ASPI suggests

The HQ-9, which China will sell to Turkey, in 2009.Turkey has announced plans to buy a long-range missile defence system (the HQ-9) from China, rather than NATO supplied Patriot missiles. Speculation is that the Chinese company (China Precision Machinery Export-Import Corporation) beat the Lockheed Martin and Raytheon made competition partly because of a significant price undercut: the HQ-9 system is suspected to cost $3 billion. NATO isn’t too happy about the deal; Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said:

Our position is very clear. It’s a national decision to decide which equipment to purchase, However, seen from a NATO perspective, it’s of utmost importance that the systems nations plan to acquire can work and operate together with similar systems in other Allied nations.

The Americans aren’t impressed either.

NATO isn’t the only entity to raise objections to arms sales recently—Beijing reportedly asked Korea not to sell FA-50 fighters to the Philippines.

Every time the Korean or Filipino media reported on the FA-50 sale, China reacted sensitively trying to confirm the reports through diplomatic channels,

… a Korean government source said. On the topic of air-combat capability in Asia, here is another a piece on Singapore and the F-35B. Read more

Reader response: Australia as a pivotal power

Australian peacekeepers in East Timor, 2002.In thinking about whether Australia is a middle or pivotal power, Damien Kingsbury asks the best question: what would happen if Australia were to disappear? Andrew Davies provides an intelligent, thought-provoking response but I think he understates the impact of Australia’s hypothetical absence from the international community.

Davies rightly points out Australia’s pivotal roles in intelligence cooperation and stabilisation/disaster relief operations in the region but, at the risk of extending the thought experiment too far, there are at least three other areas where I think Australia’s absence would have significant consequences: multilateral forums, trade and overseas development assistance.

Especially in the past year, Australia has proven its central role in several of the world’s major forums, the best example of which is its leadership role on regulating small arms. Not only was it an Australian that chaired the final Conference on the Arms Trade Treaty—leading to the first international treaty on the issue—but it was under Australia’s presidency that a historic Security Council Resolution was passed on the same issue. It’s always hard to argue a counter-factual but it’s equally difficult to imagine such progress without the concerted effort that Australia has made on this issue. Read more

Australia’s new stance on Fiji: support or sell-out?

Lost in the din of an election campaign has been a quiet but dramatic change by Australia—and New Zealand—in dealing with Fiji’s military regime. Australia’s then Minister for Foreign Affairs Bob Carr saw the constitution imposed by Fiji’s regime as a step forward, while New Zealand Prime Minister John  Key didn’t see it as a ‘deal breaker’.

There’s every indication that under a Coalition government Australia will seek to continue to cosy up to the Bainimarama government. Already sanctions are being eased. For example, Fiji’s Attorney-General, previously a banned immigrant whose permanent residence status in Australia was revoked, is now a regular if secret visitor. How long before Bainimarama himself is made welcome? Read more

Cyber wrap

This month Indonesia had the dubious honour of becoming the cyberattack capital of the world. According to the second quarter Akamai report, Indonesia has surpassed China to become the preferred launching pad for 38% of the world’s cyberattacks. 79% of all attacks now originate from the Asia-Pacific region; this is a significant increase of almost 25% since the end of 2012.

Last week the third instalment of the International Conference on Cyber Space was held in Seoul, South Korea. Initiated in London 2011, the process draws ministers, government and private sector cyber leaders from across the globe. The conference produced the Seoul Framework—a principles document organised around the themes of the conference, including cybersecurity, economic growth and development, cybercrime and capacity building. Read more

South Korean foreign aid: contributing to international security

Seoul at nightSouth Korea’s economic rise is an amazing story. From a country devastated by the Korean War with a per capita gross national income (GNI) of $67, the Republic of Korea (ROK) has grown to the world’s 12th largest economy. Over the past 25 years, South Korea has become an important contributor to international development assistance. In 2011, ROK President Lee Myung-bak declared

… now, the Republic of Korea wants to give back to the international community even more than what it has ever received. The Republic of Korea stands ready to extend a helping hand to those who are in need, providing them with appropriate support and care.

In 1987, South Korea transitioned to a democracy. That same year, after over two decades of solid economic growth, South Korea became a donor of official development assistance (ODA) providing $25 million in foreign aid. Contributions increased steadily, with annual percentage increases that often ranged from 30% to 79% for the next 20 years. By 2009, ROK contributions reached $816 million. It is important to note that these ODA numbers don’t include aid to North Korea, which would make these amounts far larger. Read more

Xi Jinping and the Sabah enigma

Chinese President Xi Jinping has been a busy man of late. Fresh from a whirlwind tour of central Asian states and international summits in September, he’s been on the road again—this time to Southeast Asia.

The Southeast Asian tour included official visits to Indonesia and Malaysia and the APEC conference in Bali. Xi signed economic agreements with Indonesia and Malaysia, while stressing the resurgence of a ‘Maritime Silk Road.’ Rhetoric of shared prosperity, growing mutual trade and ‘win-win’ situations was accompanied by a proposal for an Infrastructural Development Bank, all of which we were told would contribute to a new ‘diamond decade’ in China–ASEAN relations.

Everything seems to have gone according to plan in Southeast Asia. But did it?

Let’s return to late August this year. After a meeting with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Beijing, Malaysian Foreign Minister Anifah Aman announced that Xi would visit Malaysia in October, spending 4–5 October in Kuala Lumpur and 5–6 October in Sabah. The planned visit was reported in the Malaysian press and the Sabah Chinese community began anxiously preparing for the occasion. However, cancellation of the Sabah visit was informally announced on 6 October, without explanation. Read more

A ministerial-led sea-change on the way?

An LCM8 approaches HMAS Choules during Exercise Sea Lion 2013, far north Queensland.

The principal Liberal Party defence proposals at the recent election were to increase funding, deliver yet another White Paper and have yet another reform program. All pretty standard stuff really, especially as the other side agreed with the idea of increasing funding. The focus of the new government was seemingly going to be on improving implementation and program delivery rather than embracing radical new strategic directions. Maybe that perspective is about to change.

The May 2013 white paper proposed that, with the ADF moving away from combat operations in Afghanistan, the focus should shift to enhanced regional engagement. This strategy had a somewhat balanced land, naval and air approach; there was a place for everybody. Read more

Indonesia: more than a buffer zone

Presiden SBY dan PM Australia Tony Abbott memberi keterangan pers bersama, seusai pertemuan bilateral, di Istana Merdeka, Jakarta, Senin (30/9) sore. (foto: laily/presidenri.go.id)

Daniel Grant is to be congratulated for his interesting post on the limited prospects for Australia–Indonesia strategic cooperation. I have two comments in response.

First, I think the piece underplays the idea of strategic cooperation as ballast and overplays the notion of strategic cooperation as a wartime alliance. Because of that, Grant is drawn to an argument about differing national interests based on Indonesia’s probable unwillingness to provide a buffer role for Australia when the fighting is actually happening in Indonesian living rooms.

But the great bulk of strategic cooperation between even close partners unfolds in peacetime, not in conflict. Close cooperation empowers partners. It adds to their strategic weight and it deters adversaries. It’s worth doing for a host of reasons that are less related to direct conflict than to what some strategists call the ‘gravitational’ use of force. Read more

Putting runs on the board: Australia and International Cyberspace

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop delivering a keynote speech at the Seoul Conference on Cyberspace 2013.At the Seoul International Cyberspace Conference last week, I was listening out for the big advances—if there were any—which had occurred since the previous conference in Budapest.  (For what the International Cyberspace Conference process is all about, my first post on The Strategist outlines the details.)

The most notable change in Seoul was the degree of participation from developing nations, who were absent from previous years. This time some 87 nations were represented at the conference, from all corners of the globe.  This is welcome, as unlike many of the more developed economies of Europe, China, and North America, many of these nations are still in the process of understanding how they exploit the digital economy to their advantage, building their own capabilities and working out where exactly they stand on the question of internet governance and security. Read more

Security implications of modern communication technologies in Northeast Asia

Last month, ASPI and the Australian Department of Defence co-chaired the inaugural Northeast Asia Defence and Security Forum in Sydney.

It was a wide ranging discussion, with a particular focus on how all parties could engage each other and build trust in order to prevent more serious threats emerging—see the full report here and media coverage here and here.

Those engagement mechanisms need to be robust and flexible given the especially strong nexus between commerce, domestic politics, and security in the region, underlining the need to better integrate economic and strategic analysis (PDF) of northeast Asian defence issues. Ben Schreer has written in The Strategist about some of those issues, including the pressures for military modernisation to evolve into arms racing. Read more