Contestability at 25: Hugh White & Justin Bassi on ASPI's founding and Australia’s strategic future

Contestability at 25: Hugh White & Justin Bassi on ASPI's founding and Australia’s strategic future

This Saturday marks ASPI's 25th birthday – the date the institute began operations in 2001. To mark it, STW is joined by Hugh White, ASPI's founding executive director, and Justin Bassi, its current executive director, for an in-depth conversation about how the institute came to be and what it's for. Hugh recalls the establishment of ASPI by the Howard government – including a fateful plane trip with Howard's first defence minister Ian McLachlan – and a first few weeks that turned out rather differently from what he was expecting. He discusses ASPI's early impact and the experience of publicly challenging the 2003 Iraq invasion to which Howard had committed Australian troops. Hugh and Justin discuss how a think tank should balance the issues of the day against the over-the-horizon questions no one is asking yet, in traditional defence and in emerging areas such as critical technologies. They talk about how deep into the fundamentals of strategic policy a think tank should probe, the importance of challenging orthodoxy, and the US alliance, AUKUS and the state of Australia's strategic policy debate. Despite their different views of the world, their evident respect for one another shows that healthy, robust debate is very much possible in 2026. For more on the bipartisan commitment to contestability, look out for a piece this weekend jointly authored by John Howard and Kim Beazley.

ADSTAR Summit series: CDF Mark Hammond on technology and our future ‘great white shark’

Australia’s new Chief of the Defence Force, Admiral Mark Hammond, joins STW on the sidelines of the ADSTAR Summit in Adelaide to share his thoughts on the integration of advanced technology into defence. It’s a quickie but a goodie, with the CDF packing plenty of insights into a few minutes. We cover the key areas where technology is making a difference, especially improving the survivability of Australian personnel; long-range fires; the value of nuclear powered submarines; the close tech relationship with the US; artificial intelligence; the relationship with industry and why warfare will necessarily remain a human affair. This is a great episode while you make your morning coffee or your commute to work.

Anton Leicht on Australia’s AI middle power pathway

STW speaks with Anton Leicht, one of the most compelling voices on the geopolitics and economics of artificial intelligence. Anton has become a leading authority on how middle powers such as Australia can carve out a role in the global AI value chain and avoid being pushed to the periphery as the technology advances. Anton is the author of the influential Substack Threading the Needle and a fellow with the Technology and International Affairs Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He discusses Australia’s opportunity to build data centres to train and run AI, how that would help guarantee future access to advanced American models such as Claude and GPT, the prospects for sovereign models built here, and how Australia can sustain a cooperative relationship with the US built on mutual dependence. The conversation then turns to AI and security: keeping models safe while avoiding a concentration of power in government hands, the responsibilities of the AI labs themselves, and compromise proposals such as third-party experts acting as safety watchdogs. Anton closes with his views on the likely economic impacts of AI and the big questions around the future of work. He’s a frontier thinker on the political economy of AI, and is closely watched by policymakers, fellow experts and industry leaders alike.

ADSTAR Summit series: Chief Defence Scientist Tanya Monro on asymmetric advantage

As a relatively small military, the Australian Defence Force needs to fight and win through advantages such as superior technology. Chief Defence Scientist Professor Tanya Monro, AC, is in charge of figuring out smart ways to do that. Tanya kicks off our short series recorded at the ADSTAR Summit in Adelaide, Australia's premier defence science and technology gathering. ASPI joined the summit as podcast partner alongside organisers the Defence Science and Technology Group. Tanya talks about the newly launched Defence Innovation, Science and Technology Strategy and its three core objectives: generating asymmetric advantage, accelerating innovative solutions into capability, and reinforcing an integrated ecosystem through closer work with industry and international partners. She gives her perspective on how to harness the remarkable innovation happening across technology fields, including AI, and channel it into a stronger defence force. She walks through the six priority areas Defence is focusing on, and the balance between work that delivers immediate new capabilities and longer-term fundamental research that may not pay dividends for years but is nonetheless vital. A note that this was recorded on the sidelines of an event with more than 2000 guests, so there's some background noise. We’ll roll out further ADSTAR episodes over the next few weeks. Links: https://www.defence.gov.au/about/strategic-planning/2026-defence-innovation-science-technology-strategy

Gabrielius Landsbergis on Ukraine, Russia, authoritarianism and the future of democracy

As foreign minister of Lithuania from 2020 to 2024, few people had the front row seat of Gabrielius Landsbergis to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Trump’s return to the White House and Europe’s response to both. Since leaving office, he has become one of Europe’s clearest and most forceful champions for democratic values, for support for Ukraine, and for resisting the aggression of Russia and the risks posed by other authoritarian nations, including China. This interview comes at a time that Ukraine is showing signs of regaining the upper hand on the battlefield and increasing discussions about the possibility of the US administration providing patriot system licenses to Ukraine. Gabrielius talks to Dave about whether Putin’s grip on power is as secure as it appears. Gabrielius is not for waiting though, assessing that it is too risky for Europe to rely on Russia losing, the US making the decisive difference or NATO 3.0 taking shape. Instead, Gabrielius has an innovative solution that would create a genuine coalition of the ‘willing-and-able’. Gabrielius also talks about why China has largely escaped meaningful consequences for backing Russia’s war effort. He discusses the implications of the Iran war on US credibility as a global leader for the world order that Gabrielius believes must be defended by all those who believe in democratic values and principles.