From the bookshelf: ‘The Red Emperor’

Xi Jinping’s life, like the lives of all China’s top leaders, is hidden behind a wall of secrecy. Xi has been in power for 12 years, but we know little about him beyond what we can glean from official media releases, reports on encounters with foreign leaders, official biographies and his speeches. The facade around Xi’s personal life is strictly maintained, his public appearances are stage-managed and within China rumours and criticism are quickly suppressed

Official biographies paint an idealised picture of Xi, describing him as ‘a son of the yellow earth’, a reference to the cave dug into the yellow clay in Liangjiahe village, where he spent seven years in the Cultural Revolution. These accounts describe Xi as a brotherly leader who ‘had holes and patches in his pants like the rest of us’. ‘When it rained, we gathered together and Xi told us stories’, one villager recalls.

In The Red Emperor: Xi Jinping and his new China, Michael Sheridan lifts the veil of secrecy, painting a far more realistic picture of how Xi rose to power. Sheridan has had a long career as a journalist, including stints for Reuters, ITN and The Independent, with postings in Rome, Beirut and Jerusalem. He first reported from Hong Kong and China in 1989 and served as The Sunday Times Far East correspondent for 20 years.

In the Chinese Communist Party hierarchy, Xi is considered a princeling of the highest rank. His father, Xi Zhongxun, although purged in the Cultural Revolution, was one of Mao Zedong’s ‘eight immortals’, his closest advisers. When Xi returned to Beijing from Liangjiahe in 1976, the year of Mao’s death, his privileged background gave him a boost, and he easily secured a place reserved for worker-peasant-soldiers at the prestigious Tsinghua University.

After graduation, Xi’s well-connected mother arranged for him to work as a private secretary to Geng Biao, a vice premier and minister of national defence. This put Xi’s career in the fast lane and laid the foundation for his close relationship with the armed forces.

Xi joined the party at 21, apparently setting aside any bitterness he might have felt over the ousting of his father. A friend concludes that Xi ‘chose to become redder than red’ and that his ambition was driven by a need for restoration. The young Xi and his princeling colleagues had a strong sense of entitlement, referring to politicians from less privileged backgrounds as ‘sons of shopkeepers’. Xi’s elitism has not diminished. Once in power, he marginalised the Communist Youth League, the main vehicle of advancement for his non-princeling rivals.

Sheridan details Xi’s rise through assignments in the affluent coastal provinces of Fujian and Zhejiang, followed by a brief stint as party secretary of Shanghai. A power struggle in 2007 saw Xi appointed to the Politburo Standing Committee a notch ahead of his rival Li Keqiang, effectively earmarking him for the top job.

The real watershed came in 2012. The first half of the year was marked by the ouster of Xi’s flamboyant rival Bo Xilai, whose wife Gu Kailai was convicted for the murder of British businessman Neil Heywood. Bo was jailed for life on corruption charges. Sheridan sees Heywood’s murder as part of a high-level political plot to discredit and oust Bo. He puts the onus of responsibility on the local police chief and reminds us that Gu had no motive for the crime.

Once the path had been cleared, in November Xi was appointed party secretary with a Politburo Standing Committee manned mainly by princelings. To consolidate his position, he mounted an anti-corruption campaign that lasted several years, with the jailing of hundreds of thousands of cadres and officials, numerous executions and suicides and the occasional ‘convenient heart attack’.

Sheridan makes a valiant effort to pry open the door on how Xi Jinping thinks but struggles to find depth behind his official pronouncements. Sheridan places Xi and Mao Zedong, a prolific reader and writer, on entirely different intellectual planes. In his speeches to foreign leaders, Xi likes to quote the host countries’ classics, which he claims to have read, a practice that Sheridan dismisses as ‘diplomatic piffle’. People close to Xi say that he prefers to relax with light reading materials.

Sheridan debunks several myths. Much is made of China’s growing friendship with Russia, but Sheridan points out that Xi’s three years of accompanying defence minister Geng to negotiations taught him to be coldly realistic about Moscow’s intentions. When Bloomberg published an expose of the hidden wealth of Xi Jinping’s relatives, propaganda sources suggested that an irate Xi had ordered his siblings to divest their assets. According to Sheridan, they simply hid their wealth more efficiently.

Sheridan combines information from a wide range of Chinese and international sources to produce a narrative that is rich in political and personal detail. Thoroughly researched and eminently readable, The Red Emperor provides a fresh perspective on the world’s second most powerful leader.

It’s time for a Quad defence ministers meeting

The Quad is hobbled in its current configuration as a diplomatic partnership that deliberately eschews defence cooperation as part of its agenda. It’s time to test the waters with a meeting of Quad defence ministers.

While the navies of the four Quad members—Australia, India, Japan and the United States—hold regular joint training in a quadrilateral format through the annual Exercise Malabar, officially these drills are separate to the Quad. That is despite the fact that Malabar is described by participating countries much as they describe the Quad, as part of a ‘shared commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific’.

It is increasingly awkward, if not absurd, to insist, as Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade does, that the Quad ‘is a diplomatic, not security, partnership’ but at the same time focuses on maritime security, cyber security and health security.

Some analysts maintain that the Quad’s quiescence stems from India’s ‘differing world view’ and limited strategic appetite. This assumption should be tested. The headquarters of India’s defence staff said on 9 October that the latest Exercise Malabar was an example of ‘interoperability between navies of Quad nations’. So much for Indian reticence about describing Malabar as a Quad activity.

Japan’s political willingness to explore defence cooperation through the Quad is also worth re-examining in light of former defence minister Ishiba Shigeru’s rise to the prime ministership and his reported interest in strengthening Asia’s multilateral defence structures. While an Asian NATO might be out of sight, a Quad that does defence is perfectly realisable.

The other argument commonly heard for keeping defence out of the Quad is that Southeast Asian countries are presumed to be neuralgically opposed to any expansion of its activities into the military realm. This may apply to the more cautiously non-aligned members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), but certainly not all of them. Again, this is an assumption that deserves to be tested. And deference to ASEAN’s widely assumed skittishness about the Quad is not a sufficiently weighty reason to prevent the members from legitimately discussing defence issues with each other. This is especially so at a time when the deteriorating strategic situation in the Indo-Pacific demands closer collaboration among likeminded countries with meaningful defence capabilities.

Diplomats from the Quad countries reflexively defer to the centrality of ASEAN. But a strategic vacuum at the core of this vaunted centrality was laid bare by failure at ASEAN’s summit this month to make meaningful progress on South China Sea disputes and by the inability of the associated East Asia Summit to yield even a leaders’ statement. If Quad countries wish to maintain regional stability, they will need to do more of the hard-power lifting themselves.

One suggestion for testing the waters for defence cooperation within the Quad is for the defence ministers to meet on the sidelines of a regional security summit. The ASEAN Defence Ministers Meeting Plus (ADMM-Plus), to be held in Laos in late November 2024, presents a timely opportunity. The ADMM-Plus agenda should be conducive, since it is restricted to non-warlike activities, such as maritime security and military medicine. It can provide an uncontroversial foundation that Quad defence cooperation could build on while staying within the diplomatic edifice of providing public goods for the Indo-Pacific region.

The fact that the ADMM-Plus is an ASEAN-hosted gathering presents some diplomatic sensitivity: ASEAN would not want to set such a precedent for other impromptu sideline meetings. But this sensitivity can be mitigated by hosting the meeting discreetly within one of the Quad embassies.

The 2025 Shangri-La Dialogue also presents a follow-up meeting opportunity. Since it is not institutionally tied to ASEAN, Quad defence ministers have less reason to be discreet and should publicise any meeting they hold on that occasion.

Eventually, the Quad should aim for a formal defence ministers meeting, not just to restore a much-needed component to discussions about regional trends but to generate a concrete policy agenda beyond holding quadrilateral military exercises.

Space: an opportunity for South Korea and Australian defence cooperation

Australia and South Korea should collaborate on space technology by building and launching small surveillance satellites from Australian space launch facilities. It would be in the military and industrial interests of both countries to do so.

Over the past 30 years, South Korea has made significant progress in space technology. In 2022, it became the seventh nation capable of independent space launches, with its Nuri rocket. A few months later, South Korea’s first lunar probe, Danuri, reached the Moon’s orbit, where it is surveying future lunar landing sites.

As middle powers with similar interests in the Asia-Pacific, the two countries should pursue joint research and development projects to foster mutually beneficial technological advancements in this domain. By jointly developing small surveillance satellites and using Australian launch facilities, this collaboration will promote the national defence of both countries. It will also help to accelerate innovation in a high-technology field, significantly reduce the high costs associated with space development and help to create new industries.

Deployment of small satellites must be the priority. Compared with traditional large satellites, small ones, weighing 100kg or less, are cheaper to develop, build and deploy. Their development cycles are shorter, allowing for rapid technological innovation. Each launch can deploy several simultaneously. They are also easier to replace if they malfunction or are destroyed.

South Korea said in 2022 that it aimed to deploy 40 small satellites by 2030 to monitor nuclear and missile threats from North Korea. Given the average three-year lifespan of small satellites, maintaining the entire development and launch cycle independently will be a challenge for South Korea, so it should seek international cooperation. Other countries should see reason to help, especially as the surveillance target is the global threat of North Korea’s nuclear arsenal.

Australia is the best candidate partner, because it has a nascent space program with similar goals. As emphasised in Australia’s Earth Observation from Space Roadmap, international collaboration would strengthen Australia’s satellite manufacturing capabilities.

Once the satellites are in operation, their information could also be used for Australian defence as well for civil tasks such as tracking floods and gathering data on climate change. Additionally, the Australian government’s cancelled National Space Mission for Earth Observation could be revived for a much lower cost if it were part of collaboration with South Korea.

Furthermore, both countries could use this partnership to strengthen their commercial space launch services. South Korea intends to launch its small satellites using solid-fuel rockets developed by its Agency for Defence Development. However, to meet the demand for frequent launches, South Korea will likely have to use commercial services. South Korean companies are already pursuing use of Australian launch sites.

Australian has the advantage of proximity to the equator and good weather. These factors reduce launch costs and increase the choice of orbits.

This partnership would help Australia to establish itself as a global space hub. The Arnhem Space Centre in the Northern Territory is already set to launch several South Korean rockets in 2025 and can be expanded.

It would be helpful if South Korea joined AUKUS Pillar 2 for cooperation on advanced technologies.

For satellite development and launch cooperation, technologies, parts and systems classified as strategic goods will need to flow between South Korea and Australia. To ensure this process runs smoothly, it is essential to align their export control procedures.

Given the security sensitivities involved, it would be safest to implement regulatory adjustments under the framework of a technology alliance like AUKUS Pillar 2.

In a joint statement marking the third anniversary of AUKUS last month, the leaders of Australia, the US and Britain expressed interest in exploring advanced capability cooperation with Canada, New Zealand and South Korea under AUKUS Pillar 2. Although South Korea lacks deep historical, political and military ties with Australia, a space technology agreement would begin to close that distance.

Space cooperation between South Korea and Australia holds immense potential, promising to open new frontiers in both technological innovation and strategic security for both nations.

The Starship revolution in space

SpaceX took a big step towards full reusability of space launchers on 13 October, a step towards a transformation in accessing space far more cheaply, frequently and with big payloads.

The remarkably successful fifth test flight of the Starship launcher on that day saw a spectacular recovery of the rocket’s 300-ton first stage, Super Heavy, into the arms of the launch pad gantry. The second stage, also called Starship, meanwhile climbed and accelerated to almost orbital velocity and splashed down precisely in the targeted Indian Ocean location off Western Australia. This took the company closer to landing second stages for re-use.

The full reusability of Starship will dramatically reduce launch costs. That means it’s possible to consider new types of activity in space that simply were not viable technologically or were too expensive with past launch architecture.

Most of the envisaged applications are civilian, but possible military applications include launching surveillance and other satellites far more cheaply, and therefore in greater numbers, and even urgent delivery of large payloads across Earth with suborbital flights.

Once SpaceX achieves the capability for one Starship to take fuel from others in orbit, a single mission will be able to deliver up to 100 metric tons or 100 people to the Moon, to Mars and potentially beyond.

The cost of launch matters. Only the first stage of SpaceX’s existing Falcon launcher returns for re-use, yet that rocket has driven launch costs down to US$2720 per kilogram from the US$25,000 per kg that users paid for NASA Space Shuttle flights. The total cost of a Falcon launch is about US$67 million.

Because no hardware will be lost on a Starship flight, the only costs will be fuel, maintenance and use of the pad: US$10 million or less per launch for a future Starship version and, according to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, eventually US$2 million to US$3 million. That suggests a launch cost of US$100 to US$200 per kg.

Compare this with NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rockets, which will be fully expended on each mission, except for their Orion crew capsules. They will initially cost US$4 billion per launch and may end up around US$2.5 billion. NASA will launch only one SLS per year, at best.

Starship’s capacity means it will be able to launch large numbers of satellites on each mission, further reducing cost and rapidly deploying mega constellations, such as Starlink. Alternatively, it will be able to carry very large payloads into orbit—as much as 200 metric tons in a future version of Starship.

At its Boca Chica launch site in Texas, SpaceX is establishing what it calls the Starfactory, an assembly line that will be able to build a Starship a week, up from three a year now. With two more launch sites at Cape Canaveral, there is a suggestion of up to 44 flights a year from this location. Add in the launch facilities at Boca Chica, and the launch rate can exceed that of Falcon 9, currently one every 2.7 days.

Low cost, high payload to orbit and a fast launch cadence open up new opportunities for radically different purposes, particularly when in-orbit refueling is proven.

The most important role for Starship is supporting NASA’s Artemis program to get humans back to the Moon in preparation for human missions to Mars. SpaceX is developing a special lunar-landing version of Starship. Musk has suggested flying uncrewed Starships to Mars by 2026, and potentially crewed missions there by 2028, with his goal being the establishment of a permanent human presence on the planet’s surface.

Low-cost launches by Starship could also support a permanent human presence on the Moon that could then establish an in-space economy and manufacturing capability based on the use of lunar resources. All indications are that the Moon has substantial ice deposits in its regolith around the south pole, where humans will land first. If the water can be used for a base and in making rocket fuel for Starship launches from weak lunar gravity, the Moon will become a launch pad for exploration and resource exploitation across the inner solar system. That’s more important than Mars colonisation in coming decades.

The establishment of a permanent human base on the Moon, and the utilisation of lunar resources opens up a next step in human space activities. This will include construction of large space-based solar power satellites that could solve much of Earth’s energy challenges for the 21st century and beyond. Another option will be large commercial space platforms to replace the International Space Station at the end of its life in 2030. Robotic space manufacturing using lunar resources and 3D printing would create the possibility of an in-space industry that could foster technological innovation in the 2030s and 2040s.

Starship’s promise of low-cost and frequent space access opens up this new golden era of space exploration and resource exploitation.

Typhoon relief is an opportunity for ASEAN to promote peace in Myanmar

Typhoon Yagi was a disaster for Myanmar last month, killing hundreds. But some good can come from it if the Association of Southeast Asian Nations uses the occasion to promote peace in the strife-torn country.

To facilitate humanitarian relief, military government and its armed oppositions have to negotiate a ceasefire. ASEAN should link international relief efforts to broader peacebuilding initiatives, creating a foundation for a longer-term dialogue.

If ASEAN acts decisively to mediate Myanmar conflict, it will not only help stabilise the country but also reaffirm the organisation’s role as an effective regional platform. Also, ASEAN members need to help resolve Myanmar’s civil war because the country has become fertile ground for hybrid threats and crime that present problems for the region.

Production and trafficking of synthetic drugs, primarily methamphetamine, thrives in Myanmar, in part with support by triads from China. Shan, an eastern state, is at the centre of the illegal trade. Armed ethnic groups are heavily involved in these activities, using the proceeds to fund their resistance to the government while facilitating transnational criminal operations that have spilled over into neighbouring Laos.

Another issue is illegal arms trafficking, with weapons being smuggled into Myanmar from conflict zones in southern Thailand, the Philippines, Syria and Afghanistan. A sniper rifle costs as little as US$220 in Myanmar, though ammunition is expensive. Meanwhile, cyber scam compounds are mushrooming within Myanmar’s porous borders, operated by transnational criminal networks.

And if Myanmar’s domestic conflict remains unresolved, the strategically located country could become a proxy battleground as the United States, China, Russia and other powers vie for influence in the Indo-Pacific. China already has influence over certain non-state actors in Myanmar, and its manoeuvres could destabilise ASEAN unity.

So, failure to effectively engage in peace negotiation with Myanmar so far not only diminishes ASEAN’s credibility but also weakens its ability to counter external pressures and address members’ internal strife.

Myanmar was suffering a humanitarian crisis even before Typhoon Yagi hit from the east. Floods and landslides resulting from the typhoon displaced hundreds of thousands in the Mandalay region and overwhelmed the country’s already fragile relief infrastructure. As millions remain in dire need of humanitarian aid, the Myanmar junta has called for dialogue at the end of September, offering a glimmer of hope for conflict resolution.

A 2005 precedent shows that a natural disaster can be a catalyst for peace. The eastern Indonesian province Aceh struggled to recover from a terrible tsunami in late 2004 that created common ground for both the Indonesian government and Aceh Freedom Movement to start peace talks, as both sides focused on helping victims rather than fighting.

ASEAN should take the chance by pushing for a ceasefire as a condition for improving international relief efforts, and it should aim to work from the ceasefire towards broader peacebuilding as a foundation for negotiations between the two sides over the longer term.

Indonesia and Thailand have initiated dialogues to address Myanmar’s conflict, but if ASEAN deployed pooled resources of its members, it might achieve more. In a joint statement issued at the ASEAN leaders summit on 9 October, the member states said the association would continue engagement with Myanmar. The next extended informal consultation between Myanmar delegations, the special envoy and interested member states is scheduled for December in Thailand.

Pre-coup ASEAN has already provided humanitarian assistance in Myanmar, through its ASEAN Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance on Disaster Management in Rakhine, a southwestern state. Moving forward, ASEAN can gather contributions from its member states, such as Thailand and Malaysia, and ensure that aid reaches the most vulnerable while it simultaneously pushes for meaningful political dialogue.

ASEAN needs to continue its implementation of the Five-Point Consensus, which seeks an immediate end of violence, dialogue among all parties, appointment of a special envoy and the parties in Myanmar facilitating humanitarian assistance and allowing the envoy to visit Myanmar to meet all of them. ASEAN must also enhance its engagement with influential actors, including China, India, Japan and the United States.

A unified ASEAN stance will be critical in preventing any single power from dominating Myanmar’s political landscape, thus preserving regional stability and the association’s strategic role in the region.

Finally, enhancing regional security through cooperation should be a priority. ASEAN must bolster intelligence-sharing and joint security initiatives to address threats emanating from Myanmar. Collaboration with international partners, such as with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, will be critical in dismantling criminal networks and curbing the influence of malicious actors involved in the conflict.

After 75 years of the People’s Republic of China, the party is truly the sovereign

Lecturing in Munich in 1919, German political economist Max Weber spoke of the modern state as a ‘human community that claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory’. That elegant statement serves to this day as the conventional definition of a national state.

As the People’s Republic of China marks the 75th anniversary of its founding this month, it is clearer than ever that Weber’s definition does not apply to the ‘state’ in China but rather to the Chinese Communist Party, which holds a national monopoly on the legitimate use of force and functions as effective sovereign on behalf of the nation. What’s more, the party is asking the rest of the world to welcome its rise, along with the rise of China, and promoting its values internationally for emulation by others as it seeks to refashion the world in its own image—one where sovereign parties have equal standing with sovereign states.

It is widely acknowledged that the People’s Liberation Army, Navy, Airforce, Rocket force, People’s Armed Police and Peoples Militia are party entities, not state or government ones, subject first and foremost to party authority, direction, and control. PLA officers swear allegiance to the party ahead of the state, and the PLA’s peak unit of civil command is the party’s Central Military Commission, not the state one.

The anomalous position of the PLA has long been overlooked on the understanding that the party would at some point undergo a conventional transition from revolutionary party to party-in-government, at which point authority over the armed forces and armed police would be transferred from party to state. Also, the PLA’s status has been counted exceptional. The CCP leadership has not historically substituted party for government authority over most other functions and agencies of state, which are staffed by a civil service numbering in the millions, and technically separate from the party apparatus.

Whatever their merit in the past, arguments about the transitional character of China’s communist party-state are no longer tenable in the New Era of President Xi Jinping. In this New Era, the party’s jurisdiction over the PLA is matched by the CCP’s absorption of key government agencies into the party structure, and the party structure extending its reach into every non-government institution in business, society, media, culture and education. For example, the country’s National Security Council was set up as a party entity the year Xi took office in 2013 and placed under the party Central Committee, not the State Council, despite the term national state (国家) sitting prominently in its title (中央国家安全委员会). The Leading Small Groups that have expanded in number and importance under Xi, as inter-agency bodies co-ordinating policy execution, report to the party Politburo, not the State Council. Several state agencies overseeing national minorities and religious and united front affairs have been absorbed into party bodies.

A comparable assertion of party control over everything can be found in constitutional and legal affairs and in the day-to-day operations of China’s judicial system. If there is a transition under way in Xi’s New Era, it is not in the direction of the routinisation of state functions and Weberian governmental rationality, but toward recovery of the party’s ‘original intentions’ (初心) as the proletarian vanguard of a global communist revolution requiring the progressive partification of everything.

What makes Xi’s New Era different from what came before is the leadership’s public acknowledgement that the party is no longer transitioning but has arrived—and not just in China. Drawing on the party’s domestic lessons and experience,  the leadership is offering a range of ‘China solutions’ (中国方案) to the world for meeting the challenges of democracy and development. In the Foreign Ministry’s words, it is ‘providing a new choice for countries and nations in the world that want to accelerate development while maintaining their independence, and contribute Chinese wisdom and Chinese solutions to solve human problems’. Along with ‘China solutions’, the leadership is selling party values to the world through a series of ‘global initiatives’ promoting the CCP’s ‘core socialist values’ as alternatives to constitutional democracy, and deserving emulation by others.

Looking back, it seems many observers inside and outside China have been laboring under what legal scholar Donald Clarke calls convergence theory bias, attributing anomalies in the structure of party and state to the presumed transitional character of China’s political, economic, social and legal systems on their march toward governmental rationality, if not perhaps constitutional democracy. Clarke argues that we need a theory that can account for apparent anomalies ‘as features, not bugs’.

This would help predict the international behavior of a revisionist revolutionary party seeking recognition as a national state while acknowledging no limits to its authority inside China, and arguably no limits in a world it seeks to refashion in its own image.

The ‘China solutions’ and accompanying ‘global initiatives’ are announcements of the party’s arrival.

We have a party acting as if it were a national state, exercising de facto sovereignty in perpetuity, offering party solutions to the world as alternatives to constitutional democracy, and promoting new-style party-to-party relations as a supplement to orthodox international relations among national states.

Seventy-five years on, the PRC is further than ever from transitioning to a conventional state.

When naval capability is minimal, it’s also brittle

It is rare for a developed nation’s navy to lose a big vessel in peacetime. The sinking of the Royal New Zealand Navy’s HMNZS Manawanui after it ran aground on a Samoan reef this month—the country’s first naval loss since World War II—has raised important questions about naval preparedness. Fortunately, all 75 crew members were rescued, a testament to the ship’s commanding officer and crew.

Although the exact cause of the incident is under investigation, it highlights broader issues about the state of readiness, not just for New Zealand but also for allied and partner navies, including Australia.

This incident underscores several concerning issues about naval preparedness: insufficient naval capability, workforce challenges, budget constraints and the failure to invest in critical enablers. Each is acutely relevant to New Zealand and Australia, highlighting key vulnerabilities.

Manawanui was the only mine warfare and hydrographic survey vessel in the New Zealand fleet, a crucial asset for a maritime nation with the fifth-largest exclusive economic zone in the world. The loss of this ship leaves a glaring gap in New Zealand’s naval capabilities.

New Zealand’s navy, like many smaller ones, has long been operating with minimal capability across several domains. Manawanui’s loss illustrates the risks inherent in this minimalist approach: when one ship is the sole platform for a critical capability, losing it—even temporarily—paralyses that mission set.

This situation should sound alarm bells in Australia as well. The country’s decision to scrap its future mine warfare ship program, alongside the expansion of its at-sea replenishment capabilities in the latest Defence Integrated Investment Program, echoes New Zealand’s dangerous underinvestment in niche but vital capabilities.

The justification for cancelling the mine warfare ship program was that autonomous systems would replace the capability. However, without a ship to deploy from, these systems cannot cover the full spectrum of operations needed to protect Australia’s shipping routes from naval mines—something it should expect in the event of a conflict in the region.

During World War II, Australian waters were heavily mined. There were minefields between Sydney and Newcastle, in the Bass Strait, off Hobart and in the Spencer Gulf.

Australia’s hydrographic capability, used for seabed surveys, is in a precarious state, with five of its six ships decommissioned in the past three years and the last likely to follow soon. The 2020 decision to outsource nearly all of the navy’s hydrographic responsibilities has severely weakened its capacity in this area.

Another issue exacerbating the challenges in enabling capabilities is the shortage of Australian replenishment vessels. Both of the Royal Australian Navy’s replenishment ships are out of action until 2025, and while the problems are reportedly being dealt with under the warranties, it raises a broader question: why does Australia have only two? The money allocated to expanding this capability was removed in the latest Defence Integrated Investment Program.

There are many examples of such underinvestment in the navy’s enabling capabilities. The failure to maintain and expand these powers now could leave the country dangerously exposed in the event of a maritime crisis. The underinvestment and lack of preparedness come at a time when Australia’s defence strategy has stopped assuming that the country will get a 10-year warning period of an emerging conflict.

Despite the Australian government’s recent Defence budget uplift in May, the funding allocation, which equates to about 2.1 percent of GDP, is simply not enough to tackle the issues.

While the figure in nominal terms might be historic, in real terms as a percentage of GDP, it is low—particularly at a time when Defence, and specifically the navy, are going through a major recapitalisation following the underinvestment since the end of the Cold War.

According to the 2024 Australian National Defence Strategy, the country is facing its most challenging strategic environment since World War II. Yet, this has not been met with equally robust investment.

During the Cold War, Australia’s defence spending averaged 2.7 percent of GDP and was even higher during periods of heightened tension or major recapitalisation.

Despite the current strategic environment and the largest defence recapitalisation in decades, defence spending is projected to reach only 2.4 percent of GDP by the end of the decade—well below the Cold War average.

Although funding has been allocated for new surface combatants and submarines, there is little left to enhance other naval capabilities, leaving many of these atrophying and compromising naval preparedness at a critical time.

This inconsistency between our strategic statements about the chances of conflict in the region and our investment is glaring—and our naval preparedness is paying the price.

The sinking of HMNZS Manawanui should be a wake-up call for Australia and New Zealand. A conflict in the Indo-Pacific region is no longer a distant hypothetical. Regional tensions are rising and our naval forces are likely to be at the forefront of any confrontation. The ability to prevail in such a conflict depends not just on major warships and submarines but also on the enabling capabilities that underpin maritime operations: replenishment, hydrography, mine warfare and other niche but vital domains.

Gaza’s economy: GDP down 86 percent, most businesses destroyed

It is intrinsic to warfare that economic assets are destroyed, but conflicts usually don’t generate economic devastation on the scale inflicted in Gaza.

The value of economic activity in Gaza in the first quarter of 2024 was 86 percent below pre-war levels, with studies from both the World Bank and the United Nations Commission on Trade and Development describing its economic collapse.

‘Since October 7, the Palestinian economy experienced one of the largest economic shocks ever recorded in recent economic history’, the World Bank report concluded.

By way of comparison, International Monetary Fund (IMF) figures show that Ukraine’s economy fell 29 percent in 2022 following Russia’s assault. One academic study estimated Germany’s economy contracted 64 per cent and Japan’s economy 52 percent during World War II.

The influx of relatively high-spending American and allied soldiers meant the economies of both Afghanistan and Iraq achieved modest economic growth from 2003 onwards, according to the IMF economic database, despite the human suffering. Afghanistan’s economy contracted 20 percent in 2022, after the US withdrawal. The 2014 war in Gaza resulted in a 38 percent fall in its GDP.

The World Bank estimated that by the first quarter of 2024, 82 percent of private sector establishments in Gaza had been damaged or fully destroyed. The impact on social infrastructure is similar, with around 84 percent of health facilities and schools damaged or destroyed.

Between 80 and 96 percent of agricultural assets had been hit by early this year, including irrigation infrastructure, livestock, orchards, machinery, storage and research stations. The World Bank noted that this had left those reliant on agricultural food chains without dependable food or income. Before the conflict, agriculture and the associated food-chain contributed 15 percent of GDP across both Gaza and the West Bank.

Estimates of GDP reported by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development show that Gaza generated value-added equivalent to an average of US$670 million a quarter in the three years before the conflict. This dropped to US$129 million in the third quarter of 2023 and US$92 million in the first quarter of this year.

A sectoral breakdown for the fourth quarter of 2023 shows a 96 percent fall in construction, 93 percent fall in agriculture, 77 percent fall in services and 92 percent fall in the industrial sector.

Palestine has long had high levels of poverty. By 2022, 80 percent of Gaza’s people depended on some level of international assistance, while aid was the primary source of income for more than half of households. A third of people across both Gaza and the West Bank lacked secure food supplies.

Including both the West Bank and Gaza, Palestine’s annual GDP per capita before the war was equivalent to US$3800 a year, according to World Bank data, ranking between the Philippines and Vietnam. The territory nevertheless has high literacy levels of 97.5 percent, while life expectancy before the conflict was 75.5 years, ranked between Mexico and Hungary.

By the start of this year, three quarters of Gaza’s people had been internally displaced and lacked secure shelter, with shortages of water, fuel, electricity and access to sanitation.

Gaza now depends heavily on material aid flows through UN agencies. However, these are greatly restricted. The United Nations reports that, before the conflict in 2023, 500 trucks entered Gaza daily, while, in the first two weeks of September 2024, only 166 were permitted to make the crossing.

Although suffering nothing like the economic collapse in Gaza, the West Bank Palestinian territory is also confronting a sharp downturn, with GDP in the fourth quarter of 2023 down 19 percent on the previous quarter. Virtually all private sector businesses in the West Bank are reporting a decline in sales. And 42 percent saying the number of employees reporting to work has fallen, reflecting greater restrictions on movement.

Before the conflict, 22 percent of West Bank Palestinians worked in Israel or in Israeli settlements. However, 90 per cent of those workers have now lost their jobs and unemployment in the West Bank has risen from 12.9 per cent to 32 per cent as a result. The Palestinian Authority is heavily in arrears in payments to public sector employees.

The United Nations estimates that the destruction in Gaza has left 42 million tonnes of debris, which Bloomberg calculated would take a line of dump trucks stretching from New York to Singapore to clear.

The Israeli government is promoting the idea of a futuristic Gaza free trade zone modelled on Singapore once the war is over. Reconstruction would be supervised by Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt, Jordan and Morocco, with a target completion date of 2035. The territory would be administered by Israel, Egypt and a Palestinian Rehabilitation Authority.

China’s jurisdictional traps: the risks of silent transits in the Taiwan Strait

When non-Chinese navies send warships on undeclared passages through the Taiwan Strait, they may be achieving exactly the opposite of what they want. Instead of asserting that China does not own it, it’s likely that they are unwittingly cooperating in Beijing’s attempts at normalising its assertion of jurisdiction.

China quietly escorts these foreign ships in the strait and probably does so to present an appearance of the waters being uncontested. This contrasts with its behaviour in clashes with the Philippines over maritime territory. In those cases, China is militarily aggressive and diplomatically loud to force a jurisdictional outcome in its favour.

China also tries to present an appearance of sovereignty when it deploys warships in waters all around Taiwan, not just the strait. It has stepped up this activity since the then-speaker of the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, visited the island in August 2022.

According to the Taiwanese defence ministry, an average of 4.4 Chinese warships were seen around the island on any day in 2022. That rose to 5.2 in 2023 and 6.9 so far in 2024. Deployment surges have become more common: at least 10 ships, almost half as many as are operational in the entire Taiwanese navy, were in waters around the island for 6.6 percent of days in 2023, rising to 10.1 percent in 2024. (See the chart, below.)

In the strait, there have been at least 18 transits of non-Chinese naval vessels since August 2022, some unpublicised.

Although one might expect fierce Chinese harassment of foreign warships in the strait, reminiscent of manoeuvres in the Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea, significant confrontations have seldom occurred.

Moreover, China has not responded even by sending out more vessels when foreign warships appear, even though it usually holds press briefings to oppose the passages. Instead, its standard response is just to send ships that are already in or close to the strait to track the foreigners. It acts similarly on the far side of Taiwan, too.

Taiwan’s own allies and partners unintentionally help to create the appearance of Chinese sovereignty. When they send ships silently through the strait, they give more evidence of China’s claim being uncontested, whereas by declaring a freedom of navigation exercise they make the distinct point that it is not.

If China can exploit an image of foreign acquiescence in its authority over the strait, it can progressively promote its sovereignty as an accomplished fact. This will also involve eroding Taiwan’s claim to the eastern side of the median line.

At the Second Thomas Shoal, the Philippines actively contests China’s claims by maintaining an outpost on the grounded landing ship BRP Sierra Madre. China is attempting to prevent the Philippines from delivering construction materials to the ship. China’s aim is apparently to let it deteriorate and ultimately collapse due to lack of maintenance.

The Taiwan Strait lacks artificial features occupied by countries other than China.

China’s claim to the strait appears to be based on its claim to own the land on the other side, Taiwan. Since other countries do not overtly dispute that Taiwan is part of China, preferring to leave the issue vague, Beijing is evidently hoping that its control of the waters can be normalised.

Opposition to Chinese assertions of control over the strait are based on the United Nations Convention of the Law of the Sea, which limits territorial waters to 12 nautical miles (22km) from land. The width of the strait is 130km at its minimum.

Occasional incidents in the strait accord with China’s presentation of it as uncontested. In February, a Chinese fishing vessel capsized near Kinmen. In July, a Taiwanese fishing boat was detained by the China Coast Guard. In both cases, the coast guard vessels were merely ‘present’ and conducting ‘their own missions’ without engaging in fierce clashes with Taiwanese coast guard. Nor has China obstructed sea or air transportation between Taiwan and Kinmen to date.

The image that Beijing wants the world to see is that the strait is under China’s serene jurisdiction. Other countries should use their navies to loudly say that it is not.

Chart: daily numbers of Chinese naval ships in the Taiwan Strait, with annotations showing dates of non-Chinese ships’ passages through the strait.

India has a China problem, not just a border problem

It’s not just the border. India has a deeper problem with China, and it looks like it’s part of the same problem that other countries have with China: the country has become much more aggressive.

Indian policymakers and commentators routinely assume that if New Delhi could only resolve the dispute over the line of the Himalayan border, other issues would fall into place. In fact, there’s not much reason to believe that. Just look further afield to the Western Pacific or Ukraine.

For the past several years, New Delhi has said there can be no progress in other aspects of the relationship as long as China refuses to concede on the border problem. This was initially an effort at pushing the border problem to the centre, presumably in the hope that China would not want to risk the entire relationship over it. But China has not budged and does indeed seem willing to risk the relationship instead.

There has been some recent speculation that India and China are on their way to resolving their standoff at the border, where military confrontations have sometimes become violent. India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said last month that 75 percent of the disengagement problems had been resolved. The holding of a round of Sino-Indian border talks in August and a meeting between Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Affairs Minister Wang Yi also added to hope. But Jaishankar has since clarified that his reference was only to disengagement, not to issues of militarisation of the border or the larger state of relations.

Anyway, there may be a larger problem with India’s strategy. The assumption behind it appears to be that the border dispute is the key issue in the relationship. But confrontations at the border may be consequences of deeper problems rather than a cause of them.

India-China relations have become increasingly challenging over the past two decades, even before a severe border clash that raised tensions in 2020. China objected vociferously to the US-India nuclear deal. It gave way, but a few years later refused to allow India to join the Nuclear Suppliers Group, which governs transfers of civilian nuclear technology and material. Around the same time, China repeatedly stymied Indian efforts to designate Pakistan-based terrorists under the UN terror list. Similarly, China has refused to back India’s efforts to promote UN Security Council reforms as well as India’s quest for a seat on the Security Council.

A meeting of foreign ministers of the BRICS group failed to issue a joint statement (for the first time since its founding) because of the Security Council issue. It is not difficult to assume, given China’s long-standing efforts to undermine UN Security Council reforms, that it had a hand in the latest failure.

India’s assumption appears to have been that each of these was a discrete policy disagreement rather than an indicator of a more fundamental issue—and that may be its big mistake.

China’s behaviour with many of its neighbours has similarly changed. These changes have included increasingly aggressive behaviour in the South China Sea and East China Sea, particularly against Taiwan. It is also attempting to fish in troubled waters in both the Middle East and in the Ukraine war by extending diplomatic support to Iran to undermine American influence and appearing to provide material support to Russia.

Each of these instances of China’s behaviour may seem explicable when viewed in isolation. China and its supporters would argue that its behaviour in the South China Sea is a response to aggressive actions by Vietnam and the Philippines, for example.

But we are seeing too many instances. There’s a pattern, and India should recognise it.

If China’s behaviour has fundamentally changed, and its behaviour towards India is only one aspect of that change, then what New Delhi faces is a much more serious problem than just the border. Indeed, it’s clearly not even a Sino-Indian problem, but a China problem.

Part of this might reflect some historical patterns about the way rising powers behave, but one aspect of it may be more narrowly cultural: a reflection of China’s sense of itself and its place in history. Either way, such a shift in China’s position and worldview is not likely to be dealt with through negotiations narrowly focused on an apparently simple border dispute.

This is not to suggest that the border dispute is trivial. In 2020, for the first time in decades, blood was spilled in a clash between Indian and Chinese troops. Tens of thousands of Indian and Chinese soldiers are eyeball to eyeball, with all the attendant risks of inadvertent escalation.

This is a matter of concern even without all the other layers of complications between the two countries. Nevertheless, those layers of complications do matter and suggest that more fundamental issues are at stake than just the border dispute. If China is now fundamentally difficult to deal with, resolving that problem will be harder than Indian policy seems to assume. And even if it were resolved, other disputes may not be.