Emerging Threats

Stripping citizenship: Information gaps and unforeseen consequences
It's now three weeks since the Abbott Government introduced a bill into parliament that would see dual-national terrorists forfeit their Australian citizenship. But is popularity …
Kuwait's disenfranchisement of Bidun leads to growing ISIS threat
Late last month, in conjunction with attacks at a beach resort in Tunisia and a 'lone wolf' attack in eastern France, a suicide bomber struck the Imam Al-Sadeq mosque in Kuwait…
South China Sea: Why Korea is silent, and why that's a good thing
Last month on The Diplomat, Van Jackson made an important argument about South Korea's increasingly notable silence on freedom of navigation in the South China Sea (South China…
Iran has made big nuclear concessions in Vienna
Another seven days to reach an agreement; that's what the P5-1 decided this week when they weren't able to meet their 30 June deadline for a final deal on Iran's nuclear program…
Is Egypt falling into an Islamist insurrection?
Islamist insurrection has returned to Egypt. There has been a significant growth in the sophistication of the targeting, conduct and lethality of terrorist acts, a crisis of…
Attribution is key to broader ISIS strategy
The suicide bombing of a Shia mosque in Kuwait, shooting of Western tourists in Tunisia, and a beheading and attempt to blow up a chemical factory in France. Three continents,…
North Korea missile test: Seoul must now focus on sub hunting
North Korea's apparently successful test of a workable submarine launched ballistic missile (SLBM) was big news over the weekend. Signs that North Korea had been working on…
Will space and cyber operations affect ADF force structure?
Over the past month, The Interpreter has hosted a debate on Australian defence strategy initiated by Alan Dupont's Lowy analysis paper, Full-Spectrum Defence. The discussion so…
The coming nuclearisation of the Indian Ocean
While the world focuses on the dangers that a nuclear-armed Iran could present in the Middle East, a potentially more dangerous and unstable nuclear proliferation is occurring in…
Do we need 'full-spectrum defence'?
The first thing to say about Alan Dupont's recent paper is that he is absolutely correct about the dire condition of Australian strategic policy. As he suggests, we lack a…