Episode 48: Grumpy But Grand Strategy - Australia's Two Pillars are both in trouble
Before Dr Hellyer jets off to Samoa, the Grumpy Strategists go Grand - Australian grand strategy looked at through its two enduring pillars of: 1. economic prosperity by mainlining into China's economy, and 2. a strategic pillar that relies on American security. Great stuff for the last 4 decades of 'rules based global order'ing, not so great for the competitive power-based world we're in now. We'll get back to drilling into all things Aust Defence shortly....maybe.
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Episode 47 Ground truthing Australia's drone journey & the UK's military & industrial base
The Grumpy Strategists drill into the facts behind Australian Govt announcements on drones to find disappointment: celebrating $16.7m on counter drone systems while spending $11m per day on AUKUS puts things into perspective, as does the fact Australia had roughly 700 drones in 2024 while the Russians fire 800 a night at Ukraine. They try to bridge the huge gap between Aust-UK AUKUS announcements & the UK's actual capacity to build subs & deploy its military. Then Marcus surfaces from trawling through past years' Pentagon budget papers to find that US sub deliveries have slipped back on average three years since AUKUS was announced.....instead of building more, faster.
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Grumpy Strategist Makers Series - with Beaten Zone's Steve Baxter
One Grumpy Strategist talks with Beaten Zone Ventures boss Steve Baxter. They set out Steve's journey from the Army to business success in the tech world, to now running an outfit all about investing in smart Australian companies making the best defence tech on the planet - for everyone but Australia....Changing that could be as simple - but big - as adopting the Ukrainian military's almost gamified 'Brave1' model - a market-based program that has soldiers using an online shop and tokens earned by destroying particular Russian systems. Delegation, empowerment and speed brings results.
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Oh dear, what have you done to my fleet!? & Is Australia now bandwagoning AND free-riding??
The Grumpies go over an Audit report revealing the comprehensive, systemic failures of Defence, the Navy and its contractors to maintain and operate the Navy's two biggest ships. The obvious question is how can the Navy be capable 'stewards' operating and maintaining nuclear powered subs? But there's the good news that 8 years of continuous naval shipbuilding have delivered one, mostly harmless, patrol vessel to the Navy, and our Army has test fired HIMARS. The episode ends with the Grumpies checking in with Penny Wong and PM Albanese's big but confusing speeches before his China trip. Bandwagoning begins as free-riding continues.
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The AUKUS emergency episode: What-the-Hell-Just Happpppppened? The Trump Review'n'stuff
With the UK Eurovision entry "What the Hell Just Happpppppened??" fitting Australia's reaction to the Trump AUKUS review, Marcus and Michael discuss the two Oz views: "PANIC it's over!!!!" & 'There's nothing to see, IT'S ALL PERFECTLY NATURAL" bunch - and set out why both are wrong. Politics, security, industrial capacity & cash are all at work here. This review won't be the last, particularly with 1. Anthony Albanese asserting his sovereign right to free ride on America while dissing Donald Trump, 2. US sub production numbers falling not rising, and 3. the UK's Keir Starmer choosing this moment to make UK submarine challenges 500% harder by doubling the UK's desired production rate while also building much bigger boats. What can go wrong?
The Grumpy Strategists chat about defence and security issues, from an Australian perspective. We say simple things about complicated issues that help cut through the politics and careful bureaucratic talking points. Critical but constructive conversations about the big security and technology issues affecting our world. RSSVERIFY
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