Colin Clark, the founding editor of Breaking Defense, is now our Indo-Pacific Bureau Chief, based in Sydney, Australia. In addition to his foundational efforts at Breaking Defense, Colin also started DoDBuzz.com, the world’s first all-online defense news website. He’s covered Congress, intelligence and regulatory affairs for Space News; founded and edited the Washington Aerospace Briefing, a newsletter for the space industry; covered national security issues for Congressional Quarterly; and was editor of Defense News. Colin is an avid fisherman, grill genius and wine drinker, all of which are only part of the reason he relishes the opportunity to live in Australia.
While the Labor Party accuses the previous government of flushing money "down the toilet," defense analysts say there's more politics than substance to the outrage.
The Ministry of Defense is not expected to make its recommendation to the government until the end of October, at the earliest, said one source familiar with the issue.
The military space sector is evolving fast. Get the latest from Space Force and industry officials on what’s next for acquisition, policy and training in a new Breaking Defense eBook.
"Lockheed Martin will deliver and transfer to Australia the same level of technology and development and advanced programs and systems that we have in our factories in United States," Pat Sunderlin, VP of operations for Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control, said.
The system faced a handful of small delays, Breaking Defense has learned, but nothing that derailed the project.
"In some cases, over at least the past decade, we've been developing that software from the US, modifying it locally for Australian Defence Force needs, and, actually, some other regional customers in Asia-Pacific," said Sonny Foster of Collins Aerospace.
Secretary of State Anthony Blinken made a bold promise to the Pacific island leaders: “You can count on the United States partnering with you.”
Balancing security and access to data are critical to providing users with trustworthy, reliable data for real-time decisions.
The Foreign Military Sales contract is likely to be worth around $985 million USD.
“The key strategic risk remains we might need the SSNs much earlier than the proposed schedule," Neil James, executive director of the non-partisan watchdog, the Australia Defence Association, said.
Ambiguity marks China's management of its nuclear forces and how it discusses them and uses them to deter. Unlike the US and Russia, Dean Cheng said "the Chinese believe ambiguity and doubt promote deterrence."
Prime Minister Sogavare's government claims that the "Solomon Islands have had unfortunate experiences of foreign naval vessels entering the country’s waters during the course of the year without diplomatic clearance granted, hence would like to avoid such incidents from reoccurring."
Reducing cognitive overload on warfighters while improving “time to trust” for autonomous systems is a matter of design.
“We think that China has a formidable aerospace capability, and they have concentrated that aerospace capability in the South China Sea region to deter others from going into that airspace,” the head of the Royal Australian Air Force said. “It doesn’t make it impenetrable, and it doesn’t mean you can’t deliver military effects to achieve your interests when you are operating against China."
CEO and chairman David Goodrich told Breaking Defense the $100 million USD effort to build three prototype Extra Large Autonomous Undersea Vehicles (XL-AUVs) in three years is just the beginning of ambitious plans for the company.
"In the future, Chinese missiles may well REGULARLY overfly Taiwan," says China expert Dean Cheng. "Thereby increasing tension, increasing pressure on the island. All of which, in the CCP's estimation, will make Taipei knuckle under."
"The level of distrust is the highest it has been in 50 years," said Bonnie Glaser, China expert at the German Marshall Fund. "Both sides have an enormous stake in stopping the downward spiral, and perhaps this will be a wakeup call that they need to do so."