In August 2025, Admiral Daryl Caudle assumed the role of the 34th Chief of Naval Operations, inheriting a U.S. Navy facing extraordinary pressures. From shipyard backlogs and workforce challenges to evolving threats in the Indo-Pacific, the service confronts demands that will test every aspect of its institutional capacity. To mark…
By Robbin Laird The contemporary Indo-Pacific security environment presents a fundamental challenge to traditional alliance structures: how can middle powers maintain strategic autonomy while deepening military cooperation with major power partners? This dilemma is particularly acute for Australia, which faces the competing imperatives of economic integration with China, security dependence…
By Robbin Laird When the CMV-22B Osprey touched down on the deck of USS Carl Vinson in August 2021, it marked more than just another aircraft delivery. It represented a fundamental transformation in how the United States Navy supplies carrier operations. The "Titans" of Fleet Logistics Multi-Mission Squadron (VRM) 30,…
By Robbin Laird Modern warfare has reached an inflection point. As technology accelerates and battlespaces become increasingly complex, military aviation faces a fundamental truth: the next generation of military superiority will belong not to those with the most aircraft, but to those who make the smartest investments in their human…
By Robbin Laird On September 26, 2025, the U.S. Department of Defense and Sikorsky, a Lockheed Martin company, signed one of the largest helicopter procurement contracts in military history. The five-year, multi-year procurement (MYP) agreement, valued at up to $10.855 billion, authorizes the production and delivery of up to 99…
By Robbin Laird In the shadowy world of 18th-century colonial Brazil, monks conducted business through holes in convent walls, French diplomats openly discussed bribing governors, and British ships feigned distress to access forbidden ports. This wasn't the chaotic underworld we might imagine. It was a sophisticated economic system that would…
2016-03-02 Our colleague Air Vice Marshal (Retired) John Blackburn has focused attention on the energy security shortfall for Australia for some time. As an island continent at the bottom of the Asia Pacific region, Australia is heavily dependent upon liquid energy imports and with a rapidly disappearing domestic refinery production capacity,…
2016-01-30 Recently, our partner defenceWeb looked at the evolving challenges of maritime defense and security seen from South Africa. Thursday, 28 January 2016 Economic growth through development of the ocean economy as part of Operation Phakisa requires effective maritime surveillance and defence, with nearly 4 000 kilometres of South Africa’s…
