@CorbenTom

🇯🇵🇰🇷🇦🇺🇺🇸 - Research Fellow, Foreign Policy & Defence @USSC. Formerly Resident Vasey Fellow @PacificForum. Usual caveats apply.

 Sydney, New South Wales
ussc.edu.au/tom-corben
Joined August 2018
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303Media
Pleased to share my latest: "Don’t miss the forest for the trees: Lessons from AUKUS for the Australia-Japan Mogami deal," published as part of this 2026 Young Strategist Forum volume with the support of the @gmfus and @SPF_PR.
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#breaking The Albanese government will on Tuesday confirm Rio Tinto’s Kellie Parker as the inaugural National Armaments Director, to improve management of multi-billion-dollar acquisitions for the new Defence Delivery Agency thewest.com.au/business/mini…

Rio Tinto exec appointed to fix troubled defence projects

A senior mining executive with no experience in defence has been appointed to oversee Australia’s expensive and often delayed military projects, as Labor look to turn the tide on troubled projects.

thewest.com.au
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Defense of Japan 2026 English version (Annual White Paper) is now released! For more details, please visit our website or refer to the book.   #JMOD #JSDF   ↓Click below mod.go.jp/en/publ/w_paper/in…
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"Well, gee, Mulder. There's also this report of a shipment of drugs and illegal weapons coming into New Jersey tonight." "Ugh, I hardly think the F.B.I.'s concerned with matters like that!"
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😬😬😬 "the potential for frictions to develop into a structural shift in Seoul’s alignment warrants close monitoring and, as necessary, concerted action." chinaselectcommittee.house.g…

Moolenaar: South Korea Putting Indispensable Alliance with U.S. At Risk | Select Committee on the...

Chairman John Moolenaar of the Select Committee on China has sent a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio raising concerns about South Korea's growing alignment with China, which could undermine...

chinaselectcommittee.house.gov
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"an alliance is sustained by candor, and allied divergence on important national interests is not a concern to take lightly. "
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Tom Corben retweeted
FT China
@ftchinaOct 1
Japanese companies exit China in record numbers ft.trib.al/G1w7jwO

Japanese companies exit China in record numbers

Diplomatic tensions, slowing Chinese growth and US tariff pressure spur rebalancing of supply chain

ft.com
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TLDR: AUKUS has driven "the modernization of the wider 🇺🇸🇦🇺 defense relationship, linking force posture initiatives, combined operations, federated defense production and maintenance, and greater technology and information sharing... Mogami could do the same for 🇦🇺🇯🇵."
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Where are my manners? Here's the link. gmfus.org/young-strategists-…

Young Strategists Forum

The Young Strategists Forum seeks to develop a new generation of strategic thinkers for an age of constrained resources and mounting international challenges.

gmfus.org
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Tom Corben retweeted
Paul McLeary@paulmclearySep 30
Pentagon policy chief Elbridge Colby is calling a new meeting of his "Bergen" group - 6 hand-picked NATO allies - next month in Poland. But those left out are scratching their heads. @JackDetsch @StefanieBolzen politico.com/news/2026/09/30…

Pentagon excludes key allies from NATO meeting

politico.com
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Tom Corben retweeted
Aaron Mehta@AaronMehtaSep 30
It just dawned on me that Hegseth is describing the mission of the Office of Net Assessment, which he effectively killed last year.
DOW Rapid Response
@DOWResponseSep 30
.@SECWAR “Project Meridian—the future of warfare—is not about developing new strategies or policies. Rather, its purpose is to creatively look into the future and identify the domains we must conquer—and capabilities we must master... to achieve technological and military dominance on the battlefield for decades to come.”
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Tom Corben retweeted
Bloomberg
@businessSep 29
The Chinese military opened a new logistics base at an airport in Laos, expanding the People’s Liberation Army’s overseas presence bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

China Expands Military Footprint With New Support Base in Laos

The Chinese military opened a new logistics base at an airport in Laos, expanding the People’s Liberation Army’s overseas presence as it seeks to operate farther from home.

bloomberg.com
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At least it's not Golden Intelligence.
Michael “In A Move Likely To Anger China” Mazza
@mike_mazzaSep 29
Missed opportunity to officially call it Super Duper Intelligence
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Clearing up the confusion around Southeast Asia
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An example of positive change in 🇺🇸 procurement practices: the latest 5-7 year Pentagon-RTX contract for AMRAAMs – which would 2X production if fully realised – explicitly includes projected allied requirements through the Foreign Military Sales process.war.gov/News/Releases/Releas…

Department of War and RTX Accelerate Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air

The War Department announced an award to Raytheon, an RTX business, a contract valued up to $20.7 billion to produce advanced medium-range air-to-air missiles, a critical air defense capability for

war.gov
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Tom Corben retweeted
Aaron Connelly
@ConnellyALSep 28
We're seeing more missiles (and longer-range missiles) deployed to the first island chain and for longer. They usually come for an exercise in Japan or the Philippines and then stick around. Easy to miss amid concerns about magazine depth, but still an important trend for deterrence.
Stars and Stripes
@starsandstripesSep 28
The U.S. Army will temporarily store its mid-range Typhon missile system and High Mobility Artillery Rocket System at Kadena Air Base starting in mid-October, Japan’s Defense Ministry said. stripes.com/branches/army/20…

US Army to temporarily store advanced missile systems on Okinawa

The U.S. Army will temporarily store its missile systems at Kadena Air Base on Okinawa starting in mid-October, Japan’s Defense Ministry said.

stripes.com
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Interesting: the 2026 NDS implementation update seems to emphasise resilience measures – e.g. "magazine depth, contested logistics capacity, and resilient and cyber-hardened C2" – over force posture/numbers. If anything, it emphasises the fungibility of US forces across theatres.
DOW Rapid Response
@DOWResponseSep 28
READ: Update on the Implementation of the 2026 National Defense Strategy from @USWPColby media.defense.gov/2026/Sep/2…
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Also very interesting: "In May 2026, Secretary Hegseth and Australian Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles concluded a cost-sharing arrangement to secure more than $5 billion in Australian infrastructure support to the U.S. rotational submarine presence at SRF-West."
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Last thing: shipbuilding – specifically, SSN production conundrum – is the place "where the gap between the Strategy and supply is widest." It puts SSN output at 1.1-1.2 per year, with 2 per year not expected "until approximately 2032," still 0.33 short of AUKUS requirements.
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