Asia Pacific Defence Reporter

Before we get to the Singapore air show, some more words about US isolationism and a country that seems to be fracturing.
Something that Australian politicians seem to be sadly unaware of.
There was pushback against the latest report from the US Congressional Research Service - a very authoritative group - that once again raised the possibility of Australia not receiving any Virginia class submarines.
This was in the form of a heated response from Defence Minister Marles, that everything is perfect - but where is the evidence for that?
The project will receive an injection of an additional $600 million this year, meaning that the path to reaching 2.3% of GDP will be even slower than previously believed.
From the air show, some good news about the growth path for Apache helicopters and also a reminder that NH90 helicopters - the parent design of the scrapped Taipan fleet- remain in great demand.
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For some variety we start with a few words about China's President Xi Jinping undertaking a further purge of the military leaving him in sole command. In the short term this might make an invasion of Taiwan less likely - but in the medium term the situation could be more dangerous. In the US, chaos continues on both the foreign policy and domestic fronts. A question for Australian politicians and national security figures: if US officials, including the President, lie so blatantly to their own people, why should we believe anything that they say? When it comes to decoupling from the US, we might learn a lot more about how Canada is doing so when their Prime Minister Mark Carney visits in March. Canada is seeking to take advantage of the current self-inflicted US brain drain. Australia seems to be moving in the opposite direction. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

More US-caused turmoil with President Trump cancelling his takeover of Greenland because he has reached a concept of a framework deal with NATO but of course hasn't released any details. But he's replaced that with more threats at Canada, including using violent language, if they go ahead with a trade deal involving China. All the world can see what's happening - with the exception of the Australian government. Then Trump insulted all 1,200 non-US soldiers who died in Afghanistan as part of the ISAF mission claiming it was only Americans who did the fighting. This resulted in enraged pushback from people like UK PM Kier Starmer, who called Trump directly. How did our leaders react - by avoiding any direct criticism of Trump. A notable exception was senior Opposition figure Andrew Hastie who has labelled Trump's words for what they are. And a few thoughts on how Trump is gearing up for a third term. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Before discussing the Prime Minister's strange reluctance to call a Royal Commission into the Bondi terrorist attack we have to talk about the increasingly erratic behaviour of Donald Trump. Threats from the US to take over Greenland are increasing, with greater tariffs on European countries now also part of the mix.
This is because Trump claimed the Europeans weren't doing enough to defend the island so countries have sent small military delegations there to do some research - but the US President now claims this is an escalation.
Here, Defence Minister Richard Marles has responded in his usual spineless fashion refusing to comment on US behaviour saying instead he thinks NATO will remain united when all sensible analysis comes to the opposite conclusion.
It's time for Australia to have an open, mature debate about the nature of the US alliance and what we expect to get out of it. The country expects leadership - and it isn't getting it.
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It's a good thing we waited a couple of weeks before commenting on the US attack on Venezuela because the entire thing is getting stranger by the day. It clearly wasn't about regime change and even the logic of seizing oil reserves is looking shaky. It might have been because Donald Trump felt his dancing style was being mocked by the former Venezuelan President. As disturbing as that is, of even more concern is the US threatening again to acquire Greenland - by force, if necessary. This is completely insane and would destroy NATO, but Trump seems to be obsessed with it. If the US continues to destroy the existing rules based order, will Australian politicians finally grow a spine or will they find ever more creative ways to grovel? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.