Strategist Article Archives - Page 1101 of 1187

Why an amphibious capability? (part 1)

18 November 2013

Nic Stuart made a straightforward point last Wednesday: if you want an amphibious capability, make your case. I do, so I will. But at least there has been plenty of debate. By a rough count there are a dozen or more posts on The Strategist that have looked at the ADF’s emerging amphibious capability, starting off with two post that I made back in December 2012 (here) and January 2013 (here). I won’t reiterate the points I made in those posts, but I will suggest that those interested in the ADF and amphibious operations should read John Blaxland’s new piece in the latest Security Challenges, and take a close look at the role of the ADF’s amphibious capabilities in operations over the last few decades, in particular in East Timor and the Solomon Islands.

An injection of funds for the NZDF?

18 November 2013

One thing New Zealand is never accused of internationally is throwing too much money around on defence. Those impressions aren’t about to be challenged any time soon, but Defence Minister Jonathan’s Coleman’s recent speech to an annual industry conference indicates that a bit more spending may be on the way.

Since the publication of the government’s 2010 Defence White Paper (PDF), the New Zealand Defence Force has been embarked on a quest to release up to NZ$400mn (A$350mn) in annual efficiencies by 2014/15, which can then be redirected to ‘front office’ activities. Most of these savings had been identified in a piece of creative writing known as the Value for Money Review (PDF). A big part of the aim was to allow financial room for upgrade (and ultimately replacement) of the three big ticket items—the two Anzac frigates, the Hercules strategic lift aircraft and the long-range maritime patrol Orion aircraft—without the government having to dig deeper into its pockets.

Reader response: what’s the best kind of Navy for us?

18 November 2013

Peter Layton’s article on ‘The Navy We Need’ makes some interesting points, but puts the platform cart before the function horse, despite his interest in the US Navy’s ideas of ‘presence’. He also falls into the trap of confusing tactics (such as convoy) with the end to be achieved (protection of shipping), while his remarks about the historical experience only tell part of the story, ignoring the fact that the ‘small’ escorts of which he talks were themselves provided ‘cover’ by higher capability forces in order to undertake their direct defence tasks. As it happened, some of the ‘small’ escorts proved not up to the mission and had to be replaced by ‘larger’ vessels as soon as they could be built.

In fact I don’t find the words ‘small’ and ‘large’ particularly helpful in this context. Their recent use has continued my concern with so much of the commentary on the subject. Smaller ships do have roles to play, but the objections to larger hulls seem more emotional than reasoned, or are often just superficial, with not much idea of the cost drivers of modern combatants. ‘Small’ and ‘large’ are also irregular adjectives—their meaning depends on where you stand. They don’t mean the same thing to our Chief of Navy as they do to the US Chief of Naval Operations, or to the Chief of the Finnish Navy.

China’s claims and strategic intent in the South China Sea (part 1)

17 November 2013

In a previous post, I detailed a number of recent incidents that have occurred involving Indonesia in the South China Sea, pointing out that the these incidents have occurred out to the furthest extent of China’s ‘nine dash line’ map. While I didn’t address the larger questions of China’s intentions and strategy in the South China Sea in that post (primarily for reasons of space), these larger questions were picked up in a reader’s response by Daniel Grant and are worth a closer look.

These are complex issues that are difficult to address with limited space, but I’ll attempt to condense them in two posts. This one deals with the implications of these incidents for China’s claims in the South China Sea, and the next will look at China’s strategy to enforce these claims in order to protect what it views as its maritime rights and interests in the area.

ASPI suggests

15 November 2013

There was heartache this week after a near miss in talks with Iran. On a similar note, this article in The National Interest suggests that nuclear history may at least rhyme, with Russia modernising its nuclear force. So it seems a good week to look at the above video; it’s a timeline, showing the 2053 nuclear tests by seven countries between 1945 and 1998.

Meanwhile, according to The New York Times, ‘Typhoon Haiyan, described as the most devastating natural calamity to hit the Philippines in recent history, is emerging as a showcase for the soft-power contest in East Asia.’ Rory Medcalf foreshadowed this issue in an Interpreter post earlier this week.

Gender issues in the ADF: the other shoe drops

15 November 2013

The announcements over the last week that the Army has sacked six of the officers involved in the ‘Jedi Council’ and the ADFA cadet involved in the Skype scandal are very welcome.

For most Australians, the video footage of the Chief of Army David Morrison in July 2013 was thrilling, and it has since had over 1.3 million views. He was telling members of the so-called ‘Jedi Council’, senior officers who had shared footage of sexual encounters online without the women’s knowledge.

Those who think that is ok to behave in a way that demeans or exploits their colleagues have no place in this army…If that doesn’t suit you, get out.

But many of us have been waiting for the other shoe to drop, as no one was actually being sacked, and were worried that with the departure of Stephen Smith, the political pressure would cease. My assessment of the culture review process was that the ADF has wanted to deal with gender issues on a policy basis that treats the ADF as an exceptional institution, with as much discretion as possible. I thought the impulse for reform was forced on the ADF by media, political leadership and long-term advocacy.

The Commonwealth: a global safety network

15 November 2013

The Commonwealth and security are seldom words that inhabit the same sentence, let alone a discussion. Despite the Commonwealth’s vast network of nations in every habitable continent, ranging from developed, developing, and emerging economies, the world still tends to think locally, regionally, or simply to the United States for its strategic security solutions. ASPI should be congratulated for its recent work on the Anglosphere and what it means today, but the term should be opened up to include other Commonwealth partners. This is especially germane with the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) convening at the moment.

This is because a significant number of outmoded viewpoints still circulate when it comes to security. We’re witnessing the end of unilateralism under the auspices of the US. Despite its colossal ability to maintain the status quo, it appears to have lost the will to do so. Politically, it needs to act in consort with friendly powers but, as Syria has shown, such support is fast ebbing away.

China’s ‘leapfrogging’ in high performance computing

14 November 2013

In June 2013 China once again surprised the world scientific community by introducing the fastest supercomputer in the world, the Tianhe-2 or Milky Way-2.

TOP500 project lists the top 500 supercomputers of the world on the basis of a parameter called LINPACK benchmark. The biannual list is usually released in June and November. The benchmark was an idea conceived by Jack Dongarra. In simple terms, it’s the rate at which the supercomputer solves floating-point operations and is evaluated by making the supercomputer solve a dense system of linear equations.

Don’t look back: the fallacy of sunk costs

14 November 2013

Once again the pages of The Strategist are filled with a vigorous discussion of the future shape of Australia’s amphibious capability. It’s a debate well worth having, because the decisions that are made will potentially drive major procurements and/or restructuring of the joint command and control arrangements of the ADF. But I’ve had my say on those issues (here and here), so I’m not going to add more to that debate—at least for now.

But I’m struck by the criticism of Hugh White’s position that it’s revisiting decisions already made. The argument goes along the lines that billions have been spent and the LHDs are nearing delivery, so we should be talking about other acquisition decisions yet to be made.

Does collecting big data make us safer?

14 November 2013

The idea of Big data, the bane of privacy and civil liberty activists, now conjures up Edward Snowden, the NSA, and mass surveillance. It’s also regularly presented as a critical tool for national security. So does it really keep us safe?

Intelligence organisations argue that collecting big data helps keep us safe by providing the information to thwart terrorists and other nefarious actors. When we talk about big data, we are also talking about its collection and analysis. For organizations like the NSA, charged with the directive to ‘process, analyze, produce, and disseminate signals intelligence information and data,’ it is no surprise that big data represents a holy grail of sorts. But data alone isn’t an intelligence product; the organization, interpretation, and analysis of data is what’s important.