here on The Strategist), Senator Nick Xenophon argued for parliament to play a greater role in the authorisation of military action. His argument turned, in part, upon …