In this election year, I see this as one of the first scare tactics that the Gillard government will roll out over the next nine or ten months. Where would the western governments be without their terrorist bogeymen?
Cyber security is such a handy area in which to play this card. Not many of us really understand the Internet, but we all depend on it, and any threat to it is guaranteed to generate a level of amorphous fear.
Don't look to see any assistance going to Julian Assange, a good man if ever there was one. Hopefully he will run for the Senate and manage to secure a seat.
Gillard thinks being in the pocket of POTUS will work to her advantage. Look to see more deceitful electioneering tricks coming to us from the USA play-book.

Sadly both parties will fail miserably in this arena. The LNP will be no different if the experience of Howard's national security and terrorism legislation reforms are any indication of future behaviours. Much of the rhetoric around national security after 9/11 was just PR and spin.

It is the veneer of protection that resonates with most politicians than reality which was borne out by the persecution of Alan Kessing after he allegedley revealed failures in airport security which contrasted badly with the Howard government's bold claims of strong national security and border protection credentials.

As for cutting defence spending. Seriously, DOD must be the most wasteful department of all. Anyone who has worked in the Commonwealth Government knows it and I suspect Ms Bishop does too. DOD has a history of poor decision making around defence materiel almost to the point where one wonders if these decisions are based more on political imperatives ie. relationship with the US etc.

What was the name of those planes that were the wrong size to land on ships? Boots that were so uncomfortable (but cheap) that soldiers had to fork out their own money to pay for shoes that enabled them to do their job more efficiently and safely.

What will the LNP do for national security and defence? Ms Bishop has not declared how an LNP Government would be any different or what their policies are in this area.

I thought it was Abbott playing the TeaParty tactics, and where did that get him.
Cyber crime is a growth market, and govt; around the world are contributing quite well. A good reason to put up a fire wall.
Military structure is shifting, why fight a war face to face if you can disable a country from abroad.
Time has come to get with it, like the US is content with drones, to pick off their foes.
Wars are becomming to costly and cheaper methods are being applied, so it is headed in the right way.
There will be those that think feet on the ground is the only way to fight a war. Times are changing and so will military tactics.
It takes good forsight and strength of leadership to make these decisions, all in our best interests.

Haldwell

Cyber attack could be real. I forgot which country it was that I saw on a ABC or SBS doco in which the ex-PM or someone of similar standing said that a cyber attack by another nation grounded his whole nation: no banks, no business transactions, etc, could operate for days. His regime got changed, as deemed necessary by some superior foreign forces. (I am 70. My short term memory is not much good any more.)

At a infinitesimal level I was bombarded with a few thousand emails on a day I posted something a little jarring to the ears of the author on this site one day last year. My first such experience. My service provider suspended my internet service, for days! Obviously its security system was not good enough for a sophisticated spam-bomb.

As for Julie, she seems to have acquisitioned Abbott's lost soul.

Will she commit to the restoration of the Defence budget?

She must be capable of coming out with some policies, or some positive thought, after her death stare has subsided that is.

Two years of Abbottism - relentless negative aggro - had not delivered them the head of the PM on a plate. Surely it is time for Julie to grow up, and for her chesty rooster to leave the schoolyard antics.

Chek

@Chek
Are you thinking of the cyber attack mounted by the US and Israel on Iran? That let the cyber-attack cat out of the bag, and western governments now live in fear of blowback. Not without reason, I suspect.
But, I hasten to add and should have included in my first post, Abbott and Lady Stiletto will likely do no better or different than Gillard and Co.

So the defence budget has been cut?
How else could we continue to pay all that welfare for the rich and or, so called, Howard's aspirational voters, with their MacMansions and the two beamer garage.
Perhaps if we were to fully means test public health, public education, and every other form of state supplied public service, we may just find enough money to actually ramp up our defence budget, at this critical time!
However, if we were to do just that Julie, it's London to a brick, you and your side of politics would go absolutely ballistic!
Better, we should focus on finding and exploiting the cheap energy we need to regrow a vibrant and performing economy.
That way we can actually envisage general increases in the public spend, defence first and foremost! That how genuine leaders serve the national interest?
No?
Why?
Is patent politicking more important?
We have lots of thorium, and the energy we could create utilising it, would be cheaper than coal! And we could have untouched hydrocarbon reserves to our immediate north, possibly larger than the entire known Middle East reserves?
Yes sure, the lead time for thorium power generation is significant, and will only ever increase, if we continue to wait for the private price gouging energy market, to do it for us!
Cut spending you say, with your broken record rhetoric Julie, just not defence spending?
Cut welfare you say, with more of the same, just not welfare for the rich and the votes it buy for the conservative side of politics!
So that's how you serve the national interest, is it?
Rhrosty.