Let’s “think different” about national security

We know what the future of our region looks like, but unless we start thinking about how we think, that knowledge may not be enough to help us cope with it.

Organised crime is testing Australia’s onshore migration program

Operation Sovereign Borders has reduced the number of irregular migrants dying at sea and stemmed the flow of people-smuggling ventures to Australia. Unfortunately, this success has come at great cost to our nation’s finances, and possibly our humanity.

Rethinking Australia’s food security

Australia needs to adopt a more coherent approach to the critically important convergence of food security, climate change and national security.

Food will decide the human future

Our future supply of food is filled with risk, and history tells us that lack of food leads to conflict. In his new book “Food or War” Australian author Julian Cribb calls for a new food system capable of meeting global needs on our increasingly hot and overcrowded planet.

The hard edge of soft power

The original Colombo Plan gave students from Asia and the Pacific a chance to study in Australia, and now a New Colombo Plan is sending Australians abroad to learn from our regional neighbours.

Securing consensus on national security

With the federal election out of the way, and some welcome stability in the leadership of the major political parties in prospect, Australia now faces the challenge of forging a national consensus on an external security policy that reflects our self-confidence and maturity as a nation.

Hastie’s right: it’s time to protect ourselves

Andrew Hastie’s warning that an intellectual failure to accept that Chinese President Xi Jinping’s vision for the world will test our democratic values, economy, alliances and security as never before is the blunt wake-up call that Australians need.

Australia’s ‘unbreakable alliance’

Washington’s ambassador to Australia, Arthur Culvahouse, has used a speech to ASPI to stress the strength of the alliance with the United States and to reject suggestions that China and America are involved in a new cold war.

National security should turn to the cloud

A move now to secure cloud infrastructure is required if Australia’s national security agencies are to maintain and improve their capability.

It’s time for a public–private partnership in national security

The threats we face don’t recognise the walls that exist between Australian businesses and national security agencies. To safeguard Australia, we need to put more doors in those divisions.

Australian universities must wake up to the risks of researchers linked to China’s military

China’s aggressive program of acquiring technology from abroad should be a cause of concern for Australian universities. Yet, our system of vetting research collaborations is clearly broken, putting Australian security at risk.

Rethinking Australia’s citizenship bans

The logic behind Australia’s terrorism-related loss-of-citizenship provisions is meant to be brilliantly simple, but the reality of the measure could be counter-productive to its aims.