Volume 02 Issue 03 - Fall 2019

Australia in an Age of Strategic Competition

Senator Linda Reynolds, Australian Minister of Defence
This senior-level perspective is derived from the Minister's 13 June 2019 speech to the Australian Strategic Policy Institute's International Conference: War in 2025. For a full version of the speech, please visit the Australian Department of Defence website: https://www.minister.defence.gov.au/minister/lreynolds/speeches/aspi-international-conference-war-2025.

Russia, South Asia, and the United States

A New Great Game?

Dr. Stephen F. Burgess, US Air War College
Russia will continue to struggle to regain the level of influence in South Asia that its predecessor, the Soviet Union, had in the 1980s—before it retreated from Afghanistan and before the Central Asian republics gained independence, geographically separating the fledgling Russian Federation from the subcontinent. While Russia has been resurgent in parts of Eastern Europe and Central Asia and has succeeded in creating divisions among NATO members and degrading the Western alliance to a limited extent, the power structure in most of Asia has changed to such an extent that Russia’s reach and influence are limited and will remain so, especially in South Asia.

Airmen and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

The Danger of Generalization

Drs. Natalia Jevglevskaja and Jai Galliott, University of New South Wales at the Australian Defence Force Academy
The present inquiry is motivated foremost by continuous developments in technology. As military systems incorporate ever more elements of autonomy, it is essential to assess their potential to become successfully integrated in existing force structures. Given that a human operator is projected to remain a central element of such systems, the success of the integration process is squarely dependent on how humans will adapt to increasing automation. While current unmanned aerial vehicles have only limited autonomous functionality, they nonetheless offer the only example of some of the most technologically advanced systems that have tested human capacity to adapt and where the experience of adaptation has been described by the users of such systems.

Japan and the Nuclear Challenge in a New Era of Rising Tensions

Balancing between Disarmament and Deterrence

Dr. Sayuri Romei, Sasakawa Peace Foundation USA
This article will first examine how Japanese officials and experts have perceived the US security guarantee to their country and the nuclear component of extended deterrence. Subsequently, it will discuss the obstacles that Japan faces to balance the two goals of its nuclear policy. Lastly, it will study how Japan can contribute to the creation of a more favorable regional environment for nuclear disarmament and ensure that the disarmament side of the country’s policy does not remain neglected.  

Cooperative Rivalry

Understanding Indo-Pakistani Ties Using Treaty Networks

Dr. Michael O. Slobodchikoff (Troy University) and Dr. Aakriti A. Tandon (Daemen College)
The number of ceasefire violations (CFV) between India and Pakistan has risen dramatically over the past few years. While the increased number of CFVs are a result of the heightened tensions between the two rivals, none of these CFVs has escalated to a full-blown militarized conflict or war between the nuclear-armed neighbors. An analysis of CFVs provides an incomplete picture of Indo-Pakistani relations. The bilateral treaties between India and Pakistan are also important indicators of the status of their relationship. This article argues that the increased levels of cooperation through treaties and the use of treaty nesting in their relationship may be serving a conflict management function by preventing CFVs from escalating into militarized conflict.

Nomonhan 1939: The Red Army’s Victory that Shaped World War II