Posted on Dec. 29th Australia’s military is looking to recruit foreign troops, particularly those let go in Britain where the government has announced cutbacks on defense spending, according to a Dec. 27 report. The Australian Defence Force has struggled to fill recruitment quotas and was seeking highly skilled specialists such as fighter pilots and submarine [...]

Posted on Dec. 29th (Reuters) – North Korea likely is closer to mounting nuclear warheads on its ballistic missiles than generally reported, possibly only one or two years away, the U.S. Congress’s former top expert on the issue has concluded. Larry Niksch, who tracked North Korea for the nonpartisan U.S. Congressional Research Service for 43 [...]

Posted on Dec 29th The shadow of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il’s death hangs over Northeast Asia as leaders work to reassure each other of cooperation to ensure stability in the uncertain transition ahead. South Korean President Lee Myung-bak spoke by telephone with Japan’s Prime Minister Noda Yoshihiko, whom just a day or two earlier [...]

Posted on Dec 21st The new phase of Chinese naval development could include even more new weapons and sensors than the previous phase, if the recent launch of another specialized testing ship is any indication. Last month, the PLA Navy launched“Ship 893,” its third new weapons trials vessel since 2005. Trials ships are equipped with systems [...]

Posted on Dec 21st SEOUL, South Korea – North Korea test-fired a short-range missile off its east coast on Dec. 19, the same day it announced the death of leader Kim Jong-Il, South Korea’s Yonhap news agency said. The agency quoted an unnamed government official as saying the missile launch was unrelated to the announcement [...]

Posted on Dec 21st The death of North Korea’s Kim Jong-Il over the weekend, and the uncertainty surrounding the transition of power to his youngest son, Kim Jong-Un, has raised new questions about a project to pipe natural gas from Russia across the secretive state to its southern neighbor. Since the Monday announcement of Kim’s [...]

Posted on Dec 21st TOKYO, Dec 20 (Reuters) – Japan picked Lockheed Martin’s F-35 jet as its next mainstay fighter on Tuesday, choosing the aircraft over combat-proven but less stealthy rivals, as concern simmers over North Korea and as China introduces its own stealth fighters. The decision came as Japan and the United States stressed that their [...]

Posted on Dec 21st WASHINGTON (Kyodo) — Japanese Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton agreed Monday to keep in close contact with each other as well as with South Korea on how to deal with North Korea following the death of its leader Kim Jong Il over the weekend. Stressing [...]

Posted on Dec.21st SEOUL — In the wake of leader Kim Jong Il’s death, North Korea is likely to shift for the first time to a collective leadership model, with a small circle of older caretakers advising — and sharing power with — untested heir apparent Kim Jong Eun, Seoul’s intelligence agency said this week. The [...]

Posted on Dec 14th Japan said it’s close to selecting a supplier for a fighter-jet order that may be worth more than $4 billion after the Yomuiri newspaper reported that Lockheed (LMT) Martin Corp. will win the contest. “We’ve entered the final stages,” Defense Minister Yasuo Ichikawa told reporters in Tokyo today. “I want to [...]