Author: Defenceline Webdesk

Joyu Wang, The Wall Street Journal Five Taiwanese discuss their future under the shadow of Beijing Source link

Amid leadership disruption caused by the purges, the reconstruction of the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) high command is underway. Recent reports by the South China Morning Post and Channel News Asia indicate that officers from the PLA Air Force (PLAAF) have recently risen to senior leadership positions, prompting renewed discussions on the significance of this development.  At present, PLAAF officers are in charge of five Central Military Commission (CMC) departments, compared with seven headed by Army officers, making the PLAAF the second-best-represented service at the CMC level. Moreover, of the PLA’s five theater commands, PLAAF officers lead two: the Eastern…

Chris Townsend, Sentinel Intelligence A forensic game theory investigation into the disappearance of Iran’s Supreme Leader Source link

The United States maintains the world’s largest overseas military basing presence, with as many as 750 installations in 80 countries. Most recently, U.S. bases and bases to which the U.S. military has access in Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates have become the targets of Iranian attacks, in retaliation for U.S. strikes on the country. These attacks have not only resulted in the deaths of several U.S. soldiers, but have impacted local residents in proximity to the bases and pushed others to question the necessity of the U.S. bases entirely.  Analysts have speculated about what…

A.E. Elezhar, NextGenDefense The U.S. Army is upgrading the Javelin missile with a new “brain” Source link

The United States remains strongly committed to Asia but wants its partners to bear more of the burden for their own defense, a senior Pentagon official said in the Philippines yesterday. Seeking to counter concerns about Washington’s reliability, given the capricious character of U.S. foreign policy under the second Trump administration, Undersecretary of War Elbridge Colby said that U.S. interests were “more engaged than ever in the Indo-Pacific.” “America is definitely not disengaging from Asia,” Colby said in a speech in Manila. “We are not leaving; in fact, we are digging in to ensure a favorable balance of power where…

Across Southeast Asia, artists and cultural rights defenders are increasingly being cast as threats – to public morality, political order and dominant narratives about gender, sexuality, identity, and belonging. This is especially true for queer and trans artists, whose bodies, stories, and performances often challenge the boundaries that states, religious authorities, and conservative movements seek to impose. When they are surveilled or attacked, or their work is censored, the consequences touch the foundations of civic space: the right to speak, gather, remember, imagine, and contest power. ArtsEquator’s Southeast Asia Artistic Freedom RADAR Database documents this reality across Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia,…

Indonesia’s President Prabowo Subianto has nominated Destry Damayanti, a long-time central bank deputy, as the next governor of the institution, an official announced yesterday. State Secretary Prasetyo Hadi confirmed that the nomination was submitted to the House of Representatives through a presidential letter, along with names of nominees for Bank of Indonesia (BI)’s senior deputy role, which Destry previously filled. Destry Damayanti, a seasoned economist and former chief economist at the state lender Bank Mandiri, has served as the interim governor of BI since the unexpected resignation of Perry Warjiyo last month for “personal reasons.” Perry had served as BI’s…

In recent days, there has been buzz in the Indian news media of New Delhi potentially joining France’s next-generation fighter program, the Future Combat Air System (FCAS). Considering that India is France’s top importer of big-ticket defence solutions – flagshipped by the Dassault Rafale, of which Paris submitted a proposal to sell another 114 to the Indian Air Force (IAF) – this development should have been expected. Indeed, even as far back as 2018, this author forecasted that (after India withdrew from the Russian Su-57, then known as PAK-FA) India could seek the Rafale M for the Indian Navy (IN)…

RCD The Answer is Already in Doctrine Source link