Donald Trump is making good on his promise of “America First.” After admonishing US allies for failing to pay their “fair share” of defence costs and a now infamous meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, ...

It is a difficult time to be a US ally. While nebulous and difficult to measure, credibility is a key component of functioning alliances. An ally must be viewed as having both resolve and capacity to ...

As Australians head to the polls on 3 May, the stakes for foreign policy in the Indo-Pacific are quietly profound. From where I sit in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, the debate in Australia around national ...

NATO’s European nations are ratcheting up efforts to mobilise friendly non-allies around the world to come to Ukraine’s aid, as the US commitment under the Trump administration is in question. Last ...

As Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was about to call a national election on 28 March, a Chinese state-owned marine research vessel Tan Suo Yi Hao was quietly transiting Bass Strait.

What is next in the US trade conflict with the rest of the world? At 25%, US tariffs on most auto imports will see US car prices rising unless those tariffs, too, are paused. Otherwise, with the ...

The independent review of Australia’s intelligence agencies, publicly released last month, found them to be highly capable and performing well as a community. It did, however, recommend better ...

Asked what he had done during the French Revolution, a rather cynical student of sovereignty replied: “Me, I survived”. After a global financial crisis, the Covid epidemic, wars in Ukraine and Gaza, ...

As the world gears up for COP30 in Brazil and the hopefully soon-to-be-announced COP31 in Australia (co-hosted with the Pacific), the urgency of the climate crisis has never been more apparent. Yet, ...

Unsustainable lending by China has led to a severe debt crisis in Laos and may be the closest evidence to date of ‘debt trap diplomacy’ by China, a new Lowy Institute Analysis argues. Laos cannot ...

Unsurprisingly, many commentators declared 2 April 2025 as the day “globalisation” died. Donald Trump’s “liberation day”, jacking up of barriers to the US market to their highest levels in nearly a ...

Whether a long-discussed “pivot” or a new-found competition, there are arguments that the Trump administration is shifting the US focus from Europe to Asia. The reality on the ground contradicts this ...