Kicking off with the thematic side of things this week, different facets of identity politics are stirred up in two pieces about President Trump. First, The Economist warns that Trump’s divisive ‘us versus them’ rhetoric …
Sea state The Pentagon will soon begin executing scheduled freedom-of-navigation operations in the South China Sea. It’s a shift in policy from that of the previous administration, under which FONOPs were conducted on an ad …
The force structure proposed in the 2016 Defence White Paper lacks a long-range deterrence capability—at least until we get a credible fleet of submarines sometime in the distant 2040s. Short of nuclear threats, which are …
Graeme Dunk’s recent post described challenges to Australia’s submarines in correctly classifying and discriminating between friendly and potential adversary submarines of similar design, such as the Kilo-class submarines operated by Russia, China, Indonesia, India and …
The 2016 Defence White Paper, the Naval Shipbuilding Plan, and associated statements by political figures such as Prime Minister Turnbull and Defence Industry Minister Pyne have all advocated the need for enhanced anti-submarine warfare (ASW) …
Australia’s surface warships and submarines will, in future, be much more closely linked to allied vessels to provide a collective defence against increasingly lethal threats, Royal Australian Navy chief Tim Barrett tells The Strategist. Discussing …
During his speech at ASPI last month, Minister for Defence Industry Christopher Pyne reinforced the government’s commitment to the 2016 Defence Industry Policy Statement and its intent to foster an export-focused defence industry. The policy …
On Friday 18 August, around 300 people will gather at the former site of HMAS Platypus in Sydney Harbour. On that date 50 years ago, the HMAS Oxley arrived in Australia, marking the start of …
As North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un’s and US President Donald Trump’s war of words escalated, Independence Day celebrations—commemorating the Korean peninsula’s 1945 liberation from Japanese colonial rule—was unfolding in both North and South Korea. The …
North Korea’s nuclear weapon and long-range missile programs are gathering momentum, according to a US Defense Intelligence Agency report, commented on by the Washington Post. The Post story suggests that North Korea has successfully produced …
Sea state Russia has laid down the hulls for two new diesel-electric submarines to be deployed in the Pacific. The Varshavyanka-class subs, due to be completed in November 2019, are ‘primarily designed for anti-submarine and …
Over the last decade, India’s progressive economic and military development has resulted in a strategic rebalancing of the geopolitical and security dynamics shaping power relations in South Asia. As China continues to expand its influence, …