It’s pretty hard not to appear “militaristic” when it comes to defence of the nation!

And how can a GP calmly talk about, “…our relative security from invasion for the foreseeable future…”? Are our enemies sending out invitations these days, so that we have plenty of time to get ready?

Or, perhaps the author thinks that the ‘Medical Association for Prevention of War’ can actually live up to its title! Supported of course by “… people with ‘expertise’ in peaceful conflict resolution, diplomacy, the root causes of terrorism and other threats, ways in which Australia can strengthen the role of the UN, and appropriate responses to the major threats of climate change and nuclear weapons.”

The naivety of this author is amazing. “Peaceful conflict resolution” might do for nursery school and work situations, but it is pathetic to even mention it, and the other “expert” areas when the dogs of war are straining at the leash.

The whole ‘wrong-headeness’ of this article is emphasised in the last two lines: “Overall, the paper might possibly have made some sense in a bygone era. In 2009, however, its recommendations are an expensive and dangerous distraction from dealing with the threats we face.”

It is the only way to deal with the world threats in 2009. Stick to your proper job, Dr. Wareham. Your opinions on defence are as ludicrous and of touch with reality as the idea of the Association you preside over. It probably makes you feel good, and that’s all.

I read the byline and the author's qualifications and thought O Dear! But then I read the article and the drift and compassion is heartfelt.

For every real or imagined threat from China there is an American multinational that stands to make megabucks, always late, always overbudget, from the Australian taxpayer.

Looks like America (Electic Boat) will be the main foreign contractor from the 12 sub decision, and of course Lockheed Martin is the main F-35 contractor.

If/when America decides that its economic ties with China outweigh its own old alliance with Australia, it won't matter that we have 12 U-boats or 100 new planes.

Making a peaceable settlement with China or countering China with nuclear powered subs with nuclear weapons will be the main game. Our medium-high intensity CONVENTIONAL weapons will be more an industry development pork barrels of the near future rather than decisive weapons when they are needed in the main threat time.

Either we go nuclear one day or we can forget the false comfort of conventional weapons bought from America.

So the author wrote an excellent article. I didn't come to the conclusion she intended - but thats what discourse is for.

Pete
http://gentleseas.blogspot.com/

The authors sentiments are laudable, but the reality if the actual situation is lacking. Leigh's attack is totally unwarranted and appears to me to be just that, an attack, yet Leigh provides nothing to the debate, just his ideological irritation.

Our biggest defence problems will be when people start to stream out of Asia as the factional religious conflict spreads worldwide, along with global warming, economic collapse and ecological breakdown. It would only take 4-5 nuclear strikes to paralyze this country, yet the logistics and forces required to take it over, would run into millions of troops. It's religious refugees which we have to be careful of, already they are disrupting Europe and forcing their bizarre belief upon various societies and promoting their Abrahamic god of war.

The white paper as badly flawed as it is, was supposed to be designed for this purpose, hence the reason we have no need of a missile defence system for the moment. Our defense forces are controlled by outside interests, all being owned by multinational European or USA corporations and this alone is a big problem logistically with supply and replenishment, if we are faced with more then 3 days of all out continuous conflict.

I agree with the author more should be done for our neighbours instead of brown nosing the yanks and Europe. They have no interest in us other than our resources and strategic positioning for worldwide radio communications and satellite missile launching

Stormbay,

Another newcomer who wants to "debate".

By some rule of your own, you find that my "...attack is totally unwarranted", and that I "provide nothing to debate."

Well, my "attack", if you must call it that, is warranted against such nonsense; and, I have no intention of debating when I express my opinion. I don't care what people think of my views, and I feel under no obligation to defend them from someone who doesn't like what I say.

My only interest is what is put up by contributors - they are the ones inviting comment, and what ever other posters want to say is of little interest to me: except when someone like you comes along and has a go at me.

The "debaters" have been arguing the toss on OLO ever since its inception. No changes in opinion have occurred, even though there are some people who think that their "superior" views will prevail over those they criticise.

Nevertheless, you are entitled to post what you wish about whom you wish. Going on your initial post, I shan't be taking any notice of you. You might offer me the same 'courtesy'.

The posters here so far, whether for or against the author’s argument, have sprouted the same old same old.

And that is … be afraid, be very afraid of (fill in your threat of choice), and then be more afraid still. And if you haven’t managed to be afraid enough to be absolutely bloody scared by now, then you must be naïve.

And, of course, the logical progression of all this much-needed naivety-busting is to acquire lot and lots of blowy-uppy things, and keep acquiring more blowy-uppy things still. And if we haven’t managed to acquire enough blowy-uppy things then there is always a bigger and better blowy-uppy thing being acquired by someone somewhere (fill in your threat of choice) which might hit us before we can hit them.

For what it’s worth, here is a link to an extremely ‘naïve’ website promoting an extremely important ‘naïve’ idea whose time has well and truly come. We just haven’t been ‘naïve’ enough to realise.

http://www.ministryforpeace.org.au/

There is a big difference between attack and defense.
If you want to attack someone you buy submarines and long range ships and aircraft. If you want to defend yourself you invest in early warning systems, Surface to air missiles, patrol boats, surveillance aircraft and coastal defenses like booms and mines.

Australias defense forces seem more focused on attacking others than defending ourselves. If our neighbors were investing in the same sort of hardware we would rightly be worried.

<”Nevertheless, you are entitled to post what you wish about whom you wish. Going on your initial post, I shan't be taking any notice of you. You might offer me the same 'courtesy'.”>

That's fine Leigh, I understand the depth of your fear of rational debate and knowledge. I also understand it's an integral aspect of your ideology, no sense no reason, so you have to defend your non stance irrationally and make bizarre statements.

Mikk, your very right, but we have to understand the people leading this country and controlling our defence future, have their minds living way back in the past. They think you can approach the future with what seemed to work in the past and continue down the track of relying on overseas corporate interests to provide equipment for our forces.

Submarines are very good as a defence deterrent and because of our huge coast line we need some long range ships, but they should be very fast ones. We have the best over the horizon radar in the world, which has been hijacked by the USA for it's systems. Or entire defence plan needs to be changed to suit our future conceivable threats and not that of the northern hemisphere, which has a completely different scenario to us.

This woman's main failings are innocence and an unrealistic belief in peoples' willingness to accept the ideals of 'nice' people like her. Life is not like that, particularly with with the sort of cultures most likely to be a threat to Australia in the future. I cannot think of one reason why Australia would want to go to war (our foolish sorties too Iraq and Afghanistan aside)but there are lots of reasons why certain overcrowded and resource-hungry countries could feel a need to attack Australia.

We all hope that none of our state of the art weapons of war will be needed but, as long as warfare is a definite option, we need those weapons. People who are against having them will die as surely as the rest of us.

Unlike the the times when Quakers, for example, had the luxury of being high-minded because they had other people to fight and die for them in some one else' country, modern warfare can be brought directly to you.

Showing potential enemies that we are armed and ready is a far better way to prevent war than having cosy chats with them and making ourselves look weak and silly

Mikk,

I appreciate what you're saying about the apparent aggression of the acquisitions listed. And I agree to a certain extent that defensive purchases would be somewhat different. But what would early warning systems, surveillance aircraft, etc do other than tell us that someone is attacking? When you are under attack, you need the fighters and submarines for defence purposes. Certainly it is a case of 'everything in moderation', but I don't think we can overlook upgrades to our military equipment.

I think the real problem I had with this article is that it missed the narrow scope of the white paper. It is a defence review - not an international relations review, not a Foreign Affairs review, not a trade review. Our defence force can talk all they want about the injustice of Indonesian policy in Irian Jaya; unfortunately, they can't do anything about it except be ready to act if other government departments give them the nod. And how effective would any action be if they had outdated equipment?

What has always been immediately important about defence, or any political entity's offensive capability surrounds what they would need to face, militarily, in the immediate future.
These days the world is changing demographically.
Our traditional allies from the age of empire have other issues that do not concern us.
Our vaunted ally, the US is confronted with some considerable demographics challenges.
The US will soon be populated with a majority Hispanic population - Negro Americans, second - and a predicted collapse of nationhood in result.
Meanwhile secessionist groups toy with dividing the East from the West – of the USA in much the same way as happened to the former USSR.
Most Australians do not realize how close the West Coast of the USA is to forming political alliances with Asia Pacific Nations of that ‘Rim”.

A personal note –
It frightened me to see the collapse of the USSR.
Exactly the same forces are out there towards causing a similar calamity to the USA.
I have never overmuch appreciated the construct of the USA.
Despite that the game board is set.
When the USA folds down the middle – or at least has to devolve to isolationist policy again – then Australia has to reinforce its position as a power in the Asia-Pacific.
We will no longer be the gigantic staging point for American hegemony.
China is now the world economic power.
Meanwhile the Grand Game continues to be played through Central Asia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and into the Indian Sub-Continent.
Meanwhile we sit on our hands and publicly pretend none of this affects us.
Meanwhile our senior defence people soil their britches.
Meanwhile our propaganda agencies tell Australians to trust our politicians to handle the human refuse of this arriving on our shores.
Meanwhile most Australians cover their ears to ignore the truth.
Meanwhile up North, in Australia, various groups arm themselves in order to fight the last battle.

While there is no immediate threat, it takes years, even decades, to establish a trained, coherent defense capability. If one were to wait for a clear and present danger, it would certainly be too late.

While I personally consider military spending similar to throwing money down a rat hole, I recognise that it is a necessary evil.

As to the offensive / defensive debate, a requirement for defense is the ability to strike back. The point is not to strike back first.

As for nuclear weapons, they are the quintessential defensive weapon. As the point of a defense is to let others know that an attack would incur more pain than gain.

Dear ‘Shadow Minister’,
To address yours.
There is always an immediate threat.
Defence establishments employ people and provide them resources to keep the latest threat scenario at the top of their files.

And it does not take too long to build offensive capability towards overkill if the decision has been made to go that way.
In this regard the US has usually managed to profit from war.

A for striking back or striking first – that entirely depends upon circumstances.
Pearl Harbor was a perfect case whereby it had to be seen that a ‘Day of infamy’ had to be let happen so that the belligerent had to be proved wrong.
It was entirely in the interest of a powerful nation to appear to be the underdog.
US industry capacity had to wind up by gaining experience supplying allies in Europe before turning newly developed, qualitatively superior, equipment against Japan.

And if that nation let Japan strike first then why not let it happen again in our age with a nuclear strike?
Waging war is as much about suckering the peasantry as it is about having the capability.
Hadn’t you noticed?

I'm always bemused when people make statements like "fighting the last battle."

This seems pretty stupid. If it's the 'last' battle, then by definition, we're all wiped out and fighting is useless. Unless it's some religious construct, in which case, I'dve thought the proper response was to be all peaceful and holy or something like that.

So to all those in the north arming themselves for the 'last battle', I suggest you take a chill pill and get back in touch with reality.

For someone who doesn't care about other people's posts and just states his opinions Leigh, you get awfully tetchy when criticised. It's always good for a hoot, but you might want to try relaxing sometimes. You'll live longer to grace us with your consistently vitriolic posts.

When I saw the blurb for this piece, my reaction was bemusement. The actual article wasn't quite the naive piece I thought it would be, but it still had its flaws. It did speak somewhat realistically about some threats though and made some pretty good points when highlighting the absence of commentary regarding nuclear threats and so forth.

Dear Turnabout,
“Fighting the Last Battle” – in DefPlan circles is actually a technical term used to describe big acquisitions mistakes.
Some are better than others at doing that.
Australia has honed the expertise down to the proverbial razor’s edge.

Everyone tries to work out from the last shindig what would happen in the next and what equipment ‘we’ might need in order to make for more and hopefully complete carnage.

Believe me when I say that the next buy of equipment SHALL be built to sufficiently high a standard to last out well into at least approximately 1995.
Yes. That’s right. I exaggerate not in the least and repeat – 1995. It was, after all, a good year.

Oh.
If you mean sustaining combat capability against an ‘impossible scenario’, say, the US and Its allies then accept the timeframe might be closer to about – 1957 or thereabouts.

As regards ‘armchair generals’ – I’d suggest they belt up and let a superior breed hold sway.
We ‘Couch Commanders’ are an entirely more capable lot and fit right in with C/4ISR, situational awareness, minimum necessary effort/maximum destruction/social displacement – while some of that stuff cooked up at Langley sorts out whole populations - if it works right and doesn’t turn back on those boiling the pot.

As for tetchiness – this forum like most of them gives fair indication how wars happen.
All one has to do is humbly submit the truth and either one is ignored or bawled out remorselessly.
Such conflicting emotion devoid of any fact.

Nonetheless, I enjoyed writing this.

The new purchases desired for the "defence" of Australia have a few things in common:
1 They are very expensive.
2 They are all made overseas in countries which may or may not supply us with parts etc.
3 They all run on fossil fuels. We have no strategic reserves of fuel and in another 25 years (when the joint strike fighter is ready) the supply of fossil fuels may be a bit limited.
4 They are all distracting us from tackling climate change.
5 They are all distracting us from seeking to make more friends and fewer enemies.

My remarkably innocent ‘Peace’,
Re- your last - by your numbers -

1 They are very expensive.

They’re nOT. ask your MP.
It saves us billions by buying in.
It also helps determine allies.
If they keep supplying their junk – they remain allies.
Joe Stalin could explain his particularly close relationship with his pal, Adolph Hitler.

2 They are all made overseas in countries which may or may not supply us with parts etc.

Who gave you that idea?
Australian industry involvement is the core of Defence Policy.
No-one ever said that Australians had to be stakeholders, be employed, or to derive any income
Besides tou need give regard to the immense difficulty of operating any standard of R&D, production and the like here in OZ.

3 They all run on fossil fuels. We have no strategic reserves of fuel and in another 25 years (when the joint strike fighter is ready) the supply of fossil fuels may be a bit limited.

Nooooo ! Who told you that?
The LATEST U.S. Gizmos run on Free Energy. A bullet fired from the latest US service rifle will chase you three times around the block and still kill you – batteries free!
We need to speak with that person who told you otherwise.

4 They are all distracting us from tackling climate change.

Dear Peace, distract you from a bait you’ve swallowed and hooked.

5 They are all distracting us from seeking to make more friends and fewer enemies.

IF you can find a nation in the Asia/Indian/ Pacific Bloc that actually remains a friend to Australia – then you are reading some scenario from some ‘alternative universe’.
Howard blew it entirely away, and the present lot have to exercise damage control.

Summary –
"Ci vis pacem para bellum" – make peace by being prepared for war.
That is the rule of the ages.
It isn’t right and should not be right – but that is how our ‘Masters’ still want it.
Now tell me; how might we work together, in concert with others, toward changing their attitude

Non Farmer,

Your statements:

"There is always an immediate threat", - (Please point one out to me)

"And it does not take too long to build offensive capability towards overkill if the decision has been made " - (Please indicate how you will quickly build up a force with front line fighters, tanks, ships, and trained soldiers. Given that rounding up laymen and giving them pointy sticks won't cut it nowadays.)

Show a complete ignorance of anything military.

Your suggestion that the US let Japan strike first is ridiculous. The US sat back on its laurels believing that no one would dare attack it and had not updated its hardware. Japan thought it could take the US out of the war by destroying its navy and nearly succeeded.

An suitable defense force is to some extent like a seat belt in a car. You hope you never actually need it, but you would be ill advised not to have it.