Stop the World

The Indo-Pacific is a strategic theatre named after two oceans, but according to retired US four-star general Charles Flynn, land forces would be crucial in any conflict, including over Taiwan.

In today’s episode, David Wroe speaks with Charles, who retired last year as commanding general of the US Army Pacific, about the often misunderstood and overlooked importance of land power. They consider scenarios including a Chinese full-s...

Stop the World is hosting a short series of conversations with Australian politicians that transcend daily politics and breaking news to get to the fundamental strategy and security challenges Australia faces.

In the first of the series, we speak with Shadow Finance Minister, Senator James Paterson. James shares frank views on Australia’s strategic risks, the need to deter authoritarian powers, his advocacy for higher defence spend...

In this special episode of Stop the World, David Wroe speaks with Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the Belarusian democracy advocate who leads a government-elect from exile. After dictator Alexander Lukashenka declared himself winner of the 2020 election despite sweeping evidence that the people had chosen Sviatlana, 1.5 million Belarusians took to the streets, sparking a brutal crackdown and Sviatlana’s deportation to neighbouring Lithua...

History is littered with missed calls and downright bad predictions. Think Arab Spring, the post-2003 occupation of Iraq, the Sino-Soviet split, the fall of the USSR, Operation Barbarossa and the assumption that engagement with China would mean liberalisation.

Futurist Florence Gaub’s job is to help NATO make sure it isn’t caught like a deer in headlights when events take an unexpected turn.

In today’s episode, Florence, who directs ...

This week, Australia made international headlines when it revealed Iran had directed at least two antisemitic attacks in Australia using local criminals as proxies. In response, the Australian Government expelled Iran’s Ambassador, the first time we have done so since World War Two.

While this sort of activity is new for Australia, it fits a growing pattern in Europe where Russia and to some extent Iran have been using this tactic ...

Donald Trump met with Vladimir Putin in Alaska, then with Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Washington, then with a posse of European leaders who joined Zelenskyy as back up. Everyone was polite to one another, but as Russia expert Mark Galeotti reminds us on today’s episode, there were a lot of questions left unanswered.

Mark, who hosts the popular podcast, In Moscow’s Shadows, says the best thing about the string of meetings over recent days...

Donald Trump famously called him “little rocket man”. Xi Jinping just thinks he’s a punk. But North Korea’s delphic leader Kim Jong-un has played a savvy hand and brought his country back from the ruinous Covid era to put himself in a strong position through his deals with Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

Anna Fifield, long-time foreign correspondent and North Korea-watcher who is now the Washington Post’s Asia Editor, explains the Kim’s st...

Britain’s 2018 “fusion doctrine” was an effort to bring together the elements of national power to enhance the country’s security and strategic interests under the post-Brexit “global Britain”. 

Its architect, Lord Mark Sedwill, is today’s guest. He assesses the key global trends, challenges and crises—Donald Trump’s second administration; Chinese assertiveness; Russia’s war on Ukraine and the unfolding tragedy in Gaza—and talks ab...

In this special episode, ASPI's Resident Technical Specialist, Jocelinn Kang, talks through hyperscale cloud and why it’s increasingly important for countries to get their policies right depending on their strategic circumstances. All countries want to protect their citizens’ data and have some sovereign computing capabilities, but what if your data centres are attacked? What if the undersea cables connecting you to the world a...

Today we speak with China military scholar Elsa B. Kania about China’s military modernisation. How good is the People’s Liberation Army? Where has it progressed? Where is it still deficient? And the big ones: can it match the US and how ready is it to take Taiwan by force if Xi Jinping gives the order?

Much of Elsa’s recent work has focussed on the role of technology in the PLA’s capabilities, doctrine and command structure. She tal...

Julia Ebner is a leading researcher in the area of extremism, radicalisation and conspiracy theories. She’s spent time undercover among incels, anti-vaxxers and neo-nazis, and combines this brave reportage with a deep understanding of politics.

In today’s episode, Julia explains the unsettling trend of kooky and dangerous ideas making their way into the political mainstream, as fringe ideas are repackaged as successful populist weap...

Bethany Allen explains her investigation into a British university’s joint venture campus in China and the risks of critical tech collaboration.

Recently an ASPI team led by our head of China investigations and analysis Bethany Allen published a report on a joint venture university campus between Xi’an Jiaotong University in China and Liverpool University in Britain. Their findings raise serious questions about research collaborati...

Executive director Justin Bassi and resident senior fellow David Wroe discuss issues of the week, including Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s visit to China, US President Donald Trump’s overdue but welcome change of heart on support for Ukraine, and the clashes in Syria that prompted Israel to intervene on behalf of the Druze population and strike Syrian targets including in Damascus.

They talk about risks that Australia becomes onc...

This week on Stop the World, we were delighted to host Sir Stephen Lovegrove, the UK Prime Minister’s special representative on AUKUS. Dave speaks to Sir Stephen about the UK and US reviews of AUKUS, what success looks like for pillars one and two and where we need to move more quickly, including focusing on specific capabilities in pillar two.

It’s a frank conversation and Sir Stephen conveys a vigilant confidence that AUKUS is on ...

For a brief spell after the Cold War, the idea of an international community that would coordinate and intervene in conflicts for the global good felt like an aspiration on the move.

It feels distant today, but all is not lost. Comfort Ero, the President and CEO of the International Crisis Group, gives us her take on the toughest conflicts plaguing humanity in recent times. Rather than feeling dispirited and paralysed by dysfunctio...

Seasoned diplomat and politician Jüri Luik, who has one of the more impressive CVs we’ve ever seen, gives us his readout on last week’s NATO summit in the Hague and the perspective from the Baltic nations that border Russia to the north of Ukraine.

Estonia has an impressive defence spending record, currently at 3.4 percent of its GDP, with a plan to raise that to 5.4 percent starting next year. Jüri discusses shifts already underway...

In a huge week of international news, NATO members agreed to lift their defence spending to 5 percent of GDP. Today’s guest, Canadian career defence and intelligence official Raquel Garbers, has some strikingly clear views on the value of the spending increases but also the way they need to be paired with a stronger focus on economic warfare by hostile states, particularly China. 

Raquel, who is currently a visiting executive at th...

Donald Trump’s calculated gamble in bombing Iran’s key nuclear facilities sparked a series of extraordinary outbursts this week from the US administration amid conflicting assessments of the damage that the US strikes did to the regime’s nuclear program. Trump meanwhile was feted in a downright theatrical fashion in the Hague as NATO leaders gathered to agree on defence spending increases.

David Wroe and ASPI executive director Jus...

Please note, this episode was filmed as a video interview and is available on ASPI's Youtube channel here: https://youtu.be/sg32zmJKk70

In today’s episode of Stop the World, we hear from Emmanuel Bautista, a retired Philippines general who served as Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces in 2013 and 2014 and who spoke at ASPI’s recent defence conference on preparedness and resilience.

General Bautista gives his frank views on the Ph...