– USNI News – Australia has placed significant emphasis on enhancing its maritime capabilities in its long-delayed 2016 Defence White Paper amidst an overall surge in the country’s defense spending, while warning that China’s policies and actions will have a major impact on the stability of the Indo-Pacific in the coming decades.

– Aviation Week – With troops deployed in the fight against Daesh in Iraq and Syria, the JSF program ramping up, and a heavy involvement in the two-year search for missing Malaysian Airlines Flight MH 370, Australia’s defense priorities appear self-evident. Yet 2016 looks set to be dominated by another defense procurement program, the largest in Australian history. The replacement of Australia’s Collins-class submarine fleet is turning into a political story almost as big as its anticipated budget.

– USNI News – The consortium building three air warfare destroyers (AWDs) for the Royal Australian Navy has provided an update on the construction of the ships, as well as an overview on the lessons learned from the delays and cost overruns that have plagued the program.

– USNI News – Japan’s submarine bid team has outlined the details of its proposal for Australia’s SEA1000 Future Submarine program to replace the Royal Australian Navy’s existing Collins-class boats.

– USNI News – The Royal Australian Navy has begun sea trials for its second big deck Canberra-class amphibious warship.

– USNI News – Australia’s state owned shipbuilder ASC launched the first of a new class of guided missile destroyer for the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) last week a day after after a new government statement outlined additional delays and cost overruns in the three ship program.

– National Interest – The case for building the next generation of Royal Australian Navy (RAN) submarines in Australia begins with the stand-out attributes that make submarines so important for Australia as a whole: they must be able to operate in areas a long way from home, without air or sea control, to watch, listen, evaluate and act when necessary. Australia’s future submarine will be a unique platform, giving early warning of an adversary’s intentions and providing an excellent antisubmarine and anti-surface ship capability.

– Aviation Week – It seems as though every day brings a different “definitive” story about the Australian submarine requirement to replace its troubled Collins-class submarines.

– BBC – Sailors from the Royal Australian Navy say they have suffered trauma after having to pull dead asylum seekers from the ocean while on border patrol.

– USNI News – The first of two 27,000-ton amphibious warships was commissioned into the Royal Australian Navy on Friday

– USNI News – Australian Defense Minister David Johnston blasted state-owned shipbuilder ASC (formerly known as Australian Submarine Corporation) following reported cost overruns of the Royal Australian Navy’s new class of guided missile destroyers.

– USNI News – The Australian government has confirmed its tracking a flotilla of Russian Navy warships operating in international waters near Australia’s northern coast.

– National Interest – Australia, which has been saddled for nearly two decades with the advanced—yet unreliable—Collins class attack submarines will buy Japanese Soryu class diesel submarines to replace them. The decision will send shock waves through both countries. For Australia, it will mean giving up—at least temporarily—on an indigenous submarine industry and thousands of jobs in return for a modern, reliable submarine force. For Japan it will be even more of a landmark event: the sale of Japanese-built submarines abroad will be the largest export of arms abroad in seventy years and symbolic of the new direction Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is taking Japan.

– USNI News – Australia is on track to select the Japanese Soryu-class submarines to replace its aging Collins-class submarines in a potential $20 billion deal for 10 to 12 boats.

– Royal Australian Navy – Japan & Australia consider submarine deal that could rattle China – Japan is considering selling submarine technology to Australia – perhaps even a fleet of fully engineered, stealthy vessels.

– War is Boring – Pretty soon, the Royal Australian Navy will take possession of HMAS Canberra, a 27,000-ton-displacement, flat-deck amphibious assault ship. The RAN plans to use Canberra and her sister HMAS Adelaide to manage crises across the South Pacific. But could the Canberras also give Australia an offensive naval air capability that it has lacked since the early 1980s? Could the assault ships, in other words, also be aircraft carriers?

– ABC – Indonesian authorities say the Australian Navy forced an asylum seeker boat back towards Indonesia, where it ran out of fuel and ran aground.

– Defense News – As the US pushes forward on the AirSea Battle doctrine and the so-called Asia Pivot, many in the Asia-Pacific are asking for clarification on a subject that could involve them in an unnecessary war with China.

– Financial Review – The United States has indicated for the first time it would be willing to lease or sell a nuclear submarine to Australia in a move that will inflame tensions with China and force the Coalition to declare its policy on ­bolstering regional defence.

– Daily Telegraph – The Australian navy plans to recruit up to 1,000 Royal Navy sailors facing redundancy under the Government’s defence cuts.

US Naval War College Review – Australia’s 2009 Defense White Paper – A Maritime Focus For Uncertain Times

As a significant medium power in the Asia-Pacific region, Australia inescapably is a participant in the most politically, economically, and strategically dynamic part of the world. The region is a vast and politically complex area, one that is increasingly prosperous, confident, volatile, and potentially dangerous in almost equal parts. Situated at the nexus of the Pacific and Indian oceans, Australia must share in both the opportunities and challenges thrown up by these two great maritime stages for geopolitical interaction.