'Australia can now plan, invest and develop Darwin Port so it can sustain the economic development of northern Australia and support our defence and national security needs long into the future,' writes John Coyne.
NEW PODCAST 🎤
This week on Stop the World, Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna joins David Wroe for a conversation on Russia, Iran, the United States and the imperative for smaller countries such as Estonia and Australia to work together.
🎧 Listen ➡️ bit.ly/4bE3cwi
📺 Watch ➡️ bit.ly/4b6lx4Z
'That expanded fleet of 55 Bluebottle USVs must be only the beginning of the process. Platforms such as the Bluebottle must also fully exploit continuous modernisation processes to take full advantage of rapid innovation cycles for fast evolution of their capabilities,' writes Malcolm Davis.
'My strong support for Australia’s current secrecy provisions, leads me to support the bill’s requirement that information imparted be through arrangement made between the royal commission and the Commonwealth,' writes Chris Taylor.
🚨 Registrations now open for the 2026 ASPI Defence Conference 🚨
Join policymakers, military leaders and experts in Canberra on 25 June to discuss strengthening deterrence, building credible capability and reinforcing collective security.
🎟️ Register here: bit.ly/4b4EHbo
ICYMI 🔉
This week on Stop the World, Ukrainian MP Galyna Mykhailiuk joined David Wroe to discuss the state of Russia’s war against Ukraine, the prospects for peace as the conflict enters its fifth year, and the impact of the Iran conflict on Ukraine and its security.
🎧 Listen 👉 bit.ly/3P45gVF
'The Iran War, more than four years of Russia’s war on Ukraine and tensions in the Indo-Pacific have prompted most democratic nations to reset defence strategies and budgets. The strategic rationale is just as relevant for Australia,' write Marc Ablong and Justin Bassi.
'Economic cyber-espionage has always been about securing advantage. In the age of AI, that advantage rests increasingly in models, data and algorithms,' writes Gatra Priyandita.
'While the break was ended by flights by two planes on 6 March, there have been no further intrusions since then. And the mystery remains,' writes Thijs Stegeman.
'Missile interceptors have great difficulty in intercepting highly manoeuvrable hypersonic glide vehicle warheads of the type that the DF-27 can be armed with, rendering the potential for successful defence in doubt,' writes Victor Abramowicz.
🚨 NEW PUBLICATION 🚨
In ‘Australia and the upending of US intelligence’, Chris Taylor examines how the second Trump administration’s approach to 🇺🇸 intelligence is affecting the Five Eyes & what that means for 🇦🇺’s national intelligence community & broader national interests.
🔖 Read: bit.ly/4d7uZGA
'It’s been a textbook precision air campaign. As long as the US and its allies keep the war short, keep it in the air and find some exit strategy that doesn’t prolong regional chaos or mire them in a ground campaign, they can justifiably declare a sort of victory,' writes @davidaxe.bsky.social.
'Fifty years after the Tange reforms created the modern Australian Defence Force, Australia faces a structural problem that few are willing to confront: steady erosion of the service chiefs’ authority,' writes Jennifer Parker.
'Near-term credibility must come from forward sustainment capacity, pre-positioned stocks, hardened northern infrastructure and expanded technical workforce pipelines,' writes John Coyne.
🚨 NEW REPORT 🚨
In 'Social insecurity' John Coyne and Justin Bassi find we have weakened resilience to different views along with normalisation of violence, both online and off, and need to rebuild a capacity to hold multiple, sometimes uncomfortable beliefs, simultaneously.
📚 Read the report:
'The choice isn’t between unity and freedom, or security and speech. The real choice is whether disagreement becomes a source of renewal or a slow-burning vulnerability,' write John Coyne and Justin Bassi.
'In confronting a challenge such as that posed by China, it is best for the Royal Australian Navy and the ADF more broadly to seek to project power forward from the sea-air gap in our northern approaches. Ideally, it would do this as part of a coalition,' writes Malcolm Davis.
'Japan’s restrictive arms transfer regulations and weak anti-espionage laws, both rooted in post-World War II pacifism, meant JAUKUS was not yet a realistic possibility, however appealing it might be strategically,' writes Ryosuke Hanada.
'While Australia cannot determine the outcome of a Taiwan Strait crisis on its own, it has a direct stake in how it unfolds and the ability to complicate Beijing’s actions through diplomatic, economic and military responses,' writes Nathan Attrill.
'BRICS represents institutional entrepreneurship, not ideological unity. Members seek insulation from coercion and greater control over finance, trade and technology. This resonates well beyond the Global South,' writes Andrew Henderson.
'The concerns about autonomous lethal weapons alone are enough to show this is not just any commercial tool. It is already capable of deciding to target and kill a human being. That’s not a tool; it’s an agent and its capacity for power over our lives will only grow,' writes David Wroe.
'In northern Australia, defence resilience, national security and economic security are not competing agendas. Properly integrated, they reinforce one another,' writes John Coyne.
'Decisions taken now—about technology platforms, data architectures, vendor relationships and intergovernmental coordination—will determine Australia’s exposure well beyond 2032,' writes Chris Taylor.
Without steady, coordinated finance that links miners to the manufacturers that depend on their materials, good intentions won’t translate into real capacity or secure supply,' writes John Coyne.
'No publicly known exercise or basing initiative is explicitly framed as a Taiwan war rehearsal. Nevertheless, taken together, they reveal an emerging operational model that aligns closely with the requirements of a Taiwan contingency,' writes Rowan Allport.
'Darwin sits closer to Jakarta than to Canberra. It’s proximate to Southeast Asia’s maritime chokepoints and to the Indo-Pacific’s most dynamic economic and security corridors. For Territorians, distance isn’t measured in political narratives but in nautical miles,' writes John Coyne.
'The president’s first term combined tariff activism and burden-sharing rhetoric with institutional continuity in Indo-Pacific defence settings. Tariffs functioned largely as bargaining leverage,' write John Coyne and Justin Bassi.
NEW PODCAST 🎤
In a special double episode of Stop the World, Dr Andrew Charlton joins David Wroe to discuss AI and the future of the Australian economy, while Maxwell Scott explains how AI could complement, enhance or replace certain human tasks.
🎧 Listen: bit.ly/4azaxNf
