Asia Pacific Defence Reporter

The US has celebrated Independence Day with President Trump giving a hugely bombastic and historically inaccurate speech saying that he leads the greatest country ever and the American military will kick sand in the face of anyone it wants. What an ally. Then we look at an important speech given by Defence Industry Minister Pat Conroy on 2 July. It was meant to be about Defence reform but he inclu...

Uncertainty continues in the Middle East with no one in the Trump administration having a clue about what they are doing; the government of Israel is out of control - and Iranian hardliners are in charge of their country. It is possible that Donald Trump is losing interest because the world economy hasn't yet collapsed. All the Australians who cheered on the US might wish to reflect on the consequ...

Chaos continues in the Middle East with the status of peace talks between the US and Iran fluctuating wildly in response to continuing threats from President Donald Trump. The critical Strait of Hormuz seemingly remains both open and closed. The deal that the US appears to have agreed to allows Iran to retain its enriched Uranium, receive massive reparations payments and continue its ballistic mis...

A ceasefire deal has been announced in the Middle East, but it's too early to know if it will be permanent. On the AUKUS front, the UK Defence Secretary John Healey resigned last week in the middle of a visit by his Australian counterpart, Richard Marles. Whoops! While his resignation was not directly over AUKUS, it is connected to it because Mr Healey does not believe the UK is spending nearly en...

There has been more news about AUKUS Pillar One and the developing story that Australia will no longer receive two second hand and one new Virginia class submarine from the US - as had been previously promised. The government is all over the shop, claiming that the closure of the Strait of Hormuz somehow justifies the acquisition of SSNs. No it doesn't - submarines are almost completely useless in...

What was going to be a philosophical podcast largely about uncrewed systems has been completely upended by a major change to AUKUS Pillar One. The plan from the get go has been for the US to sell us two second hand Virginia class SSNs, followed by a brand new one. But overnight that's been changed - and on the fringes of the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, Defence Minister Richard Marles announc...

There's a great deal to unpack, starting with the Strait of Hormuz - and no one knows the exact state of negotiations between the US and Iran. Neither are particularly trustworthy and the situation seems to change hourly. And a quick reminder - this is a war initially cheered on by our government and even more enthusiastically supported by the opposition. On the local front, the Collins Life of Ty...

There were two major events last week - Donald Trump's visit to China and the Federal budget - and from a national security perspective both were something of an anticlimax, which is probably not a bad thing. The Defence budget continues to track upwards and is a 6% increase over the previous year, which looks to be well ahead of inflation. The Trump China visit doesn't seem to have achieved anyth...

To follow on from last week, we start with some thoughts about Mogami frigates and why none of them will ever be built in Australia. The simple fact is that WA companies do not have the necessary experience - and building some landing craft for the Army will not get them there. Secondly, in an outrageous oversight during the bidding process, no one was asked by Defence to provide a single lin...

The stalemate in the Middle East continues with neither the US or Iran backing down. US President Donald Trump continues to do the bidding of Russia by withdrawing some troops from Germany.  On the local scene, Shadow Defence Minister James Paterson addressed the National Press Club and outlined a vision noticeably different from the government's - particularly regarding the US alliance. He s...

We start with the US and another attempted assassination of President Donald Trump. While there might not be a causal link, his obvious pleasure in inflicting pain and suffering on others - identical to that of the appropriately named Secretary of War Pete Hegseth - has helped increase a propensity for violence. The US seems to be moving further away from what we regard as Australian values....

Last week saw the release of both the National Defence Strategy and the associated Integrated Investment Plan. Rather than squabbling over the amount - there is a genuine, if small, increase in funding - people should be asking how much additional capability will this buy. The answer is, probably not enough, though more on drones is undoubtedly a good thing.  Speaking at the Nationa...

Events in the Middle East continue to evolve in rapid and unexpected directions. Following the failure of peace talks in Pakistan between the US and Iran, the US is now hoping to open the Strait of Hormuz by blockading it. In the short term, the fuel crisis in Australia may get worse before it gets better - not that you would know that by looking at the amount of jet fuel being burnt up by our PM...

Enough of Donald Trump already! We can't avoid him completely but there's a lot more to talk about, including the visit of German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius - and what a breath of fresh air he is. He has called the US attacks on Iran a mistake and is worried about declining US support for Ukraine. He speaks honestly and clearly - unlike our own politicians. Next was a seminar organised...

The situation in the Middle East risks spiralling out of control with Donald Trump threatening to destroy Iran's electricity grid and that country saying it will retaliate by targeting water desalination plants throughout the region. Australia will not send a warship to the region at the moment, even if one were available, because the nature of warfare is being radically altered. The informat...

We discuss the ongoing conflict in the Middle East and Australia's reasons for jumping in so quickly in support of the US.  But first some words on yet another assault on transparency by the government scrapping the ANAO's annual review of major Defence projects. Ministers Marles and Conroy will be delighted that an important source of scrutiny has been removed - as will the Defence bure...

The unrelenting aerial bombardment of Iran by the US and Israel continues - with no known end point. Israel would probably like to keep attacking forever and in the case of the US, it might stop when President Trump gets bored. Gulf states have called for assistance from a number of countries to counter Iran's aerial attacks, including Australia. The sad reality is that with an annual Defence budg...

We have to start with the US and Israeli bombings of Iran, even though they have little direct relevance for Australia. The chances of the US achieving regime change is unlikely, no matter how many clerics are killed. Unless the US and Israel have been secretly arming rebel groups within the country, calls for protests will only lead to the deaths of even more innocent civilians. In Australia, the...

This episode marks the 4th anniversary of Russia's brutal invasion of Ukraine, which shows no sign of ending. Australia is providing some help - but not nearly enough.  The international environment remains chaotic - and we pose the difficult question: if Australian governments are incapable of introducing a digital passenger arrival card, what hope is there that we will ever be able to build...

Before we get to the Singapore air show, some more words about US isolationism and a country that seems to be fracturing. Something that Australian politicians seem to be sadly unaware of.  There was pushback against the latest report from the US Congressional Research Service - a very authoritative group - that once again raised the possibility of Australia not receiving any Virginia class s...

For some variety we start with a few words about China's President Xi Jinping undertaking a further purge of the military leaving him in sole command. In the short term this might make an invasion of Taiwan less likely - but in the medium term the situation could be more dangerous. In the US, chaos continues on both the foreign policy and domestic fronts. A question for Australian politicians and...

More US-caused turmoil with President Trump cancelling his takeover of Greenland because he has reached a concept of a framework deal with NATO but of course hasn't released any details. But he's replaced that with more threats at Canada, including using violent language, if they go ahead with a trade deal involving China. All the world can see what's happening - with the exception of the Aus...

Before discussing the Prime Minister's strange reluctance to call a Royal Commission into the Bondi terrorist attack we have to talk about the increasingly erratic behaviour of Donald Trump. Threats from the US to take over Greenland are increasing, with greater tariffs on European countries now also part of the mix. This is because Trump claimed the Europeans weren't doing enough to defend t...

It's a good thing we waited a couple of weeks before commenting on the US attack on Venezuela because the entire thing is getting stranger by the day. It clearly wasn't about regime change and even the logic of seizing oil reserves is looking shaky. It might have been because Donald Trump felt his dancing style was being mocked by the former Venezuelan President. As disturbing as that is...

We start with a few thoughts on the awful terrorist attack on members of the Jewish community holding a party on Bondi Beach. But we cannot ignore other developments and have some further thoughts about the new US National Security Strategy, which explicitly attacks Europe and gives both Russia and China a leave pass. The official policy of the US is that they will now support European far-right p...