Tag Archive for: Defence Strategic Review

Multi-domain combat units and preparing Australia for an era of ‘archipelagic denial’

Australia’s 2023 Defence Strategic Review (DSR) prescribed the ADF a ‘strategy of denial’ using an Anti-Access/Area-Denial (A2/AD) force structure to deny adversaries the ‘freedom of action to militarily coerce Australia and to operate against Australia without being held at risk’. The ADF’s primary area of interest spans from the north-eastern Indian Ocean to Australia’s northern approaches in Southeast Asia to the Pacific.

It identified capabilities for denying enemy forces from approaching Australia that include undersea warfare assets, multi-domain long-range strike capacity, multi-domain capabilities for sea denial and localised sea control, as well as air and missile defence (AMD) systems. As Australia’s northern approaches through Southeast Asia and the South Pacific are archipelagic, they are covered with islands, rivers and ocean.

Specifically, the DSR gave the Australian Army several force structure priorities, including ‘littoral manoeuvre capability by sea, land and air’, long-range land and maritime strike capabilities and AMD capabilities. Littoral manoeuvre occurs close to shore, with Army intending ‘to achieve control of the maritime domain from the land, as well as projecting and sustaining force ashore’. The DSR also stipulated that the acquisition of medium-range AMD systems ‘should be accelerated’ because these capabilities are needed ‘urgently’, noting that ‘off-the-shelf options must be explored’. The DSR concluded that ‘only by concurrently delivering these capabilities—littoral manoeuvre vessels, land-based maritime strike capabilities and infantry fighting vehicles—will Army be able to achieve the strategic and operational effect required of the ADF for National Defence and a strategy of denial’.

From this, it’s reasonable to draw the following conclusions:

1. The ADF must assert localised control across multiple warfare domains to deny Australia’s archipelagic northern approaches and the South Pacific to potential adversaries. Multi-domain control demands competence in undersea, anti-surface, and anti-air warfare. It also requires the use of AMD and long-range strike capabilities.

2. Defence is actively shifting Army’s identity towards multi-domain combat units, aimed at defensively denying key archipelagic geography (like maritime choke points) to adversaries through sea and air control. The DSR’s force structure priorities for Army, such as littoral manoeuvre, long-range strike and AMD, suggest this. The idea of land-based multi-domain combat units isn’t new—it was floated in a 2018 US Army multi-domain operations concept, a 2019 CSBA study and a 2021 US Marine Corps stand-in forces concept.

3. Army combat units will need to be road-mobile, deployable by Air Force airlifters, and deployable with Navy vessels, and Army’s future littoral manoeuvre vessels (LMVs).

4. Army wants to be capable of projecting force independently into Australia’s archipelagic northern approaches and the South Pacific. The scale of the LMVs being procured indicates this—a medium sized LMV is planned to be capable of carrying a 70 tonne payload at a range of around 2,000 kilometres.

5. The urgency of delivering these capabilities will require the extensive use of off-the-shelf military procurement.

With the DSR’s strategic intent and capability priorities unpacked, particularly for Army, let’s consider what Army could acquire for its multi-domain combat units to contribute to the ADF’s strategy of denial.

Future Australian Army multi-domain combat units could include the following four groups: a Command Control Communications Headquarters (hereafter ‘C3HQ’) group, an AMD group, a strike group and a force protection group.

The C3HQ group would focus on integrating communications and sensors to help unit commanders find, track, target and engage enemy forces. Off-the-shelf solutions—like ‘Virtualised Aegis’—boast proven interoperability with existing communication systems, sensors and weapons for undersea warfare, anti-surface, strike and AMD missions. Army C3HQs could mirror the Combat Information Centre of Navy Hobart Class destroyers—harnessing existing Navy training structures and minimising duplication across the joint force while enhancing Army/Navy interoperability.

For communications, C3HQs would need datalinks, encrypted radios and satellite connectivity. For sensors, C3HQs could leverage ground-based radars that the ADF are already acquiring under the LAND 19  and AIR 6500 programs, and could also be supplemented with the new US Army LTAMDS radar—offering 360 degree detection and tracking of ‘advanced and next-generation threats, including hypersonic weapons’. The LTAMDS radar is compatible with PAC-3 MSE missile capabilities—a variant of the LTAMDS radar is also compatible with the ADF’s new NASAMS batteries for AMD missions. Additionally, the range of ground-based radars could be extended by fitting high-altitude balloons and uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs) with appropriate sensors. And in littoral environments, C3HQs could deploy unmanned surface vehicles fitted with towed arrays—like the Australian ‘Bluebottle’—to detect enemy submarines.

The AMD group could then use C3HQ data to engage hostile aircraft, cruise missiles, ballistic missiles and boost-glide missiles. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) batteries could defend against short, medium and intermediate range ballistic threats both inside and outside the atmosphere at ranges of 150 to 200 kilometres.

Although a bespoke hypersonics defence system doesn’t exist, it might be possible to improve the intercept probability of existing PAC-3 MSE interceptors using sensor data from the LTAMDS radar. Japan is reportedly considering this pathway to improve its defences against hypersonic threats.

In Australia, Army is acquiring new NASAMS missile batteries to defend against aircraft, UAVs and cruise missiles. Each battery supports up to 72 AMD interceptors across 12 launchers and is compatible with Navy’s RIM-162 ESSM interceptor. This is important because the ESSM has a speed of Mach 4+ and a range exceeding 50 kilometres, and can be upgraded to defeat low-signature targets and some ballistic missiles. In the future, NASAMS could potentially support other longer-ranged interceptors like the Skyceptor, with a range of around 200 kilometres.

In turn, the strike group could use C3HQ data and Army’s existing HIMARS rocket launchers for land and maritime strike missions. In the short-term, HIMARS could be modified to support to support surface-launched LRASM anti-ship cruise missiles with a range around 900 kilometres. HIMARS can also support future PrSM ballistic missiles that have a planned range around 1,600 kilometres for land and anti-ship strikes. To deny enemy undersea forces, the strike group could use rotary-wing UAVs armed with very lightweight torpedoes weighing around 100 kilograms. Alternatively, Air Force’s existing P-8As or loitering Ghost Bat UAVs could provide on-demand anti-submarine strikes with air-launched torpedoes.

Finally, the force protection group would focus on limiting the effectiveness of enemy attacks. Advanced camouflage and concealment methods—like multi-spectral camouflage—could render Army units less detectable to enemy sensors. A counter-drone capability would be needed to prevent the enemy using low-cost swarms of drones for saturation attacks—the 40mm D40 loitering drone has a range of 20+ kilometres and is a prime example of this technology.

Army could also consider pairing innovative high-powered microwave counter-drone technology, for defeating drone swarms, with a counter rocket artillery mortar system—like Israel’s ‘Iron Dome’—in order to defend high-value assets within multi-domain combat units. Army might also consider adding cyber warfare capabilities and electronic protection vehicles fitted with countermeasures and decoys to this mix.

The DSR pivots Army’s identity away from Middle East land operations towards multi-domain combat units that focus on littoral manoeuvre and archipelagic denial capabilities. To do this, Army should consider fielding multi-domain combat units capable of handling high-intensity warfighting conditions and of serving as the nucleus of Army deployments. This approach would make Army’s force structure strong but flexible—multi-domain combat units could be tailored to specific mission requirements by reinforcing specific groups, reducing or omitting specific groups, or by adding detachments from other Army corps (such as combat engineers or mobile field hospitals).

The best news is that the technology to achieve Army’s goals already exist. For an idea of what is possible, the US Army took a clean-sheet mid-range capability battery design in July 2020 all the way through to prototype by late 2022. Only with the right funding and high-level authority to remove all obstructions can the Australian Army prepare for a strategy of denial with the haste demanded by the DSR.

What exactly is Australia’s strategy of denial meant to do?

The 2023 defence strategic review has been broadly welcomed across the Australian strategic policy commentariat. The reasons for that, and the analysis of what it means, however, are oddly diverse. Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Marles in his opening statement frames it as ‘the most ambitious review of Defence’s posture and structure since the Second World War’. Some commentators have agreed, arguing that it represents ‘the boldest statement of Australian strategic policy in many decades’.

Others have drawn very different conclusions from the same document, seeing it as representing far more continuity than change. Paul Dibb has even gone so far as to bemoan the dropping of the ‘defence of Australia’ nomenclature.

The language in the DSR (or the public version at least) is pretty vague in places, but it goes without saying that the document, and more importantly the ideas behind it, can’t be everything that people are suggesting it is. Much of this confusion revolves around a lack of clarity in two key areas—the first is what is meant by denial, and the second is the type of scenario being envisaged.

The DSR defines a strategy of denial incredibly broadly as ‘a defensive approach designed to stop an adversary from succeeding in its goal to coerce states through force, or the threatened use of force, to achieve dominance’.

Denial is not new in Australian strategic thinking; indeed, the ‘defence of Australia’ concept is usually seen as a denial strategy focused on maintaining the sea–air gap to the north. But this isn’t really a strategy of denial in the sense that the DSR defines it. It’s a narrower, more conventional (or operational) concept that’s focused on denying an enemy sea and air space, rather than controlling them.

The broad goals of the DSR’s strategy of denial don’t have to be achieved through a denial approach. Indeed, a strong argument can be made that such an approach is ill-suited to Australia and was only plausible in the 1980s because of the incredibly benign strategic circumstances. Throughout most of the nation’s history, Australia’s efforts to stop an adversary from coercing or threatening it relied primarily on its ability, and the ability of its allies, to control the region’s maritime connective fabric.

Australia’s great strategic weakness has never been the vulnerability of its territory to attack, but its long, exposed lifelines across the oceans. This has meant that Australia has always relied on the fact it and its allies can control those waterways, not merely deny their use to others.

This point has been repeatedly made by senior Australian Defence Force figures. A recent navy chief remarked that a continentalist approach focused on denial ‘simply can’t work for a nation which needs to protect its sovereignty and sovereign rights thousands of miles from its coasts’. Even the current Australian maritime doctrine, the capstone doctrinal document for the maritime domain, states bluntly: ‘Because Australia is an island continent fundamentally dependent upon the sea for communications, and because it exists within a region equally dependent upon the sea, it is control rather than denial which more closely bears upon our national situation.’

The 1980s defence-of-Australia strategy could rely on an approach focused on maritime denial because it was concerned with very limited threats and was backstopped by unquestioned American command of the seas in the event of a more significant conflict. Both the limited nature of the threat and American regional hegemony are now in doubt.

This naturally draws attention to the second area where we lack clarity in the discussion—the nature of the threat. The DSR focuses heavily on the alliance with the United States, saying that it will ‘remain central to Australia’s security and strategy’. Most of the discussion falling out from the review is predicated on the scenario in which Australia would be a member of a US-led coalition opposing Chinese aggression in the region.

However, the DSR also states that Australia should ‘develop the capability to unilaterally deter any state from offensive military action against Australian forces or territory’—implying that the ADF needs to prepare to defend Australia against a great power on its own.

These scenarios are, however, very different. In the former, Australia would likely need to project power well forward, looking to deny China the ability to achieve its goals by containing its forces. The entire effort would be predicated on the coalition’s ability to maintain sufficient sea control throughout the region, both to enable supply and to facilitate the projection of power forward.

The latter scenario aligns far more closely with the ideas being proffered by Hugh White and Sam Roggeveen. Australia would almost certainly have to fall back on maritime denial in the sea–air gap to have any hope of achieving the wider strategy of denial. Notably, the DSR focuses on threats to ‘Australian forces or territory’ when discussing the requirement for independent action. Whether this is a subtle acknowledgement of the impossibility of protecting Australian sea lines of communication in such a scenario is unclear, but the challenge would obviously be immense.

The real-world prospect of Australia fighting a war against a great power on its own seems extremely remote. Australia has little that is of vital interest to potential adversaries such as China, and what we do have that might be of such interest, we’re not likely to value highly enough to risk war. This raises the possibility that the ‘unilateral’ requirement in the DSR is viewed more in the light of a regional threat, but again the lack of clarity makes it difficult to tell.

This matters because much of the discussion over issues such as AUKUS has seen the differing camps largely talking past each other, despite often using the same language. Opponents of Australia’s planned acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines have, with some justification, raised questions over their suitability for a strategy of denial, framed in the context of maritime denial in the sea–air gap. Such arguments are far less convincing if denial is viewed as a larger, umbrella concept, achieved through coalition operations likely to be focused on the edges of the first island chain.

The focus here on terminology might sound like semantics, but language matters. It shapes how we think and act. It informs the wider debate, in which the pernicious effects of the lack of clarity are plain for all to see. We need to think carefully about what we mean by terms such as ‘denial’ and question whether the current lexicon is suitable to facilitate a proper debate.

What will the RAN’s fleet look like in 2035? Indo-Pacific 2023 offered options

Australia is often accused of ‘sea blindness’ and a lack of appreciation of the need for a strong navy to protect our vital maritime trade routes. It was reassuring that last week’s biennial Indo-Pacific exposition in Sydney delivered a confluence of ideas from defence personnel, industry and academics on the future of maritime capability in Australia and the region.

Within the exposition was the Royal Australian Navy’s Sea Power Conference, on the theme ‘Fleet 2035: Sea power and the future of maritime warfare’, where it was noted that the future structure of the surface combatant fleet remains unsettled despite an eight-month defence strategic review (DSR) process and five-month independent analysis of surface capability. The analysis was delivered to the government in late September and it was anticipated that decisions on the surface fleet’s structure would be made public this year. However, the government has indicated that the outcomes will not be known until early 2024.

The 2016 defence white paper planned for recapitalisation of the RAN, but uncertainty remains about the viability of the choice of nine Hunter-class frigates and 12 Arafura-class offshore patrol vessels. Debate has focused on whether either program can deliver as promised. The Hunter program was the subject of a highly critical Australian National Audit Office report, and while the first of the Arafura class was launched in 2021, it’s yet to be commissioned into operational service and that program has been listed as a project of concern.

Perhaps gaining more traction is the debate over whether either program will deliver the capability required to meet Australia’s strategic circumstances. The DSR authors clearly believed that these vessels did not meet the need for an enhanced-lethality surface combatant fleet consistent with a larger number of smaller surface vessels.

Given that the government is yet to answer the question of what the fleet should look like in 2035, some industry representatives took it upon themselves to do so. Defence companies put forward options to meet the DSR intent that the fleet should consist of Tier 1 and Tier 2 surface combatants.

Among the new contenders were light frigates from TKMS and Gibbs & Cox, a subsidiary of Leidos. Both presented designs to address the DSR’s call for Tier 2 ships. TKMS, which produced the MEKO 200, the reference design for the RAN’s current Anzac-class frigate, delivered a design for a third-generation multi-purpose frigate, the A210. The 4,700-tonne design sought to answer the DSR’s call for enhanced lethality with 32 vertical launch system (VLS) cells, 16 cannisters for naval strike missiles (NSMs), a directed-energy weapon with power plant, a mission bay for uncrewed surface vessels (USVs), a towed-array sonar and plans to integrate Australia’s CEAFAR radar.

Gibbs & Cox offered a 3,700-tonne (similar to the Anzac) design for an Australian light frigate based on the new Taiwanese light frigate. The design has a similar strike capability to the MEKO A210 with 32 VLS, 16 cannisters for NSM, capacity for a close-in weapons system (CIWS) and a hangar to embark the MH-60R helicopter. Although both are interesting propositions, it seems unlikely that the surface combatant fleet decision would embrace a new designer at this difficult stage.

The current surface combatant plan already relies on extending each Anzac frigate by nine years which, given the state of the class highlighted in the 2019 ANAO report, seems unlikely. Any decision on the surface fleet will therefore need to ensure delivery of vessels in the early 2030s as currently planned, or perhaps earlier. There will be limited appetite to introduce further risk with a new ship designer. One exception is, perhaps, an AUKUS Pillar 3 covering shipbuilding, which could be a worthwhile consideration now the US is back in the frigates game.

Seeking to address concerns that the Hunter frigate lacks firepower, BAE Systems Australia showcased a design for an evolved Hunter with the number of VLS increased from the 32 in the current design to 96, akin to the firepower of a US Arleigh Burke destroyer. It was suggested that could be increased to 128 should the 5-inch gun not be required.

By any stretch that’s a dramatic increase for the Hunter design. Of course, this would come with a cost. The 2023 ANAO audit highlighted concerns about the weight of the Hunter design, so the addition of a further 64 or 96 VLS would appear to be challenging. To accommodate the extra weight, BAE has said the USV mission bay, towed array or other anti-submarine warfare systems would be removed from the evolved Hunter, but it would still have 85% commonality with the current Hunter class.

The Hunters were always intended to be delivered in batches, and BAE says this change would have a negligible risk to the schedule if it’s delivered in batch II (ships 4–6). There are significant benefits in retaining the same shipbuilder/designer and commonality of systems, and the hull. While that could reduce the risk in delivering a more lethal fleet, questions would remain about the plan’s viability and cost. It’s unlikely that such an expansion of capability would be feasible within the current Hunter project costs, already predicted to be beyond $45 billion.

Perhaps seeking to address all aspects of the surface fleet discussion, Navantia, which designed the RAN’s Hobart-class destroyers, Canberra-class landing helicopter docks and Supply-class replenishment vessels, produced three designs. Consistent with the company’s previous offerings, they included both a corvette and a destroyer option. Navantia’s Tasman-class corvette is based on the Alpha 3000 design built for Saudi Arabia with the same tonnage as the Anzac class. It has increased firepower with 16 VLS, room for 16 NSM cannisters, a 57-millimetre main gun, CIWS, USV mission bay and the Australian CEAFAR radar. Navantia announced that it would lock in Australian shipbuilding partners by joining with CIVMEC and Austal to deliver six corvettes to the RAN.

Seemingly in response to corvette critics—though the Tasman class is the size of an Anzac frigate—Navantia also unveiled a design for an Alpha 5000 frigate at 4,550 tonnes with 32 VLS. That’s about half the tonnage of a Hunter frigate but would have double the VLS capability of the Tasman-class corvette. Navantia’s final design was for a ‘Flight III’ destroyer to address the RAN’s Tier 1 requirements. Based on the Spanish F110 design, the 10,200-tonne destroyer has 128 VLS cells in two 64-cell segments, a 127-millimetre main gun and two CIWS. It reportedly has drone-swarm and anti-drone-swarm launchers.

With the surface combatant recommendations now in the government’s hands, it’s difficult to forecast which, if any, of the options on offer at Indo-Pacific 2023 might be selected. It’s clear that with the Anzacs nearing their expiry date there will be limited appetite to introduce further risk into the shipbuilding program. This must make the BAE and Navantia bids compelling, with existing relationships and commonality of systems key elements in de-risking the decision. Of course, there’s always the option of aligning with American shipbuilding programs now that the US is back in the frigate game, so perhaps an AUKUS Pillar 3 based on shipbuilding is worth considering.

Strategy must drive the RAN’s surface combatant fleet structure

The structure of the Royal Australian Navy since its inception has been determined by trading off capability, cost and workforce. Long lamented by naval historians and practitioners alike has been the view that Australia’s maritime strategy, or lack thereof, has been shaped by a continentalist conception of the nation, culturally and strategically. When the average Australian thinks of the military and its sacrifices, they think of Gallipoli or the battles on the Western Front. They don’t tend to think of the loss of HMAS Perth in 1942 with 400 crew in the Sunda Strait some 2,500 kilometres from Darwin, or of the loss HMAS Sydney in 1941 with 645 crew 290 kilometres west-southwest of Carnarvon.

This sea blindness has arguably shaped investment in the RAN and its structure. But it shouldn’t be overlooked or misunderstood that failing to adequately resource the navy could result in the loss of an Anzac-class or a Hobart-class surface combatant—and its crew—within hours of a conflict commencing in the region. That is what ‘no strategic warning time’ means.

So, where are we today? The world has evolved. We increasingly see foreign warships operating aggressively in our region. A war is raging in Europe. Successive Australian defence white papers in the 2000s and the 2020 defence strategic update and force structure plan all recognise the real possibility of conflict. All highlight the strategic importance of the maritime environment to Australia and our increasing reliance on seaborne trade, which equates to about 40% of GDP. That figure grossly undersells the relevance of maritime trade—91% of our oil is imported and we rely on it to keep the country going. Our economy also relies on undersea cables for communications and transactions, including within our banking systems.

And yet, despite our reliance on the maritime environment and the deterioration of regional stability, the answer to most questions about the RAN’s surface fleet structure for over 50 years has been 11–12 surface combatants. There was a notable deviation in the 1987 white paper’s recommendation for 16–17 surface combatants, but that was never followed through. The only dramatic changes have been the replacement of the Kanimbla-class amphibious transport ships with the Canberra-class landing helicopter docks and the retirement of Australia’s aircraft-carrier aspirations.

The 2023 defence strategic review recommends a strategy for Australia’s defence of deterrence by denial, but what does that mean for a maritime strategy? How does the Australian Defence Force determine what it means for traditional concepts of sea control, sea denial and power projection?

The answer is not entirely clear. There are some clues in remarks by government ministers, and if they are interpreted correctly and in context they are alarming. In the wake of the AUKUS partners’ announcement of Australia’s pathway to acquiring nuclear-powered, conventionally armed submarines, Defence Minister Richard Marles said they were a ‘capability which would give any adversary pause for thought about disrupting the trading routes to Australia and the way in which we connect to the world’.

He also said: ‘The way you need to think about what submarines do is really less about patrolling that massive coastline, which you would need a lot of submarines to do. It’s about the question mark that you place in an adversary’s mind.’

While that may be true, the moment deterrence fails (and there’s no guarantee it won’t) we still must be able to protect Australia’s seaborne trade—or, as the late James Goldrick more accurately pointed out, Australia’s seaborne supply. That requires, at least in part, the execution of localised sea control and power projection. While submarines can assist with that function, they can’t achieve the required tasking. Australia’s maritime strategy must include elements of maritime and naval tasking (which are not entirely the same thing) to achieve power projection and elements of sea control along our sea lines of communication. This includes the Coral Sea, the Java Sea where both HMAS Perth and HMAS Canberra were lost in World War II, and even the western India Ocean. Getting there, and providing persistence, will require a reach greater than the 6,000-nautical-mile range of a stereotypical corvette.

As highlighted in the recent call for an overarching strategy addressing maritime security, ensuring maritime security requires the execution of a large spectrum of maritime tasks of which protection of trade is only one. But it’s an important one that requires a significant blue-water capability.

While the dual constraints of cost and workforce will of course prohibit a Mahanian view of ‘total command of the sea’,  a realistic approach is needed to achieve localised sea control and power projection to secure Australia’s seaborne supply. In articulating its maritime domain force structure priorities, the 2023 review states that the navy ‘must be optimised for operating in Australia’s immediate region and for the security of our sea lines of communication and maritime trade’. It then highlights that, as a consequence, immediate investment priorities for the maritime domain include ‘the acquisition of a contemporary optimal mix of Tier 1 and Tier 2 surface combatants, consistent with a strategy of a larger number of smaller surface vessels’.

There arises the challenge. Be it a consequence of insufficient armament, endurance, flight deck capabilities, speed—the list of comparative metrics goes on—Tier 2 surface combatants (however that designation may be defined) will not be able to meet this tasking. Nor will they be able to complete a number of other tasks required in Australia’s implied maritime strategy.

They will, however, be able to complete many other maritime security tasks currently performed by the patrol boat force. I tend to agree with Rowan Moffitt’s assertion that the 1986 Dibb review intended the Anzac-class frigates to be a Tier 2 capability. The patrol boat’s planned replacement, the offshore patrol vessel, is underarmed and slow for the current context, and Peter Dean makes a valid point that replacing the OPV with a corvette may be beneficial.

But the core of the challenge is that the surface combatant fleet needs to be expanded beyond ‘the answer is always 12’. How that is to be done is a different question to whether Australia should acquire corvettes or not.

Based on the three-to-one ratio often used to indicate force availability, 12 surface combatants, of which four are likely to be available for operations at any time, can’t provide the degree of localised sea control and power projection required to protect Australia’s sea lines of communication.

This doesn’t mean that the real cost and workforce constraints aren’t important. They are. It does mean that Australia and the ADF must find a way to mitigate these issues. That will require a separate, dedicated discussion.

The ADF must receive more funding if the government intends to meet the challenges set out in the defence strategic review, as discussed in ASPI’s 2023–24 budget brief. This will enable the expansion of the RAN’s surface fleet, among other priorities. And we must think differently about the navy’s workforce challenges. The discussion about recruitment and retention, while important, won’t address the structural changes required to crew a fleet designed to protect Australia’s national interests. The answer to this vexed question may include a coastguard, a naval auxiliary, a system of readiness levels, a rehash of the reserves—the list goes on.

The point is that the answer to the problem of how many surface combatants we need is not perpetually 11–12, and difficult choices will need to be made to ensure the required structure is identified, funded and crewed.

A ‘Plan B’ for the ADF: supporting resistance as a strategy

A geographic reality for Australia is that almost all physical threats to its sovereignty will first need to compromise the sovereignty of one or more of its northern neighbours. It is perhaps for that reason that the defence strategic review once again affirms Australia’s commitment to the security of its allies and partners in the region and the global rules-based order.

But how should the Australian Defence Force respond if a threat to a neighbour’s sovereignty might lead to Australia or its interests being threatened? The response, a ‘Plan B’, should be for Australia to aim to deter aggression in the first place by adding ‘support to resistance’ to its portfolio of strategic options.

Resistance in this context is ‘a nation’s organised, whole-of-society effort, encompassing the full range of activities from nonviolent to violent, led by a legally established government (potentially exiled/displaced or shadow) to re-establish independence and autonomy within its sovereign territory that has been wholly or partially occupied by a foreign power’.

In other words, resistance may be nonviolent, as with the Danish resistance to German occupation in World War II; an insurgency, as in the Afghan mujahideen resistance to the Soviets in the 1980s; or a hybrid response, as has been typical of Ukrainian tactics following Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.

In an article for the Australian Journal of Defence and Strategic Studies, I explain what a resistance strategy is, the recent history of developing and employing such strategies in Europe, and why this matters to Australia in the context of major-power competition today. I also point to subtle efforts from the US, UK and NATO to support Ukraine’s development of an effective resistance strategy.

The notion that a resistance strategy might deter by denial was tested in World War II when the Wehrmacht prepared a plan to invade Switzerland. Following the fall of Denmark, Norway, the Low Countries and France in 1940, the German calculus was that 21 divisions would be required for an invasion of Switzerland. The objective was to open alpine transport links to Italy, but the tunnels and bridges on those links were prewired by the Swiss for demolition. The potential denial of the very aims of an invasion, and the opportunity costs it entailed, were thus more than Hitler could bear. The Nazis, commenting on the Swiss barbed-wire fortifications along its borders, began to describe the Swiss system of defence as a ‘porcupine’, and thus the ‘indigestible hedgehog’ metaphor of resistance strategy was born.

If the aggressor is undeterred, a resistance strategy that relies on insurgency is still useful. Insurgencies impose costs—in materiel, personnel, reputation, money and ethics or morality—but to be most effective, they must be prepared prior to hostilities with an appropriate focus on control over the legal, moral and ethical employment of force.

The ADF and Australian policymakers—and indeed Western nations more broadly—have an acute understanding of the costs that might be imposed by an insurgency. Australia experienced such costs during its military commitments to counter insurgencies in the Middle East over the past two decades. Contrary to some recent commentary, organisational learning about insurgencies through these commitments may not have been a ‘distraction’ from contemporary defence challenges after all. Importantly, the West also lost to an insurgency in Afghanistan, despite having overwhelming technological, numerical and doctrinal advantages.

A profound irony in Australian military culture is thus highlighted by the defence strategic review. Despite a stated objective to create ‘asymmetry’ and ‘deter by denial’, the review shows how quickly we have forgotten that insurgents created asymmetries against us and denied the West victory.

The implication when considering a pacing threat that has greater mass, greater range and greater technological advantages is simple. An asymmetric strategic option for the ADF is to support the resistance efforts of our neighbours against an aggressor that might occupy some or all of their territory. This strategic option, if communicated effectively to would-be aggressors, might deter by denying them the quick fait accompli seizure they desire of a targeted region or country. An aggressor would know that a resistance movement will have been established that is capable of waging a prolonged insurgency; that the armed forces of a targeted country will receive training and materiel assistance to sustain the fight for their homeland; and that targeted political leadership will be helped to maintain a government-in-exile that denies a quisling government legitimacy internationally and domestically. If all of this is communicated effectively, the aggressor will know that the invaded country will receive support from Australia to fight back and endure.

A commitment to support the resistance efforts of targeted countries thus reinforces the global rules-based order by dissuading acts of military aggression. And Australia can then benefit from strategic depth in defence.

Resistance strategy is, notably, reliant on resilience. A targeted country must be able to absorb the disruption caused by a military invasion. Many of the considerations in developing resilience to military action are similar to what a society requires to be resilient to disruptive climate events, terrorism or pandemics. Support to a resistance strategy thus develops capacity and capabilities that might reduce the requirement for ADF contingency operations. Indeed, attention to developing resilience with our partners might also help to enhance Australian resilience.

A strategy of support to resistance is asymmetric in that doesn’t depend on a ‘qualitative edge’ or a major research investment. Instead, it depends on people—their selection, training, management and education—and an effective concept of their employment. It is also asymmetric in that it enhances the likelihood of successful conventional military operations by dispersing threat forces, thus denying them the ability to concentrate. This dilemma was exemplified by the Allied support to the French resistance in World War II and the orchestrated maquis uprisings that occurred immediately prior to the Normandy landings. Doctrine explaining such requirements that might support policymaking, education and training is absent in the Australian context. It is therefore a ‘Plan B’ by being able to augment the conventional military power that our ‘Plan A’—the defence strategic review—articulates.

A final irony is, of course, that the West has already unconsciously adopted such a strategy through its military support to Ukraine. We have stood up and stated that we will not abide the aggressive actions of nations that erode the rules-based order. The only question is whether we could have done so more effectively or efficiently.

A commitment to a strategy of deterrence by denial should look to the recent efforts by Eastern Europe to deter Russian aggression and the support to such resistance strategies that have been conducted by NATO. It should look to the lessons from resistance concepts employed in Ukraine and develop appropriate doctrinal models for how a resistance strategy might be supported in the future.

An Australian strategy of support to regional resistance can learn from this recent operational experience to deter autocratic regimes in the Indo-Pacific.

A guide to Australia’s planned strike missiles

Australia is planning to acquire a remarkable variety of strike missiles—weapons designed to hit distant surface targets. They will differ in capabilities and will variously be carried by aircraft, ships and trucks.

Despite the differences, great capability overlaps exist among the eight planned missile types and versions.

Strike missiles are key contributors to the strategy of deterrence by denial required by the defence strategic review, the public version of which was published in April. Facing such missiles, a hostile power is supposed to hesitate before placing surface warships, ground forces or bases close to Australia.

Most of the planned strike weapons will be cruise missiles. That is, they will fly like aeroplanes and rely on small size, low altitude and perhaps stealthy design to penetrate defences. But three types in Australia’s plans are ballistic: they will fly like balls, thrown to the upper atmosphere or beyond by their motors to descend on targets at a great speed that will make them hard to intercept.

Cruise missiles used to always be divided into anti-ship and land-attack weapons, but the categories are merging. We increasingly see weapons that perform both functions and are lumped together as ‘strike missiles’.

Strike missiles are expensive. Most cost at least US$1 million at the factory gate, then more to be made operational and maintained in stock.

Bombs cost only tens of thousands of US dollars each, but attacking with them will be impossible if a target is too strongly defended or too far away. That’s when strike missiles are necessary.

The issue of cost raises the question of inventory sufficiency. It’s unlikely that any country at war will think it has nearly enough strike missiles in stock.

What follows are descriptions of Australia’s planned strike missiles—first the air force’s, then the navy’s and finally the army’s. Acquisition timing is often unclear.

Lockheed Martin AGM-158B JASSM-ER—A standard US air-launched cruise missile primarily intended to hit land targets.

Canberra last year announced acquisition of AGM-158Bs, initially for the Boeing F/A-18F Super Hornets and later the Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightnings.

The weapon has a stealthy shape, helping it to get past radars, fighters and surface-to-air systems.

In principle, it should become usable against ships when fitted with a planned datalink, through which it could be redirected as targets changed course. Its infrared seeker should work against maritime targets.

F-35s will lose stealth and range when carrying AGM-158Bs, because the weapons won’t fit in weapon bays. But the missiles will be able to fly far.

Standard range is almost 1,000 kilometres, to which can be added the radius of the fighter, which can easily exceed 1,000 kilometres with in-flight refuelling. Announcing its approval in 2022 for the possible sale of 80 JASSM-ERs to Canberra, the US State Department ambiguously suggested that Australia’s version could be the AGM-158B-2, which will fly much further than 1,000 kilometres.

Australia has operated an earlier, shorter-range AGM-158 version, the AGM-158A JASSM, on F/A-18A/B Hornets. The aircraft are now retired, and a Department of Defence spokesperson confirms that the weapon is not now operational with the Royal Australian Air Force. But a source who is familiar with the inventory says Australia has retained its AGM-158A stock. Since the AGM-158A has some compatibility with the Super Hornet, the RAAF may have an option of eventually returning the weapon to operation.

Lockheed Martin AGM-158C LRASM—Essentially an AGM-158 version with a datalink and a more complex seeker that also homes in on radar signals and is therefore better at hitting ships.

The AGM-158C can also be used against ground targets, but it is unnecessarily complex for that purpose, for which the AGM-158B should be preferred.

Australia has been planning to equip at least its Super Hornets with AGM-158Cs. The defence review called for F-35As also to carry the missiles—again, at the cost of stealthiness and range.

AGM-158Cs will replace the AGM-84 Harpoons, so to some extent the acquisition will update a capability rather than introduce a new one.

Australia’s Boeing P-8A Poseidon maritime aircraft, which probably have a strike radius without refuelling of around 3,000 kilometres, will presumably get AGM-158Cs at some time. If they do, Australia will acquire a bomber-like air-to-ground capability with a very long reach.

The AGM-158C itself may have a range of well over 500 kilometres.

Kongsberg JSM—A Norwegian missile that can fit inside F-35A weapon bays and hit land or sea targets.

Being smaller than the AGM-158B and AGM-158C, the JSM has a shorter range (stated as more than 275 kilometres) and a smaller warhead.

Thanks to its extremely low flight altitude and stealth shaping, the JSM should be able to get very close to a ship before it is detected, so the target would have little time for defending itself. The missile can also throw wild manoeuvres in the last few seconds before impact, confounding attempts to intercept it.

The combination of the F-35A and JSM should present hostile warships with a highly dangerous threat of sudden attack.

The defence review called for JSMs to be acquired for Australian F-35As. The fighters will need updating before they can use the weapons.

Raytheon RGM-109E Tomahawk—A weapon with an unusually long range, mostly launched from ships or submarines and lately updated to hit maritime as well as land targets.

The US State Department in March approved the possible sale to Australia of 220 RGM-109Es in two sub-versions (Blocks IV and V). Japan wants to buy 400. Until now, the US has exported Tomahawks only to Britain.

Despite its range—1,850 kilometres, according to Raytheon, possibly understating it—the weapon is fairly inexpensive at around US$1 million per round, though Australia will pay an estimated total of US$895 million for its batch. That will include equipment and services to make the weapons operational.

Hobart-class destroyers will carry them.

A great limitation is that not enough missile cells are available on the Hobarts even for the ships’ main function, air defence. It seems that few cells can be allocated to Tomahawks.

Another problem is that attacks by ships cannot be frequent, because returning to base for reloading takes days or weeks. On the other hand, a ship may be able to go further from Australia than an aircraft and launch at shorter notice.

Kongsberg NSM—A strike missile of moderate range for launching from ships or trucks against sea and ground targets.

Australia will install NSMs on Hobart-class destroyers and Anzac-class frigates beginning in 2024; the same missile type is also a likely candidate for an army anti-ship requirement. For the navy, NSMs will replace Harpoons, so that acquisition is basically a capability update.

Key advantages over the Harpoon include the NSM’s extremely low flight altitude, use of infrared homing instead of detectable radar, and extreme endgame manoeuvres.

The land-attack function has probably limited value, because of the relatively short range of the weapon, which is given as ‘more than 185 kilometres’. Getting within a few hundred kilometres of a well-defended target could be quite dangerous for a ship.

Raytheon RIM-174 SM-6—An unusually flexible weapon, designed originally to defend ships against aircraft and missiles but itself usable ballistically, mainly against ships.

The SM-6 would be hard to intercept on a ballistic trajectory, but it is an expensive weapon and carries only a small warhead over just a few hundred kilometres. For Australia, SM-6s are really for naval air defence, not strike. Hobart-class destroyers will carry them.

PRSM—The ground-launched weapon that will give the Australian Army a role in the denial strategy. Designed initially for ground targets, it will be upgraded to hit ships, too.

The PRSM (pronounced ‘prism’) flies ballistically. It is intended to go into full-rate production for the US Army in 2025 with a range of 400 kilometres but has been tested to beyond 500 kilometres. That is still very short compared with the reach available from aircraft.

Australia has contributed to PRSM development.

The acquisition cost looks moderate at US$1.5 million per round even for early-production units.

PRSMs will be carried in HIMARS launcher trucks, which when stationary would be hidden. Greatly improving responsiveness, C-130 and C-17 airlifters will be able to swiftly move the trucks around Australia or potentially to the islands of neighbouring countries. Ships could move them forward, too.

PRSM Increment 4—Not actually a PRSM version, but a new missile type with much longer range, still launched from the ground to hit land and, presumably, sea targets.

The weapon is still at an early development stage for the US Army. The defence review implicitly required it for Australia by strongly supporting ongoing co-development and rapid acquisition of the PRSM ‘in all its forms’.

The PRSM Increment 4 will fly further than the initial PRSM by using atmospheric oxygen for the combustion of its fuel instead of carrying an oxidiser mixed with the fuel.

The US Army is looking for a range of 1,000 kilometres from the new weapon.

Editors’ note: This article was amended on 4 and 5 July 2023 to include an update on the status of Australia’s stock of AGM-158A JASSM missiles and the potential for Super Hornets to use them and on July 20 to note that the army may receive NSMs.

Time to hit the books: education and training in the defence strategic review

The recent unclassified version of the defence strategic review (DSR) highlights Australia’s focus on acquiring cutting-edge technology for its military.

Acquiring expensive, complex fighting systems is essential to ensure Australian forces are not technologically outmatched as we seek to define our own destiny in an era of growing great power competition. However, while demonstrably and publicly preparing Australia for potential conflict, the DSR says little about the most important element of a military—the quality of its people.

It neglects the training and education needs of a modern defence force. This risks wasting large sums of taxpayer money on advanced technologies that cannot achieve their full potential because we don’t have the expertise or people to use them effectively.

The DSR focuses so heavily on defence technology because of the assumption that better technology results in higher capability. But at the end of the day a nation, and therefore a defence force, is composed of humans.

With such a seismic shift toward higher-tech defence, it’s reasonable to expect that the review would see training and education as headlining a list of steps to take next, or at the very least, reasonably reinforce their importance to a modern defence force.

Yet the unclassified version of the DSR rarely mentioned training. It did appear at times, noted as important for a new fleet of infantry fighting vehicles, another time for the RAAF to ‘meet aircrew requirements across the force’, and notably for cyber and space domain personnel.

DSR also mentioned the need for Defence to conduct more and larger joint, integrated, multi-national exercises, which double as deterrence and as training events, but gave no apparent consideration to developing the workforce we will need to meaningfully participate in such exercises.

To make matters worse, despite the significant changes to the technologies defence expects to use—long range missiles, hypersonic weapons, and nuclear submarines—it did not mention education at all.

By not dedicating pages to the problem of workforce development, the DSR risks signalling that this is not a main area of effort for current leaders. By 2018, Defence knew it had to actively seek a human performance edge in a declining strategic environment. From wide-ranging terms of reference, the DSR was supposed to review spending priorities, including on training and personnel, in the Integrated Investment Program (IIP)—the last publicly available version of which is from 2016.

At that time, the IIP allocated $11.47 billion to training and simulation systems, and an additional $2 billion to general and training ranges upgrades over a 20-year period. Leaders knew from the 2016 defence white paper that ‘…[the] quality of our people is the foundation of Defence’s capability, effectiveness, and reputation…’, with the document mentioning ‘train’ and ‘education’ 80 and 10 times respectively.

That white paper had dedicated sections on preparedness and training systems, and concretely linked military preparedness to the ability to train and educate staff. If in 2016 the focus was not simply on new technologies-as-capabilities, but also on ensuring that people would be an effective component of our capability. Why is this no longer treated as important in 2023?

All capabilities need well-trained and well-educated personnel to be effective, and first-in-country capabilities need new investment to achieve this. With many such capabilities coming on board in coming decades, investment in post-compulsory education and training is critical. Failure to develop not just the necessary individual skills, but also the right attributes and behaviours across the defence workforce, undermines the DSR’s strategic aims.

Getting focused on new technologies for the government’s shopping list without investing in the workforce never ends well. It leaves everyone playing an unwinnable game of catch up. If the dire strategic circumstances outlined in the DSR come to pass, ignoring defence’s human element would be a disaster. We risk wasting massive sums of money to get no closer to our security objectives.

To prepare its security future, the government must develop a comprehensive approach that balances this investment in advanced technology with a strong focus on training and education. This will ensure Australia remains capable, adaptable, and ready to face future challenges.

A higher place for space in the defence strategic review

The 2023 defence strategic review (DSR) has moved space further into the mainstream as a key element of a more integrated force. With the prominence given space in the 2020 defence strategic update reinforced by the DSR, this domain—alongside land, sea, air and cyber—is no longer an afterthought in defence planning.

That’s good news for an Australian Defence Force seeking to build a focused force to undertake a strategy of denial. Space is essential to the integrated force for multi-domain operations, particularly as part of an anti-access and area-denial (A2AD) approach. Space capabilities underpin the ‘impactful projection’ Defence Minister Richard Marles is seeking for the ADF. It must be able to strike deep, and to see deep, to project power decisively and rapidly.

Space capabilities are central to this. The 2020 update and its accompanying force structure plan set the path for the ADF to develop space capabilities, leading to the establishment of Defence Space Command (DSpC) in January 2022, and to major defence projects. The DSR builds on these steps in important ways.

The most significant step is moving DSpC from the Royal Australian Air Force to the Joint Capabilities Group (JCG) which shifts space into a joint and integrated context. The DSR says space command needs to be re-postured inside Defence to maximise its effectiveness. ‘It requires a centralised space domain capability development and management function, and a method for building and sustaining a trained Defence Space workforce, including a defined career path for space professionals.’

Space must not revert to being regarded as simply a supporting function for the ADF as critical as that function is. The ability to strike high value targets with certainty and precision at long range is entirely dependent on space capabilities. Most of the priority capabilities and effects that exist today and which are to be developed for the ADF in all domains rely on space-based capabilities.

Space has already been acknowledged as an operational domain in its own right by Defence Space Command. JCG’s primary role is to provide enabling capabilities to support operations in traditional domains. Care must be taken to ensure that within JCG space does not become simply an enabling adjunct. Space Command should quickly assert the importance of space equal to the other domains. The ADF has depended on the US for high-end and exquisite space-based capabilities—a suitable and efficient choice in a more peaceful and less technologically demanding era. As both the US military and global commercial space have evolved, so too must thinking in the ADF. An update to the 2022 Defence Space Strategy, and the Space Power e-Manual that considers the 2023 DSR would be a good step towards the 2024 National Defence Strategy.

The DSR constantly refers to multi-domain operations that cannot be conducted without space capabilites, and JCG’s second role is ‘progressing leading edge capabilities, such as cyber, data link and satellite communications’. In this sense, a move of DSpC into JCG allows it to not only better engage with the other services as part of an integrated ADF but also to take on a leading role in ensuring space capabilities are front and centre in project development. The ADF does not need to own and operate entire space systems, but it does need to carefully consider Australia’s advantages strategically, operationally and industrially for an enhanced role in space, and how to leverage those for national requirements and alliance contributions.

The DSR includes the judgement that ‘at this stage, there is no need to generate a separate Space Force’. That was not expected in this review. Australia is just starting to develop sovereign space capabilities for the ADF and moving beyond dependency on external providers, primarily the US and other Five Eyes countries. There’s some way to go before Australia should be ready to establish a ‘Royal Australian Space Force’. However, the idea should not be taken off the table entirely and many nations besides the US are developing defence space organisations in a manner that could facilitate independent space forces in the future. Australia should be open to a similar path, particularly as technologies such as rapid reusable launch, space mobility and logistics, and small satellite mega-constellations take shape. The concept of a space force for Australia should be open for debate and consideration in the future. There’s danger in conceptual thinking lagging behind technological change and innovation.

It’s welcome that where the DSR recommends that space command falls within JCG, it says it’s essential that JCG be given a dedicated funding line, with appropriate authorities to manage it.

This will ensure that DSpC continues to maintain a leading role in shaping ADF space policy. However, two of the DSR’s three recommendations in relation to space are only ‘agreed in principle’.

They are to establish a ‘centralised space domain capability development and management function’, and ‘building and sustaining a trained defence space workforce, including a defined career path for space professionals’. If DSpC is to be fully effective in its role, and if Defence is to establish a true ‘space-savvy’ workforce, it’s important that these recommendations be fully supported by Government and Defence. The DSR’s recommendation that the ADF workforce be centralised into a ‘single, integrated system incorporating the five domains’ has been agreed. This will help DSpC build a stable workforce.

The DSR recognises the importance of rapid innovation in space. It would be a mistake for Defence to embrace ‘old space’ mindsets. A total focus on large, expensive satellites whose high cost means they can only be acquired in small numbers and launched overseas, would be a step backwards to the days of passive dependency. The recent contract for advanced military satellite communications will see two to four large satellites operational in geosynchronous orbit with initial operational capability from 2027. It’s a big advance for ADF satellite communications capabilities, but it should not be the end of the story. The DSR says Space Command also requires additional investment for smaller, rapid acquisition projects. ‘Given the speed of technological developments in space, the current capability life cycle is too slow,’ it says. ‘Defence must adopt an approach that emphasises speed of capability acquisition including off the shelf commercial and military capabilities.’

Defence must fully engage with Australia’s vibrant commercial space sector, including small to medium enterprises, to provide sovereign capabilities. It must take full advantage of Australia’s nascent sovereign space launch capability to reinforce resilience in a contested domain. Defence can also help the commercial sector embed itself in the global space economy which is expected to reach well over US$1.5 trillion by 2040.

Missing from the publicly-released version of the DSR is discussion about the rapidly growing challenge posed by adversary space and counterspace threats, and by congestion in space. It talks of ‘space assurance’ but not how that will be achieved. The force structure plan and defence space strategy both talked about the importance of space domain awareness as a basis for space control, resilience and assured access, more broadly contributing to the establishment of space deterrence. The DSR needed to at least note the importance of these tasks for DSpC. It comes back to the reality that space is an operational domain, and not simply an enabling adjunct. A new mindset is needed. There’s more to space than provision of satellite communications. This is a key information domain and the ADF’s modern way of warfare cannot exist without it.

It’s time to get much more serious about space.

On deterrence

The recent defence strategic review has much to recommend it. Even the publicly released unclassified version is the boldest statement of Australian strategic policy in many decades. But it is not without flaws. The chapter on deterrence (Chapter 4), for example, is either obscure or vague on a range of issues. Given that the entire chapter consists of 23 sentences, the level of obscurantism in relation to aggregate length is impressively high.

True, in the land of deterrence, a degree of ambiguity is, often, no bad thing. And the DSR’s predecessor, the 2020 defence strategic update, contained a single paragraph, of just three sentences, which implied a wholesale shift in Australian thinking on extended nuclear deterrence—one reason for reading this year’s review so closely on that point. In any event, deterrence is meant to be a key focal point of this review, so let’s try to untangle what we can.

Reading through paragraphs 4.1 to 4.13, the problems begin almost immediately. Paragraph 4.1 states that ‘deterrence is about compelling an actor to abandon or defer a planned strategy’. Frankly, it would have been better if the authors had not defined ‘deterrence’ as a subset of ‘compellence’ in the first four words of the chapter. The classic deterrence theorists tend to underline the differences between the two: deterrence is about stopping an intended action; compellence about forcing an intended action. Deterrence maintains the status quo; compellence changes the status quo.

In practice, of course, the world is seldom so neat. What Putin’s doing in Ukraine—attempting to force the country to abandon its independence—is compellence. He backstops conventional aggression with nuclear threats to keep NATO from interfering. On face value, those threats are intended to maintain the status quo in regard to the European nuclear balance, but are deployed to help undo the status quo in regard to an independent Ukraine.

It would be unreasonable to expect the review’s writing team to wrestle with the finer points of deterrence theory; that’s not its purpose. But the casual use of the compellence framework here suggests that Australia’s view of deterrence bears some similarities to Putin’s view—which is untrue.

Paragraph 4.3 says—accurately—that deterrence happens inside the head of the adversary’s decision-maker, so deterrent threats need to be credible. Moreover, says the review, we don’t know it’s working. Granted, deterrence works best on risk-averse decision-makers. It makes cautious leaders more cautious. But it seems to work well enough even in relation to more brazen leaders. The test of whether it works can’t be whether or not certain events happen in the real world—because we can’t attribute deterrence as the actual cause of a non-event. But we should look for evidence we can measure, in particular an adversary more cautious in its decision-making.

And that brings us to the nub of the problem: the pattern of thoughts straddling paragraphs 4.6, 4.7, 4.8 and 4.9. The first two assert a historical practice of deterrence by denial—courtesy of the defence of Australia doctrine—but accept that this model of deterrence was designed for less challenging times and is no longer suitable for today’s regional environment.

The plot thickens in 4.8: in future we will need to develop a capability to unilaterally deter any single country from attacking Australian forces or territory. The single-country test is new. And so is the deterrence requirement: we have to be able to deter unilaterally. That is, another country is thinking about attacking us and no one’s coming to our aid.

This paragraph is susceptible to a range of interpretations. Pessimists naturally presuppose that the single country we might have to deter unilaterally is China. If that were to be the case, Australia might well need an independent nuclear arsenal. But is China the prime candidate? It’s comparatively easy to imagine China and Australia coming to blows as part of a wider regional conflict. But, putting the matter brutally, Australia isn’t important enough for China to attack unilaterally. I read this paragraph more optimistically, as setting a fairly low threshold for what we might have to manage courtesy of unilateral deterrence.

That interpretation fits best with paragraph 4.9, which says the appropriate test for whether or not we can successfully deter any single country turns on whether or not we can prevail in the northern maritime approaches to Australia. That’s problematic since the review has already declared such an approach ineffective against higher-level threats.

The flow of thoughts across those paragraphs is complex and contradictory. One can hope that the classified version contained a better-reasoned argument on this point but, if so, that sense has been lost in the process of the thousand cuts. I think the best way to approach those paragraphs is to see them as an answer to the questions raised by the 2020 update. In short, how does Australia see the future of extended nuclear deterrence? And what did Australia mean when it asserted a claim to have more of the instruments of deterrence in its own hands?

On the first question, the DSR is not particularly helpful. Paragraph 4.10 states that our best protection against nuclear escalation is US extended nuclear deterrence ‘and new forms of arms control’. But the review is silent about the future of extended nuclear deterrence—indeed, over whether it has a future—and silent too about those arms control agreements. It appears to have no good understanding of the transformative effects of developments currently under way in the nuclear field—the rise of a tripolar nuclear world, the emergence of more risk-tolerant leaders within the traditionally responsible P5, and the spread of ICBM capabilities to a rogue state—upon both assurance and regulation.

There’s some danger 4.10 will be read as an endorsement of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons , or at least of a TPNW which has solved the problems of verification, enforcement and universality that currently make it unsuitable as a vehicle for nuclear disarmament.

Similarly, the single-country test may be an early marker of how much deterrent power the Australian government wishes to have in its hands, but it’s an imperfect indicator which needs further work.

The government confronts a difficult agenda on both deterrence and arms control—one made more challenging by AUKUS, which is sucking the oxygen out of other nuclear issues. Unhelpfully, government ministers have been drawn to a mantra of ‘nuclear propulsion good, nuclear weapons bad’, which has hindered rather than helped good thinking on extended deterrence. While US allies in northeast Asia—South Korea in particular—have energetically pursued greater nuclear engagement, Australia has been left back at the starting line.

The ADF will have to deal with the consequences of climate change

The Albanese government has accepted a recommendation in the defence strategic review (DSR) that the Australian Defence Force be released from most of its domestic disaster response roles to concentrate on the increasing regional security risks.

This is welcome and likely means that the Commonwealth will significantly expand Australia’s civilian capacity to respond to climate-driven natural disasters.

The ADF’s role in domestic disasters has grown significantly in recent years, primarily because of more frequent and destructive disasters related to climate change and a shift in treating Defence, in particular the Army, as a primary responder rather than a secondary or last resort. While this has shown confidence in the ADF’s ability to respond to disasters, importantly the DSR found that this has ‘negatively affected force preparedness, readiness and combat effectiveness’.

Precisely what shape this enhanced national civilian capacity takes will become clearer in the months ahead. At a minimum, it could entail additional inducements for the states and territories to expand their capacities and additional support for existing volunteer agencies, such as Disaster Relief Australia, to help supplement emergency services.

But over the longer-term, filling the gap left by the withdrawal of the ADF from all but last-resort engagement in domestic disasters is likely also to require new infrastructure and equipment and significant additional staffing. This could be provided through the establishment of a national civilian service or staffing stand-by arrangements, enabling existing government employees and other Australians to be released from their jobs during crises to scale-up the Commonwealth’s response capacity. The stand-by arrangements would include emergency response training between disasters, in much the same way as Defence reservists are trained during peacetime.

The DSR’s climate recommendations are focussed on empowering the ADF to do what a defence force is primarily designed to do—deter wars and win wars should deterrence fail. That said, freeing-up the ADF from domestic disasters will enable it to scale up its role in responding to regional humanitarian disasters, which are also becoming more frequent and severe due to climate change.

Until recently, the defence community has generally underestimated how rapidly these climate impacts will begin appearing and the cascading consequences in areas such as food security, population movements and for political and regional security. As the climate continues to warm, the ADF’s regional climate-related missions are likely to evolve rapidly from humanitarian and disaster response to stabilisation and conflict prevention.

The scale of this emerging challenge might be revealed later this year. Two climate events, an El Nino and a positive Indian Ocean Dipole, or IOD, will likely form in the months ahead. Together, they would contribute to very hot and dry weather in our region. But much of Southeast Asia is already experiencing a record-setting heat wave, perhaps the worst ever recorded in April, while oceans are now at record high temperatures, even with the cooling effect of recent La Niñas. If these trends continue, and a strong El Nino emerges, the impacts in our region, including in geopolitically pivotal places like Indonesia, could be catastrophic.

With the clear synergies between defence and climate, the DSR’s devotion of a chapter to the climate threat is encouraging, in particular the clarity that climate change is now a national security issue.

‘Climate change,’ it states, ‘will increase the challenges for Australia and Defence, including increased humanitarian assistance and disaster relief tasks at home and abroad … It could lead to mass migration, increased demands for peacekeeping and peace enforcement, and intrastate and interstate conflict.’

Indeed, this inclusion of climate as a core national security issue along with the Government’s inclusion of the Minister for Climate Change and Energy on the National Security Committee of Cabinet, finally formalises the then-Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s vision in the 2008 National Security Strategy that climate was ‘an area of emerging consequence which will require the formal incorporation of climate change within Australia’s national security policy and analysis process’.

Less encouraging, given its lack of clarity, is the DSR’s oddly cautious formulation: ‘If climate change accelerates over the coming decades, it has the potential to significantly increase risk in our region.’

There is little scientific doubt that it will accelerate with very serious regional consequences, particularly given that our immediate region is a hot spot of overlapping climate hazards and vulnerable countries. This overly cautious line may reflect the many cooks involved in ensuring a public version of a classified report is released expeditiously, but the DSR formulation is particularly odd given that the review team was likely briefed on the recent classified Office of National Intelligence climate and security risk assessment, which, if the recent comments of government ministers are any indication, would have left few doubts about the scale and urgency of the challenge.

Regardless of language inconsistency, the fusing of climate with defence and intelligence, through the Government’s very strong focus on climate change, optimises the opportunity to learn the lessons of previous security and defence strategies, including the Defence White Paper produced by the Rudd Government some 14 years ago. That 2009 White Paper was ahead of its time, but also illustrates why the DSR’s new biennial National Defence Strategy process is much needed to ensure inevitable fact changes and new data can be factored rapidly into defence policy.

For example, the white paper concluded that ‘large-scale strategic consequences of climate change are not likely to be felt before 2030’. That prediction was clearly wrong. Major climate disruptions are already affecting multiple regions simultaneously. Indeed, the systemic impacts of climate change will fundamentally undermine Australia’s national security interests, including with respect to the other security challenges that receive far greater attention in the DSR than climate.

That is why we shouldn’t be asking if climate change will accelerate and increase regional risks, but rather determining how to reduce the consequences of the inevitable crises that will befall the region.