In this interview – part of European Geostrategy’s now long-running interview series – James Rogers discusses Indo-Pacific geopolitics; Australia’s geostrategic location in relation to future American and British overseas basing requirements; Australian security policy in the Indo-Pacific; Taiwan’s role in East Asia; and European interests in the Indo-Pacific, with Iskander Rehman, a Research Fellow at the Centre for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.
Over the past 15 years or so, the People’s Liberation Army has undertaken a significant military modernization program. A large portion of this modernization has centered around a counter-intervention strategy—that is, developing capabilities and forces that have the wherewithal to prevent or to make it very costly or difficult for an outside power to intervene in the Western Pacific area, and at the same time make it very difficult for such a power to operate at all in that same area over time.
Widespread opposition has yet to form around any single Pentagon proposal to cut a specific weapon system, indicating most could be implemented despite lawmakers’ protestations on behalf of parochial interests.
In a move with major implications for the defense budget, defense contractors, and inter-service politics, the Marine Corps is set to publish a new “capstone concept” — leaked to Breaking Defense – that will guide the entire service for the next decade. From the title on, Expeditionary Force 21 paints an emphatic, uncompromising picture of a future Marine Corps that is “expeditionary… fast, austere, and lethal,” from equipment to training to the mindset of every single Marine. The concept
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan laid out a budget vision Tuesday that goes beyond President Obama’s request by ramping up defense spending beyond the caps in 2016 and restoring them by 2017.
The Air Force wants its secret Long Range Strike bomber to be only part of a “family of systems” that will enhance its ability to hold any target at risk — but don’t expect to meet the relatives anytime soon.
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