Dr Michael Raska

Dr Michael Raska is an Assistant Professor in the Military Transformations Programme at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies. His research interests focus on East Asian security and defense, including theoretical and policy-oriented aspects of military innovation, force modernization trajectories, intelligence, information and cyberwarfare. His publications include journal articles in the Korea Journal of Defense Analysis, Pointer-Journal of Singapore Armed Forces, and Asian Journal of Public Affairs. He has contributed chapters to edited volumes for the Project on the Study of Innovation and Technology in China at the Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation; the National Bureau of Asian Research Annual People’s Liberation Army Conference; and the Norwegian Institute of Defense Studies. His commentaries have been published by the Project Syndicate, Defense News, The Diplomat, East Asia Forum, RUSI Newsbrief, as well as select newspapers worldwide. He is a frequent commentator on Asian security issues for BBC World News, Al-Jazeera News, Channel News Asia, and other networks. Dr Raska has taught at the Goh Keng Swee Command and Staff College (SAF Campaign and War Studies Course) and the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (International Security). At RSIS, he currently teaches a course on information and cyberwarfare. His research experiences include visiting fellowships at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Yonsei University, Pacific Forum CSIS, and Samsung Economic Research Institute. He holds a B.A. in international studies from Missouri Southern State University (2000), an M.A. in international relations from Yonsei University (2002), and a Ph.D. in public policy (2012) from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, where he was a recipient of the NUS President’s Graduate Fellowship.

• East Asian security, crisis management, and intelligence: Threat assessments, security conceptions, defense strategies, and force modernization trends in East Asia
• Military Innovation: Diffusion of military technologies, ideas and concepts, comparative defense industry trends
• Information Conflicts & Cyberwarfare: concepts, strategies, policies

• Fellow, Hertog Summer Study, Philip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies, 2014
• Fellow, Summer Workshop on the Relationship between National Security and Technology in China, IGCC, 2013
• Fellow, Philip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies Basin Harbor Teaching Seminar, 2013
• Fellow, Summer Workshop on Military Operations and Strategy (SWAMOS), Columbia/Cornell University, 2012
• Fellow, Samsung Economic Research Institute, 2006
• Fellow, Rothberg International School, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2004
• Fellow, Air Power Program, GSIS Yonsei University, 2003.

Policy Reports

• Countering the U.S. Third Offset Strategy: Russian Perspectives, Responses and Challenges

  24 January, 2017

• Confronting Cybersecurity Challenges: Israel's Evolving Cyber Defence Strategy

  08 January, 2015

• The AirSea Battle Debate and the Future of Conflict in East Asia

  01 February, 2013

Commentaries

• CO18071 | Cross-Domain Coercion: Contours of East Asia’s Future Conflicts

  24 April, 2018

• CO17205 | North Korea Threat and Asian Markets: A Paradox?

  01 November, 2017

• CO17165 | Strategic Contours of China’s Arms Exports

  11 September, 2017

• CO17102 | 4G SAF: Creating New Advantages

  24 May, 2017

• CO16223 | China's Quantum Satellite Experiments: Strategic and Military Implications

  05 September, 2016

• CO16156 | Cyber Conflicts and Singapore’s ‘Total Defence’ Strategy

  23 June, 2016

• CO16093 | Tailored Deterrence: Influencing North Korean Decision-Making

  22 April, 2016

• CO16032 | The Real Star Wars: Improving Satellite Defences

  11 February, 2016

• CO15262 | Hybrid Warfare with Chinese Characteristics

  02 December, 2015

• C015172 | Cyber-Enabled Hybrid Conflicts in East Asia

  17 August, 2015

• CO15091 | Russia’s Concept of Hybrid Wars: Implications for Small States

  14 April, 2015

• CO15045 | Decoding China’s Cyber Warfare Strategies

  04 March, 2015

• CO14229 | Back to the Future: China’s Defence Industry Innovation Paths

  19 November, 2014

• CO14192 | Building a Cyber Iron Dome: Israel’s Cyber Defensive Envelope

  02 October, 2014

• CO14130 | Toward Stealth and Sea Denial: Submarine Modernization in East Asia

  07 July, 2014

• CO14030 | SINGAPORE AIRSHOW: China’s Aviation Industry on the Horizon?

  13 February, 2014

• CO14026 | SINGAPORE AIRSHOW: East Asia’s Changing Security Dynamics: The Role of Airpower

  11 February, 2014

• CO14008 | Rethinking Asia-Europe Security Cooperation

  15 January, 2014

• CO13163 | China's [Secret] Civil-Military Megaprojects

  02 September, 2013

• CO13119 | Information Warfare 3.0: Weapons of Mass Effectiveness

  28 June, 2013

• CO13101 | Australia's Evolving 'Smart Power' Strategy

  28 May, 2013

• CO13052 | South Korea's Security Predicaments: Preparing for 'Hybrid Conflict'

  02 April, 2013

• CO13013 | Submarine Trends in Asia Pacific: Air-Independent Propulsion A Game Changer?

  24 January, 2013

• CO12219 | Creating Reverse Asymmetry: Patterns of IDF's Military Innovation

  05 December, 2012

• CO12194 | China's Defence Aviation Industry: Searching for Innovation

  17 October, 2012

• CO12158 | Decoding the Air-Sea Battle Concept: Operational Consequences and Allied Concerns

  23 August, 2012

• CO12105 | Ascertaining China’s Strategy for the Korean Peninsula: Implications for the U.S.-ROK Alliance

  20 June, 2012

• CO12039 | Iran’s Nuclear Conundrum: Israel’s Strategic Options

  12 March, 2012

• CO12031 | From Copier to Innovator? China’s Ballistic Missile Modernisation

  21 February, 2012

Authored Books

• Raska, Michael. Military Innovation in Small States: Creating a Reverse Asymmetry. Routledge, 2015
• Creating Reverse Asymmetry: Military Innovation in Small States (London: Routledge, 2015 Forthcoming).

Edited Books

• Jo Inge Bekkevold, Ian Bowers and Michael Raska (eds.), Security, Strategy and Military Change in the 21st Century: Cross-Regional Perspectives, Routledge, April 2015.
• Jo Inge Bekkevold, Ian Bowers and Michael Raska (eds.), Security, Strategy and Military Change in the 21st Century: Cross-Regional Perspectives, Routledge, April 2015.

Edited Chapters

• Michael Raska, "South Korea's Military-Innovation Trajectories," In: Cronin, Patrick (ed.), Breakthrough on the Peninsula: Third Offset Strategies and the Future Defense of Korea (Washington D.C.: Center for New American Security, 2016), 23-39.
• Koh, Swee Lean, Collin; Richard A. Bitzinger; Michael Raska; Kelvin Wong Ka Weng. “Locating China’s Place in the Global Defense Economy” in Tai Ming Cheung (ed.), Forging China’s Military Might: A New Framework for Assessing Innovation, pp. 169-212. Baltimore, Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014.
• “Locating China’s Place in Global Defense Economy,” with Richard Bitzinger et. al., in Forging China’s Military Might: A New Framework for Assessing Innovation, ed. Tai Ming Cheung (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2013).
• “China’s Strategic Imprint on the Korean Peninsula: Crisis Scenarios and Implications for the US-ROK Alliance,” in Contending for the Asia-Pacific: New Dynamics in US-China Relations, eds. Mingjiang Li and Kalyan Kemburi (London: Routledge, 2014).
• “Capacity for Innovation: Technological Drivers of China’s Future Military Modernization,” with Richard Bitzinger, in The PLA in the 2025, eds. Roy Kamphausen and David Lai (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 2014 Forthcoming).
• “Debating Military Innovation: Conceptual Approaches,” in Managing Military Change: Strategic Thinking, Reforms and Adaptation in a Changing Security Environment, eds. Jo Inge Bekkevold and Dahiya Rumel (Oslo: Norwegian Institute for Defense Studies, 2014 Forthcoming).
• “SSK Submarine Modernization in East Asia: The Role of Air Independent Propulsion Systems,” in Emerging Critical Technologies and their Impact on Asia-Pacific Security, ed. Richard Bitzinger (London: Palgrave, 2014 Forthcoming).
• “China’s Military Aviation Industry: In Search of Innovation,” in The Chinese Defense Economy Policy Briefs: Sector-by-Sector Assessments and the Role of Military End Users, ed. Tai Ming Cheung (San Diego: Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, 2013)

Journal Articles

• “Locating China’s Place in the Global Defense Economy” (with Michael Raska, et.al.), in Forging China’s Military Might: A New Framework for Assessing Innovation (Tai Ming Cheung, ed.), Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014
• “RMA Diffusion Paths and Patterns in South Korea’s Military Modernization,” Korean Journal of Defense Analysis 23, no. 3 (2011): 369-385.
• “Five Waves of RMA Theory,” Pointer - Journal of Singapore Armed Forces 36, no.3 (2011): 1-12
• “Beyond the Bomb in the Basement: Israel’s Nuclear Predicament & Policy Options,” The Asian Journal of Public Affairs 1, no.2 (2011):22-33.
• “The Concept of Reverse Asymmetry: Israel’s Military Innovation,” RUSI Newsbrief 33, no.1 (2013).
• “The Air-Sea Battle Debate and the Future of Conflict in East Asia,” RUSI Newsbrief 32, no.6 (2012).

Op-Eds

• “What is China’s Strategy for North Korea?” Aljazeera, May 15, 2014.
• “Singapore’s Smart Army,” East Asia Forum, March 1, 2014.
• “East Asia’s Changing Security Dynamics and the Role of Airpower,” Defense News, February 3, 2014.
• “Time to Rethink Asia-Europe Security Cooperation?” The Korea Herald, January 19, 2014.
• “Scientific Innovation and Chinese Military Modernization,” The Diplomat, September 3, 2013.
• “Australia's Evolving 'Smart Power' Strategy,” The Jakarta Post, June 7, 2013.
• “Information Warfare on the Korean Peninsula,” ASPI Strategist, March 13, 2013.
• “Integrating Information Warfare into U.S.-ROK Defense Strategy,” The Korea Herald, March 4, 2013.
• “China’s Defense Aviation Industry: Toward Stealth Innovation?” with Alanna Krolikowski, East Asia Forum, March 11, 2013.
• “South Korea’s Changing Security Paradigm,” Project Syndicate, February 10, 2013.

• S6038 – Conflicts in the Digital Age: Information and Cyberwarfare