For decades Australia has been critically dependent on space-based infrastructure and systems for environmental management and monitoring, satellite communications, and national security. Access to the benefits derived chiefly from US space systems and programs have tangibly boosted Australia€™s scientific achievements, military capabilities, and economic productivity. At the same time, in niche ways, Australian space facilities and science have become important to the United States. Australia€™s national space aspirations have traditionally been modest. However several combining trends mean that Australia will soon need to do more in space. In this lecture, James Brown will outline the next steps for Australia and America€™s evolving alliance in space. 

 

 

About the Speaker

Adjunct Associate Professor James Brown directs the Alliance 21 Program within the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney. A former Australian Army officer with service in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Solomon Islands, Brown is the author of Anzac€™s Long Shadow: The Cost of Our National Obsession (Black Inc, 2014). Between 2010 and 2014 he was the military fellow at the Lowy Institute for International Policy in Sydney, where he focused on Australian defence and strategic policy.

 

31 August 2015