by Marcus Hellyer | May 28, 2024 | Defence Budget, Policy, Strategy & Capability
These questions are based on the information contained in the 2024 National Defence Statement (NDS), 2024 Integrated Investment Program (IIP) and 2024-25 Defence portfolio budget statements (PBS). Note: In this essay, ‘this year’ refers to the 2024-25 budget year....
by Michael Shoebridge | Apr 24, 2023 | China, Defence Budget, Strategy & Capability, Uncategorized
While there’s only a single paragraph devoted to it down on page 23, it’s clear that the Defence Strategic Review and the billions of dollars the government will spend on Defence over the next ten years is all about grappling with Chinese power in the Indo Pacific....
by Anthony Bergin | Jan 15, 2025 | Featured, Policy
Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus, a prominent Jewish member of cabinet, is visiting Israel for about a week to help mend relations between the two countries. Dreyfus had a trip to Israel scheduled for the one-year anniversary of the October 7 terrorist attacks. It was...
by Marcus Hellyer, Peter Jennings and Michael Shoebridge | Jan 14, 2025 | Defence Budget, Featured, Policy, Strategy & Capability
No-one wants war, but the risk of conflict in our region is substantially growing, and we could well find ourselves in war whether we want it or not. The challenge now is to rapidly strengthen the Australian Defence Force with the goal that our efforts, along with our...
by Peter Jennings | Jan 14, 2025 | AUKUS, China, Featured, Indo Pacific, Policy, Strategy & Capability
If you thought 2024 was hard for defence and security, the outlook at the beginning of 2025 suggests this year will be even riskier. From 2020, all Australian defence ministers have said the strategic outlook has never been more challenging than since the end of World...
by Michael Shoebridge | Jan 10, 2025 | Featured, Policy
If 2024 was the year of global elections, 2025 is the year voters want experimentation in politics and government – and they’re willing to elect risky people to deliver it. 2024 set a clear pattern: incumbent governments were punished by being chronically weakened or...
by Gedaliah Afterman and Anthony Bergin | Jan 7, 2025 | Featured, Policy
The Middle East is experiencing game-changing developments with consequences that extend well beyond the region. Intensifying superpower competition, China’s expanding presence, and the return of Donald Trump to the White House are redefining global power dynamics....
by Anthony Bergin and Michael Shoebridge | Jan 7, 2025 | AUKUS, China, Featured, Strategy & Capability
‘Narco-subs’ are semi-submersible vessels drug lords have used for at least a decade to smuggle drugs to Europe or across the Caribbean. They sit just below the water with small chunks of the vessel above it. One intercepted by the Colombian Navy in late 2024 shows...
by Peter Jennings | Jan 7, 2025 | Featured, Policy
Investigations into the terror attack on Bourbon Street in the French Quarter of New Orleans continue to move fast, with the emerging picture about the assailant, Shamsud-Din Jabbar, becoming more complex. On Friday morning 3 January AEDT, an FBI spokesman told a...
by Peter Jennings | Jan 3, 2025 | Featured, Policy
[Note to SAA readers: This article appeared in The Australian on 03 January 2025. Overnight the FBI investigation of the attack concluded that Shamsud-Din Jabbar probably planted two IEDs in the vicinity of Bourbon Street himself, before engaging in his vehicle...
by Peter Jennings | Jan 2, 2025 | China, Featured, Policy, Uncategorized
China’s ambassador Xiao Qian has replaced wolf warrior language with silken tofu. According to his interview with this newspaper’s defence correspondent, Ben Packham, the bilateral relationship has achieved a “full turnaround” from the bad days when Canberra...
by Michael Shoebridge | Dec 20, 2024 | Featured, Strategy & Capability
A troubled US Navy frigate program looks like a humming top of efficiency and value compared to our Department of Defence’s $27 billion program to get 3 Hunter class frigates for our Navy. The bad news is the Australian Government isn’t doing anything to change...
