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Seismograph all over the world jumped on May 11, but not on the 13th. INDIA'S NUCLEAR TESTS CAUGHT THE international community off guard. This has caused some commentators to question [...]

Australia's new government is committed to delivering the next defence white paper in 2015. The two previous white papers took a predominantly risk-management approach to Southeast Asia, generally ignored the strategic opportunities in the region, treated it as a stand-alone region largely unrelated to developments in East Asia and failed to link Australia's policies in Southeast Asia with the broader goal of helping to ensure greater strategic stability in Asia by putting constraints on Chinese assertiveness and encouraging its peaceful rise. After offering a summary of recent Australian defence thinking on Southeast Asia, this paper outlines why managing China is the key variable when it comes to strategic stability in the region. It then examines how China's strategy and behaviour can be shaped and influenced by events and relationships in Southeast Asia, and offers some suggestions as to the role Australia can seek to play in Southeast Asia that relates to Canberra's China-focused objectives and strategic stability in Asia more broadly If that can be achieved in the 2015 defence white paper, Australia - which is often criticized for being preoccupied primarily with managing the relationship with its superpower ally the United States - will demonstrate to itself and Asia that its heavy reliance on the ANZUS treaty is no barrier to strategic creativity in Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses the political context of Defence White Papers from 1976 to 2013. Political competition between the major Australian political parties is an inevitable and indeed essential backdrop to policy development. Only by understanding the dynamics of that competition is it possible to understand how governments make key defence policy decisions around strategy, force structure and defence spending. Competition for authority within parties also informs how Prime Ministers use White Papers as a means to cement their own power. A key challenge for governments is the need to look credible as custodians of Australian national security in the perceptions of voters. If one party is unable to demonstrate clear superiority over the other in its management of defence, a secondary aim is to try to remove defence as a point of political difference by claiming bipartisanship on key aspects of policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the United States northern neighbor, Canada serves as a NATO ally and a strategic partner with Washington through the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD). Canadian forces have fought honorably and bravely in concert with American forces in many wars. Canada's Government, however, has been less consistent in promoting a credible vision of Canadian national security policy and geopolitical interests in its defense white papers. These documents have often contained idealistic rhetoric about adhering to a rules-based international order and defending freedom. In reality, Canadian governments of varying political parties have consistently failed to provide the sustained funding and coherent national security strategy to make Ottawa an effective partner with the U.S. and the NATO alliance in addressing historical and emerging national security threats. This article examines Canadian defense white papers for several decades and recommends ways Canada can ensure its defense policy planning can have greater credibility in the national security policymaking corridors of its allies and with potential adversaries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australia has traditionally done without a grand strategy, relying on Defence White Papers to set out a military strategy that is largely subordinate to the grand strategy of its great power ally. However, three changes mandate that Australia should begin to develop its own grand strategy: the demise of uncontested regional unipolarity; the bifurcation between Australia's security and economic interests; and Australia's growing geopolitical importance. This article takes the 2016 Defence White Paper as a platform on which to ponder the challenges of Australia's grand strategising around five key issues: context, capability, constraints, coherence and competitiveness. It concludes by considering the political obstacles that lie in the way of forging an Australian grand strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the importance and the implications of Australia's defense policy as described in its 2009 defense white paper, the first statement of its defense policy in nine years. The policy is important because of Australia's strategic prominence in an area that is developing rapidly and has increasing interstate conflict. The article notes that Australia and other nations in the Asia-Pacific area rely heavily on unimpeded maritime activity for their success and development. The article discusses the white paper in detail and presents information about its implications.

This study analyses how the rise of China will change the international system and how it will alter decisions and actions taken by the United States. As such, it will also analyse the operational implications for Europe resulting from the United States military capabilities' relocation to Asia-Pacific. This is an important topic as the European Union enters the era of new international order and faces new challenges for its security cooperation. By defining a security strategy the EU has acknowledged the importance of European cooperation as well as cooperation with the United States. Nevertheless it still examines the ways to cooperation. This paper utilises Realism -- in particular, the Power Transition Theory -- to account for China's rise and America's response to it. It combines theory with historic and contemporary actions, draws conclusions and makes recommendations. The study finds that with the United States' rebalancing of its military efforts to the Asia-Pacific, which could be compounded should the US become distracted by a crisis in East-Asia, Europeans may face a number of capability-driven operational implications as well as operational implications resulting from political differences, should they seek to undertake their own military operations. This work also analyses existing and evolving forms of security cooperation within Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LARRY BERMAN DIDN'T REALLY believe that a journal article he was writing in 2004 would break much new ground in telling the story of Lyndon B. Johnson and his conduct [...]

Discusses the defense structure planning and implementation in the Baltic States. Elements of a society based on the soviet command economy; Independence against a background of economic hardship and difficulty; Use of the armed forces to assist in the preservation or restoration of law and order in certain circumstances.

On November 23, 2015 the United Kingdom (UK) released a defense white paper detailing its national security strategic objectives. This work examines the geopolitical, economic, and strategic implications of this document and compares it with recent and historical defense white paper documents issued by the British government. It scrutinizes the text of these documents and relevant scholarly literature analyzing them while also examining the national security threats facing the UK at the time of their issuance and assesses whether the 2015 document will be supported with requisite political will, military personnel, and financial support to carry out its objectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the impact of military threat due to Australia's geographical nearness to the South Pacific areas including Papua New Guinea, and Timor-Leste considering the stability and fragility of South Pacific areas.

The analysis in the 2013 White Paper of international defence engagement highlights the important co-operative activities that Australian Defence Force personnel and Defence officials conduct in, and with, other countries. These activities can create vital synergies for Australia, but their benefits should be neither assumed nor overstated. In particular, they need to be assessed in the broader context of the White Paper's narrative, which is focused primarily on a rationalisation of the gap between the ends and means of defence policy. In that context, the role of Australia's international defence engagement risks being portrayed disproportionately. In the most critical dimension of such engagement, the alliance relationship with the United States, Australia's capacity for burden-sharing and value-adding is diminishing, not expanding. In other forms of international defence engagement, the White Paper's emphases seem designed to compensate for budgetary shortfalls and other deficiencies elsewhere in the policy narrative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the notion of strategic intelligence, namely with respect to leadership and business-oriented areas. Strategic intelligence is a researched concept that primarily concerns the collection and analysis of intelligence for policy and military planning, mainly at national and international levels, whereas this study of management and organizational decision-making application is an extension of that. This article's subject is the necessity for strategic intelligence, a crucial competence for leaders, managers, and companies striving to remain competitive, to be utilized and best leveraged in today's volatile and dynamic business contexts. This study follows a research design that includes a thorough literature review and bibliometric research, executed via VoSViewer, illustrating the concept of strategic intelligence from a leadership point of view as a driver of competitive advantage, enhanced by knowledge dynamics. Furthermore, this article points out that the limitations are acknowledged because the literature on the matter is limited, as strategic intelligence is relatively new to the business sector; moreover, more research is required to fully understand and use the potential of strategic intelligence in business growth. Overcoming these limitations and continuing to study the strategic intelligence concept could, on the one hand, use multiple platforms, such as scholarly articles or encyclopedias, and, on the other hand, support businesses in gaining a competitive edge and making informed decisions that can fuel their success in an ever-evolving market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Defence White Paper 2013 is the latest in a long series of Australian Government Defence White Papers outlining defence policy, projected defence funding, structural reform proposals and expected savings plans, but lacking a budget sufficient to implement the plan. The impact of the decisions taken in the Defence White Paper 2013 for aerospace forces is at first glance positive, but in reality damaging. The government has committed billions of dollars to the Super Hornet acquisition to address an undefined transition risk at the end of this decade, while deferring the purchase of the full Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) capability promised in the 2009 Defence White Paper to around 2030. As a result of operating a mixed fleet of Super Hornets and JSFs in the mid to late 2020s, Australia will have many fewer than the '100' JSFs originally planned for, and will therefore have a reduced fifth generation fighter capability to address an uncertain future security environment. The mixed fleet will also result in increased operating overhead costs that will compound existing concerns regarding budget pressures and associated force capability risks. Australia's security depends on having realistic goals matched by achievable funding commitments. Merely aspiring to be a middle power will not make it so. If one accepts that the strategic risk analysis contained in the 2009 Defence White Paper was valid for Australia's role as a middle power, then the ADF should be resourced accordingly. If not, then government must recalibrate its aspirations, accept that Australia's future is not as a middle power in the region, and redesign strategy, concepts and force structure accordingly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a method for assessing the cost of friction between North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) allies and highlights internal threats. This is applied to the Greek-Turkish conflict within the NATO context and concerns the functioning of defence expenditure in Greece, modified in such a way as to focus on the causes of friction between these allies. The analysis concentrates mainly on the issue of internal threats to the long-run equilibrium of NATO. The ARDL methodology used modifies the typical error correction model by introducing a mechanism that accelerates the process that leads back to the long-run equilibrium. Along with assessing the cost to an ally in relation to an internal threat, the method proposed allows the time required for the long-run equilibrium of NATO to be restored. The paper concludes that dynamic incidents of friction between allies expressed as an internal threat disturb NATO's static equilibrium, destabilise an individual ally's defence policy and contribute to cost being incurred. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An excerpt from the White Paper issued by the British Minister of Defense about the new British defense policy is presented.

The 2013 White Paper talks a great deal about reform in Defence. It is notable, however, that the areas of reform that are discussed relate primarily to processes of accountability, planning, reporting, consultation and reviewing. Some advances have been made in these fields. However, their effect has largely been to tune long-standing and well entrenched administrative systems. Deeper strategic or root and branch reform to achieve world's best practice in efficiency and effectiveness is hardly mentioned. If Defence is to win the internal functional savings directed by the 2009 Defence White Paper, much more rigorous and thorough-going processes of reform lie ahead. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A list of non-fiction books related to military art & science is presented. These books include "Military Justice in Vietnam: The Rule of Law in an American War," by William Thomas Allison, "U.S. Army Counterinsurgency and Contingency Operations Doctrine 1942-1976," by Andrew J. Birtle, and "The Comedy of War: Understanding Military Policy and Politics for the Twenty-First Century," by Earnest N. Bracey .

"Autonomous weapon systems" (AWS) have been subject to intense discussions for years. Numerous political, academic and legal actors are debating their consequences, with many calling for strict regulation or even a global ban. Surprisingly, it often remains unclear which technologies the term AWS refers to and also in what sense these systems can be characterised as autonomous at all. Despite being feared by many, weapons that are completely self-governing and beyond human control are more of a conceptual possibility than an actual military reality. As will be argued, the conflicting interpretations of AWS are largely the result of the diverse meanings that are constructed in political discourses. These interpretations convert specific understandings of AI into strategic assets and consequently hinder the establishment of common ethical standards and legal regulations. In particular, this article looks at the publicly available military AI strategies and position papers by China and the USA. It analyses how AWS technologies, understood as evoking sociotechnical imaginaries, are politicised to serve particular national interests. The article presents the current theoretical debate, which has sought to find a functional definition of AWS that is sufficiently unambiguous for regulatory or military contexts. Approaching AWS as a phenomenon that is embedded in a particular sociotechnical imaginary, however, flags up the ways in which nation states portray themselves as part of a global AI race, competing over economic, military and geopolitical advantages. Nation states do not just enforce their geopolitical ambitions through a fierce realpolitik rhetoric but also play around with ambiguities in definitions. This especially holds true for China and the USA, since they are regarded and regard themselves as hegemonic antagonists, presenting competing self-conceptions that are apparent in their histories, political doctrines and identities. The way they showcase their AI-driven military prowess indicates an ambivalent rhetoric of legal sobriety, tech-regulation and aggressive national dominance. AWS take on the role of signifiers that are employed to foster political legitimacy or to spark deliberate confusion and deterrence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In addressing defence industry policy, the 2013 White Paper reaffirms well established themes that need revisiting in the light of changing economic, strategic and technological circumstances: The strategic importance of a local defence industry base; the economic constraints that preclude materiel self-sufficiency; Defence use of open and effective competition to achieve value for money in procuring goods and services; and the linkage between of local industry involvement in upstream procurement and local industry's capacity to support ADF equipment downstream in service. Maturing initiatives like the Priority Industry Capabilities and the Australia-US Defence Trade Treaty are platforms for future defence industry policy development, which will also be affected by growing awareness of the link between innovation and productivity, and potentially far reaching changes in the Defence Science and Technology Organisation's research priorities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper discusses the role of gender equality policy in the military. The aim is to find out, paying due attention to unconscious bias, whether or not soldiers enrolled in mandatory initial military service in Lithuania support any stereotypes regarding women, and if so, then what are the stereotypes they adhere to, and what are the stereotypes that women in mandatory initial military service are confronted with. The paper analyses gender equality issues in the following two important contexts: the democratic value of gender equality in military service, and the need and readiness of the military to accommodate different genders. The latter context forms a stark contrast with the former two, especially given the traditional point of view that military service is meant to ensure effective security and defence, rather than the effective implementation of gender equality. The paper analyses how stereotypical attitudes towards women as a gender support the above-mentioned tradition. Based on the results of empirical research, stereotypes have proven to be still maintained by soldiers in the target group. The dominant stereotypical attitude is that active military service may be putting women at greater risk of harassment and sexual abuse. Female soldiers in the target group are confronted with stereotypical attitudes. They link the reasons underlying the overall support of stereotypical thinking to the age of the individuals concerned, their inherited stereotypical attitudes, and their education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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This year's Defence White Paper reaffirmed most of the aspirations outlined for Australia's future submarine in the 2009 White Paper, with the notable exception of land attack cruise missiles. In doing so, it focussed on the two most capable options of the four that were hitherto under consideration—an evolved Collins class boat, or a new bespoke design. While media reporting said the government had ruled out the off-the shelf and modified off-the-shelf options, it has actually suspended work on those, thus allowing the possibility that they could be revived at some future time. Regardless of which of the two remaining options is chosen, maintaining continuity of submarine availability until the first of class is ready for service will require an extension of the planned life of the Collins fleet. The net result is that the evolved Collins is the option most likely to be pursued. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]