How digital identities challenge traditional espionage

It used to be so simple. An intelligence officer could fly to a country, change passports and, with a false identity, emerge as a completely different person. But those days are long since over. Biometrics and facial recognition technologies can easily detect people travelling on false identities. Even if you can travel on false documents, a simple Google search uncovers your lack of an online profile and digital legend.

Solving this problem is a generational challenge for defence and intelligence agencies. As technology rapidly develops—including encryption, smart cities and generative AI—security agencies and defence communities have a golden window to research, develop and build new identity technologies. Failure to develop the right technology now will change espionage forever.

There are two related capability challenges: creating genuine-looking false profiles for offensive intelligence operations and, conversely, developing the ability to detect artificially generated profiles and identify who is behind them. This is a classic poacher-turned-gamekeeper challenge that domestic and foreign intelligence agencies must navigate: they must develop the capabilities to catch the bad guys while coming up with solutions to defeat those investigative technologies themselves.

In a world where Google, Meta, commercial data brokers and even your bank know a lot more about you than the government does, creating a false identity is hard. However, governments still have one big advantage: they are still the authority on and ultimate backstop for authenticating a person’s identity—typically by validating birth certificates and passports.

Australia, like many countries, has embraced technology as a partial solution to the authenticating identity challenge. It adopted an enhanced tax file number system in 1988 following the defeat of the then government’s attempt to introduce a national identity card. Backed by voiceprint recognition for authenticating identity, the tax file number is now used for data matching across much of the Australian government.

Fraudsters, adulterers, government agents and police forces are perhaps the only people who have an overwhelming need to develop convincing deepfake technologies. An arms race is developing. As companies include more security and authentication in generative-AI tools (such as embedded watermarks and improvements in deepfake detection tools), it is harder to use such tools nefariously. Even if you can spoof official forms of identification (as Russian sleeper agents were recently shown to have done via South American countries) and also generate a realistic digital twin, your online profile (or lack thereof) will still give you away.

Generating believable false social media profiles, posts and digital devices is only a small part of the capability requirements. Spooks also need to trace all aspects of the digital profile they already have, including biometrics such as voice print, gait and face descriptors, and have them consistent across multiple devices and platforms. They will need to be able to track where that digital identity already exists and how exposed they are to adversaries.

Operational officers will want assurance that profiles have not been contaminated through data breaches or tradecraft errors (such as a recent cyberattack that exposed face descriptors and biographical data). They will need to be able to delete or modify aspects of these profiles that are already in the world (their digital shadow). They may want to operate online with an only slightly modified profile (a digital twin), rather than operating online under a completely different persona. Spooks will need online profile management tools to track and trace where digital profiles have been used and exposed online.

At the same time, investigators will need to be able to spot other countries doing this to us; which raises its own challenges. How can we track profiles across platforms? How do we validate identities online? And how do you fuse identity information together to convey the level of uncertainty to the analyst? Saying that a profile is a 60 percent match to a known criminal isn’t that helpful to a busy analyst.

Ultimately, the difficulties in developing these technologies will start to challenge the assumptions of what kind of espionage can be done in-person or online. For example, if bots can generate profiles and hold conversations with targets online, nurturing the relationship until a human role-player can pick up the engagement (while keeping the conversation in line with the digital-forensics profile of the bot), why do you need to meet the target in person at all? Bots can have thousands of conversations in parallel whereas a role-player is generally limited to two or three engagements at any one time.

A broad technology architecture of different tools is required to solve this generational challenge. It is not all about technology. We need to develop these capabilities in ways that are in line with western democratic values, manage ethical and privacy concerns, address the public’s lack of trust in government and large tech companies, and account for the increasing globalisation of social media platforms. There’s no easy solution.

Nuclear war in Asia would be Australia’s problem, too. We must prepare

Australia must be prepared for limited nuclear war in the Indo-Pacific, be it over Taiwan, the Korean Peninsula, or beyond. It should understand what such a conflict would mean for regional and global security, and specifically for the Australian Defence Force.

In September 2022, North Korea’s regime passed a law declaring a new nuclear doctrine. It raised the prospect of nuclear first-use, either to pre-empt a perceived threat or, according to the law’s wording, to ‘take the initiative in war.’ The law rejected denuclearisation, instead calling for an ‘exponential’ increase in the country’s nuclear weapons capabilities. North Korea has since expanded its stock of tactical nuclear weapons. This includes low-yield capabilities that the regime might use pre-emptively to gain operational initiative, rather than to deter or end conflict. Pyongyang’s goal is not one of escalating to de-escalate; it’s escalating to win.

At the same time, China has rapidly expanded and modernised its nuclear forces, and there have been troubling signs that its own ‘no first-use’ policy is weakening. In recent weeks, conflict between India and Pakistan—two nuclear-armed states—raised fears of nuclear escalation. These events should make clear to Australian defence planners that the risk of nuclear war, including limited nuclear warfare in Asia, is rising.

High-intensity war in the Indo-Pacific leading to the use of nuclear weapons is a live possibility. Australian defence policy must explore how the ADF could support coalition operations in a nuclear scenario, be it in relation to Taiwan, in response to a crisis on the Korean Peninsula, or indeed both simultaneously.

First, the ADF should ensure it has the means to contribute to integrated conventional and nuclear operations—US and allied conventional operations coordinated with US nuclear retaliatory strikes against a nuclear-armed adversary. This could include long-range strike by air and naval forces; commitment of enabling assets such as the E-7 Wedgetail air-surveillance aircraft; and logistics equipment such as the Royal Australian Air Force’s KC-30A tankers. The Pine Gap joint facility would also play an important role in detecting a nuclear attack in Asia and supporting any coalition responses. Future ADF-controlled satellites for communications support as well as intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance could—and should—enhance this capability.

Second, the ADF should prepare to support coalition integrated air and missile defence. The Royal Australian Navy’s Hobart-class destroyers, with SM-6 and SM-2MR air defence missiles, offer a missile defence capability that could defend coalition forces, both at sea and on land, against ballistic or cruise missiles. The 2023 Defence Strategic Review signalled acquisition of land-based integrated air and missile defence capabilities as a priority. If the upcoming funding plan, the 2026 Integrated Investment Program, provides clear guidance on this acquisition, such capabilities could further strengthen a coalition’s ability to counter adversary missile threats from the land.

Third, at the policy level, Australia should more actively support and strengthen US extended nuclear deterrence and be ready to support nuclear operations to restore deterrence should it fail. Australia already supports extended nuclear deterrence by hosting joint facilities, but it could also consider further expanding and increasing US long-range bomber access to Australian air bases under the Enhanced Air Cooperation agreement. This would allow for more regular forward basing and create opportunities for the RAAF to support US Air Force long-range bomber operations.

However, the government is reluctant to discuss Australia’s role in supporting US extended nuclear deterrence, beyond a cursory reference in the National Defence Strategy and an allusion to the role of joint facilities. This is an unhelpful public stance.

As my ASPI colleague Alex Bristow has argued, Australia needs to develop sufficient policy sense to advance its own position on conventional-nuclear integration, escalation, and war termination. It must learn from NATO’s structures without necessarily copying them and talk to the United States, Japan, South Korea, Britain and France about nuclear issues without assuming that our viewpoints align perfectly with theirs. There is an AUKUS dimension too, as US submarines operating from Submarine Rotation Force–West may be nuclear-armed by the mid-2030s, and the conventionally armed submarines and Pillar Two technologies that Australia is acquiring will affect the regional nuclear balance.

To move forward, Australia could adopt a more active role in key dialogues such as the Strategic Policy Dialogue and the US-Australia Defence Policy and Strategy Talks. The significance of these dialogues should be emphasised in AUSMIN communiques. They should also lead to a dedicated extended deterrence dialogue, following the examples of US-Japan and US-South Korea dialogues, which have existed for more than 15 years.

Australia must think not only about how best it can contribute to nuclear crisis management; it should also plan for what happens after nuclear weapons are used. Ideally, the nuclear genie stays firmly contained: deterrence holds, and actual nuclear use is avoided. But should the nuclear taboo be broken, Australia and its allies will face an entirely different set of challenges. We must be ready.

22 years after RAMSI, Solomon Islands social, political fractures persist

History haunts Solomon Islands. More than two decades after the end of the Tensions of 1998 to 2003, the fractures that prompted ethnic conflict between Guadalcanal and Malaita communities remain deep in politics, society and governance.

While the Australian-led Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands (RAMSI) successfully restored peace in 2003 and laid the groundwork for institutional recovery, the underlying causes of the conflict—land disputes, regional inequality and political marginalisation—remain unaddressed. These unresolved issues continue to manifest in calls for provincial autonomy, public distrust of central government, and periodic unrest, such as the riots in Honiara in 2021.

In 2010, the Solomon Islands Truth and Reconciliation Commission was launched to examine the root causes of the conflict and chart a path forward for national healing. Its final report, delivered in 2012, presented a sobering record of human rights violations, systemic failures and societal grievances. The commission recommended prosecutions, reparations and structured reintegration support for former combatants.

More than a decade later, these recommendations remain largely unfulfilled. Successive governments have failed to enact enabling legislation or allocate the necessary funding. Although the commission’s report was finally tabled in parliament in 2023, it was in a condensed form, and no timeline for implementation has been established. Many victims and former fighters feel abandoned, contributing to a growing sense of disillusionment and reinforcing the narrative of selective justice.

In an attempt to address these lingering challenges, the previous Democratic Coalition Government for Advancement introduced two key frameworks: a National Reparation Policy and a National Reintegration Policy. Endorsed by cabinet between 2021 and 2022, these policies aimed to provide  a framework for restitution to victims and structured reintegration pathways for ex-combatants. However, they remain unlegislated and underfunded, with draft  policy paper for a proposed Conflict Prevention and Victims Commission reportedly stalled in the policy pipeline.

The Ministry of Traditional Governance, Peace and Ecclesiastical Affairs has been tasked with implementing these frameworks, and with driving forward the outstanding provisions of both the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s report and the Townsville Peace Agreement alongside relevant government agencies. This mandate reflects a significant shift under the National Security Strategy 2025, which recognises reconciliation and traditional governance as fundamental to state-building. The ministry’s role is not only about healing the past, but also about enabling an inclusive, resilient state for the future. However, the ministry continues to face structural challenges—including chronic underfunding, limited staffing and a perception of being peripheral to national security planning.

Despite these constraints, the ministry continues to implement peacebuilding initiatives—facilitating reconciliation ceremonies, community dialogues, and consultations with ex-combatants—alongside its broader mandate. These are essential contributions to social stability and should be recognised as core components of the national security ecosystem. Without stronger political backing and strategic investment, however, these efforts risk being symbolic rather than transformative.

Leadership commitment remains the greatest constraint. While the current Government of National Unity and Transformation has made symbolic gestures—explicitly affirming peace and unity as national priorities—implementation remains inconsistent. Parliamentarians such as Matthew Wale have criticised the lack of concrete timelines, highlighting broader institutional inertia. Without decisive political will and cross-sector collaboration, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s vision for national healing and the Townsville Peace Agreement’s recommendations will continue to stall.

This inertia has serious security implications. The National Security Strategy 2025 explicitly identifies ‘unresolved tension issues and incomplete implementation of the Townsville Peace Agreement’ as a Tier 1 threat to national security. This places internal reconciliation challenges on par with climate-induced disasters, transnational crime, and political instability. The strategy calls for renewed reconciliation processes, the implementation of the Townsville Peace Agreement’s provisions and inclusive conflict resolution mechanisms led by traditional and local authorities. It is a crucial acknowledgement: without resolving the internal legacies of the Tensions, Solomon Islands remains at risk of renewed instability.

Geopolitical dynamics only heighten the stakes. Since switching diplomatic ties from Taiwan to China in 2019 and signing a security agreement with Beijing in 2022, Solomon Islands has become a flashpoint in regional competition. The then Malaita provincial government’s resistance to these developments revived historical grievances and deepened provincial divides. In this context, unresolved domestic issues and external strategic rivalries create a volatile mix.

Australia, Solomon Islands’ closest partner, has spent more than A$800 million in law enforcement, infrastructure and governance since the end of RAMSI. Yet this support has often prioritised physical infrastructure over the human infrastructure of reconciliation. Critics argue that failing to spend on peacebuilding undermines the very stability that these aid programs aim to safeguard. Australia’s renewed Pacific ‘step-up’ and the Manele government’s openness to closer ties now offer an opportunity to realign support with Solomon Islands’ state-building priorities.

There are two immediate areas where Australia can contribute constructively. First, it can provide technical and financial assistance to support the implementation of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Townsville Peace Agreement frameworks—particularly by helping the responsible ministry operationalise its policy mandates and legislative agenda. Second, it can facilitate long-term capacity-building within the ministry through advisory placements, inter-ministerial coordination, and funding for community-based reconciliation programs. These investments would go beyond symbolic partnerships and lay the foundation for sustainable peace.

For Solomon Islands, the stakes are high. A peaceful and stable future demands more than diplomatic realignment or infrastructure development. It requires confronting historical grievances and delivering on long-standing commitments to truth, justice and national unity. Reconciliation is not simply a moral obligation—it is a strategic necessity, now formally embedded in the nation’s security doctrine.

A secure Solomon Islands will be one where reconciliation is not rhetorical, but real. And for both Honiara and Canberra, investing in this vision is not optional—it is essential.

This article is part of ASPI’s Pacific Perspectives series, dedicated to championing the assessments and opinions of Pacific island security experts. All opinions presented, including any errors or omissions, are the sole responsibility of the author.

Harnessing NIC surveillance for better climate security outcomes

Australia’s National Intelligence Community could substantially enhance Australia’s climate security response. It could do so by applying its surveillance resources to the task.

The 2024 Independent Intelligence Review lists transnational challenges—which includes climate change—as one of the ‘major trends shaping global affairs’. Despite noting that ‘climate change is a priority for intelligence agencies and is likely to require more [intelligence] collection’, the report doesn’t contain a chapter on climate, nor does it make any recommendations for addressing the challenge. Meanwhile, technology, as one of the other major trends listed, is given an entire chapter and 11 recommendations to ensure Australia is adequately ‘positioned for the future’.

This omission is consistent with the limited consideration that has been afforded to integrating climate security into intelligence establishments in Australia and beyond. Until the review’s release, the Australian government had officially and publicly raised climate change only in relation intelligence’s assessment functions. The Independent Intelligence Review is a step towards recognising the broader intelligence establishment’s relationship to climate security, but it must come with a considered and deliberate assessment as to what this might mean in practice.

The government has recognised that reducing emissions is ‘a fundamental part of protecting Australia’s national security’, but has overlooked what the broader intelligence establishment could do to assist climate change mitigation. This has not been for a lack of ideas: one notable case includes Louis Bruhnke’s 2013 master’s thesis for the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. Bruhnke contended that, should a binding and enforceable international greenhouse gas limitation treaty be formed, the US intelligence community could assist the international monitoring, reporting, and verification of emissions.

This is an interesting idea, but a distant prospect. As such, Australia should consider how we could use our intelligence community’s capabilities to help reduce emissions now, not later.

Certain agencies within the Australian intelligence community are well-placed to contribute to monitoring regulatory breaches, specifically around the legislation on greenhouse gas reduction under the government’s Safeguard Mechanism.

The Safeguard Mechanism requires Australia’s largest greenhouse gas emitters—accounting for around 28 percent of national emissions—to keep their net emissions below a certain limit, with the default baseline set at 100,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per year. This baseline is set to decline at a rate of 4.9 percent each year until 2030.

Currently, however, the Safeguard Mechanism’s effectiveness is severely undermined by weak monitoring and surveillance. Factors such as self-reporting, lengthy audit warning times and selective testing are undermining the integrity of the scheme, so much so that, according to recent satellite imaging, several coal mines in Queensland were emitting emissions that were cumulatively as much as double the mines’ reported figures. Four of these mines were safeguard-covered facilities. These went undetected by the Australian government.

The existing authority, the Clean Energy Regulator could have its surveillance powers bolstered to enhance its monitoring effectiveness. However, this would be an unnecessary duplication of powers. The regulator would also be ill-equipped to navigate the associated sensitivities due to its lack of specialisation, experience and expertise. Not to mention it would also require significant investment—both in time and money—to successfully stand up these capabilities.

As such, it would be more efficient and effective for the regulator to collaborate with the National Intelligence Community when surveillance expertise and capabilities were required.

Of course, monitoring and information-sharing would require new enabling legislation. While this is no small task, it is a necessary step in advancing new thinking as to how our most powerful agencies could contribute to mitigating climate-related national security issues.

My research, published in 2024, found that the agencies best suited to this task were the Australian Geospatial-Intelligence Organisation (AGO), the Australian Federal Police (AFP) and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC).

AGO would already be able to support the regulator as it possesses specific functions that allow it to aid Commonwealth or state authorities in certain instances, including when assistance pertains to environmental protection. For ACIC and the AFP to support surveillance efforts, the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act 2007 would need to be amended to include a criminal penalty to form a hybrid criminal/civil regime.

Government agencies currently rely on weak surveillance practices to regulate corporations. But the security implications of excessive emissions are not a standard consequence of corporate misconduct, and companies should be regulated accordingly. Doing so would serve public interest by helping to avoid, for example, the crossing of various tipping points, without harming the rights or freedoms of individuals, and treading carefully around the social licence extended to Australia’s intelligence agencies in their domestic operations.

Australia adrift. We must restore our merchant shipping fleet

Australia’s ports may be busy, but we have no way of ensuring that ships will keep coming to them in wartime. In an age of contested supply chains, strategic competition and rising instability, this absence of Australian shipping capacity poses one of the country’s most underappreciated national security risks.

The problem is blunt and unresolved. Australia lacks an Australian-controlled, internationally trading merchant shipping fleet. This means we have no national capability to move essential fuel, food, medical supplies or military stores. In a crisis—be it conflict, global logistics breakdown, fuel disruption or natural disaster—we rely entirely on foreign-flagged vessels to move crucial imports and exports.

To take national resilience seriously, the federal government must decisively rebuild sovereign control over a degree of international shipping capacity. That starts with revitalising the moribund Australian International Shipping Register (AISR) as a credible, competitive and security-aligned mechanism for rebuilding a merchant fleet. Appropriate government stimulation of similar registry regimes in comparable economies has proven to deliver a core of commercial maritime resilience.

The current incentive, an exemption from tax for earning of ships that are on the AISR, isn’t enough. In return for the exemption, each ship must be available for requisition and have at least two Australians aboard in management roles (typically those of captain and chief engineer) and three trainees to create a supply of new officers.

Possible further incentives, which would need detail investigation, might include an initial round of grants or favourable loans to fund a few ships that would re-establish the industry. Another might be the government taking minority ownership of ships.

For decades, successive governments have allowed our maritime capability to wither. In the 1980s, Australia maintained a fleet of more than 120 internationally trading ships of varied types, including tankers and container carriers. Today, we effectively have none. Our current capacity comprises just a handful of vehicle and passenger vessels serving Tasmania, an icebreaker and one self-discharging bulk carrier. Requisitioning these vessels in an emergency would cut lifelines to the island state and offer no depth or diversity in capability.

Meanwhile, other maritime nations, including Japan, Britain, France, Denmark, Norway and Israel, along with most other OECD countries and even landlocked Switzerland, have maintained significant international fleets on registries similar to our AISR. Vessels that serve commercial markets in peacetime and can be called upon in times of crisis. Australia has taken the opposite path, ceding control to market forces and allowing national capability to evaporate.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, global shipping schedules collapsed, leaving Australian supply chains vulnerable. Industries scrambled for goods, while empty shelves and spiking freight costs highlighted our dependence on foreign operators. But even this systemic shock failed to trigger reform. The AISR—designed to provide a competitive platform for Australian-flagged international vessels—remains unused, ignored by industry and neglected by the government.

This must change. Reviving the AISR is the fastest and most cost-effective path toward restoring sovereign shipping capability. It offers a viable structure to encourage Australian companies to register vessels under national control without sacrificing competitiveness or flexibility. More importantly, it allows the federal government to create a requisition-ready merchant fleet that can operate in times of crisis.

The benefits of revitalising the AISR extend beyond emergency logistics. It would generate workforce pathways for Australian deck and engineering officers, many of whom currently lack opportunities to accrue the sea time required for qualification. Without ships, there is no workforce, and without a workforce, there is no capability.

Reestablishing a sovereign shipping sector would also revitalise the broader maritime ecosystem. Greater activity and certainty would benefit ship management, port services, logistics, training and regulatory expertise, strengthening our national resilience.

Importantly, the cost would be marginal. For context, a defence budget equivalent to 3 percent of GDP would equate to more than $75 billion annually. That’s roughly $1.44 billion weekly, or $206 million daily. The funding required to sustain a viable AISR—estimated at $40 million to $50 million annually—represents less than a third of one day’s defence expenditure.

That raises a serious question: If we are willing to spend hundreds of millions each day to prepare our military for a contested future, why are we not willing to spend a fraction of that to secure the logistical backbone those forces will rely on? Sovereign shipping is not a boutique capability—it is an essential enabler of national power.

To operationalise this strategy, the federal government should:

—Reinvest in the AISR with incentives and regulatory support, such as those mentioned above, to make it an attractive, viable platform for Australian-controlled shipping companies;

—Set clear targets to increase Australian-flagged merchant vessels, including capacity for key cargo classes: fuel, food, bulk commodities and defence-related materials; and

—Develop a maritime skills strategy aligned to the AISR, ensuring reestablished and expanded training pipelines for maritime officers, engineers and shore-based support.

Australia’s national security strategy must move beyond platforms and posture. It must include the often unseen logistics that enable power projection, humanitarian assistance and economic continuity. Without ships, Australia cannot move. Without maritime workforce development, we cannot crew. And without a policy reset, we will remain dependent on foreign goodwill when it matters most.

It is time to shift the conversation. We must see sovereign shipping not as nostalgia or economic protectionism but as a form of critical infrastructure. The next crisis will not wait for capability to catch up. While the seas are calm, we must invest now to ensure we are ready when they turn rough.

Strategist coverage of ASPI’s The Cost of Defence

On 29 May, ASPI released its annual defence budget briefing, The Cost of Defence. 

Introducing the report, ASPI executive director Justin Bassi reflected on its aim of ‘strengthening Australia’s long-term security, prosperity and sovereignty’ and its responsibility to ‘ask the hard questions’ about the adequacy of defence resourcing. He further highlighted the need to view defence as a whole-of-government issue to effectively counter the growing security threats in the Indo-Pacific region:

The security challenges that Australia faces cannot, and should not, be borne by Defence and our armed forces alone. For too long, Australian governments have partitioned Australia’s security and failed to deliver a comprehensive approach to national security. ASPI has been vocal in calling for comprehensive national security planning, and now we reflect this by examining the government’s national security spending as a whole.

Director of defence strategy Mike Hughes and senior fellow Marc Ablong outlined that ‘the government’s rhetoric about a once-in-a-generation defence investment is not matched by funding levels or organisational reform.’ They described the defence budget as a ‘lost opportunity’ that could result in a lack of preparedness. They highlighted an over-prioritisation of funding for distant capabilities that may leave Australia vulnerable:

Most major capability acquisitions for the Australian Defence Force–including the nuclear-powered submarines under the AUKUS partnership and a planned class of frigates–are scheduled for delivery well into the 2030s and beyond.

While these future capabilities are critical for long-term deterrence, they provide little immediate enhancement of our defence capability, preparedness or resilience. For the next few years, we’re left with a paper ADF that lacks the readiness and size to meet near-term threats.

ASPI senior analyst Alex Bristow discussed consequences that inadequate defence spending may have for Australia, noting that ‘where Australia drags its feet, its peers are shifting gears.’ He warned that Australia was in danger of falling behind its partners and allies if it couldn’t raise defence spending to a level commensurate with regional threats:

Like Europe, we must relearn the tragic lesson that deterring a bully is cheaper, in lives and national treasure, than fighting one. Australia is not spending enough, fast enough, to keep the bullies at bay.

Since its release, the report has sparked nation-wide conversations on defence spending, many of which took place at our 2025 Defence Conference on 4 June. Admiral David Johnston, Chief of the Defence Force, offered his insights during a panel on national preparedness and national support for defence:

I would say Defence is fully expending its budget at the moment. That’s a good thing, as we’ve uplifted our acquisition delivery, workforce is improving, our view of what we need to do around readiness. That does put pressure on a budget that we have to make choices on.

The conclusion of Justin Bassi’s foreword encapsulated the purpose of The Cost of Defence:

It has never been more important for experts inside and outside the public service to speak truth to power frankly and fearlessly in order to give decision-makers the strongest possible suite of options. We do not expect all readers to agree with our positions. Indeed, we welcome debate and disagreement in the hope that Australia will be stronger, more prepared and more resilient for the challenges we confront now and will face in the future.

Germany’s chance in frigate deal rises—potentially at cost to Australia-Japan relationship

German shipbuilder TKMS has significantly increased its chances in Canberra’s frigate competition by partnering with Saab, an entrenched supplier of crucial equipment for Australian warships. This challenges widespread assumptions that Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) is the favourite.

A German victory, if it occurs, will be a serious blow to what has been a revitalised security relationship between Australia and Japan.

TKMS on 26 May signed up Saab to ‘explore opportunities for collaboration on the MEKO A-200, with a focus on enhancing naval capabilities through joint innovation and integration.’

Australia shortlisted TKMS’s MEKO A-200 design and an improved version of MHI’s Mogami class in November for the competition, called Sea 3000, for up to 11 general-purpose frigates. The winner is expected to build the first three ships and support construction in Australia of the rest.

The TKMS-Saab memorandum of understanding, signed in Sydney, referred to Sea 3000 and covered collaboration on Saab’s AusCMS combat management system. This is hardware and software that knits a ship’s sensors, weapons and crews into an integrated fighting machine. Saab is involved in the combat management systems of most major Royal Australian Navy ships.

Until now, MHI has looked best placed in the frigate competition. Its design offers technical strengths and the advantages of Australia operating equipment also used by its most important regional friend. Moreover, choosing it would strengthen what Canberra and Tokyo call their special strategic partnership.

Crucially, TKMS’s bid has lacked what should have been an easily deployed advantage, participation by Saab, whose combat management system could be much preferred by the RAN over unfamiliar Japanese equipment. TKMS now has that advantage.

In another appealing move, Saab has said it is expanding its Western Australian operation that works on combat management systems.

If TKMS wins the frigate competition, Japan may recognise that Australia made its choice on sound naval-technical grounds, including ship performance and the lack of export experience on the part of MHI and the makers of systems in the Mogami design. Armed forces need confidence that their suppliers can adeptly help them get complex equipment into operation and keep it working.

Nonetheless, rejection of MHI’s bid would pose a risk to Australia’s defence partnership with Japan. A senior Australian official has described it as ‘the closest … we have with any other country except the United States’, adding that the two countries needed ‘to grow our cooperation not just directly in the military-to-military domain, but also in the industrial and technological fields.’

Japan’s government and defence industry have responded strongly to such signals, including at a navy-to-navy and leadership level.

Putting the Japanese bid in a winner-takes-all down-select process has been risky for a relationship that Australia’s defence leadership prizes so highly. Canberra has worked hard to revive Japan’s confidence in Australia since its disappointment in losing to France in 2016 in a competition (since cancelled) for 12 submarines for the RAN.

If Japan goes away empty handed again, it may conclude that Canberra’s promises of strategic partnership are hollow. If Canberra declines a second, serious offer from Japan within a decade to supply Australia with frontline naval vessels, it is hard to imagine Tokyo trying its luck a third time for the foreseeable future.

The potential hammer blow to momentum and confidence in the bilateral relationship matters much more than it did in 2016, when the threat from China to both countries was not so acutely appreciated as now. And Australia and Japan now face parallel political pressures and uncertainties in their alliances with the United States. The strategic logic for them to join forces in a common defence industrial project has never been stronger, as Washington readily accepts.

Australia has a history of burning through trusted international partnerships as a result of its decisions on major defence acquisitions. The costs, in terms of our reputation for reliability and lost opportunities, are never quantified but they are substantial. These non-financial costs must be weighed carefully in the final Sea 3000 decision, alongside local jobs and the value for money of the alternative German and Japanese programs.

Of course, Australia also has reasons for getting closer to Europe. Its response to the EU’s public proposal of a defence and security agreement last month was unnecessarily dismissive of a group of nations that are closely aligned to Australia’s democratic principles and values. But Japan is as close to an ally for Australia as two nations can be without a formal treaty. Both are allies of the US and are members of key minilateral partnerships, including the Quad.

Whatever the outcome, the Australian government must avoid the strategic blunder of needlessly damaging relations with Japan. History will look unkindly upon an unforced error at such a critical strategic juncture for Australia’s defence.

Ukraine’s drone attack offers fearful lessons for a Chinese invasion force

Ukraine’s massive drone strike against Russian air bases on 1 June should reverberate across all theaters of conflict. But there is one Western Pacific scenario where it could be very relevant indeed: a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

There was a micro-panic among invasion watchers in March when a brief video appeared, and then vanished, showing an impressively large and unique Chinese device, a series of barges with telescoping  vertical pylons in their hulls and built-in bridges at each end. Towed into place in line astern, the barges would extend their pylons to the sea bottom and lift themselves out of the water, connect themselves with bridges and extend a long cable-stayed ramp to the shore.

The system is designed to bypass Taiwan’s ports and allow commercial ro-ro ships to directly and rapidly discharge vehicles ashore. That’s important because an invasion of Taiwan would be so massive—300,000 troops is the baseline estimate in a comprehensive recent study by the US Naval War College—that for a navy to provide enough sealift is almost inconceivable.

But the mobile pier, ingenious as it is, acknowledges a basic fact: there is no alternative in Taiwan to an amphibious assault through the surf line, with the goal of then seizing nearby port or using the beach as a landing point for the pier. Attractive alternatives such as directly seizing a major port or using airborne force to grab centers of gravity (Hostomel was another Ukraine lesson) don’t exist.

Completed in October 2022, the War College study is the product of a  conference held in 2021, before Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The study doesn’t mention the kind of drones used in Ukraine—but they could make an enormous difference.

China’s amphibious forces, a joint army-navy responsibility, are built on a blend of the assets and technologies used by the US Marine Corps and others, technologies based on experience in World War II and Korea, where the last major amphibious landing took place.

The technology hasn’t changed much: a combination of seagoing ships designed to approach the beach, and larger ships that carry and launch landing craft to deliver troops and vehicles to the beach, along with amphibious combat vehicles (ACVs) that can swim to the beach and fight beyond it. Helicopters and hovercraft have been added to the mix since Korea, but can only handle part of the load. And some of the landing craft are now hovercraft, which are faster and may be able to move a little inland.

Like the Marines, China’s amphibious doctrine calls for a focused landing on a front of 2 to 4 km, with boats, hovercraft and ACVs approaching the beach in columns from the motherships close to the horizon. Except for a few hovercraft, they’d be generally moving at less than 15 knots.

Such a force is a fat target. The landing craft and ACVs are neither fast, nor hard, nor can they carry effective defenses. Surprise is next to impossible, particularly in Taiwan, with a rugged coast where most beaches are backed by steep cliffs or equally impassable rice fields.

China’s plan, tested in its own exercises and countless Western wargames, is based on massive use of force to prevent attacks on the landing force, through control of the three domains—land, water, and air.

But small drones do not live in any of those domains.

Sure, they fly, and travel faster than anything on the surface, but their small size and proximity to the surface protect them from air threats and most surface-to-air weapons. Sometimes called the ‘air littoral’, it’s a different domain.

The Ukrainian strike on 1 June highlighted other aspects of drones. Slower than conventional aeroplanes and missiles, surviving with swarm tactics and small size, they can be very precise, picking the exact point where to land or deliver a weapon. ‘Zero miss distance’ means that a small warhead can be destructive, using the target’s fuel or weapons—or its very marginal buoyancy—to destroy it. A laden landing craft or an ACV will sink rapidly if holed.

Small drones don’t have long range, but if the target is headed your way from 20 km out, that’s not necessary.

Being sure that an object is the enemy, not a friend, is not hard in an amphibious invasion. If it has a wake and it’s heading for the beach, it’s Red—the other side.

But let’s throw in a self-forming 5G network of autonomous drones, all with cameras. The Ukraine attack was against non-moving targets, so the invasion force might be harder to hit. But as the drone swarm overflies the incoming force, the video from each camera is continuously stitched into a high-resolution target map, updated as targets are hit.

Drones that still have energy but are out of munitions continue to build the target map, diving on a target as their batteries drain. Drones joining the fight do not have to search for targets; they are directed to them, so the attack becomes more efficient. None of this takes sophisticated hardware or artificial intelligence—just simple rules that ensure drones with unused munitions don’t run out of energy and fall uselessly into the sea.

If resources permit, the drones can engage larger combatants and ro-ros. Heavier drones with more powerful munitions can hide in a swarm of smaller vehicles and are hard to distinguish from them.

Red does not have many good counter-moves. Defensive directed-energy weapons or guns on large ships are far from where the drones are hitting the landing force. Jamming a communications network that has dozens or hundreds of nodes within a few kilometers of one another is next to impossible. ACVs or other craft assigned to carry counter-drone weapons risk being identified as such and swarmed.

And can this drone force be hit on the ground before launch, even with total air supremacy? Not much. As the Ukraine attack showed, drone arsenals are mobile and easily camouflaged: the drones that hit airbases were driven thousands of kilometres into Russian territory without being detected.

At the defender’s discretion, the operation can be livestreamed on social media, stressing the most disciplined nation’s will to fight.

Can we doubt that China is rewriting its wargames this week?

Overshadowed by border dispute, India-Pakistan water security risks grow

A disputed India-Pakistan border in Kashmir isn’t the only threat to stability on the subcontinent. One that’s often overlooked is water security.

India and Pakistan should incorporate transboundary watery cooperation into broader security dialogues to deescalate tensions, build cooperation and resilience, and ensure that water-sharing agreements are insulated from geopolitical fictions.

This can help the region safeguard against future tensions just as climate impacts strain access across the Indus River Basin.

These waters are shared by Pakistan (47 percent), India (39 percent), China (8 percent) and Afghanistan (6 percent). They all depend on the river for agriculture, drinking water and hydropower.

The situation is particularly dire for Pakistan, which relies on the Indus River for more than 90 percent of its water and is already grappling with severe water shortages due to both droughts and flooding.

The Indus Water Treaty, which prevented conflict by regulating water distribution, has historically insulated water security from Pakistan’s fraught relationships with upstream nations, particularly India and China. Yet changing water availability challenges the treaty’s efficacy.

Several concurrent climate drivers are at play, which have already challenged disaster response capabilities, complicating long-term adaptation. This includes a near-term acceleration and eventual loss in glacial melt flows; shifting monsoon patterns that have contributed to severe floods; and drought conditions exacerbated by those dynamics.

Glacial meltwater accounts for a significant portion of annual flows in the Indus River Basin in the dry season. As global temperatures rise, glaciers in the Himalayas, Karakoram and Hindu Kush ranges melt at an accelerated rate, leading to short-term abundance in water. As glaciers retreat due to climate change, this flow will eventually decrease, leading to long-term water scarcity. Pakistan is particularly vulnerable to severe water shortages that could result from this.

In addition to glacial melt, the basin also relies heavily on the seasonal monsoons to recharge its water reserves. However, climate change has caused shifts in monsoon patterns, leading to more erratic and intense rainfall. This has contributed to more severe floods, particularly in Pakistan, where the Indus River frequently overflows, causing widespread damage to crops, infrastructure and human settlements. For example, the 2010 floods in Pakistan were among the worst in the country’s history, affecting 20 million people and causing more than US$19 billion in damage.

Climate change is also increasing the frequency and intensity of droughts in the Indus Basin. A 2021 World Bank report indicated that Pakistan, India and Afghanistan were experiencing increasing water scarcity due to prolonged periods of drought, exacerbated by reduced glacial melt and unpredictable monsoon patterns. In 2018, Pakistan faced its worst water crisis in decades, with many regions, particularly in Sindh and Balochistan, facing severe drought conditions. This scarcity, combined with a growing population and expanding agricultural needs, is placing tremendous pressure on the region’s water resources.

Pakistan has expressed concerns about India’s upstream infrastructure projects, citing both technical issues and national security worries, including the potential for India to influence water flows during periods of tension. India, in turn, emphasises its right to develop its water resources while acknowledging the need to address cross-border concerns through dialogue and cooperation.

Climate change exacerbates these insecurities by making water availability less predictable, thus amplifying the strategic importance of the Indus River and the need for cooperative management to prevent water from becoming a catalyst for conflict.

Despite these challenges, there are several strategies that can be employed to mitigate the impacts of climate change on water security in the Indus Basin.

Transboundary water cooperation is one of the most critical avenues for addressing these challenges. Strengthening the Indus Water Treaty and promoting joint management of the basin’s water resources through regional platforms could help reduce tensions and foster collaboration. Incorporating water security into broader India-Pakistan security dialogues could also deescalate tensions, ensuring that water-sharing agreements are insulated from geopolitical tensions. The establishment of data-sharing agreements and joint monitoring systems would improve transparency and provide the necessary tools to manage water resources more effectively.

The adoption of sustainable water management practices, such as water-efficient irrigation technologies, can help reduce water wastage in agriculture. Drip irrigation, water-efficient crop varieties and better crop management practices could significantly reduce the demand for water in agriculture, enabling more efficient use of available resources.

Finally, the implementation of early-warning systems and climate adaptation strategies could help the region better prepare for extreme weather events. These systems would provide real-time data on river flows, weather patterns and water levels, enabling governments to take proactive measures before disasters occur. Strengthening disaster preparedness at the community level, particularly in flood-prone areas, would be vital to reducing the human and economic costs of climate-induced water crises.

Shared custodianship: Indigenous voices in critical infrastructure

The six-year delay in approving Woodside Energy’s North West Shelf extension reflects a failure to integrate Indigenous Australians as strategic partners in the nation’s development agenda. Policymakers and project proponents should recognise the impasse is far from just a niche environmental compliance issue.

If Australia is serious about realising northern ambitions—whether in energy, defence or critical minerals—it must adopt a new development ethos grounded in shared custodianship with First Nations peoples.

Northern Australia is rich in natural resources, geostrategic potential and cultural heritage. More than half of the Northern Territory and vast areas of Western Australia are held under Aboriginal land rights, creating an opportunity for genuine engagement.

If Australia forges genuine, early-stage partnerships with Indigenous communities, it can unlock not only project certainty but social license, environmental sustainability and national resilience.

ASPl’s report following the 2024 Darwin Dialogue argued that Indigenous Australians were not passive stakeholders in northern development but active contributors to environmental stewardship, emerging industries and national defence. The dialogue called for Indigenous inclusion not as a matter of political correctness or procedural compliance but as a source of long-term competitive and strategic advantage.

It’s a message echoed in the Woodside case, highlighting how delays, despite eventual project clearance, appeared to reflect concerns about the depth of Indigenous engagement before the submission of project documentation—underscoring the importance of engaging early and meaningfully with Indigenous communities.

Woodside maintains that its engagement aligns with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and associated principles of ‘free, prior and informed consent’. Yet criticism from Indigenous leaders points to a disconnect between the stated policy and meaningful practice. Disputes over the transparency of environmental assessments and questions about when and how Indigenous communities were consulted highlight the high stakes of getting this balance wrong.

The lesson is clear. Trust is not built during a project’s final regulatory hurdle; it is forged in the earliest stages of conception, design and intent. And when trust is missing, so are timelines, social license and investment certainty.

For development in northern Australia to be sustainable and strategically sound, Indigenous custodianship must be embedded, not bolted on. This is not only about respect and inclusion; it’s also about achieving better project outcomes.

Projects incorporating Indigenous land and sea management practices are inherently more adaptive to climate risk and biodiversity pressures. Co-designed clean energy ventures with Indigenous landholders can pioneer new models of co-ownership, shared governance and revenue participation models.

For example, the Centre for Appropriate Technology in Alice Springs partners with Indigenous communities through its social enterprise division to deliver infrastructure, communications and renewable energy projects across remote regions. These initiatives are not just about service delivery. They build local capacity, create jobs and centre Indigenous decision-making. They also show how strategic infrastructure can be designed and delivered to communities, not just for them.

If the federal government and industry are serious about getting development right in the north they must prioritise genuine engagement and meaningful partnerships through three key initiatives.

Firstly, Indigenous leaders must hold permanent, empowered roles in the governance of major projects and regional development bodies ensuring decisions are made with communities, not for them. While Australia’s assessment frameworks must be reformed to ensure Indigenous perspectives are integrated early and meaningfully, not just retrofitted, into project design and approval processes.

Secondly, governments must support education and training programs that blend Indigenous ecological knowledge with STEM disciplines, expand vocational pathways aligned to regional industries, and back Indigenous entrepreneurship through co-investment in infrastructure. This would lay the foundation for Indigenous leadership in clean energy, environmental stewardship and regional development.

Finally, defence, energy and critical minerals sectors must adopt measurable targets for Indigenous employment, procurement and leadership. These should not be symbolic gestures, but central aspects of operational effectiveness, resilience and legitimacy.

Woodside’s project delay reflects a broader truth. Projects that treat Indigenous engagement as a box-ticking exercise will keep facing delays, resistance and reputational damage. In contrast, those that treat Indigenous communities as strategic partners can increase their legitimacy, innovation and sustainability.

The Darwin Dialogue painted a hopeful picture of what’s possible: a northern Australia defined not by exclusion or conflict but by shared ambition and mutual respect. But that vision cannot be realised through good intentions alone. It requires new policy settings, governance models, and a deeper national commitment to Indigenous partnership. It requires recognising that development in the north is not just an economic exercise; it’s a question of trust, identity, and nation-building.

Last week, Rio Tinto and the Puutu Kunti Kurrama and Pinikura Aboriginal Corporation signed a landmark co-management agreement to ensure the traditional owners would be engaged early in the mining process. Under this agreement, the traditional owners of the Juukan Gorge rock shelters will have a decisive role in shaping Rio Tinto’s future mining activities on their land. This groundbreaking agreement should serve as a model for prioritising relationships over regulation.

The Woodside case is both a cautionary tale and a call to action. To build a resilient, inclusive, and prosperous north, Indigenous Australians must be placed at the centre of our national infrastructure strategy. In northern Australia—as elsewhere—long-term success depends not on working around Indigenous communities but working with them.