Sam Roggeveen > Quotes

“there is a temptation to think that policy and capability only work in one direction: first, we set the policy, then we develop the capability to match the policy. But it is a perverse aspect of defence policy that, once a capability exists, it will to some degree determine policy.”
― Sam Roggeveen, The Echidna Strategy: Australia's Search for Power and Peace

“It is a vital necessity for Australia to remain on friendly terms with Jakarta as Indonesia fulfills its potential as a great power. Failure to do so would be strategically disastrous. An Indonesia that is both wealthy and hostile to Australia would represent the biggest challenge to our security since World War II, much more serious than the threat China presently poses. If Indonesia was our enemy, we would join Israel, South Korea and the central European states bordering Russia as some of the least secure in the world, with the highest risk of conflict.”
― Sam Roggeveen, The Echidna Strategy: Australia's Search for Power and Peace

“If it is costly to resist a change in the balance of power, and if the consequences of such a change are bearable, then it is likely such a change will happen. Such is the basic logic of my argument that America will decline as a great power in the Asia Pacific. When it comes to taking on China, the costs are too high and the stakes too low.”
― Sam Roggeveen, The Echidna Strategy: Australia's Search for Power and Peace

“America has all the ingredients for sustained economic and military strength over many generations. But a fight for leadership in Asia will require not only massive resources but also a measure of national will that is difficult to summon unless the stakes are existential. And the problem for those who want to see America take on this contest against China is that the United States is one of the most secure nations on earth, and therefore has no powerful motivation to do so.”
― Sam Roggeveen, The Echidna Strategy: Australia's Search for Power and Peace

“For an Asian concert to be even remotely acceptable to its great-power members, we must rule out the idea of it being built on liberal principles.”
― Sam Roggeveen, The Echidna Strategy: Australia's Search for Power and Peace