A key aspect of the new Defence White Paper is significant enhancement to ADF force structure. In previous White Papers, a list of four principal tasks has shaped Australian military strategy. In …
On 4 February, US Secretary of Defense Ash Carter announced that the US Navy had developed a new anti-ship missile (ASM)—the Standard Missile 6 (SM-6). But that ‘new’ missile isn’t as new as it might …
Beijing has come under increasing international pressure over its building and militarisation of the maritime features it occupies in the Spratly Islands. On 30 January, the US Navy sent a guided-missile destroyer within 12 nautical …
Our modern navy needs to be increasingly a national enterprise, bringing together the private and public sectors of the economy to deliver a fundamental national objective—security above, on and under the sea. That means Navy …
Sea State The US Navy’s fleet of Aegis cruisers and destroyers are set to gain new ship-killing missiles, with US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter announcing modifications to the Raytheon Stand SM-6 during an address …
One of the questions I’m sometimes asked is ‘why do we call 6,000 ton warships frigates’? The implicit assumption behind the question is that the frigates of the past were vessels of modest size, and …
Sea State The US Department of Defense has confirmed that the USS Curtis Wilbur conducted a freedom of navigation operation in the South China Sea on 30 January, sailing within 12 nautical miles of Triton …
Political controversy, design issues and a logistics foul up, including a failure to allocate the resources to sustain the capability—there are some strikingly familiar themes in the acquisition of Australia’s first submarines, two 700-tonne E-class …
In his recent post on Australian policy towards acquisition of nuclear weapons, Rod Lyon responds to a thesis promoted by Christine Leah and Crispin Rovere that Australia should acquire its own independent nuclear deterrent capability. …
This week’s release in the ADF capability snapshot series takes a look at the Royal Australian Navy. (Here’s a link to last week’s RAAF paper.) Again, there’s a lot more good news than bad in …
Sea State Last week the destroyer USS Donald Cook visited Turkey’s Aksaz naval base on Turkey’s southwest coast for joint Turkey–US exercises. Elements of the Turkish naval force present included submarines, surface and air defence …
In a rare moment of not talking about submarines or frigates at the recent PAC2015 meeting, we sat down for a talk with the good folk from MDBA, a multinational company that does a lot …