ASPI today released its latest Strategic Insight: The Agenda for Intelligence Reform by ASPI Director of Programs, Peter Jennings.

This paper proposes reforms to the structure and activities of the Australian Intelligence Community designed to strengthen the capacity of the agencies performing intelligence analysis and to build a stronger sense of shared professionalism across the intelligence community.

At a time when Australia faces its most challenging strategic outlook since the mid-1960s, no issue is more important to Australia’s security than the capabilities of our intelligence agencies.

Peter Jennings presents seven reforms that Government could adopt to strengthen the analytical depth and the organisational coherence of the intelligence community:

Establish an Intelligence College to provide common training, principally for ONA and DIO analysts, in the methods and content of strategic analysis.

Analytical agencies should develop a common recruiting strategy, pooling resources for advertising, interviewing, induction, and conducting psychological and security assessments.

Implement a program of AIC staff placements into the critical policy-making centres of the Departments of Defence, Foreign Affairs and Trade and Prime Minister and Cabinet.

Review whether there should be a separate position of Director of Intelligence, independent of the collection or assessment roles of any agency. This new position would provide a strong focus to help integrate the agencies’ analytical reporting.

Create a Long Term Assessments Centre, with a specific charter to research the broad strategic trends that act out over a decade or more.

Develop a strategy to manage the huge volume of open source material in ways that give analysts access to the right information and the means to integrate it into classified assessments.

Pay closer attention to how intelligence agencies manage their public profile.

These reforms will strengthen the analytical capacities of our intelligence agencies, by boosting training and professional development opportunities for analysts, and by strengthening the profile and position of the AIC with the addition of a new Director of Intelligence.

Release of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s (ASPI’s) Defence budget Brief 2004-05

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute today released its report The Cost of Defence: ASPI Defence Budget Brief 2004-05.

This document has been written to give interested readers greater access to the complex workings of the Defence Budget and to promote informed debate on Defence budget issues.

In releasing the publication, Dr Thomson said that:

“There is a surprisingly large amount of new money for national security and Defence, notwithstanding the emphasis given to Tax and Family in this year’s pre-election budget.” 

“Specific measures for Defence include $815 million for logistics, $654 million for personnel, $300 million for estate upkeep and $132 million to maintain our deployment to Iraq until the middle of 2005.”

“But just like last year, there continues to be a slow shift of spending away from capital investment in future capability to spending on today’s personnel and operating costs.”

“This budget announced that around $2.2 billion of previously planned investment in new military equipment would be deferred from the first part of this decade to beyond 2007-08 because it has become increasingly clear that Defence simply cannot spend the money as quickly as first thought.”

“To improve the delivery of investment projects, there are major reforms under way in the Defence Materiel Organisation (DMO) whose job it is to acquire new equipment.

“This had better work. Later this decade, when the deferred investment funds reappear in the budget, DMO is going to really have its work cut out for it.”

” Overall there have been visible improvement in Defence’s budget discipline, planning and reporting compared with a couple of years ago, nevertheless we think that more could be done to ensure that value for money is being delivered.”

“We’re into the central years of the 10-year White Paper funding period and, as yet, the Government has not decided what Defence funding will be past 2010. That’s one of the reasons why we called for a new White Paper in our 2004 Strategic Assessment.”

Release of Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) Strategic Insight No. 5/2004

ASPI today released its latest Strategic Insight: Australia and Ballistic Missile Defence: Our Policy Choices.

Whether we like it or not, there are high levels of commitment in the US, by both the Republican and Democrat parties, to develop defences against attack by ballistic missiles. What are the policy issues that this raises for Australia?

Australia has been involved in missile defence and associated matters for many years, in particular through the Defence Support Program (DSP) formerly at Nurrungar and now collocated with the Joint Facility at Pine Gap.

The most persuasive option for Australia is to continue with our intelligence relationship with the US and with the use of data from DSP (and from its replacement SBIRS in the future) to give alert and initial tracking.

To do less, or to seek to differentiate between warning of massive ICBM attack, theatre attacks and US homeland attacks, fails the test of common sense and our national interest.

We should also look for opportunities to conduct more joint scientific investigations with the US.

There is no need to go beyond this and to acquire our own systems. There is neither threat nor priority.

There are nevertheless some threshold issues. The paper argues that the US missile defence program will most likely not upset the stability of the nuclear balance or in itself cause proliferation. But the Australian Government needs to establish an independent and informed view on the matter and to explain it to the Australian people; a major statement in the Parliament is called for.

Release of the ASPI’s Strategic Insight on Australian Naval Shipbuilding

ASPI today released its latest Strategic Insight: Weapons of Mass Construction: Australian Naval Shipbuilding

Its author Dr Mark Thomson said; “The Government plans to spend around $8 billion on new naval construction work over the next fifteen years.”

“While designs for the first two classes of new vessels are now being considered, the Government has not yet decided how to engage Australia’s naval shipbuilding industry in the venture.”

“This is a tough issue for the Government because how they proceed with these first two projects will reshape the industry for years to come. And Australia’s naval shipbuilding industry is currently spread across all the mainland states except for Queensland.”

“A further complication is that the Government is the sole owner of the Australian Submarine Corporation (ASC) which is unavoidably part of any future industry structure.”

“The key issue for the Government is whether to deliberately try and restructure the sector, or to simply offer the projects for tender and see what the market throws up.”

“There are signs of interest from outside of the traditional naval construction sector. These new entrants bolster the case for allowing competition to run its course with minimal intervention.”

“To ensure that the taxpayer is getting value for money, the option of foreign construction should not be discarded. The economies of scale in the current construction program are slight; only 8 vessels spread across 5 different classes to be delivered over 12 years.”

Dr Thomson concluded by saying; “Irrespective of the industry approach taken, it’s important to guard against risky Australian-unique projects by limiting the changes to existing ship designs.”

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute has today released a short paper on ways Australian business can be better protected against terrorism.

Authored by ASPI’s Director of Programs, Peter Jennings, the ASPI Strategic Insight argues that: “If terrorists choose to launch an attack in Australia or against our interests overseas, then it is likely that Australian businesses could be targeted. Yet there is much that business can do to become more resilient against the threat of terrorism and to help government defeat terror groups.”

Peter Jennings argues that the challenge for business is to work out how it can assure the safety of its people and infrastructure while continuing to operate in a vastly more difficult environment. That means paying much closer attention to threats outside the traditional realm of business risk management.

The challenge for government is to work out how to defeat a non-state threat that constantly changes shape while seeking vulnerable targets. That means developing greater organisational flexibility and faster reaction times. So governments need to think about security more like modern business thinks about its operations.

The ASPI Strategic Insight offers some suggestions for how businesses can strengthen their operations against the direct and indirect consequences of terrorism. These include: ” Broadening risk assessments to better understand how strategic and political events can impact on business operations. ” Involving boards and top management more closely in risk management as a part of strategic planning. ” Reviewing organisational vulnerability to the possible ripple effects of terror attacks. ” Using ‘war gaming’ and decision-making exercises to test the strengths and weaknesses of business resilience.

Peter Jennings argues that, to effectively counter terrorism, there is a need for more comprehensive collaboration between the business community and top levels of government.

A creative alliance against terror between business and government must find new ways of identifying and mitigating risk, faster and more comprehensive information sharing and new strategies to manage crises when they develop.

Mr Jennings is speaking today at the conference of the Association of Risk and Insurance Managers of Australasia in Cairns.