Fergus Ryan

Unverified reports & heavily censored footage suggest a major incident occurred around May 13 at China's "Deep Sea No. 1" ultra-deepwater gas platform off Hainan. x.com/whyyoutouzhele…

PROJECT UPDATE 📢 Today @ASPI_CTS launches an update to the China Defence Universities Tracker, including insights on China-Iran research ties for the past 15 years, a major refresh of sanctions information and updates to 12 institutions. 📝 Get access: unitracker.aspi.org.au

'Amodei says he suspects open-source models and Chinese developers will be able to replicate Mythos’s capabilities within six to 12 months.' ft.com/content/9e0e0f…

'When one adviser later asked him about it, he said he came up with the [Praise be to] Allah idea himself. He said he wanted to seem as unstable & insulting as possible, believing it could bring the Iranians to the table,' wsj.com/politics/natio…

He's right. abc.net.au/news/2026-04-1…

The West: *creates the internet* “Try nailing THAT jello to the wall.” CCP: *nails it* The West: *creates LLMs* “Alright, try nailing THIS.” CCP: *picks up hammer*

Musk is launching his XChat app in China. Huh. 'Zhihu discussions note...the app will likely remain inaccessible. Beyond China’s stringent platform regulations, XChat requires an X account to log in, meaning users cannot get past registration.' whatsonweibo.com/quick-eye-xcha…

NEW PODCAST 🎤 In this episode of Stop the World, ASPI’s @fryan and @BethanyAllenEbr join @davidwroe to unpack AI in 🇨🇳, from the automation of the justice system and predictive policing to “ambient censorship” and authoritarian values in tech. 🎧: bit.ly/4vlRO01

It's nice to wake up to good news every now and then.

‘The president & at least some of his allies have said privately it would be possible to seize the material in a targeted op that wouldn’t significantly extend the timeline of the war & still enable the U.S. to be done with the conflict by mid-April…’ wsj.com/politics/natio…

'The transatlantic alliance and the larger rules-based order may not recover to a pre-2025 state. Australia’s leaders should make plans for a future in which it does not,' write @BethanyAllenEbr, Nathan Attrill and @fryan. aspistrategist.org.au/australia-in-a…

Extraordinarily problematic and unserious article from an epistemological perspective. This article claims to present how we know what we know about Xinjiang, but includes zero mention of years worth of reporting on Xinjiang, including an entire series that won a Pulitzer Prize.

Australia's top security partner, the United States, is now illiberal. This poses grave challenges for Australia's security, sovereignty, and democracy. Read my latest for ASPI, with Nathan Attrill and @fryan

…Such protestations will deserve nothing but contempt.’ forever-wars.com/the-many-fathe…

‘If Trump does something in the neighborhood of what he is threatening, there will be many with blood on their hands who will rush to declare Trump an aberration, that they certainly never intended for this to happen, that they had a wiser, tougher, more effective approach…

Excellent. Ben Roberts-Smith, the former Victoria Cross winner and Australian solider, has been arrested for alleged war crimes. #block-69d45d7d8f08764b987cb2e6" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">theguardian.com/australia-news…

US embassies are being pushed to counter foreign narratives, including by recruiting local influencers, academics & community leaders to push narratives in a way that feels organic. theguardian.com/us-news/2026/m…

👀 'In early 2025, he [Sam Altman] asked former Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal to informally consult a team inside OpenAI that was working on a separate social-media project similar to X, people familiar with the matter said.' wsj.com/tech/ai/the-su…

Israeli forces allegedly tortured a 1-year-old boy in Gaza to coerce a confession from his father.