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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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 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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What a Shorten government will mean for the US-Australia alliance

To start, I think it’s pretty likely that Labor will win on Saturday, meaning a change of government in Australia. So my comments will be based on that assumption. In broad terms, a Labor government is not going to present any major challenges to the US alliance and its central role in

By Nick Bisley

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The Rohingyas: the security dimension of a deep humanitarian crisis

Bangladesh is now facing a serous dilemma over the future of 1.2 million Rohingya Muslim refugees from Myanmar. Its efforts to contain and isolate them from the mainstream community risk creating an alienated, extremist community. Australia has played an important role in helping to meet immediate

By David Brewster

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Australia struggles for clarity on the South China Sea

The Lowy Institute’s Richard McGregor has noted the absence of China discussion in Australia’s current election campaign, a state of affairs which prompted his colleague Sam Roggeveen to observe that “Bipartisanship on China is becoming a form of collusion”. Given that the

By Iain Henry

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The looming international law paradox between the US and Iran

The Trump administration’s confrontation with Iran escalated over the past week, highlighting a series of alarming trends. First, it demonstrated the extent to which the administration is prepared to shun key allies. When US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made an unscheduled visit to Iraq,

By Melinda Rankin

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Myanmar: pariah status no bar to defence modernisation

It has been more than two years since military “clearance operations” against Myanmar’s Rohingyas began in October 2016. Since then, the international community has relied on public criticism, unilateral sanctions and a range of measures in the United Nations and International Criminal Court

By Andrew Selth

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Strategic trends across the Indo-Pacific region

Much has been written in recent years about the reorientation of US policy to the Indo-Pacific region in response to China’s expanding economic and strategic footprint. What is less clear, however, is how the region itself is responding to the new era of strategic competition proclaimed by

By Kevin Rudd

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North Korea’s uranium and prospects of a stealthier bomb

Verifying North Korea’s nuclear stockpile will be a critical part of any future disarmament negotiations. As past experience with other nations demonstrates, it is also a tricky process. North Korea will be expected to supply an inventory of their weapons stockpile, its fissile material and the

By Morris Jones

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Caliph emerges without his caliphate

This week, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, the world’s most wanted man, appeared in a 20-minute video released by al Furqan Media, the official media outlet for ISIS. This is only the second time he has been shown on video as he has stayed assiduously out of the public eye since he was selected as the ISIS

By Lydia Khalil

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Film review: On Her Shoulders

On Her Shoulders, a documentary film by Alexandria Bombach, follows young genocide survivor Nadia Murad in her global cause against sexual violence for which she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2018. Women and girls in her community were subjected to widespread and systematic sexual

By Pishko Shamsi

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Atrocities of April

The month of April is littered with reminders of how cruel the world can be and should motivate us to be vigilant about the potential for atrocity crimes in our own time. 24 April marks the start of the Armenian Genocide when, in 1915, hundreds of Armenian community leaders and intellectuals were

By Nikki Marczak

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Paradigm shift: Understanding propaganda in the digital age

Influence operations in the digital age are not merely propaganda with new tools. They represent an evolved form of manipulation which present actors with endless possibilities – both benign and malignant. While the origins of this new form are semi-accidental, it has nonetheless opened up

By Maryanne Kelton

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Sri Lanka attacks: Still many puzzles to solve

It is very early in the aftermath of the Sri Lanka terrorist attacks and like all such attacks, more information will emerge in the coming days and weeks. But a few early observations: 1. This was a well planned and coordinated attack: seven suicide bombers attacking six targets on the west

By Rodger Shanahan

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US-Taliban negotiations: marginalising women is no path to peace

There are major problems with the current negotiations over Afghanistan, underway since last year between the United States with the Taliban in an attempt to find a peaceful solution to the long-running war so that US troops can be withdrawn. Women have been entirely excluded from the process, and

By Susan Hutchinson

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ISIS: the generational problem

The fate of perhaps as many as 70 children born to Australian mothers and caught up in the Iraq-Syria conflict has been the focus of Australian media attention. There are calls for them to be repatriated on the grounds that they should not be tarred with the same brush as their parents. An episode

By Rodger Shanahan

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Australia-India: naval drills show trust, yet political caution still

The largest ever Australian naval fleet arrived in India this week to conduct the biennial AUSINDEX naval exercises with the Indian Navy. The size and shape of this year’s exercise is a major step forward in defence cooperation between the two countries, even if significant political caution

By David Brewster

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ISIS: children should not pay for the sins of the parents

The fall of the so-called ISIS caliphate and resultant outflow of fighters’ families into temporary refugee camps highlights the plight of Australian women and their children who are seeking to return to Australia. In many cases the children have been born overseas to Australian mothers who

By Kim Rubenstein

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Japan’s very busy fighter force

By international standards, the Japan Air Self-Defense Force is very busy. It scrambles fighters daily to intercept multiple aircraft penetrating Japan’s Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ) – the block of airspace established over, and usually somewhat beyond, a nation’s territory in which

By Peter Layton

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India’s anti-satellite missile test: also a test for the polity

Last month, scientists of India’s Defence Research and Development Organisation carried out an anti-satellite missile test, as a part of the mission codenamed Shakti (Power), and successfully destroyed one of the two satellites put into the low-earth orbit by the Indian Space Research Organisation

By Amit Cowshish

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The cost of terror: two tales of country life

One country town, two people. One of them a hero who added to the legacy of the uncomplicated stoicism and selflessness that Australians popularly associate with “the bush”, and the other someone who betrayed it. Last week two people from the small Riverland town of Loxton in South Australia (

By Rodger Shanahan

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ASEAN Regional Forum: less might be more

The ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) – with its unwieldy number of member states (27) and preoccupation with dialogue (a “talk shop”) – has been declared a failure time and again. Some criticism is justified. But it can also be argued that the earliest expectations regarding this regional

By Ron Huisken

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The case to prosecute “jihadi brides” at home

A woman believed to be Melbourne-born Zehra Duman has recently resurfaced among the thousands of women and children at al Hawl refugee camp fleeing the last vestiges of the so-called ISIS caliphate. At just 19 years old, Duman left Australia to join the Islamic State. She married fellow

By Lydia Khalil

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Mobilising Defence in the “fourth industrial revolution”

Australia’s future wars may not run to our timetable. Our recent wars of choice have allowed participation as and when we wished. If some future conflict is short notice however, the Australian Defence Force may lack the logistic backup to be more than a one-shot force, operationally viable for

By Peter Layton

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Remembering Rwanda: small mercy from the horror of Kibeho

What you don’t expect to see when you arrive at Kibeho are the eucalyptus trees. When Belgium ruled Rwanda, gum trees were planted across the colony to provide firewood. A small country in central Africa, Rwanda is mainly populated by two ethnic groups: the minority Tutsi and the majority Hutu.

By John Connor

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The strategic consequence of the Chagos Islands legal dispute

At the end of last month, the African archipelago nation of Mauritius secured an important legal victory in its territorial and maritime disputes against its former coloniser, the United Kingdom. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) produce an advisory opinion that rejected the UK’s claims

By Bec Strating

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The battle to resource the US National Defense Strategy

In a recent article, (What the pessimists get wrong about Trump in Asia) Natasha Kassam argued that Donald Trump’s election has not ended Barack Obama’s pivot to the Pacific or led to a significant break with traditional approaches to US foreign policy in Asia. Kassam rightly pointed to the 2017

By Erin Hurley

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Christchurch enters a nightmare peculiar to our times

“The nihilist … acts out the violence that so many others perpetrate verbally and virtually on the web: he is, in that sense, the avenging angel of post-truth and the rant made flesh.”- The Revolt of the Public The cold-blooded murder of 50 persons while at prayer at mosque in

By Martin Gurri

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Who bears responsibility for the Children of ISIS?

The death of UK teenager Shamima Begum’s newborn son and the recent video of an Australian woman in Syria calling to be returned home with her sick infant daughter has brought the issue of ISIS minors and the role of the home government in safeguarding these citizens to the forefront. By

By Rodger Shanahan

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Christchurch attack: the dark web of terrorism as entertainment

Following the deadliest terror attack in New Zealand’s history, a flood of articles have been devoted to “understanding” the accused shooter, Brenton Tarrant, decoding his manifesto, and finding reason in his actions. Yet such assessments overlook a deeper, more chilling reality: Tarrant’s

By Nicolas Johnston

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Five questions about the Christchurch attack

The terrorist attack on two mosques in Christchurch by an Australian white supremacist accused of killing 50 people as they gathered for prayer has rightfully horrified people the world over. While police and security agencies grapple with how the attack came to pass without their

By Rodger Shanahan

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Singapore’s careful F-35 fighter aircraft purchase

Singapore has finally decided to acquire four F-35 aircraft with options for eight more, initially for evaluation purposes. The purchase appears cautious, well-timed, and cost-effective. Cautious, in that development remains ongoing with a full rate production decision not likely until late 2019.

By Peter Layton

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Four reasons why China supports North Korea

Of all the countries on the sidelines of the Hanoi summit between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-Un, few were watching more intently than China. Chinese financial and trade support effectively facilitated North Korea’s nuclear program by keeping its economy afloat and thus fractured the chances of a

By Richard McGregor

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India’s wobbly quest for fighter aircraft

India’s air strikes this week targeting suspected terrorist hideouts in Pakistan and subsequent air battles comes at a time of growing concerns about sharply declining strength of India’s fighter squadrons. The number of aircraft presently stands at 31, against the authorised level of 42. The

By Amit Cowshish

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Behind every mujahid there is a mujahidi

The tendency to downplay the agency of female ISIS members was explored last week by my colleague Lydia Khalil (Repatriating female foreign fighters: political not personal). In media interviews, detained women or their families often make self-serving claims to have been brainwashed or

By Rodger Shanahan

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The pressure to curb arms sales to Saudi Arabia

The Australian government is finally considering a ban on defence exports to Saudi Arabia. Like-minded governments such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany have stated that they are also strengthening their resolve to end military support to Saudi Arabia because of breaches of

By Susan Hutchinson

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Responding to cyber attacks: resilience and transparency is key

Prime Minister Scott Morrison this week revealed that Australia’s major political parties were the target of a recent cyber attack. The Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) identified a malicious intrusion in the Parliament House computer network. It was later discovered that the Liberal, Labor

By Dirk van Graver

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Repatriating female foreign fighters: political not personal

The Islamic State is on the verge of total defeat. As a result, many of the remaining foreign fighters who travelled to the caliphate are coming out of the woodwork. One of those is Shamima Begum, a former student from the United Kingdom who at the age of 15 travelled along with two other

By Lydia Khalil

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China may only seek a limited naval role in the Indian Ocean

Among the many questions raised by the massive modernisation and expansion of China’s Navy in the last few years is its future role in the Indian Ocean. Will the Indian Ocean become a Chinese lake? China has gone from essentially zero presence in the Indian Ocean around a decade ago to a fairly

By David Brewster

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