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Who sent thousands of tweets targeting Islamic extremism in Indonesia?

ASPI works closely with Twitter to analyse information operations and disinformation datasets. High-confidence attribution isn’t always possible in the analysis of these datasets, but we can identify behavioural patterns within the data in order to judge them as likely to be inauthentic—that is, arising from coordinated activity rather than organic expressions by genuine users on the platform.

We can also explore the content, narrative and timing of posts relative to events in order to make inferences about who might be behind them.

Working as a close research partner of Twitter, we are focusing on information manipulation in the Indo-Pacific to encourage transparency around these activities and norms of behaviour that are conducive to open democracies in the region. In this piece, we analyse a dataset relating to Indonesia. ASPI is reporting separately on our analysis of Twitter activity in India.

The broad context

As various commentators have observed, Indonesian democracy has taken an increasingly illiberal turn over the past decade. Our analysis of these Twitter datasets indicates that one aspect of this trend may be the deliberate, secretive manipulation of social media for political purposes. Social media activity suggests that dark actors have used Twitter to legitimise controversial actions that the state’s security apparatus have taken against perceived enemies of the state ideology, Pancasila, and the concept of the unitary Indonesian state.

Pancasila has been integral to the national identity of Indonesia since its earliest post-colonial days. Enshrined in the Indonesian constitution’s preamble and built on five basic principles ranging from belief in a god to concepts of national unity, social justice, and civilised and just international behaviour, it has been described as ‘the main cohesive power to maintain the integrity and entity of the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia’.

For much of this history, various regimes have deployed Pancasila to advance their own political and internal security interests. Suharto’s authoritarian New Order (1966–1998) propagated Pancasila to entrench hierarchy, order and social harmony above liberal democracy and universal human rights, which were cast as dangerous deviations. This variety of Pancasila receded in the first decade of the post-Suharto democratic era.

Joko Widodo’s administration, however, has overseen a gradual reinvigoration of Pancasila as an ideological tool to use against supposed threats to its notion of the Indonesian state, particularly Islamists (who want the state and public life built on Islamic law and values), communists and Papuan separatists. In 2016, just two years into his first presidential term, Widodo declared Pancasila Day on 1 June as a public holiday, arguing that the ideology ensured the country’s tolerance of diversity as well as its solidarity and public order, and positioned it to win ‘the global competition’.

The following year, after mass protests by Islamists against Jakarta’s Christian governor that also implicitly condemned the national government, Widodo signed a decree granting the government strengthened powers to disband and ban any group that didn’t adhere to Pancasila. Stressing the need to ‘stop all frictions that have caused tension’, he ordered the national police to crack down on anyone opposed to Pancasila without any regard to other ‘considerations’. If the police had evidence of such opposition, he told a meeting with editors of national media outlets in 2017, and ‘if they [the police] think they should whop them, just do it. Do not hesitate’.

Analysing the data

The dataset we have analysed is made up of two batches of more than 5,900 suspicious tweets that Twitter removed for breaching its platform manipulation and spam policies. One batch related to Papuan issues (and will be addressed in a separate article). The other was pumped out around the middle of December 2020 and related to a series of events that began a month earlier with the return to Indonesia of Muhammad Rizieq Shihab, the leader of the radical Islamic Defenders’ Front (FPI).

Rizieq’s return gave rise to mass rallies and anti-government protests by FPI’s adherents during a Covid-19 lockdown. Ironically, Rizieq labelled these protests as part of a moral revolution consistent with the tenets of Pancasila. Police actions against the organisation for violations of the lockdown and other civil disturbances followed, as well as warnings by senior military officers that the military would deal with anyone who disturbed ‘the unity and integrity of the nation’.

These developments culminated in the 7 December killing of six FPI ‘guards’ of Rizieq in an incident with the Indonesian National Police (POLRI) on a Jakarta freeway. A five-second film soon spread on social media purporting to capture a black-clothed officer unlawfully shooting two FPI guards dead. It was quickly revealed to be a hoax (though, separately, two police officers were eventually convicted for unlawfully killing four of the guards). Police detained Rizieq on 12 December, charging him with numerous crimes such as committing incitement, acts of violence and violations of civic order as well as violations of health orders. Clad in his clerical garb, he appeared in court for a pre-trial hearing on the morning of 18 December.

On 30 December, the government banned FPI. Among the reasons given were that some of its members had been involved in terrorism and other criminal activity and that it had violated the principles of the 1945 Constitution, Pancasila and the Unitary State of the Republic of Indonesia. In June 2021, Rizieq was convicted and sentenced to four years in jail.

Numerous suspicious tweets started surfacing a week after the killings and involved several hashtags, including #IndonesiaNegaraHukum (Indonesia is a law-based state), #FPILaskarHoax, #FPISumberKeributan (FPI source of commotion) and #NewRadikalisme. There was no organic engagement with these coordinated, replicated sets of messaging.

Some of these tweets were anodyne iterations of Indonesia’s system of governance and its principles. For example, roughly 70 said: ‘Laws must be obeyed and enforced to protect the interests of society, protect the interests of the nation and the state’.  A few conveyed a relatively measured call for proponents of FPI to pursue any grievances through the courts rather than stage demonstrations. Most, however, either claimed that FPI was an armed terrorist group that should be disbanded for having committed violent offences; unreservedly defended the actions of police; or called on the government to level the full force of the law against FPI.

Of the 1,074 tweets under the #IndonesiaNegaraHukum hashtag that flooded Twitter around noon on the day of Rizieq’s pre-trial hearing, the vast majority were of these types. These included 40 that declared, ‘THE STATE OF INDONESIA IS A STATE OF LAW It is an obligation as a law enforcement officer to enforce the law firmly and fairly. Law officers are protected by law in carrying out their duties.’ They were followed shortly afterwards by 54 tweets stating, somewhat incoherently: ‘Still convinced that those who came today are all empty-handed [that is, unarmed] therefore the evidence In reality his behaviour does not reflect his [religious] attire The state must be firm against armed terrorist groups’.

The same line persisted in a string of repetitious tweets that appeared a day later under #FPISumberKeributan. An example is a series repeating, ‘It’s said on the FPI card, you can’t bear sharp weapons, this is the fact. As it turned out, his behaviour did not reflect his attire Arrest the demo’s Instigator Provocateur’.

Similar tweets had proliferated three days earlier under #FPILaskarHoax, prompted by the bogus anti-police video. Of the 632 tweets under this hashtag, 94 said: ‘Let’s work together with the Police to eradicate radical mass organisations [that] must be disbanded!’ A further 83 tweets declared: ‘People are brainwashed by terrorist doctrine yeah that’s how it is [with] their behaviour, deceive the Society by playing victims!’ Another 37 repeated, ‘Support the Police so that this case becomes real in the public eye, so that rottenness will be exposed’. Thirty-two repeated, ‘likes to throw tantrums, likes provocations, likes to do hate speech. Law enforcement does not stand idly by’. Many others broadly echoed the same themes.

Released in the wake of a controversial use of lethal force against religious extremists whose behaviour had already alarmed the government and upset public opinion, the tweets’ consistent message is plain: FPI (and groups like it) threaten the unitary state by their actions and non-Pancasila ideology, and POLRI has only ever defended Indonesia by its officers’ unswerving loyalty and invariably lawful actions.

A contemporary twist

Earlier this month, POLRI’s chief, Listyo Sigit Prabowo, formally disbanded a hitherto shadowy unit known as Red and White Special Task Force after its head, Ferdy Sambo, was sensationally charged with murdering one of his officers. The unit was reportedly established in late 2016 by the then POLRI chief, Tito Karnavian, following the earliest mass protests against the Christian Jakarta governor. As home affairs minister, Karnavian was instrumental in the decision to ban FPI in 2020.

Ostensibly, the unit was set up to deal with such crimes as narcotics trafficking and gambling rackets. Allegations are now circulating, however, that the unit, which reportedly didn’t have a formal budget line, conducted black operations using funds derived from its own gambling and drug dealings. At least one report also claims that the unit controlled equipment for wiretapping and the hacking of communications and social media, and that the two officers convicted for murdering the FPI guards were members of the unit.

The fallout from the Sambo case, including the light it has shed on his unit, now threatens to bring down others in POLRI’s upper echelons and to bring a police force that already engenders widespread public distrust into even more disrepute.

Final assessment

Our analysis of the tweets cannot conclusively identify the actors responsible. But we can judge them to be inauthentic, coordinated and to mirror a position the Widodo administration had been propagating for years about the singular legitimacy of the state ideology and the existential threat to Indonesia posed by Islamists.

Many Indonesians would likely have had few qualms were its security apparatus to have secretly manipulated social media to reinforce an already negative public mood towards a violent radical group characterised as deviating from the state ideology, and thereby perhaps influence legal action against its leader.

Given the public’s deep cynicism towards POLRI, however, they may be less comfortable about what prima facie was an operation also aimed at legitimising the lethal actions of police officers that many suspected at the time to have been unlawful, as Indonesian courts eventually found.

China’s escalating coercion of Taiwan holds lessons for the international community

At a time of worryingly high tensions between the world’s two superpowers, last week’s visit to Taiwan by US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi triggered an aggressive cascade of attacks by the Chinese government against the island on multiple fronts. An understanding of the full spectrum of coercive activity beyond the military domain is essential to counteract Beijing during further escalatory events.

The Chinese Communist Party will exploit any non-traditional security vulnerability to exert control over Taiwan, but it will also do so in international disputes that are deemed sensitive to its internal stability. It’s important to analyse the full scope and potential of the tactics used, as the tools employed to deter support for Taiwan will be largely the same in any international efforts challenging Beijing on a range of major issues.

Taiwan has always been a hotspot to watch closely for those studying CCP coercive statecraft. This is especially true of hybrid activity—the spectrum of grey-zone threats short of conventional warfare—across the economic, cyber and information domains. In recent history, coercion against Taiwan has been incremental and not necessarily attributable to a clear trigger; rather, it can be viewed as part of a broad campaign to pressure and isolate Taipei.

It’s rare to see the coordinated deployment of such a wide range of tactics in such a short timeframe and at such a scale and intensity as the response to Pelosi’s visit. This is a show of force intended as a warning for those who may be tempted cross China’s ‘red lines’ in the future, notwithstanding that the visit breached no international rules or commitments. With hybrid activity, Beijing likely believes it can impose costs on Taiwan while minimising the risk of military conflict and potential US intervention. Beijing will now hope the US and others allow this malicious activity to go unchecked, which will only encourage the CCP to ramp up its efforts.

In the economic domain, the past week provided what could be the most severe example of Chinese coercion against Taiwan, although the full extent and impact can’t yet be assessed. So far, Beijing has imposed new import bans on more than 2,000 Taiwanese food products and further curbs on citrus fruit and seafood. China’s commerce ministry also announced the suspension of natural sand exports to Taiwan. Cutting its own exports is rare for China, which generally favours sanctions limiting access to its market. Sand is a key material in the manufacture of semiconductors, although Taiwan said it is not heavily reliant on Chinese imports.

China’s typically contradictory and arbitrary justifications for trade restrictions were on display throughout the week. Official ministry sources cited technical and legal reasons, while state media made clear that the sanctions were punitive. This again raises several questions about how to manage this behaviour when lines are blurred and Beijing can exploit plausible deniability. Despite a growing list of precedents, there’s still much work for the international community to do on defining what support and collective action in the face of such measures should look like.

Since 2021, as part of its broader campaign against Tsai Ing-wen’s government, China has imposed targeted bans on Taiwanese pineapples, candy apples, grouper and meat. These sanctions have been manageable because agricultural products account for only US$200 million of Taiwan’s annual exports to China. One senior Taiwanese official said the bans were tailored to regions where Tsai’s Democratic Progressive Party enjoys strong support.

‘But now they are broadening this immensely as they are targeting processed foods. That gives them enormous extortion powers,’ Chiu Chui-cheng, deputy chair of Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council, said. To avoid future retaliation, lowering Beijing’s extortion power will be key, and it should be coupled with a wider regional strategy of economic resilience vis-à-vis China.

In the cyber domain, Pelosi’s visit triggered a flurry of denial-of-service attacks on the websites of the Taiwanese president, defence ministry and foreign ministry and Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport. Convenience store chain 7-Eleven, railway stations and government facilities using Chinese software in their digital signage systems were hacked and displayed messages slandering Pelosi. Chinese technology company Sina also abruptly suspended its Weibo service in Taiwan.

This escalation has occurred in a broader context of increasing cyber hostility. Cyberattacks against Taiwan’s foreign ministry increased 40-fold between 2018 and 2020, reaching 2,100 intrusions per day, according to local media reports. This should be yet another clear sign for countries to be concerned about the security and reliability risks associated with Chinese technology.

Pressure on Taiwan in the information environment has intensified, too. Taiwan’s defence ministry said it had uncovered 272 attempts at spreading disinformation in the past week, including a report by Chinese state-run newspaper the People’s Daily that People’s Liberation Army Air Force Su-35 fighter jets were crossing the Taiwan Strait. Information and influence operations have long been a lever used by China to pressure Taiwan. Earlier this year, the PLA official publication described information warfare as taking a central role over conventional military strength.

Just as China may use its coordinated escalation across these domains as exercises for future conflicts, it is a critical opportunity for the rest of the world to learn how these tactics might be deployed against any state in a dispute with China, and what effective remedies look like. The past week has highlighted the need for strategic communications to counter Chinese government narratives seeking to justify ‘countermeasures’, and to call out tactical disinformation more effectively.

Responding to the crisis over Pelosi’s visit, the US–Australia–Japan trilateral strategic dialogue and G7 foreign ministers plus the EU high representative expressed concerns over China’s ‘escalatory’ actions and the risk to regional stability, with the latter specifically calling out economic coercion. These were important displays of solidarity. China’s rejection of the G7 statement, scolding of the foreign ministers, and warning to Australia ‘to not create new troubles’ is testament to how staunchly Beijing objects to international demonstrations of support for Taiwan. Speaking up is vital, but it’s only the first step.

Taiwan has been an exemplar of restraint and resolve for any countries on the receiving end of the CCP’s use of coercive tactics. Governments should ensure they do not reduce or postpone their planned and potential meetings with representatives of Taiwan in the wake of Beijing’s latest actions. A smart agenda item would be to consult with Taipei on increasing understanding of the hybrid threats we all might face in the future, how to counter them, and how to further efforts to reinforce stability in the region.

Pelosi and Taiwan: the players, the stakes and the consequences

Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the US House of Representatives, is leading a congressional delegation on a tour of the Indo-Pacific. The world is waiting to see whether she will visit Taiwan, with some reports suggesting she may do so as early as tonight. In protocol terms, such a visit would be the most senior visit since then-speaker Newt Gingrich visited the island in 1997. Three of ASPI’s China experts, Samantha Hoffman, Yvonne Lau and Alex Bristow, analyse the players, stakes and potential consequences of such a visit.

For context, Taiwan (formerly called Formosa) was a Japanese colony from 1895 to 1945, following its annexation from Qing dynasty China. After Japan’s defeat in World War II, Taiwan was handed to the ruling party of China, the KMT, also known as the Nationalists, led by Chiang Kai-shek. It was China under the leadership of Chiang that was made one of the five permanent United Nations Security Council members.

In 1949, Mao Zedong’s Chinese Communist Party took power across mainland China, and Chiang’s Nationalists fled to Taiwan with around two million people, shifting the capital of the Republic of China from the mainland to Taipei. The island has been a crucible for potential great-power conflict since the US Navy ‘neutralised’ the Taiwan Strait in 1950, protecting the Nationalist government and preventing the CCP from incorporating Taiwan into the People’s Republic of China.

Both Chiang’s ROC and Mao’s PRC supported ‘one China’, with both claiming to be the legitimate government of the mainland and Taiwan. The ROC maintained China’s permanent UN Security Council seat until 1971 when a General Assembly vote transferred the seat to the PRC. In 1979, the US recognised the PRC as the sole legal government of China but did not recognise the CCP’s sovereignty over Taiwan; instead, it ‘acknowledged’ China’s position that Taiwan was part of China.

Similarly, Australia has a ‘one-China policy’ in which it acknowledges the PRC’s position. Australia doesn’t recognise the ROC as a sovereign state and dealings between Taiwanese and Australian government officials are unofficial.

For its part, Taiwan’s government hasn’t dropped its own ‘one China’ approach and has never declared independence. Taiwan has continued to democratise and held its first presidential election in 1996. The Nationalists remain a major political party, and Taiwan is currently ruled by the Democratic Progressive Party.

The compromise has established a status quo—but under President Xi Jinping, China is openly committed to what it refers to as ‘reunification’, preferably through peaceful means but by force if necessary. It’s important to understand that while reunification is a term used by the PRC, Taiwan has never been ruled by communist China.

Should Pelosi go ahead with the visit and is the US administration’s stance correct?

Samantha: Decades of effort to maintain ‘strategic ambiguity’ has, in my view, only helped Beijing politically and weakened US capacity to push back against Chinese aggressiveness towards Taiwan. Yes, Pelosi should visit, but the leak of the planned visit and President Joe Biden’s response have only empowered China and made the administration appear weak on Taiwan. The White House probably would have been better staying out of this, reflecting the constitutional separation of the executive and legislature, rather than give the impression of an internal dispute.

Yvonne: Pelosi going ahead with the visit will be a concrete action to demonstrate US support of Taiwan. The context is important. Many believed Biden was deliberately signalling a stronger approach to China during his trip to the region in May, answering ‘yes’ when asked whether the US was willing to get involved militarily to defend Taiwan. The White House promptly clarified that the US policy of strategic ambiguity hadn’t changed, and its work behind the scenes to dissuade Pelosi has exacerbated the impression that the Biden administration is confused about its Taiwan stance. China will likely view this internal dispute as a sign of weakness and question US commitment.

Alex: I agree Pelosi should go. To reverse course now would be seen as kowtowing to Chinese coercion and encourage China to repeat its tactic whenever any high-profile figure considers travelling to Taiwan. But I take a more charitable view of strategic ambiguity, which I think has been a pragmatic response to unique circumstances—dissuading Taiwan from declaring independence, while providing sufficient deterrence so that China has not risked invasion, at least not yet. On that basis, I think it was right for the White House to maintain a more measured tone than Beijing after last week’s Biden–Xi phone call, reiterating that US policy has not changed and the US continues to oppose any unilateral attempt to change the status quo. But whatever our opinion of strategic ambiguity, the vignette of a tussle between the White House and Pelosi is certainly unhelpful.

How might China react and what are its aims?

Samantha: China has little choice other than to show a strong reaction. At a minimum, this will include propaganda and diplomatic messaging. But there is a risk of a disproportionate response because Xi is facing political pressures at home. I don’t think Beijing will choose to start a war now, but the aggressive military posturing that we’re already seeing increases the risk of inadvertent escalation.

Yvonne: China will certainly react. From its point of view, Beijing must impose a cost on Taiwan and the US, demonstrate its power and resolution to the world, and satisfy nationalistic clamour at home. Further coercive measures to constrain Taiwan’s space to engage internationally are probable. More concerning, perhaps, are potential military actions, which might include incursions by People’s Liberation Army Air Force planes into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone or further live-fire drills. The West risks misinterpreting Xi’s intentions if we unpack them through our framework for rational decision-making. Xi is focused on the long-term goal of what he calls ‘reunification’.

Alex: Beijing has painted itself into a corner, raising expectations for an unprecedented response through shrill rhetoric, including the threat that ‘those who play with fire will perish by it’. It’s worth recalling some recent benchmarks: former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott’s visit to Taiwan in October prompted PLAAF incursions, and former US secretary of state Mike Pompeo’s visit in March was disrupted by widespread power outages, highlighting the risk of a hybrid attack that Beijing could deny involvement in. Even if Pelosi’s visit is stage-managed to downplay its significance—for instance, if she just makes a quick, ‘informal’ stopover, reflecting the fact that Taipei is not on her official itinerary, and doesn’t make a speech—I still expect Beijing to respond in a more robust fashion than it has before.

What does this all mean for Taiwan?

Samantha: Domestically in Taiwan this visit only became a topic of conversation very recently; most of the coverage to date is in foreign media. The Taiwanese people would generally welcome Pelosi’s visit, especially against the backdrop of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. For Taiwan, China’s increasingly aggressive posturing and mid-term plans to invade make US strategic ambiguity increasingly less helpful. The US needs to be clearer about its willingness to stand up for Taiwan. China’s systematic approach to political messaging puts it ahead of the US and allies that are hesitant to publicly state their positions. Handled right, Pelosi’s visit could have sent a clear deterrent signal to Beijing that would have been welcomed by Taiwan. But that opportunity has been largely missed.

Yvonne: It’s important to take note of Taiwanese views and opinions, which are often overlooked. In general, the Pelosi visit is viewed by the Taiwanese as a symbol of US support for the island. In the wake of the Ukraine invasion, Taiwan’s vulnerability means any form of support, whether political or military, is welcomed. While there are concerns about full-fledged military aggression from China, the Taiwanese generally perceive it as all talk and no action.

Alex: It’s surprising to me how little attention is given to Taiwanese perspectives. The framing of a battle of wills between Washington and Beijing is so compelling that we overlook the fact that Taiwan is not a bystander in this. Public views are mixed, but Chinese threats are such a part of everyday life in Taiwan that it’s understandable many seem nonplussed. Taiwan’s leaders need senior foreign figures to continue visiting the island to help fend off further isolation, but I don’t expect Taipei to talk up the significance of this visit in the way Beijing has. Looking ahead, this episode should reinforce the importance of Taiwan’s efforts to improve its defences—making itself as porcupine-like as possible, working with the US and learning the lessons of Ukraine.

What are the wider implications for Australia and the region?

Samantha: I don’t think this episode will produce a major shift in the status quo. But for Australia at least, it might reinforce the importance of developing power-projection capabilities and joint interoperability with US and allied forces in the region.

Yvonne: The region is watching. Whether Pelosi visits or not, Australia and others, including China, will draw conclusions about US commitment to the Indo-Pacific and its resilience to Chinese pressure. This episode will become another reference point for how the US deals with Chinese threats and intimidation, and how far Washington will go to support and defend Taiwan.

Alex: This is a quiet nightmare for Australia. In line with US strategic ambiguity, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has had to remain vague about potential Australian involvement in a conflict. And Australia risks being subjected to similar coercion in future, perhaps when a former PM like Abbott or Malcolm Turnbull next visits, even if the recent trip by the retired Liberal grandees Christopher Pyne and Kevin Andrews went largely under the radar.

Australian views on the US-led Indo-Pacific Economic Framework

The deterioration in the global economic outlook in the face of multiple crises—including rising inflation, the war in Ukraine and autocratic belligerence, along with the requirement for urgent action to address the systemic threat of climate change—has heightened Australia’s concerns about economic security in the Indo-Pacific.

To coincide with the launch of ASPI’s office in Washington DC, we undertook a short research project to get a sense of how Australian policymakers view the US-led Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF), announced by President Joe Biden in May. IPEF takes its place among the Indo-Pacific’s already crowded field of regional mechanisms.

Australian officials surveyed for our report said they the IPEF as an opportunity to bring more investment into the region, shape standards setting, form collective solutions to supply-chain risks, and influence the direction of clean energy infrastructure. They view it as a potentially innovative way to boost regional investment rather than as a mechanism to strengthen the usual substance of trade agreements, such as market access into the US.

Understanding the offer is crucial to understanding the IPEF. In the conventional terms of trade agreements (offers and requests), the IPEF has been criticised as failing on multiple fronts. For some trade analysts, it extends insufficient offers, in the form of market access, in exchange for onerous demands on participant countries to conform with expectations on standards for green-technology and digital-economy initiatives.

But, as Australian officials have pointed out, the IPEF isn’t a trade agreement. Rather than seeking to influence behaviour by negotiating the regulatory terms of market access, the framework relies on inward investment into the region—if certain behavioural conditions are met—as an alternative to market access. The behavioural conditions across the IPEF’s four policy pillars—supply-chain resilience; clean energy and decarbonisation; tax and anticorruption; and trade—are yet to be negotiated, which is seen as a distinct opportunity for Australian decision-makers to build regional capacity.

Australian trade ministers have for some years made routine statements about trade expansion and diversification. In the lead-up to the federal election in May, Labor Party representatives said they were committed to diversifying trade and taking a more expansive and proactive approach to regional engagement.

The newly elected Labor government is looking to connect trade with building the local Australian industrial base through public and private partnerships such as the National Reconstruction Fund. There’s a varied mix in the priority areas indicated by the government, which include multibillion-dollar initiatives to invest in green metals (steel, alumina and aluminium), clean energy component manufacturing, medical manufacturing, critical technology, advanced manufacturing, agriculture and fisheries.

It will be essential in the early development of the IPEF to move beyond broad statements towards action on key issues of concern, like supply-chain resilience, international technology standards, and tech cooperation on the green economy. This is particularly important if the framework is to deliver results outside existing regional economic agreements, such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, which Australia is a party to but the United States is not.

Our analysis was informed by interviews with officials from across the Australian government and in industry bodies with portfolios that are relevant to the IPEF’s four pillars. While we note that the officials interviewed aren’t the ultimate decision-makers and that there’s a new government in Canberra with its own emerging priorities, our report offers insights into the potential opportunities for Australia to shape the framework.

As participating nations look towards beginning negotiations within IPEF’s pillars, we offer the following recommendations.

The US, as the convener of the IPEF, should lean into Australia’s capacity-building expertise in the region. Australia has a long history of organising capacity-building and training exercises in Southeast Asia and the South Pacific. Examples potentially relevant to the IPEF include the Australian Infrastructure Financing Facility for the Pacific. Future engagement should be based on an objective assessment of the efficacy of past and existing programs, with a clear eye on enhancing coordination and adding value to avoid fruitless duplication. Focusing capacity-building on ensuring that participant countries have the skill sets required to engage effectively in the IPEF in each pillar area will create a sense of joint mission.

Participant countries should quickly begin organising dialogues on the pillars involving relevant government agencies and non-government organisations, such as peak standards bodies. To strengthen the IPEF’s relevance, it’s important to ensure that governments are open to understanding the different perspectives on each of the four pillars among nations and between the public and private sectors. With the IPEF still in its early stages, it’s fundamental for officials to create specific mechanisms focused on each of the four pillars to allow participating nations to underline their key interests and their visions for the IPEF.

Participating nations and their corporate sectors should work together to identify areas of vulnerability and criticality in regional supply chains. Akin to the supply-chain initiatives that Australia has with the UK, Japan and India, new intergovernmental and government–industry forums can be established through the IPEF. The overall intention is to build avenues for cooperation among like-minded nations.

Mechanisms for enhancing capital flows between IPEF partners should be investigated. If the key strength of the IPEF is that it provides opportunities for increased investment in the region, then strategies to enhance the relations of official bilateral donors and creditors and private-sector involvement need to be followed. Some minilateral initiatives, such as the US–Australia–Japan Blue Dot Network and the G7 Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment, already aim to boost foreign investment, so the IPEF should study and, where possible, complement those initiatives.

Six cybersecurity challenges for Australia’s new government

After nearly four years, the new government has reinstalled a dedicated minister for cybersecurity. Clare O’Neil will hold the reins, as well as running the (now slightly shrunk) mega-portfolio of Home Affairs.

During the period cybersecurity has been without a dedicated minister, the cyber challenge has further exploded.

Getting departments, businesses, civil society and individuals to patch their computers and adopt basic protections is only the simplest aspect of cybersecurity (and it’s not that simple, as every secretary will no doubt inform the minister).

Cybersecurity has become a massive, cross-cutting portfolio. There is the policy arm in Home Affairs; there are the operational arms that encompass the Australian Signals Directorate (and the Australian Cyber Security Centre), the Australian Federal Police and AUSTRAC; and there is the international dimension that brings in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

The areas of focus are also broad—take the theft of intellectual property. A decade ago, a US commission estimated annual losses from IP theft at more than US$300 billion, and agreed with the then National Security Agency director that it constituted ‘the greatest transfer of wealth in history’.

But the cybersecurity portfolio goes well beyond IP theft. It encompasses the protection of infrastructure and defending against espionage. It increasingly involves the information space including aspects of election interference, foreign interference, disinformation and hybrid threats. It will require protecting critical space assets.

And all of this will require skilled immigration and a training uplift to facilitate what is effectively the birth of a whole new industry.

There is also an important international relations dimension to cybersecurity. Australia must work to drive norms in international forums, build capacity to respond to these threats in our region, and work with like-minded countries to respond to cyber criminals.

This latter function will require bringing DFAT, the AFP, ASD, AUSTRAC, state police and industry together, alongside their international counterparts, to aggressively tackle the problem. As any victim of cybercrime will tell you, it’s a process that has barely begun.

To add to the list, new technologies will present new cyber risks. Technologies like 5G will connect much of what we own to the internet, creating potentially diabolical cybersecurity risks, while automation and artificial intelligence will also open up new challenges, requiring a new generation of defensive measures.

So, what can the new minister do to address these challenges?

The first priority should be the talent pipeline. Here, there are only two options: training more people and increasing skilled migration. O’Neil should use both. Migrants should be encouraged to come to Australia and a serious training effort should be commenced, including restoring STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) teaching in schools.

To date, ASD has performed a critical but unsung national service in training Australia’s top cybersecurity experts. Our policy settings should empower it to fully embrace this role—options could include appointing a dedicated executive to oversee training of cyber experts at scale, looking beyond ASD, and at how the agency can support nationwide efforts.

Second, we must measure impact. For example: has mandatory data breach reporting helped the health sector protect sensitive data? How large is the ransomware problem, and by how much have we reduced it through recent initiatives?

A third focus should be on the cyber dimensions of AUKUS. The trilateral pact goes much further than defence, as then prime minister Scott Morrison made clear at its inception.

One big initiative the cybersecurity minister could champion is mutual recognition of security assessments like IRAP (Infosec Registered Assessors Program) across AUKUS countries, so that companies that pass security assessments here can instantly sell into US and UK markets. The minister could also focus AUKUS on (what should be) low-hanging fruit, such as agreements on the next stages of 5G and 6G.

Fourth, the minister should marshal all relevant instruments of international power (DFAT, the AFP, AUSTRAC, ASD and ASIO) to counter malicious cyber actors. We should aggressively track down cybercriminals and put pressure on financial entities and governments that allow them to operate. This pressure includes increased transparency of malicious and harmful activities, which would require an increased willingness to use public attribution and cyber-related sanctions.

Fifth, while Home Affairs should lead on cyber policy and ASD on operations, the minister should also join with Foreign Minister Penny Wong to ensure any increase in foreign aid includes significant resources for cyber and technology capacity building in the region—a dual benefit for the economies and resilience of our regional partners, as well as our own security.

Sixth, with authoritarian regimes ramping up digital transnational repression (targeting, for example, women), the government must set itself up to tackle the challenges of cyber-enabled foreign interference.

This issue spans many areas in addition to cybersecurity, but the outcome is the same—government and social media platforms can’t continue passing the buck when our public discourse is covertly shaped or hijacked by actors overseas, or when citizens, organisations and diaspora communities are threatened and silenced by foreign governments. The new minister should prioritise this policy issue.

Finally, O’Neil should be building a focus on technology. While the portfolio is titled ‘cyber security’, it should really be ‘cyber and technology’. The minister will need to drive security policy across emerging and critical technologies, and this will consume more of her time every year she’s in the job.

Countering hybrid threats in the Indo-Pacific

Enabled by digital technologies and fuelled by geopolitical competition, hybrid threats in the Indo-Pacific are increasing in breadth, application and intensity. Hybrid threats are a mix of military, non-military, covert and overt activities by state and non-state actors that occur below the level of conventional warfare. The consequences for individual nations include weakened institutions, disrupted social systems and economies, and greater vulnerability to coercion—especially from revisionist powers such as China.

But the consequences of increased hybrid activity in the Indo-Pacific reach well beyond individual nations. The Indo-Pacific hosts a wide variety of political systems and interests, with multiple centres of influence, multiple points of tension and an increasingly belligerent authoritarian power. Given its position as a critical centre of global economic and social dynamism, instability in the Indo-Pacific, whether through or triggered by hybrid threats, has global ramifications.

Because hybrid threats fall outside the conventional frameworks of the application of state power and use non-traditional tools to achieve their effects, governments have often struggled to identify the activity, articulate the threat and formulate responses. Timeliness and specificity are problematic: hybrid threats evolve, are often embedded or hidden within normal business and operations, and may leverage or amplify other, more traditional forms of coercion.

More often than not, hybrid threat activity is targeted towards the erosion of national capability and trust and the disruption of decision-making by governments—all of which reduce national and regional resilience that would improve security and stability in the region.

There’s no silver-bullet solution to hybrid threats; nor are governments readily able to draw on traditional means of managing national defence or regional security against such threats in the Indo-Pacific.

As we explain in our new ASPI report, released today, because of the ubiquity of digital technologies, the ever-broadening application of tools and practices in an increasing number of domains, it’s evident that policymakers need better and more timely information, the opportunity to share information and insights in a trusted forum, and models of how hybrid threats work. Exchange of information and good practice is also needed to help counter the amorphous, evolving and adaptive nature of hybrid threats.

Our report proposes the establishment of an Indo-Pacific hybrid threat centre as a means of building broader situational awareness on hybrid threats across the region. Through research and analysis, engagement, information sharing and capacity building, such a centre would function as a confidence-building measure and contribute to regional stability and the security of individual nations.

While modelled on the NATO–EU Hybrid Centre of Excellence in Finland, the centre would need to reflect the differences between the European and Indo-Pacific security environments. Most notably, that includes the lack of pan-regional Indo-Pacific security institutions and practice that the centre could use. There are also differences in the nature and priorities assigned to threats by different countries: the maritime domain has more influence in the Indo-Pacific than in Europe, many countries in the region face ongoing insurgencies, and there’s much less adherence to, or even interest in, democratic norms and values.

That will inevitably shape the placement, funding and operations of an Indo-Pacific hybrid threat centre. A decentralised model facilitating outreach across the region would assist regional buy-in. Partnership arrangements with technology companies would provide technical insight and support. Long-term commitments will be needed to realise the benefits of the centre as a confidence-building measure. The Quad countries are well positioned to provide such long-term commitments, while additional support could come from countries with experience and expertise in hybrid threats, particularly EU countries and the UK.

As with the NATO–EU Hybrid Centre of Excellence, independence and integrity are paramount. That implies the positioning of the Indo-Pacific centre’s core in a strong democracy; better still would be the legislative protection of its operations and data. Accordingly, we propose scoping work to establish policy approval, legislative protection and funding arrangements and to seed initial research capability and networks.

Chinese and Russian propaganda work in tandem to blame the West for war in Ukraine

A new ASPI report demonstrates that in the early days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, social media posts by Chinese diplomats on US-owned platforms almost exclusively blamed the US, NATO and the West for the conflict. Chinese diplomats amplified Russian claims about US biological weapon labs in Ukraine and linked this disinformation narrative with conspiracy theories about the origins of Covid-19. Chinese state media mirrored these narratives while replicating the Kremlin’s language describing the invasion as a ‘special military operation’. As Western governments collectively encouraged Silicon Valley to restrict the reach of Russia’s disinformation ecosystem, China’s propaganda system quickly became an alternate vehicle for the Kremlin’s false narratives.

The information campaigns of the People’s Republic of China are designed to reinforce efforts to shape its operating environment so that the party-state’s power can be consolidated and expanded, not just domestically but also globally. The PRC information campaign responding to events in Ukraine is not taking place in isolation, but instead is being tied to the party-state’s key strategic interests. Understanding how, and why, this is occurring requires acknowledging deeply rooted threat perceptions that the Chinese Communist Party has long articulated and, more importantly, the strategies through which it attempts to deal with those threats.

The CCP strongly believes that threats to its political power are just as likely, if not more likely, to emerge due to the organisation of ‘hostile forces’ outside the PRC. The party is convinced that outside actors, specifically the US, actively attempt to create instability within China (including economic instability and political instability). In more recent history, ‘colour revolutions’ and ‘jasmine revolutions’ are often cited as examples of incidents in which those alleged efforts have ultimately triggered crises. The data in ASPI’s report demonstrates that the events unfolding in Ukraine are being cited as a further example justifying this threat perception.

The themes that the report identifies on sanctions and ‘anti-China’ disinformation are also tied to the growing number of sanctions, tariffs and export restrictions from the US and other countries, in response to the party’s policies in Hong Kong and Xinjiang, and more broadly its policies and strategies for science and technology security and military–civil fusion. The narrative reinforces the policy drivers behind a number of ongoing PRC efforts, such as the development of China’s Digital Currency Electronic Payment system. Meanwhile, the themes (in apparent collusion with Russia) that we identify suggesting that the US has violated international biological weapons conventions are also being tied to Chinese attempts to deflect responsibility for the country’s early mismanagement of Covid-19. The report’s data suggests that, in terms of its international-facing propaganda, the Russia–Ukraine conflict offers the CCP an opportunity to reassert enduring preoccupations that it perceives as fundamental to its political security.

Chinese diplomats’ persistent criticism of security blocs, NATO expansionism and the US military-industrial complex might equally apply to security relationships in the Indo-Pacific such as AUKUS and the Quad. ASPI has already identified pro-CCP social media networks targeting the Quad and the evolving security architecture in the Indo-Pacific region.

Our sample of data was taken before the Silicon Valley platforms reassessed their measures to limit the reach of Russian disinformation (including via Chinese state media). In the early stage of the conflict, tweets about Ukraine by Chinese diplomats performed better than unrelated content, particularly when the content attacked or blamed the West. PRC foreign ministry spokespeople continue to flirt with fringe alternative media outlets to bridge into Western political discourse framed around anti-imperialism, for example by amplifying claims associating NATO and the Ukrainian government with neo-Nazis.

ASPI found that PRC diplomats and state media calibrated their messaging differently for different regions of the world. This investment in tailored and multi-lingual influence reflects the CCP’s strategy of targeting regions—particularly Africa, South America and Southeast Asia—that have rapidly emerging economies, and often Western colonial histories, for specific attention. Beijing’s alignment with the Kremlin’s propaganda demonstrates how the CCP seeks opportunity from crisis, mobilising in response to perceived threats and using contemporary events as vehicles for the projection of its political power.

For some, this situation has become untenable. Professor and former US diplomat David L. Sloss suggests that the time has come to ban both Russian and Chinese state media from US social media platforms. This position may sound extreme to some given how fundamental freedom of speech is to democracy. Yet authoritarian regimes are exploiting democratic openness in their political warfare campaigns and calibrated strategic responses must be taken to shift this calculus.

Understanding global disinformation and information operations

A new website launched by ASPI’s International Cyber Policy Centre is designed to identify nations using deception operations to manipulate potential adversaries, and their own populations.

The Understanding Global Disinformation and Information Operations website provides a visual breakdown of the publicly available data from state-linked information operations on social media. ASPI’s information operations and disinformation team has analysed each of the datasets in Twitter’s information operations archive to provide a longitudinal analysis of how each country’s willingness, capability and intent has evolved over time.

Our analysis demonstrates that there’s a proliferation of state actors willing to deploy information operations targeting their own populations, as well as those of their adversaries. Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, China and Venezuela are the most prolific perpetrators. By making these complex datasets available in accessible form, ASPI is broadening meaningful engagement on the challenge of state actor information operations and disinformation campaigns for policymakers, civil society and the international research community.

Since October 2018, Twitter has released the tweets, media and details of associated accounts that the social network believes were part of state-linked information operations. The datasets originated from 17 countries, including the usual suspects Russia, China and Iran, but also Armenia, Bangladesh, Cuba, Ecuador, Egypt, Honduras, Indonesia, Serbia, Spain, Thailand, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and Venezuela.

Analysis of information operations that exploit social media as a vector has tended towards the examination of individual sets of takedown data, particularly those relating to high-profile significant state actors, such as Russia, China and Iran.

As a taste, between October 2018 and March 2021, Twitter removed eight networks it believed originated in Russia and were attributed to the Internet Research Agency and other Russian state actors. ASPI’s analysis of all Russia-linked operations found that mentions of the US dwarfed those of all other countries and that the most used hashtags were heavily focused on hot-button US political issues, including President Donald Trump’s ‘MAGA’ slogan, QAnon and anti-Islam sentiment.

US domestic politics wasn’t the only focus. Other narratives included efforts to undermine NATO to European audiences, slander Ukrainian leaders, promote Russian foreign and military policy in Syria, and discredit candidates in US and European democratic elections.

Between November 2019 and March 2021, Twitter removed seven networks it believed originated in Iran and were backed by or associated with the Iranian government. Given that Twitter is banned in Iran, the campaigns sought to influence international perceptions of Iran while stirring up political division and encouraging unrest in adversary states. These networks also amplified content relating to social divisions in the US, such as the Black Lives Matter movement.

Unlike Russia-linked messaging—which was overwhelmingly focused on the US—Iran-linked messaging referenced countries in Iran’s region, including Pakistan, Palestine, Israel and Syria.

The network’s fake personas were sometimes convincing, well-rounded characters, giving the appearance of locals concerned with particular political issues. Other assets may have been part of an influence-for-hire network. Some of those networks benefited from Iran’s sophisticated fake-news and state-media apparatus.

Between September 2019 and July 2020, as the pro-democracy movement erupted on the streets of Hong Kong, Twitter removed three networks of accounts that originated within China, which is notable, given that the platform is blocked to most of the population there. In terms of geographical mentions, Hong Kong dominated the data compared with mentions of China itself and the US.

The networks disclosed in these datasets generally sought to influence the attitudes of Chinese diaspora communities and citizens overseas on domestic and foreign policy issues that were of concern to the Chinese Communist Party. Tweets contained text in both simplified Chinese characters, which are used by Chinese citizens originating from the Chinese mainland, and traditional Chinese characters, which are used in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Notably, the posting pattern for the China-origin tweets almost perfectly mapped to Chinese working hours, with a peak of posting at 10 am and a lunch break around noon.

Few research entities—internationally, let alone in the Indo-Pacific—have the technical and analytical capability to investigate more complex takedown datasets, hindering the international community’s capacity to understand the tactics and tradecraft of actors willing to mobilise strategic deception as a tool of statecraft. Yet traits within this data help us determine who was responsible, who the targets were, the narratives propagated and the patterns of coordination and inauthentic behaviour.

Twitter’s information operations archive now has sufficient longitudinal data for us to learn more about how actors behave over time. To that end, ASPI has built this unique website to analyse and compare all the data from the archive at the same time. Policymakers and researchers can now consistently compare the activity, techniques and narratives across each operation, and compare what states do differently from each other and how their activities change over time.

Twitter has been perhaps the most forward-leaning entity in the social media industry in terms of its public engagement on information operations. No other company has consistently provided complete state-actor-linked information operations datasets for public scrutiny. Twitter’s recent signalling that it will discontinue the information operations archive makes ASPI’s longitudinal analysis of these datasets all the more pertinent.

The threat spectrum

Planet A

The first-ever Middle East and North Africa Climate Week, organised by UN Climate Change, has just wrapped up in Dubai. The event followed on from last year’s global effort on regional collaboration on climate.

Urgent action is needed to support adaptation to climate change in the water-poor Middle East. Strategies should address regional climate modelling that warns temperatures could reach up to 60°C during heatwaves, exceeding the ‘human survivability’ threshold.

The disruption that climate change will bring to food and water systems is expected to further fuel regional conflicts, the growth of extremist groups and the mass displacement of populations. Collaboration between regional partners on climate is therefore critical to the security of North African and Middle Eastern nations.

As an example of what can be achieved, EcoPeace, an Israeli–Palestinian non-governmental organisation, recently brokered an energy-for-water agreement between Israel, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. The UAE and Jordan will supply renewable energy to Israel in exchange for water from Israel’s desalination plants.

Democracy watch

Last week, the US officially declared that the Myanmar military committed genocide against the country’s Rohingya Muslim minority, five years after more than 740,000 Rohingya fled Myanmar for Bangladesh in successive waves of displacement.

Despite calls from human rights advocates, the Trump administration declined to refer to the atrocities as genocide, instead describing the operation as ‘ethnic cleansing’, which is less well defined in international law. The decision was based partly on the prediction that the Myanmar civil administration was transitioning towards democracy, a hope that was largely dashed after a military coup toppled the democratically elected government last year.

Rohingya refugees welcomed the Biden administration’s decision, but warned that unless it’s followed by concrete steps and actions, the suffering will continue. Given ‘the very little possibility’ of Myanmar’s domestic legal proceedings delivering justice, the change in language lays the groundwork to hold the military junta to account at the international level.

Information operations

The British government has provided the BBC with emergency funding of £4.1 million ($7.2 million) to support its Ukrainian- and Russian-language news services. The additional resources are intended to help the national broadcaster combat Russian propaganda and disinformation campaigns.

The announcement came just days after the UK Ministry of Defence accused the Russian government of being behind several propaganda videos featuring doctored clips of British cabinet ministers. The BBC’s revenue comes mainly from a licensing fee that has twice undergone major revisions by Conservative governments in recent years. In January, the government confirmed the freezing of the BBC’s licencing fee, expected to amount to a budget cut of £2 billion ($3.5 billion) over the next six years.

The emergency funding reflects a growing awareness of the important role public broadcasters play in countering disinformation narratives, especially those propagated by authoritarian regimes.

Follow the money

Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) agents in Moscow have seized millions of dollars worth of Swiss-made Audemars Piguet watches. While Russian authorities cited customs offences as the official reason behind the seizure, Swiss government officials say it was likely a retaliation for sanctions Switzerland imposed following the invasion of Ukraine.

When the sanctions were first introduced in February, Audemars Piguet, one of the biggest Swiss watchmakers, suspended exports and ‘temporarily’ closed its two Moscow outlets. In March, following the imposition of additional Western sanctions and withdrawals of foreign businesses from Russia, President Vladimir Putin signed a law that allowed the government to seize hundreds of commercial US- and European-owned aircraft.

While it’s not clear whether the watch seizure was another instance of the enforcement of Putin’s new asset-seizure law or some form of undisciplined FSB looting, it highlights just some of the challenges faced by the many foreign companies attempting to withdraw from Russia.

Terror byte

Despite repeatedly preaching about the importance of his campaign to ‘denazify’ Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has reportedly deployed thousands of mercenaries to try to break the invasion’s ‘burgeoning stalemate’.

Social media reports have corroborated the presence of mercenaries in eastern Ukraine, and UK intelligence suggests that Putin has brought the Wagner Group into the war. The Wagner Group is a Russia-based private paramilitary force that has been linked to far-right and white-supremacist elements worldwide. While private militaries are prohibited by Russian law, the Wagner Group has represented an ‘unofficial foreign policy tool of the Kremlin’ since 2014, illegally operating in countries including Syria, Yemen and Libya.

The Wagner Group’s unorthodox skillset allows Putin to pursue objectives unattainable through conventional military tactics. The company’s affinity for covert operations poses legitimate threats to Ukraine’s military technology and possibly even President Volodymyr Zelensky’s life.

The five-domains update

Sea state

As Russia’s costly invasion of Ukraine grinds into its second month, what was framed as an ‘imminent’ plot to launch an amphibious assault on the port city of Odessa seems to have more bark than bite. The Pentagon hypothesised earlier this week that the dozen Russian vessels anchored in the Black Sea, poised to assault Odessa, were a ‘diversionary tactic’ to draw Ukrainian troops away from Mariupol and Kyiv. Ukrainian forces, already outnumbered, are torn between defending Odessa and reinforcing their compatriots inland, potentially giving Russian a significant advantage.

The Chinese aircraft carrier Shandong made an unexpected passage through the Taiwan Strait just hours before a scheduled conversation between the Chinese and US presidents last Friday. The Chinese government labelled the movement of the carrier, shadowed closely by a US destroyer through the strait, a ‘routine training exercise’. Nevertheless, with anxieties already heightened over China’s perceived support of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s Ukraine invasion, the transit will amplify fears over Beijing’s plans to subjugate Taiwan.

Flight path

Boeing’s ‘loyal wingman’ Air Power Teaming System being developed for the Royal Australian Air Force now has an official designation: the MQ-28A Ghost Bat. The name was announced by Defence Minister Peter Dutton at RAAF Base Amberley in Queensland. The uncrewed combat aircraft is named after Australia’s only carnivorous bat. The drone can deliver fighter-like performance with a range of 3,700 kilometres, which will allow it to fly independently or team with other uncrewed or crewed aircraft. The Ghost Bat is the first military aircraft to be produced in Australia in more than half a century and its local development may increase the global export potential for Australia’s defence industry.

Aerorozvidka, a unit of elite Ukrainian drone pilots, has reportedly been destroying priority Russian assets, including tanks and trucks, in night-time raids. It’s been a surprising success that demonstrates the power of drones in modern warfare. The unit’s arsenal ranges from inexpensive commercial drones to custom-modified, heavy octocopters that can drop anti-tank grenades. The unit operates via Starlink, a satellite system supplied to Ukraine by US space entrepreneur Elon Musk shortly after Russia’s invasion began.

Rapid fire

The British supply of next-generation light anti-tank weapons, or NLAWs, to Ukrainian forces has helped them inflict major Russian tank losses. More than 4,200 of the Swedish-developed NLAWs, alongside similar weapons like the American Javelin, have been sent to support Ukrainian efforts to dent major Russian armoured advances. The performance of high-tech anti-tank capabilities like the NLAW has reinforced the importance of international aid to Kyiv, but has also raised serious concerns about the vulnerability of modern armour.

General Stephen Townsend, the head of US Africa Command, has requested American ground troops to return to Somalia in response to a resurgence by al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist group al-Shabaab. American troops were withdrawn from Somalia by President Donald Trump in December 2021, though some supporting forces were left in neighbouring nations, including Kenya. Any return of US forces to Somalia could help reinforce stability there and ensure the nearby international shipping lanes in the Gulf of Aden remain open.

Final frontier

Defence Minister Peter Dutton launched Australia’s defence space command on Tuesday. It’s tasked with ensuring Australia’s continued access to space and the launch follows the official establishment of the command earlier this year. The new command is a recognition from Defence that space is increasingly congested and competitive and Australia has catching up to do. A growing number of countries are similarly establishing space domain awareness capabilities, with the command’s launch coming on the heels of a similar announcement from the Japan Air Self-Defense Force.

Russia has been excluded from a range of international space partnerships in response to its invasion of Ukraine. The European Space Agency has indefinitely suspended its joint Mars mission with Russian space agency Roscosmos. The UK has banned the sale of space-related technologies to Russia, and the US has terminated bilateral discussion of space norms. These developments are likely to further bolster Russo-Sino space cooperation as the two countries establish an international alternative to the US-led efforts to return astronauts to the moon.

Wired watchtower

Hackers gained access to employees’ computers at 21 major US natural gas companies in the lead-up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Through compromising machines or purchasing infected computers, hackers attempted to enter the protected corporate networks. The timing coincided with high energy prices and increases in demand in the build-up to war, with the US becoming Europe’s top supplier. Russia views cyber as a tool to influence foreign decisions, but it’s as yet unclear whether Russia was responsible for this attack.

Japan has launched a cyber defence command by reorganising related units in its self-defence forces. It has been tasked with protecting the Japan Self-Defense Force’s information and communications capabilities. Although it is aimed at countering cyber threats from China, North Korea and Russia, legal restrictions and Japan’s self-defence-only policy are likely to limit its effectiveness.