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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The Wiranto attack and the ISIS impact

The stabbing attack last Thursday by an ISIS supporter on Wiranto, Indonesia’s top security minister, was a shock for several reasons. Attacks on senior officials in Indonesia are very rare, though terrorist attacks on police are common. Protection proved to be disturbingly lax – the stabber got

By Sidney Jones

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The women of ISIS and the fog of law

The difficulties of establishing a coherent policy towards women and children detained as members of the Islamic State or their dependents presents a longstanding challenge. One key question from an Australian point of view is whether all the women involved were still Australian citizens. News

By Rodger Shanahan

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Book review: Common enemies

Book review: Common enemies: crime, policy and politics in Australia–Indonesia relations, by Michael McKenzie (Oxford University Press, 2018) Next month marks the 17th anniversary of the Bali Bombing, which on 12 October 2002 claimed the lives of 202 people and injured 209 others. The attack

By Natalie Sambhi

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A US view on Australia’s role in the Indian Ocean

Australia plays a critical role in maintaining strategic stability in the Indian Ocean and remains one of the United States’ closest allies on economic, diplomatic, defence, and intelligence matters. Canberra has been a thought leader in formulating the “Indo-Pacific” concept. Yet, even with

By Nilanthi Samaranayake

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The sharp sword: China and the drone threat to Australia

In Saudi Arabia, a combined drone and cruise missile attack conducted by still-unknown forces (either Iran, Iraqi proxy groups, Yemeni militia forces, or a combination of all three) caused significant damage to the Kingdom’s most important oil facility. Defence writer Tyler Rogoway is alarmed

By Sam Roggeveen

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INTERFET and the defence of Australia

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the establishment of the International Force East Timor (INTERFET), a multinational mission led by Australia to stabilise the country in 1999. As a former Army officer posted to Timor-Leste after INTERFET, I’m proud to be back in Dili today to represent the

By Luke Gosling

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Afghanistan – what’s next?

Ten days ago, US President Donald Trump called off negotiations with the Taliban about withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan, widely expected to be followed by intra-Afghanistan peace talks, which Norway hoped to host and President Ashraf Ghani had begun to prepare for by selecting a negotiation

By Susanne Schmeidl, Astri Suhrke

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With new coastguard, Myanmar looks to improve maritime security

In March this year, Myanmar’s Defence Ministry submitted a proposal to parliament to establish a national coastguard. Given strong support for the idea from the main political parties, the armed forces, and the public, it is expected that the necessary legislation will be passed without undue

By Andrew Selth

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Pressure upon pressure builds around Kashmir

The political talk in South Asia at this moment is reminiscent of the 1990s. The Taliban are returning to Afghanistan and conflict is escalating between India and Pakistan in a seething Kashmir region. There is even debate on the potential use of nuclear weapons amid India-Pakistan crises –

By Stuti Bhatnagar

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You can’t always get what you want, but you can get what you need

Last month, during an Indo-Pacific defence conference held in Perth, former Australian defence minister Kim Beazley and present Chief of the Australian Defence Force General Angus Campbell both observed that almost all of Australia’s strategic commentators agree an increased defence budget is

By Victor Abramowicz

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Secrets and laws

Since the Australian Federal Police raids on the offices of the ABC and the home of News Corporation journalist Annika Smethurst, there has been an understandable debate on the tensions between national security and press freedom. This has extended to questions around whistle-blowing and

By Mark F. Briskey

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Suspicion creeps into the Five Eyes

The world’s oldest intelligence partnership turned 73 this year. Traditionally, trust amongst spies is a rare commodity, but the UKUSA Agreement of 1946 (commonly known as the “Five Eyes”) has more than stood the test of time. Forged under the pressure of the Second World War, the Five Eyes

By Alasdair Nicholson

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Gender-based violence and the Arms Trade Treaty

This week, the 104 states parties to the Arms Trade Treaty are meeting in Geneva to discuss the world’s only international agreement on the sale or transfer of conventional weapons. This covers everything from small arms and light weapons to battle tanks, attack helicopters and warships,

By Susan Hutchinson

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Australia in the Gulf: Will we make a difference?

Australia’s commitment to the US-led coalition to provide maritime security for the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf will be one maritime surveillance aircraft, to start operations later this year, and one frigate from early 2020. Military personnel will also help staff a coalition

By Sam Bateman

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The reluctant coalition

The Australian government’s announcement today that it will contribute assets to a maritime coalition force in the Persian Gulf comes as no surprise, given the very public way the US request was delivered in Sydney at the recent AUSMIN meeting. Washington doesn’t make those type of requests

By Rodger Shanahan

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After the attack: Supporting victims of terrorism in Indonesia

Terrorist attacks inevitably generate frenetic global media coverage, with pundits examining motives, ascertaining network links, and theorising new developments or political repercussions. Numbers of deceased and injured are central to initial reports, but eventually victims are reduced largely to

By Cameron Sumpter

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It’s time for a “Quad” of coast guards

The so-called Quad group of Indo-Pacific maritime democracies – Australia, India, Japan, and the United States – is a valuable grouping, although it is still underutilised in many ways. One of the most effective ways that these countries could work together to enhance maritime security in the

By David Brewster

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US foreign policy: restraint without retrenchment

US foreign policy since the end of the Cold War has come under growing criticism for its expansive, even aggressive, character. Despite its name, “liberal hegemony” often seems illiberal, belligerent, even militaristic. The US has used force regularly over the last 30 years, often with dubious

By Robert E Kelly

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What China’s defence paper tells us about Beijing’s regional ambition

Beijing, over the years, has become more focussed and explicit in recognising and explaining its security threat perceptions. China last week released its 11th national defence paper, and such white papers have come a long way since 1995, when US activity in Asia wasn’t presented as an immediate

By Pooja Bhatt

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The curious case of Hamza bin Laden’s death

This week at least two US officials have anonymously confirmed to US news outlets that Hamza bin Laden, the son of former al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, was killed in a targeted operation. It is clear that counterterrorism and intelligence officials from around the world have been tracking him for

By Lydia Khalil

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Indigenous roots of the “first” Filipino suicide bombing

On 28 June, two suicide bombers carried out an attack in the Philippines, targeting the headquarters of 1st Brigade Combat Team (BCT) in Indanan, Sulu. Days later, one of the suicide attackers was identified as Norman Lasuca, a 23 year-old resident of Jolo, now considered the first Filipino to be

By Joseph Franco

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China’s intelligence gathering ships change the equation

Exercise Talisman Sabre has finished, and the Australian, American and Japanese units involved have dispersed to their bases or operational deployments. So has the Chinese ship which monitored their activities. The Type 815G intelligence gatherer (AGI) No. 853 Tianwangxing (in English Uranus) was

By James Goldrick

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Gender: workforce transformation in Defence

The comprehensive analysis in the Lowy Institute report, Foreign Territory: Women in International Relations reinforces the already compelling case for why gender diversity matters, and from a Department of Defence perspective, as one of the main areas of the bureaucracy examined in the report, the

By Greg Moriarty

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The trouble in the air on a tense Tuesday in Northeast Asia

Last Tuesday (23 July) was a bad day in Northeast Asia, not just for what happened but what it foreshadows. Tensions are rising. After all, it’s not every day that a South Korean jet fighter fires across the bow of a Russian spy plane. Tuesday’s first big event was the inaugural China-

By Peter Layton

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China’s head-spinning defence white paper

Readers of the white paper China’s National Defence in the New Era can be forgiven for their headaches as they move from one conflicting statement to another in Beijing’s latest effort to help “the international community better understand China’s national defence”. This best of times/

By Dennis J. Blasko

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What Tom Cruise can teach us about great power competition

Last week Paramount Pictures released the trailer for its much-hyped Top Gun sequel, Top Gun: Maverick. The new movie sees Tom Cruise reprise his role as Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, now an aging fighter pilot facing the political and technological realities of a world in which there may no longer

By Dirk van Graver

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The changing face of violent extremism

The Easter bombings in Sri Lanka killed 258 people, including two Australians among 46 foreign nationals, and injured 500 more. Its perpetrators according to Sri Lankan State Defence Minister Ruwan Wijewardene were “well-educated and come from the middle or upper-middle class”, and were “

By Khalid Koser, Lilla Schumicky-Logan

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Australia’s alliance with the US is defined by more than one President

Analysis of the Lowy Institute Poll of Australians’ international perspectives reveals a remarkable resilience in the level of support for Australia’s alliance with the United States. This year, 72% of Australians considered the alliance either “very” or “fairly” important for Australia

By Hugo Seymour

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‪ISIS: women’s work?

Should domestic labour be valued the same as work outside the home? What is the contribution of a stay at home wife and mother? How can we evaluate emotional labour when it often goes unseen? No, these are not topic questions during a “Lean In” circle. These are questions that many courts are

By Lydia Khalil

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Professor White, the bomb can endanger but not defend Australia

“I am prepared for the worst, but hope for the best”, wrote Benjamin Disraeli in the 19th century. Maya Angelou improved on that in the last century: “Hoping for the best, prepared for the worst, and unsurprised by anything in between”. Hugh White in his latest book How to Defend Australia

By Ramesh Thakur

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Paying a blood price: understanding the casualty cost of intensive war

For most Australians, the kind of intensive war that inflicts hundreds or even thousands of Australian military casualties in a short period is a reflection of distant history, not part of an imaginable future. The public has learned to understand “war” as consisting of carefully risk-managed

By Charles Knight, Cate Carter

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Women yet to smash glass ceiling in Australian diplomacy and security

Around the world, the fields of diplomacy, defence and intelligence – those jobs that underpin so much of how governments engage with one another – have long been male-dominated professions, often with “boys club” cultures. But in Australia, these professions are slowly shaking

By Danielle Cave, Alex Oliver

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The burden of friendship: Germany, Trump and NATO

“Burden sharing” has long been a totemic term in discussions about NATO. Behind the happy paeans to shared values and mutual security interests uttered publicly by national leaders has always stood the hard reality of American power and Europe’s complete dependency upon it. Yet under the

By Marcus Colla

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First salvo: missile tests mark intensified US-China competition

In a major first, China has test-fired anti-ship missiles over the contested waters and islets of the South China Sea. While much remains to be learned about these exercises, they mark the first salvo in a newly-intensified dynamic of military competition between the US and China. Much about these

By Bates Gill

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Cambodia: the regime’s base survival instinct on display

Rumours of a Chinese military presence in Cambodia have again resurfaced following claims from a senior Pentagon official that Cambodia intends to host Chinese military assets. This week it was reported that Cambodia’s Defence Ministry declined a US offer to refurbish a training facility and

By Sovinda Po, Lucy West

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Book review: Hugh White’s How to Defend Australia

Book Review: How to Defend Australia, by Hugh White (La Trobe University Press, 2019) Defence commentator Hugh White never shouts from the rooftops, and his new book How to Defend Australia is written in the same measured tone that has long driven his more strident critics crazy. Yet if White

By Sam Roggeveen

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National security: Australians and their elites

It may be distasteful to some, but there is no escaping the need for political elites. The trick, particularly in a democracy, is for those elites to carry a sense of legitimacy. Australians are disconnected from politics, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they differ from politicians in their

By Sam Roggeveen

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Behind the Veil: Women in jihad after the caliphate

How the Islamic State has expanded the role of women in jihad and what that means for the future of jihad

By Lydia Khalil

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Five factors will decide the survival of the US-led alliance system

In a recent column in Foreign Policy, a slightly bewildered Stephen Walt asked two related questions: (1) Why do we not have better answers to major, overarching questions about international affairs? (2) What are five of “those very important things about the world nobody knows?” Walt rattles

By Mason Richey

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The limits of unilateral action against Iran

As Washington is finding, maximum pressure campaigns have their own limitations, even with the most coherent and experienced foreign policy teams. But with the Commander-in-Chief sending mixed messages (overnight Donald Trump described the alleged Iranian attacks on oil tankers in the

By Rodger Shanahan

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Baby milk and tantrums after Chinese ships show the flag in Sydney

China has dominated Australian media over the past week. Warships, baby milk formula, Hong Kong protests, the US China trade war, the list goes on. Politicians, academics, commentators and journalists are all weighing in. Confusing at the least, damaging at the worst, the result is chaotic

By Erin Watson-Lynn

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Maybe Australia should donate a warship to Sri Lanka

The Royal Australian Navy is about to take two highly capable guided missile frigates out of service. But they are not just surplus equipment, but they are important strategic assets that Australia can use for continuing strategic benefits. We should think seriously about giving them to our

By David Brewster

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The “khaki cavalcade” dilemma when soldiers become public servants

The recent federal police raids against the ABC and News Corp raised the issue of state control, not only of the free press, but of public institutions. The Australian Army was the object of stories at the centre of investigations into the ABC, but the army can also be the subject of discussions of

By Cate Carter

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En masse Muslim resignations a setback for healing in Sri Lanka

This year’s Eid-al-Fitr festival has been a bleak affair for Sri Lanka’s Muslims in the aftermath of the Easter Sunday bombings. The steep increase in retaliatory Islamophobic attacks has struck fear into the hearts of the Sri Lankan Muslim community. As if that was not enough, 11 Sri Lankan

By Roshni Kapur, Mustafa Izzuddin

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Fierravanti-Wells’ outburst tells more than just a China story

Liberal senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells’ opinion piece published on Friday in The Australian criticising the government over the visit of Chinese naval ships to Sydney is rather extraordinary. A few observations: Less than three weeks after the election, we are witnessing the first

By Sam Roggeveen

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A sea ride with Australia’s Indo-Pacific Endeavour

When the Australian Defence Force first dispatched its flotilla known as the “Indo-Pacific Endeavour”, the then Defence minister Christopher Pyne touted the regional drills as Australia’s “premier international engagement activity” designed to “enhance partnerships”. But what lies

By Bec Strating

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Superpower scrutiny at Shangri-La

For the past two years, the highlight of the annual IISS Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore was the keynote speech by the sadly departed former US defence secretary Jim Mattis. This year the task of speaking on behalf of America to the leading forum of Asian defence

By Michael Fullilove

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The relativity of the death penalty

Opposition to the death penalty has a long and quite public history in Australia. Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan of the so-called “Bali Nine” drug smugglers received support from artists, singers, actors, media personalities and sports stars, while a crowd of about a thousand people

By Rodger Shanahan

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Masood Azhar – a global terrorist – and the implications for Pakistan

Four times Masood Azhar escaped the formal designation as an international arch-terrorist. Each time India had sought to add his name to a UN Security Council blacklist as the head of Pakistan-based militant group Jaish-e-Mohammed, China had cast a veto. But in a sudden turn-around this month that

By Murali Krishnan

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The clock is ticking on tensions with Iran

Washington’s attempts to isolate Iran economically and politically rely largely on whether it can get Tehran to opt out of the 2015 nuclear deal. As long as the Trump administration is the only signatory to withdraw from what is known formally as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA),

By Rodger Shanahan

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