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Asia-Pacific

Coverage of Indo-Pacific security, South China Sea disputes, Taiwan contingencies, and the strategic dynamics of ASEAN, Australia, Japan, and Korea.

Taiwan's HIMARS gamble: Why Taipei is deploying missiles it cannot protect

Taiwan's HIMARS gamble: Why Taipei is deploying missiles it cannot protect

Taiwan plans to station American-supplied precision weapons on islands within easy reach of Chinese missiles. The systems will likely be destroyed within hours of any conflict. That may be exactly the point.

Taiwan's submarine gamble: Can eight boats deter a Chinese invasion?

Taiwan's submarine gamble: Can eight boats deter a Chinese invasion?

Taiwan is building its first indigenous submarines after decades of failed foreign procurement. The program aims to create sea denial capability against China, but faces a race between slow production schedules and rapidly improving Chinese anti-submarine warfare. The window where these boats...

Xi's military purge: war preparation or proof that China can't fight?

Xi's military purge: war preparation or proof that China can't fight?

The largest removal of Chinese generals since Mao reveals a military hollowed by corruption while racing toward a 2027 Taiwan deadline. Xi Jinping is simultaneously cleaning house and discovering the house was far dirtier than he knew.

India's hypersonic missile creates mutual vulnerability with China, not strategic advantage

India's hypersonic missile creates mutual vulnerability with China, not strategic advantage

New Delhi's successful test of a Mach 10 anti-ship missile demonstrates technological prowess but enters an arms race India cannot win on industrial terms. The weapon compresses crisis decision-making without shifting the Indian Ocean's fundamental power dynamics.

Taiwan's outlying islands and the HIMARS gamble: hours, not days

Taiwan's outlying islands and the HIMARS gamble: hours, not days

Taiwan plans to deploy HIMARS launchers to islands within sight of the Chinese coast. The launchers could devastate an invasion fleet—if they survive long enough to fire. Military logic and political reality collide in a space measured in minutes.

Why Bougainville rejected Chinese mining investment—and what it reveals about Beijing's Pacific limits

Why Bougainville rejected Chinese mining investment—and what it reveals about Beijing's Pacific limits

When Bougainville's president turned away China Molybdenum Company in January 2026, he wasn't bowing to Western pressure. He was honoring a governance architecture forged in civil war—one that Beijing's economic instruments cannot penetrate.

Xi's military purge: Weakened invasion force or tighter grip on the trigger?

Xi's military purge: Weakened invasion force or tighter grip on the trigger?

China has removed at least sixty senior military officers since 2023 in its biggest purge since Mao. The campaign has gutted the Rocket Force and frozen defense procurement—yet PLA exercises around Taiwan grow more sophisticated. The purge reveals Xi's priorities: he fears disloyalty more than...

What breaks first when America deprioritizes China: Allied trust or allied capacity?

What breaks first when America deprioritizes China: Allied trust or allied capacity?

The 2026 National Defense Strategy has reordered American priorities, placing homeland defense ahead of comprehensive China containment. For allies who restructured their security postures around sustained confrontation with Beijing, the shift does not merely alter strategy—it questions the...

Why Britain traded sovereignty for security at Diego Garcia

Why Britain traded sovereignty for security at Diego Garcia

The UK-Mauritius deal on the Chagos Archipelago looks like retreat. It is actually a strategic consolidation—trading the fiction of colonial ownership for a 99-year lease that secures one of the world's most important military bases against legal challenges that were becoming impossible to ignore.

Xi's military purge: Why removing generals makes China both weaker and more dangerous

Xi's military purge: Why removing generals makes China both weaker and more dangerous

The decimation of China's Central Military Commission has destroyed institutional knowledge and created a culture of fear. But a wounded military is not necessarily a less threatening one—especially for Taiwan.

Why America's Pacific allies are losing sleep over the Pentagon's new priorities

Why America's Pacific allies are losing sleep over the Pentagon's new priorities

The 2026 National Defense Strategy demotes China from top threat to regional concern. For Japan, the Philippines, and Australia—facing Beijing's gray-zone coercion daily—the timing could not be worse. What happens when the guarantor's attention wanders?

Xi Jinping's military purge: What the fall of China's top generals reveals

Xi Jinping's military purge: What the fall of China's top generals reveals

The elimination of nearly the entire senior command structure—including Xi's closest military ally—signals neither war preparation nor regime collapse. It signals both, simultaneously, in ways that make prediction impossible.