The Royal Australian Navy’s Hull Gap Decade

05/28/2026 By Robbin Laird The Royal Australian Navy is entering a decade defined not simply by modernization, but by transition. The fleet is moving from an aging force structure built around Hobart-class destroyers and Anzac-class frigates toward a future force of Hunter-class frigates, new general-purpose frigates, upgraded destroyers, and eventually a follow-on large surface combatant. That transition, however, will not be… Read more »

Designing for Strategic Advantage: Lessons from the Return of Direct Defense in Europe

05/20/2026 By Robbin Laird Before a nation asks what threats it faces or what allies expect, it should ask a prior and more fundamental question — what are our genuine strategic advantages, and what force design maximizes them? That framing is right. It is also not new. The same foundational question animated the best European defense thinking of the period examined… Read more »

Lewis B. Puller and the Mine Warfare Mission at the Strait of Hormuz

05/19/2026 By Robbin Laird USS Lewis B. Puller (ESB-3) embodies a straightforward but strategically important proposition: if you want to keep the Strait of Hormuz open against the threat of mines, you put the mine-warfare force where the mines are likely to be laid. The expeditionary sea base brings aviation, unmanned systems, small craft, explosive ordnance disposal teams, and command-and-control together… Read more »

The Next Chapter of Military Transformation: From Noriega to Maduro

05/18/2026 By Robbin Laird The U.S. capture of Manuel Noriega in Panama in 1989 and of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela in 2026 frame a striking transformation in American military power. Both operations targeted a hostile ruler in the Western Hemisphere. Both aimed to reset a regional balance of power. Yet the ways and means could hardly be more different. Panama was… Read more »

Ocius and the Blue Bottle USV: An Update May 2026

05/17/2026 By Robbin Laird When I first visited the Ocius build facility, it was tucked inside the University of New South Wales, an enthusiastic team of smart young engineers clustered around Robert Dane's vision of what an uncrewed maritime surface vessel could become. There was genuine energy and real technical imagination, but it had the character of a university lab: what… Read more »

Ghost Shark and the Strategic Opportunity: A Conversation with David Goodrich of Anduril Australia

05/15/2026 The transition from prototype to production is rarely as simple as it sounds in procurement documents. But for Anduril Australia, the journey with Ghost Shark — the large autonomous underwater vehicle now in steady-state production for the Royal Australian Navy — represents something far more consequential than a contract milestone. It is the opening chapter of a fundamental redesign of… Read more »