Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese shakes hands with Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on May 4, 2026. (Getty Images)
A Philippine Air Force Black Hawk helicopter lands on June 29, 2023, on Mavulis Island, which is the Philippines’ northernmost island and is roughly 88 miles from Taiwan. (Getty Images)
Senior lecturer in the Department of Security Studies and Criminology at Macquarie University, Council of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute
A production line of the Glide, a high-altitude glider that delivers munitions across thousands of miles, is seen at the defense tech startup Mach Industries in Huntington Beach, California, on September 11, 2025. (Getty Images)
Trailers with launchers for guided missiles of a German Patriot air defense system stand on a snow-covered field in southeastern Poland on April 3, 2023. (Getty Images)
A Chinese flag flutters in the wind at a beach on Pingtan Island, the closest point in China to Taiwan’s main island, in Fujian Province, China, on October 15, 2024. (Adek Berry via Getty Images)
Chinese President Xi Jinping inspects troops during a parade commemorating the seventieth anniversary of the end of World War II in Beijing on September 3, 2015. (Huang Xiaobang via Getty Images)
Wild peach and apricot flowers are in full bloom in Yanqing District, encircling the Longquanyu Great Wall on March 25, 2025, in Beijing. (Hao Jihong via Getty Images)
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi attends a press conference for the fourth ministerial meeting of the China-CELAC Forum at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse on May 13, 2025, in Beijing. (Tingshu Wang via Getty Images)
Smoke rises after a reported Israeli strike on a building used by the Islamic Republic of Iran News Network, part of Iran's state TV broadcaster, on June 16, 2025, in Tehran, Iran. (Stringer/Getty Images)