Introduction
Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, this is the first opportunity I’ve had to attend the Shangri-La Dialogue and it’s an honour for me to be here today presenting to such an influential audience.
The focus of this session is how we make defence policy in uncertain times – and today I’d like to share an Australian perspective on this issue.
I’ve been the Australian Minister of Defence for six months now and in that time I’ve been struck by the complexity of developing an Australian defence policy that meets our strategic needs in both the short and long term and is also affordable.
Making defence policy is difficult at the best of times and, as we face an uncertain future international environment, there can be little doubt that this challenge will get harder in coming decades.
In these remarks, I’ll briefly describe some of the key uncertainties we face in the future, before outlining my perspectives on some of the principles of good policy making and some of the difficulties involved in Australia’s situation.
We’ll hear at least two other perspectives on these issues today and so I want to make it clear that I am focusing on Australia’s approach – but I won’t claim that it’s the only valid approach.
Before going any further, I want to highlight that this is a very practical and topical issue for me for two important reasons.
The first is that Australia is currently developing a new Defence White Paper.
A new White Paper and the strategic guidance it provides are critical to success in developing defence policy. This is something I will go into in more detail in a moment.
But I would also like to mention that the new Australian Government is deeply committed to engagement with our region and all of the complexities that can bring. Complexities that can be seen here as the many delegations bump into each other between meetings!
Ensuring that we have solid Defence relationships in the Asia Pacific region based on mutual trust and understanding is as vital as it is complex to manage. It is something that I am deeply committed to as Minister.
Attendance at this dialogue is just one part of building deeper relationships between me and my counterparts as well as between senior Australian officials and those of nations in the region. These relationships, established or further nurtured at forums such as this, are the key to building a trust and understanding that translates into practical cooperation that supports peace and stability in the region and across the globe. A great example of this kind of practical cooperation is the recent decision made by the Singaporean government to deploy defence medical staff to Afghanistan to work alongside Australian forces.
This is a contribution that greatly assists Australian and international efforts to rebuild Afghanistan and demonstrates that solid regional relationships can lead to cooperation with global outcomes.
Key Recent Changes
But the major complex policy challenge we are facing in Australia is the development of a new White Paper. It has been eight years since the last one – and in that time we’ve witnessed profound changes in the global security environment, such as: September 11 and subsequent terror attacks in Bali, Jakarta, London and Madrid; the wars in Afghanistan and in Iraq; the nuclear ambitions of North Korea and Iran; and the big shifts underway in the global distribution of power – which has led commentators to talk about the rise of an ‘Asia-Pacific century’.
The role of military forces is also changing – today, defence forces find themselves participating in a wide range of non-traditional operations, such as disaster relief and stabilisation and reconstruction.
The influence of the wide range of non-state actors – most benign, but some more disruptive – is ever more apparent and coincides with changes in the way the international community applies the concept of state sovereignty.
New challenges also emerge from time to time – for example, we can’t be sure exactly how climate change will affect security, but we know that it will have some impact on our world. Demographic changes may also affect security – but again, we’re not sure exactly what the precise effects will be. And there are other challenges too – such as energy security, rising food prices, and access to supplies of clean water. All important today and will become more important over time. How all these trends will play out over the next twenty years – and how they interact with each other – is not clear. This highlights the uncertainties we face in developing defence policy.
Policy Principles
So how does Australia deal with this uncertainty in making its defence policy? To start with, we are closely adhering to our basic principles of policy development. Principles which don’t just apply to defence policy, but to the development of policy across all Government activities.
The first principle is to develop a clear vision of what you want to achieve – before developing a strategy to implement that vision.
The second principle is to align vision and strategy with resources. This is critically important because, if the implementation strategy is poor, or if there aren’t enough resources to implement it, even the best policy in the world will fail. This is where Australia’s White Paper will be valuable – it will set out our strategy and how we are going to implement it.
The third principle is consultation. We need to consult with other government agencies, the Defence Community and the broader community to make sure that Defence policy is aligned with the Government’s broader approach to national security. This is why the Australian Government is undertaking a thorough consultation process in preparing our White Paper. There are a lot of people in Australia who want to contribute to the White Paper process and we’re keen to hear their ideas. So we’re going to talk to the Australian community, as well as state and territory governments, industry representatives and Defence analysts and commentators. And of course, we are also keen to talk with and consult with our international partners.
These principles – a high level vision backed up by a clear implementation strategy and a secure resource base; together with consultation – form a commonsense approach to policy making which have stood the test of time. But it’s not that easy for Defence But even if the principles are straightforward, policy making – especially in Defence – is never easy in practice.
One reason is that Defence planning occurs over a much longer timeframe than most other Government policy making. The acquisition of major capital equipment such as fighter aircraft and submarines can take many years and means that Defence planners must look several decades into the future. For example, the Collins class project was ahead of its time in building an Australian submarine capability – but it took more than a decade for the submarines to reach their full potential.
This long timeframe adds to our uncertainty – the further out into the future we look, the harder it is to be confident about what will happen and what we can achieve. One of the key challenges in planning for the future is properly understanding and managing risk: balancing the probability of an event occurring – and the cost of preventing it – against the consequences of that event.
For example, while the probability of major conflict is low, the consequences are very high and so it is prudent to take steps to mitigate this risk. This is a key reason why I am committed to building a strong Australian Defence Force fully capable of protecting Australia and its interests. But this kind of risk mitigation is expensive and governments need to balance the resources devoted to Defence against those spent in other sectors such as health or education.
Another challenge for Defence policy making is the sheer cost – acquiring Defence capability is very expensive. So too is recruiting, training, equipping and sustaining a high-quality defence force. To give some indication of the cost to Australia, our current Defence Capability Plan includes forecast purchases of $51 billion Australian dollars. That’s expensive in any language.
With this level of investment, Governments rightly demand high quality advice to assure them that they are getting value for the money they spend and that they are spending it in the right areas. The new White Paper may also highlight some areas where we can use our resources more efficiently so that Australia can focus our expenditure on maintaining and equipping the ADF. These challenges for policy makers – the major consequences of something going wrong, the long timeframes and the high cost of defence capabilities – all add to the complexity of developing defence policy.
How can Defence Forces respond to, and plan for, future uncertainty? This all leads to a big question: how do Defence Forces plan for uncertainty about the future? Maintaining an awareness of regional and global trends. My first response to that question is to maintain high levels of awareness of regional and global trends.
For example, we need to consider questions such as: What the international world will be like in 2030? Will the era of major inter-state conflict come to an end? Could it be superseded by an era of threats from non state actors? What role should our armed forces, which are largely geared for war, play in any future environment? Will challenges in the planet’s climate and environment create, for example, new sources of tension and conflict?
Even though the future is uncertain, this type of analysis provides an understanding of what is happening around the world and how these events and trends will influence future developments. This approach can reduce the level of complexity, making it easier to identify future challenges and enabling us to prepare our forces for potential operations. But just conducting this type of analysis is not enough.
Once we’ve identified the likely tasks and role for our defence force in the future, we need to make sure that we train our personnel to perform these roles and develop the right capability and force structure to successfully undertake these tasks. We also need to be able to adjust our planning to incorporate lessons learned during operations and respond to changing local circumstances.
This doesn’t mean that we need to do everything at a hundred miles an hour – rather, it means we need to identify strategic shifts as early as possible so that we are ready to respond within warning time. And given the long lead time required to develop major capability, the earlier we can identify trends and develop responses, the better off we will be.
Developing strong partnerships
We can also deal with an uncertain future by developing strong regional and global partnerships. A globalised world is more vulnerable to worldwide shocks and leveraging our capabilities alongside those of partners and allies will be necessary to overcome future challenges.
Different countries have varying areas of expertise and by working together countries can benefit from others’ strengths and ideas to address complex situations.
And when the costs of meeting a challenge are too high for one country alone, partnerships can help to share this burden. Increasingly, multilateral approaches will be needed to address global challenges such as climate change, transnational crime climate change and environmental degradation, which do not respect international borders.
Responding to global issues requires global partnerships – building on our shared interests to solve our shared problems. This is not just rhetoric, but a real commitment by Australia to a greater focus on multilateralism. In a speech to the Brookings Institution in March, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd committed Australia to greater engagement in multilateral fora such as the United Nations and the ASEAN Regional Forum.
And as a practical demonstration of this approach, earlier this month Australia and Indonesia co-hosted an ASEAN Regional Forum desk-top exercise to build interoperability among ARF nations in disaster relief operations. Australia is also committed to a deeper engagement with our friends throughout the Asia-Pacific region, where regional security and prosperity is closely linked to Australia’s own security.
Again, Australia’s extensive training and exercise programme with regional Defence Forces indicates our strong commitment to the region.
But we also need to recognise the importance of another kind of partnership.
Increasingly, our partners in disaster relief and humanitarian assistance operations are not government agencies at all, but non-government aid organisations. For example, following the devastating Boxing Day tsunami in 2004, the ADF worked closely with aid organisations such as the Australian Red Cross and Oxfam Australia to provide basic health care, shelter and food and fresh water to victims in Indonesia as part of Operation SUMATRA ASSIST. Strengthening these relationships can only add to the range of options available to governments.
A comprehensive, whole-of-government approach
Unfortunately, many future challenges will not restrict themselves to the responsibilities of individual government departments, making a whole-of-government approach more important. In some countries, environmental degradation, rising levels of criminality and limited provision of health and education services can all destabilise societies and lead to increasing violence. Responding to these challenges requires a broader, whole-of-government approach – not just a military commitment – to address the underlying causes of violence.
This means that defence planners increasingly need to work with other government agencies to respond to these challenges.
A whole-of-government approach increases the resources available to develop innovative solutions to complex policy challenges.
And it also means that governments have the widest possible range of tools at their disposal to respond to challenges. For example, the ADF currently works closely with the Australian Customs Service and the Australian Federal Police to secure our maritime borders and is also working with the AFP to help maintain security in the Solomon Islands.
Recognising the importance of a whole-of-government approach to security, the Australian Government is currently developing a National Security Statement to provide a cohesive and strategic approach to national security policy in the 21st century.
Being flexible and adaptable
From a military perspective, flexibility and adaptability will be key attributes for defence forces in the future. For example, the ADF that will provide security at the Pope’s visit and World Youth Day in Sydney later this year is the same ADF that will simultaneously be: conducting nation-building operations in Afghanistan; securing our maritime borders; exercising with regional friends at sea, in the air and on land; and supporting the Australian Federal Police to maintain law and order in the Solomon Islands.
This means developing a force that is capable of undertaking a variety of different operations at short notice and that can adapt quickly to changing circumstances. But is also means developing and maintaining capabilities that we will need if a major conflict occurs – because while the risk of such conflict is low, the potential consequences mean we need to be prepared for this situation. This is why Australia is maintaining a strong ADF to protect our territory and our interests. Nor can we afford to ignore the benefits offered by technological developments – incorporating these advances into our capability acquisition and other plans will improve our ability to conduct successful operations.
People
Flexibility and adaptability is also about having high-quality people who can react quickly when situations change. It means investing in these personnel – training them for the different types of operations they may undertake in the future; supporting them and their families; giving them jobs that are both interesting and rewarding; and providing them with opportunities for advancement and promotion.
As a result, Australia is continuing to develop strategies to recruit high quality people to maintain a professional and capable defence force.
Interoperability
Another important component of being flexible and adaptable is interoperability – interoperability within the ADF, within the Australian Government and with key partners. Within the ADF, we need to excel at joint operations, which draw on the capabilities of all three services to achieve desired outcomes. And I’ve already mentioned how the ADF is currently working alongside other Government agencies.
In terms of partners and allies, the role of the ADF in current operations demonstrates the importance of interoperability.
For example, in the Solomon Islands, the ADF is supporting not just the local and Australian police, but is also working alongside defence force personnel from New Zealand, Tonga and Papua New Guinea to provide security for local people. The ability to work with others also increases flexibility and can improve operational and organisational outcomes. It is for all these reasons that the options being developed and considered as part of Australia’s new White Paper process will be set in the context of joint, interagency and coalition operations.
Concluding Remarks
I’ve outlined some general principles to guide policy making in difficult circumstances, as well as suggesting some of the ways that Defence Forces can respond to an uncertain future. As I mentioned at the outset, these all represent practical challenges for Australia at the moment as we prepare a new Defence White Paper and seek to build our relationships with our friends in the region and further afield.
So I’d like to conclude by wishing you all the best in developing your own Defence policy in view of the challenges I’ve just outlined.
And now I’m going to listen to the views of my co-presenters and see what ideas I can pick up from them and others I speak with this weekend to take home and consider throughout the course of our White Paper process.
