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    Defence spending

    Yesterday

    A soldier from the Royal Australian Regiment participates in an exercise at Townsville in 2020.

    Australia won’t raid Pacific militaries to plug defence gaps: Conroy

    Plans to recruit Pacific Islanders to join the Australian Defence Force are focusing on attracting school leavers with the offer of learning a trade.

    • Andrew Tillett

    This Month

    The ADF faces a shortfall of nearly 5000 soldiers, sailors and airmen and women.

    The ADF will grow by just 358 people next year. That’s a big problem

    If Defence is to attract the 5000 new soldiers, sailors and aviators it desperately needs, it must do a much better job looking after its current ones.

    • Andrew Tillett
    An Australian Collins class submarine.

    Defence’s big budget boost four years away, as soldier shortage hits 5000

    Despite dire strategic times, defence spending will hover just above 2 per cent for several years before starting to meaningfully rise from mid-2027.

    • Andrew Tillett
    A MH-60R Seahawk Helicopter had flares dropped in front of it by a Chinese fighter jet.

    China wrong on defence flare stoush: Albanese

    Beijing now says an Australian navy helicopter was spying on its military in the Yellow Sea.

    • Andrew Tillett
    Building defence equipment overseas may produce savings that can be spent elsewhere in the military.

    FWC, government face pressure to step in over submarines pay stoush

    The Albanese government insists that an industrial dispute at submarine builder ASC in Adelaide won’t affect the navy’s ability to deploy the ageing Collins-class submarines.

    • Andrew Tillett
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    Austal chief executive Paddy Gregg with the USS Canberra at Sydney harbour.

    Backers of takeover target Austal want Hanwha in the race

    Austal shareholders say the opening shots in takeover battle for the defence ship builder have fallen well short of the mark, but granting due diligence would be a start.

    • Brad Thompson
    Korean shipbuilders Hanwha Ocean and Hyundai Heavy Industries have their Daegu class frigate under consideration for the Australian navy’s general purpose frigate.

    Hanwha could face long wait for answer on Austal bid

    The Albanese government is likely to prioritise picking a new frigate design over considering a foreign takeover bid for the Perth shipbuilder.

    • Andrew Tillett

    April

    Defence Minister Richard Marles visits Ukrainian troops at a training facility near Lviv, near the Polish border on Saturday.

    Failure to reopen Australia embassy in Kyiv ‘an embarrassment’

    Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles visited Ukraine to unveil the package, including drones and air-defence systems, but there was one glaring omission from his trip.

    • Hans van Leeuwen and Ronald Mizen
    Xi Jinping.

    The ‘frightening discussion’ Australia needs to have about China

    Defence experts are urging the Albanese government to canvass how the civilian population and industry could be mobilised on a war footing.

    • Andrew Tillett
    A RAAF No.1 Squadron F/A-18 Super Hornet.

    Navy, RAAF face cuts to pay for $330b in new weapons

    While the government touts its $330 billion new weapons blueprint, concerns are being raised about programs that have been scrapped.

    • Andrew Tillett
    Defence Minister Richard Marles warns Australia faces a precarious decade.

    Defence’s $330b plan still leaves decade of danger

    Defence Minister Richard Marles says Australia faces a “precarious” decade, by the end of which defence spending will be about $100 billion a year.

    • Andrew Tillett
    Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and his wife arrive in Washington to meet US President   Joe Biden.

    AUKUS partners eye adding ‘like-minded’ Japan to counter China

    The announcement from the AUKUS defence ministers came as Canada said it was considering joining the pact, signalling concern over threats from China.

    • Updated
    • Matthew Cranston
    USS Mobile, JS Akebono, HMAS Warramunga and BRP Antonio Luna during a multilateral maritime cooperative activity between Australia, the United States, Japan and the Philippines off the coast within the Philippines Exclusive Economic Zone

    China lashes joint war games involving Australia

    As AUKUS members prepare to open talks with Japan on joining the pact, China warned against “provocative” destabilisation in the South China Sea.

    • Andrew Tillett

    It’s Hanwha against the hawks in race for shipbuilder Austal

    The Korean conglomerate has made the news plenty of times before and not always in a positive light. Now it wants Australia’s largest defence group.

    • Kylar Loussikian
    Defence Minister Richard Marles says the outcome of great power rivalry between China and the US is uncertain.

    Outcome of China-US great power rivalry uncertain, says Marles

    The defence minister also said Labor had inherited a situation where Defence had no money for more than a quarter of what it planned to buy or deliver.

    • Andrew Tillett
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    Former Australian ambassador to the US Arthur Sinodinos.

    Sinodinos rockets into corporate world

    The former ambassador and minister will chair a Brisbane aerospace company developing superfast rockets for the US.

    • Andrew Tillett
    The Rheinmetall Boxer CRV at Parliament House in Canberra in 2017.

    Australia locks in $1b defence deal with Germany

    The manufacturing deal will create at least 600 jobs in Queensland but was thrown into doubt last year after Labor snubbed the company involved for its own defence contract.

    • Updated
    • Hannah Wootton

    March

    Defence Minister Richard Marles (centre) with UK Foreign Secretary David  Cameron, South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas and UK Secretary of State for Defence Grant Shapps.

    Rule Britannia: How Australia’s military future relies on one UK firm

    In naming BAE Systems as the builder of Australia’s submarines, the Albanese government is putting its major shipbuilding eggs in the British defence giant’s basket.

    • Andrew Tillett
    Defence Minister Richard Marles and  UK Defence Secretary Grant Shapps inspect Australian troops in Canberra on Thursday.

    Australia to spend $5b on UK subs in AUKUS pact

    Taxpayers will give the UK government almost $5 billion to subsidise an expansion of British production lines for Australia’s first nuclear-powered submarines.

    • Andrew Tillett
    Richard Marles and Grant Shapps.

    Australia joins ‘Drone Coalition’ to help Ukraine fight Russia

    Defence will also upgrade ties with the British military, as uncertainty grows over America’s commitment to the war.

    • Andrew Tillett