With just 27 million people, Australia is the world’s 13th largest economy. It has the 11th largest GDP per capita. It ranks 10th on the human development index. Its major cities consistently rank amongst the world’s “most liveable,” and the vast majority of its population live in a state ofContinue Reading
A fortnight after the Indian and Australian cricket teams battled each other on the cricket pitch, the sports rivalry receded into the background as defense officials from New Delhi and Canberra discussed ways of deepening their already close cooperation for tackling a resurgent Chinese military in the Indo-Pacific. The discussionsContinue Reading
Australia’s alliance with the United States, as former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who is now Canberra’s ambassador in Washington, once remarked, is the “bedrock” of the country’s foreign and defense policy. Since the end of World War II, Australia’s security and prosperity have been predicated not only on the primacyContinue Reading
As President Donald Trump and his administration set about tearing up the foundations of the international order and U.S. global leadership, and discarding decades worth of soft power, it is an understatement to say that middle powers like Australia are left in an extremely delicate position. Trump has threatened alliesContinue Reading
Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO) chief Mike Burgess has warned that over the next five years Australia’s security environment will become more dynamic, diverse, and degraded, with “more security surprises” in the second half of the decade than in the first. In his Annual Threat Assessment delivered on February 19,Continue Reading
The return of Donald Trump as U.S. president marks an important crossroads in the future of two emergent Indo-Pacific security frameworks: the Quad, comprising Australia, India, Japan, and the United States; and AUKUS, the trilateral partnership between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Both institutions played a keyContinue Reading
This week Australia’s Minister of Defense and Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles had his first phone call with the United States’ newly confirmed Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. The call was a conventional formal exchange of pleasantries and an attempt to build a rapport with a counterpart from a newContinue Reading
