Writer
Hugh White
Hugh White is Emeritus Professor of Strategic Studies at Australian National University. He served for many years as a senior defence and intelligence official with the Australian government.
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Doubts about AUKUS
Eighteen months ago, when Australians first learned of the AUKUS proposal for their country to build nuclear-powered submarines, it came as a stunning shock. So great was the shock, in fact, that for a time it eclipsed any serious debate about this revolutionary and quite unprecedented idea. An initiative of such scale and audacity seemed Continue reading »
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Is Australia in the firing line of a new Chinese campaign against the US?
How can Australia navigate the tough and dangerous strategic environment in Asia today with America and China competing to be the leading regional power? The consensus in Canberra – on both sides of politics – is that we should stick as close as we can to America, in the hope it will win the contest. Continue reading »
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If growing US-China rivalry leads to ‘the worst war ever’, what should Australia do?
Should Australia join the United States in a war against China to prevent China taking the US’s place as the dominant power in East Asia? Until a few years ago the question would have seemed merely hypothetical, but not anymore. Continue reading »
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The price of primacy: Can the United States stop China becoming the dominant regional power?
In this episode of Democracy Sausage, eminent strategic studies expert Hugh White joins Mark Kenny to examine Australia’s strategy for dealing with rising tensions between the United States and China and the prospects for armed conflict in the region. Continue reading »
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China threatens the West’s primacy, not its democratic systems
Some Western leaders, including Scott Morrison, have begun to describe the contest with China in starkly ideological terms, as a defence of democracy against authoritarianism. They say China threatens to replace the democratically-based “liberal international order” with a new order founded on the principles and practices of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which would endanger democratic Continue reading »
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The right reasons for saying no to nuclear first use
Washington is once again debating whether to declare that it will never be the first to use nuclear weapons. There are good reasons why it should. But it would not be right to suggest that a no-first-use policy would cost the United States nothing strategically. Continue reading »
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American overreach in Anchorage points to conflict with China
It’s fantasy to think that the US can still lay down the law as it attempted to in Alaska. Avoiding a Pacific war will take hard statecraft instead. Continue reading »
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Australia in a no-win situation if Taiwan crisis escalates
Tensions are escalating between the US and China and the recent provocation over Taiwan on the part of both powers could well be a tipping point. Joe Biden will face an agonising choice if Beijing does poke the bear and call America’s bluff. Continue reading »
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Why China has been exceptionally harsh on Australia (AFR Dec 17, 2020)
This is not a schoolyard, China is not a schoolboy, it hasn’t slunk away, and nothing about our predicament is as easy as the government would like us to believe. Continue reading »
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Morrison has misread China
The Prime Minister thinks he can set the terms with Beijing. But hard choices and compromises are required to manage our region’s ruthless great power. Continue reading »
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Whoever wins, Australia can’t rely on its great and powerful ally (AFR, Nov 4)
Geopolitics Donald Trump has done little to counter China, and Joe Biden would do no better. We must face up to a future of fading US power in our region. Continue reading »
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Payne sensibly says no to Pompeo’s coalition of the willing (AFR 29 July, 2020)
Australia has avoided joining the Trump administration’s new cold war. But big questions about handling the escalating US-China rivalry remain unanswered. Continue reading »
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Australia-China relations affected by COVID-19 crisis (RN Breakfast with Fran Kelly )
China has hit back at Australian calls for an international investigation into the origins and spread of the coronavirus pandemic. Guest: Hugh White, Emeritus Professor of Strategic Studies, ANU. Continue reading »
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Why Australia’s strategic situation is far worse than we think (AFR 6.7.20)
For all the dire warnings in last week’s defence review, its chief fault lies in being far too optimistic. Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE.- Australia’s Attack- class submarines need competition.(The Strategist 18.3.2020)
Australia’s strategic circumstances over the next few decades will mean we cannot afford to be without a submarine capability. Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE.-Why India isn’t going to save Australia from China’s power(EAF 15.3.2020)
Will India save us from China? Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. Australia needs to give up its South Pacific dream (AFR 13-14.7.2019)
What can Australia do to restore and preserve our sphere of influence in the South Pacific, and deny it to China? Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. Why Pacific nations would host a Chinese military base (AFR 13-14.7.2019)
Our neighbours’ commitment to values and interests shared with Australia might prove feeble in the face of Chinese persuasion. Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. With China’s swift rise as naval power, Australia needs to rethink how it defends itself (The Conversation, 2 July 2019)
Visiting Wellington in April 1996, I fell into conversation with a very wise and experienced New Zealand government official. We talked about the still-unfolding Taiwan Straits crisis, during which Washington had deployed a formidable array of naval power, including two aircraft carrier battle groups, to the waters around Taiwan. The aim was to compel China Continue reading »
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We must not join Trump’s cold war (AFR 25.6.2019)
Scott Morrison should spell out Australia’s opposition to Washington’s futile attempts to contain China. Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. Canberra’s growing silence on US leadership in Asia
Sometimes what is left out of a major policy speech is as important as what is said. This was certainly true late in January when Australia’s Defence Minister Christopher Pyne spoke about regional security in a keynote address to a prestigious audience in Singapore. Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. The US shouldn’t go to war with China over Taiwan—and nor should Australia (ASPI: THE STRATEGIST, 13 Feb 2019)
Paul Dibb, in his recent Strategist post, writes that America’s strategic position in Asia would be fatally undermined if it didn’t go to war with China if China attacked Taiwan, and that Australia’s alliance with America would be fatally undermined if we didn’t then go to war with China too. The conclusion he draws is that, in the Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. The Costs of Containing China (East Asia Forum)
Washington’s policymakers at last understand that China is a serious strategic rival. For the first time since the Soviet collapse, they recognise that a major country is trying to expand its power and influence at the expense of US global leadership. Continue reading »
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Hugh White: The New East Asian Jigsaw (The Straits Times (Singapore), Caixin Global (Beijing), 18.12.2018)
If 2018 was the year of unscrambling, the next year will offer a clearer picture of how the U.S.-China power struggle has reshaped the region, with Taiwan being a potential flashpoint In 2018 all the big pieces in the East Asian international order were thrown up in the air. The U.S.-China economic relationship was transformed Continue reading »
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Australia must position itself in Asia (ABC radio interview with Hugh White)
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/breakfast/australia-must-position-itself-in-asia-expert-says/9794492 Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. The White Paper’s grand strategic fix: Can Australia achieve an Indo-Pacific pivot?
By far the most important and sobering part of the 2017 Foreign Policy White Paper is Figure 2.4. It offers the Treasury’s estimates of the sizes of the region’s key economies in 2030. They are calculated in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms, which adjusts for differences in prices and exchange rates to give a more Continue reading »
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HUGH WHITE. Choosing between the US and China.
As strategic tensions have mounted in Asia this year, it has become steadily clearer that small and middle powers in the region — countries like Singapore and Australia — face a stark choice. But it isn’t, as some people suggest, a simple choice between accommodating China’s growing power or resisting it. It is a Continue reading »
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Hugh White, Australia’s Defence White Paper and the China threat- a hidebound view of Asia’s future’
Any defence policy is ultimately based on a view of the international system and how it is expected to evolve over coming decades. These are the judgments that most fundamentally influence the nature and scale of armed conflict that a country’s forces must be prepared to fight. Australia’s new Defence White Paper makes two central Continue reading »
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Hugh White on Australians and War from Honest History.
In my blog of 20 October ‘It is becoming much easier to go to war’ I highlighted the reasons and the background to developments since the Vietnam War that are making it much more likely that we will commit ourselves to war. In an earlier posting of March 23 – see below – I carried Continue reading »
