Defence & Security

The strategic order and the nature of conflict are changing. Security competition between nations and military strategy are growing in complexity even as new transnational challenges deepen. The Lowy Institute’s experts in security and defence look at changing strategic relations, security architecture, nuclear strategy, military capabilities and defence and intelligence policy.

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A strategy for uncertain times

It seems obvious that the next government will need a national security strategy. In the election campaign foreign policy debate last week Marise Payne and Penny Wong agreed that Australia’s national security environment was more complex than ever and seemed to concur that this demanded a more

By Ben Scott

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What went wrong? How Morrison lost control of the khaki election

Two of the most recognised concepts from the great Prussian philosopher of war, Karl von Clausewitz are friction and chance. Clausewitz noted that friction “includes all those surprising things” that happen that make “even the simplest thing difficult”. Chance, meanwhile, is where “

By Peter Dean

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AUKUS: More than meets the eye

The clear intention of AUKUS is to tip the military balance in the Indo-Pacific in favour of the United States. The various initiatives in the pact between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States are headlined by cooperation to develop a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines for Australia

By Jada Fraser

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How do we keep an eye on our spies?

Our intelligence services have never been more important to us, and democratic governance is part of their strength. But do we need to look at this again? Originally published in the Australian Financial Review

By Ben Scott

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Chinese bases in the Pacific: A reality check

There was barely concealed panic in Australia when news broke that China had struck a security agreement with Solomon Islands. What if this is really a basing deal that allows China to station military aircraft or warships permanently? Solomons Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare’s emphatic denial on

By Sam Roggeveen

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Iran applies its own maximum pressure in nuclear talks

Negotiations in Vienna to revive the Iran nuclear deal have dragged on through nearly a dozen rounds for more than a year now. The Biden administration’s hopes for a quick restoration of the 2015 agreement, unilaterally abandoned by Donald Trump, have been hampered from the outset. By simply

By Prabhat Jawla

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Australia can stand up for the Afghan people, and the time is now

On 19 April, a suicide bomber struck as students were coming out of school in Kabul, Afghanistan, leaving dozens injured and at least six dead. The brutality of the attack – and others that occurred later that week – shook Afghanistan and the Afghan diaspora in Australia. The youngest victim

By Ahmad Shuja Jamal

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For North Korea, military parades come before the people’s wellbeing

A military parade in the streets of Pyongyang last month gave North Korea another chance to show off its new Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile while marking the 90th anniversary of the foundation of the Korean People’s Revolution Army. Kim Jong-un, lauding the country’s nuclear

By Khang Vu

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Not all maritime disputes are built the same

Maritime disputes in Southeast Asia should be viewed less as a single big basket of problems, and more as smaller individual problems with their own corresponding solutions. There is not a one-size-fits-all approach. And three inter-related policy contexts can help explain why some troubles persist

By Evan Laksmana

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Does commemorating war really promote peace?

The phrase “lest we forget” expresses a moral judgment that it is irresponsible – if not reprehensible – to allow past wars to fade from collective memory. A familiar argument for this duty to remember is captured by the quip “those who forget history are destined to repeat it”. We need

By Ned Dobos

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Solomons security pact: Sogavare, China, and Australia

Labor has described Solomon Islands’ security pact with China as Australia’s biggest foreign policy failure in the Pacific since the Second World War, but this is hyperbole. Australia’s biggest foreign policy failure in the region – ever – is its failure to address (at both a national and

By Peter Hooton

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Taming troubled waters

While regional countries respond to Covid-19 and the many social and economic consequences, ensuring peace and stability in the South China Sea has become even more important due to its role in connecting continents, fostering international trade and ensuring supply chains are not broken. This will

By Lai Thai Binh

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Australian cyber: What’s “Redspice” for?

Canberra is significantly boosting the cyber capabilities of the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) – the government agency responsible for signals intelligence, support to military operations, cyber warfare and information security. Project Redspice, announced in March, will increase ASD’s

By Ben Scott

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Law of the sea: A contested watershed ruling

When in 2016 the Arbitral Tribunal issued its watershed ruling in the case between the Philippines and China, responses from the international community were lacklustre. The Asian Maritime Transparency Initiative’s “arbitration support tracker” suggests that eight governments have publicly

By Clive Schofield

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China’s nine-dash line proves stranger than fiction

Vietnam recently banned the film Uncharted from domestic distribution due to a scene depicting an “illegal image” of China’s infamous “nine-dash line”. This is not the first time popular culture has become embroiled in the politics of the South China Sea. In 2021, the Philippines’

By Bec Strating

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Thinking outside the box on Southeast Asian maritime security

The Southeast Asian maritime domain continues to be fraught. The Covid-19 pandemic brought about an observable increase in transnational crimes such as smuggling – at first, pandemic-related medical material, then later food – as well as illegal drug trading and human trafficking. Piracy and

By Collin Koh

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Shore thing: climate change and maritime security intrinsically linked

The recently released Sixth Assessment Report from the International Panel on Climate Change emphasised the urgency of adapting to and mitigating climate change in coastal regions to “prevent the further acceleration of sea-level rise beyond 2050”. Climate change is likely to have

By Kate Clayton

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Protecting law and order at sea means educating people on their rights

In recent years, the rise of illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing activities, transnational organised crime at sea, expansion of terrorist networks and activities by sea, and increasingly belligerent assertions of unilateral maritime claims have prompted coastal states in the East Asian

By Jay Batongbacal

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Of maritime security and a rules-based order

Maritime scholars and practitioners often wrestle with the question of what a “desirable” architecture for maritime security should be, and how must it be properly implemented? The issue is complex, because although security is best delivered in collective and cooperative settings, there is

By Abhijit Singh

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Cause and effect: The right security architecture for the Indo-Pacific

The Indo-Pacific maritime security order consists of international treaties, multilateral diplomatic forums and, increasingly, minilateral security initiatives. The first two are under stress due to China’s assertive behaviour in the maritime domain and have led to the formation of the latter.

By Ian Storey

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AUKUS can be a good platform for cooperation with India

Someone famous once reputedly quipped “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” So there is a certain echo to the AUKUS arrangement, which brings together Australia, United Kingdom and United States to share vital defence technologies in an effort to stabilise the Indo Pacific

By David Brewster

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Ukraine: This isn’t the information war you were looking for

Dystopias make for popular fare. One needs only look at popular video games to see a common theme: Fallout’s nuclear wasteland, Mass Effect’s alien invasion, or Horizon Zero Dawn’s machine apocalypse. The protagonist must resolve problems, recruit allies and build capability to prepare and

By Lesley Seebeck

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Order at sea: Southeast Asia’s maritime security

However you define good order at sea, it’s hard not to feel rather pessimistic about its future. A host of accounts and reports from popular writers including Ian Urbina or environmental organisations such as Greenpeace and UNESCO suggest plenty of reasons to support the notion that the seas are

By Geoffrey Till

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Can states have strategic personalities?

In The Interpreter last month, Bec Strating and Joanne Wallis weighed into the debate about Australia’s “strategic personality” and how it should change to respond more effectively to the security challenges the country now faces. If Canberra’s policymakers wanted a personality to

By Ian Hall, Renee Jeffery

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The Gulf’s diversification dilemma

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had posed difficult questions for Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and exposed the costs of pursuing a more diversified series of diplomatic, economic and military relationships. The two Gulf states are in effect experiencing the “diversification dilemma

By Rodger Shanahan

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Does the Quad Plus add up?

According to its members, the Quad – a group comprising the United States, Japan, India and Australia – seeks to present an inclusive vision for the Indo-Pacific region, and its members seek to work with a range of countries. Despite this rhetoric, the group hasn’t established any clear

By Susannah Patton

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Australian defence: what the 1930s foretells for the present

James Cotton (ed), Australia and the World 1931–1936: Documents on Australian Foreign Policy (University of NSW Press/Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, 2021) As a primer for modern day policymaking, Australia’s strategic decisions of the early 1930s provide clear lessons in alliance

By James Cotton

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Defence’s bullet for disaster isn’t silver, it’s brass

The declaration of a national emergency in response to unprecedented flooding in eastern Australia, and the deployment of 7,000 Australian Defence Force troops across the states of New South Wales and Queensland, has reignited debate in the community about how Australia should best respond to more

By Miranda Booth

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We need to stop talking about the grey zone

The concept of a grey zone in international affairs has gained popularity as analysts have tried to understand how states compete for strategic advantage in a more complex and interdependent world. But war in the Ukraine has underscored how the concept now obscures more than it clarifies. The “

By Ben Scott

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Washington rediscovers “nuclear responsibility” in the Ukraine crisis

Aside from Donald Trump’s bluster about “fire and fury” and Kim Jong-un’s similarly theatrical replies in the manufactured “crisis” of 2017, serious nuclear threats made during an international crisis have been happily MIA for the better part of the past 40 years. Not so now. Less than

By Benjamin Zala

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Ukraine war triggers debate on Japan’s nuclear option

In the wake of the Ukraine conflict, Shinzo Abe, Japan’s former prime minister and now head of the largest faction of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), has suggested that Japan consider hosting US nuclear weapons facilities on Japanese soil, similar to some European nations, such as

By Purnendra Jain

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Exploit Xi and Putin mutual distrust to limit China-Russia partnership

Originally published in The Australian

By Ben Scott

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The nature of US intelligence is radically different - and more open - with the Ukraine invasion

Originally published in The Sydney Morning Herald

By Ben Scott

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Squaring the circle in Ukraine

Vladimir Putin proclaimed set of objectives for his newest invasion of Ukraine appear paradoxical. Putin noted Russia’s key aims for Ukraine were a replacement of Volodymyr Zelensky’s “Nazi” government, demilitarisation, rejection of NATO membership, recognition of the separatist states in

By Victor Abramowicz

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Back in the USSR – surprises in the Russia-Ukraine conflict

My grandfather Kopel Harkowitz was born in Lismore, which is experiencing the worst floods in more than a century. In 1880, when the last big wet hit the Northern Rivers, his father, (my great grandfather) Israel Harkowitz, was proprietor of the Lismore General Store and fortunately also had a

By Tim Harcourt

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Australia and the crisis in Europe: threats and opportunities

Vladimir Putin’s ruthless bid to erase Ukraine’s nationhood and redraw the map in Europe is a direct attack on the foundations of the post-war rules-based order, from which Australia has benefitted more than most. A Russian fait accompli in Ukraine would also boost the idea that might makes

By Ben Scott, Richard Maude

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What if Trump wins again?

Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has seen a return to the political alignments of the 20th century, with the United States as the leader of a grouping of democracies against a Russian dictatorship uneasily partnered with China. But Donald Trump has offered a radically different response,

By John Quiggin

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Putin’s hubris foreshadows tragedy – for Ukrainians and Russians alike

However this ends, it will not end well for Ukraine. And likely not for Russia either. Ukraine’s experience throughout this crisis has been a sad lesson in the realities of realpolitik. Geographically stuck right next door to a powerful, menacing neighbour intent on bringing it to heel, but

By Ian Hill

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Keeping Australian uranium out of Russian hands – and bombs

“If you’ve looked on the TV into Vladimir Putin’s eyes – he is one tough son of a gun and I don’t think that he cares about what we think.” Such was the verdict by one Australian federal MP. But this wasn’t in reaction to news in recent hours about Russian troops swarming across

By Daniel Flitton

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China’s grey zone tactics amount to far more than just laser games

Just after lunchtime Thursday 17 February, China for the first time undertook grey zone actions in the seas close to Australia. There have been many earlier cyber intrusions targeting Australian government and commercial sites but this was the first time physical actions have been taken against

By Peter Layton

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Russia-Ukraine: Lessons for Australia’s defence

Lesson 1: The era of state-on-state conflict is still with us The idea that war between nations has become an anachronism over the last 40 years has some statistical support, but evidence from the post-Cold War period of relative peace needs to be weighed against hundreds of years of

By Sam Roggeveen

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Damage limitation and US nuclear strategy

Almost four years ago, I argued in The Interpreter that Vladimir Putin’s decision to pursue a range of weapons specifically designed to defeat America’s Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) system was irrational behaviour, being an expensive solution to a problem which did not exist. In particular

By Victor Abramowicz

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Putin’s choice

Whatever steps Vladimir Putin takes over coming days will be deeply consequential for the security of both Russia and Europe. What does Putin want? Firstly, he wants to bring Ukraine back within Russia’s orbit. This is partly for emotional reasons of national identity and imperial nostalgia:

By Ian Hill

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Indonesia makes a big defence statement

The fuss made over Friday’s Quad meeting in Melbourne is quite out of proportion to the group’s significance. Australians shouldn’t take any comfort from rhetoric about democratic solidarity and common values. The bonds holding together the quadrilateral relationship between the United States

By Sam Roggeveen

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The curious case of Blenheim Reef

A remote sandbank in the middle of the Indian Ocean, known as Blenheim Reef, is hitting the international news. The Mauritian government has sponsored an expedition to the reef to embarrass Britain in their long-running dispute over ownership of the Chagos Archipelago – which is home to the US

By David Brewster, Samuel Bashfield

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Australian intelligence should not be used for political goals. The US is still recovering from Trump doing just that

The political consensus on China is a dead end. Australia should harness political debate to produce smarter policies. Originally published in The Guardian

By Ben Scott

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Delivering promises will show steel in Quad

The German naval chief, Vice Admiral Kay-Achim Schönbach, lost his job during a visit to Delhi last month. During an interaction where he went woefully off-script, he urged the West to offer “respect” to Russian President Vladimir Putin and keep the focus trained on China, a “not so nice

By Indrani Bagchi

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Getting ready for Trump as President 47

Paul Kelly’s recently published book, Morrison’s Mission: How a Beginner Reshaped Australian Foreign Policy, provides the most detailed account yet of the formation of the country’s foreign policy since Scott Morrison became prime minister in 2018 and is full of useful insights. The Forever

By Ben Scott

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How China views “strategic competition” with the United States

While “strategic competition” between China and the United States is now regularly presented as a given, what is missing from much of this discussion is a focus on Chinese attitudes – both official and unofficial. In both Washington and Canberra the prevailing view is that tension with the

By Michael Clarke, Matthew Sussex

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AUKMIN shows the UK is a world away from Australia

Last week’s AUKMIN consultations between Australia and the United Kingdom, the first since 2018, suggested both sides were injecting new energy into this relationship. As Australia increasingly “mainstreams” European partnerships within its Indo-Pacific focused foreign policy, it’s worth

By Susannah Patton

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