The first half of my adult life was spent as a professional army officer—a Duntroon graduate in the Australian Intelligence Corps. For the second half of my adult life I’ve been a businessman, based in Perth. Yet I have remained a curious military observer and what I’ve seen often hasn’t impressed.

The Special Air Service Regiment in those post-Vietnam days was certainly elite, but still part of the Australian Army. Its look and feel was jungle green. Its role was strategic, combining surveillance and intelligence with counterterrorism. It was not an uber-infantry battalion.

When the SAS deployed to the Middle East soon after the 9/11 terror attacks, it was still low key. The Tampa affair was the beginning of the slippery slope that has got us to where we are now. In 2001, Prime Minister John Howard, facing defeat, needed to swing the Australian populace. He committed the SAS to board and secure a foreign-flagged vessel of peace, a blatant political mission to ensure the refugees it carried did not arrive on home soil.

Charged up with a political victory, Australia’s political leaders became super-romanced with the power of the SAS in the national psyche. Soon the SAS was deployed in larger numbers to both Afghanistan and Iraq. It became a go-to tool of Australian foreign policy. Its funding skyrocketed and the SAS Resources Fund, a non-military entity, received huge sums. The SAS was developing independent financial means, albeit for welfare, but why should that be the case? Aren’t all Australian soldiers equal in status and need?

The SAS was becoming a brand. It was moving away from the army, culturally, operationally and financially.

Worse still, it began to do very un-SAS things. Australia had six infantry battalions whose role was being subordinated to the now mega-SAS infantry unit, and the peacetime public had no understanding of the change occurring. The rotation problem, which led to the embedding of the warrior culture, could have been easily fixed by reducing the size of the SAS contingents and deploying more regular infantry who were trained and equipped to clear villages, conduct searches and sniper operations, and seize and hold ground. Many times while pondering things in front of my TV, I thought: Why is the SAS even in that village? Shouldn’t they be on the hilltop watching and reporting, avoiding contact?

Interestingly, the Rudd–Gillard–Rudd governments that followed Howard’s also loved the brand association and kept the Kool-Aid flowing stronger than ever.

Then there’s the officer and non-commissioned officer relationship—that’s majors and captains versus sergeants and corporals.

The army is not like the police force, which has a single thread from constable to commissioner. It has a two-stream system. Officers go to Duntroon and then climb the ladder to, hopefully, become generals. So, a captain will probably do one tour, maybe two, in Afghanistan in the fighting part of his career.

On the other hand, an SAS soldier might make sergeant when he’s 26 and have 10 to 15 years of constant rotational fighting ahead of him. Moreover, if you keep the same squadron in Afghanistan and rotate people through it, it’s very clear that the sergeants and corporals will feel that they are the true custodians of the regiment. They largely pay lip service to inexperienced young officers who are most likely on their first tour, or the slightly less young majors in the command centre.

Operationally, the SAS works in patrols of four to six men and there’s rarely an officer among them. This is different from the rest of the army, where an officer is almost always within 100 metres of a soldier or helicopter or truck. An SAS patrol can be isolated for weeks, save occasional radio situation reports. This is where sinister events occurred.

So, on operations the sergeants are running the show. Officers are flowing through and out. Some do come back to command, but they rarely step onto red earth; they are simply too valuable. They would be reticent to take on a career-ending reportable-abuse event—or maybe they should have?

Officers and soldiers remain on a first-name basis in the SAS, so picture how that would work in the field. Everyone is a mate.

Moreover, as the then head of Special Operations Command, Major General Jeff Sengelman, noted in his tour report of 2016, back in Swanbourne the home base had gone ‘off the rails’, with soldiers socialising with ‘bikies, bad boy footballers and topless bar maids’ in the other ranks’ mess and club. This is not how the army is run on the east coast.

The SAS had gone rogue mongrel. Financed by ever-growing taxpayer funds, its soldiers were earning huge salaries and massive tax-free operational allowances. It was a busted game that was always going to go wrong. Worse still, hidden away in beachside Swanbourne, it was only ever exposed to fleeting oversight from visiting senior officers and it became a source of public relations grabs for local ministers and aspiring backbenchers who dreamed of nothing more than an invite to the officers’ mess and a photo op for the local community newspaper. Just don’t let anyone look under the bonnet.

The SAS is part of the Australian Army; it is not an unanswerable mob of military entrepreneurs. It should be sent back to the hilltops to watch, lurk and report and leave the contact battle to the exemplary infantry battalions of the Royal Australian Regiment.

As Australia comes to grips with accusations that some of its elite soldiers committed war crimes in Afghanistan, a catch cry for certain commentators is that the ‘fog of war’ explains, justifies and possibly excuses the alleged atrocities that have come to light. The term seeks to capture the uncertainty regarding one’s own capability, the adversary’s capability and the adversary’s intent during an engagement, operation or campaign.

The fog of war is woefully inadequate to explain alleged war crimes that were deliberate, targeted and repeated.

‘Culture’ will feature heavily in analyses of ‘what went wrong’ in Australia’s Special Operations Command (SOCOMD).

In 2015, I commenced the SOCOMD review. Over the past 10 years I have led more than 40 reviews and studies dealing with many aspects of the ‘culture’ of the Australian Defence Force and broader Department of Defence. Conducting research in like organisations (emergency services, for example) and in other militaries has added to my thinking on the value of culture as a construct for understanding organisational or institutional issues.

Does a focus on culture provide clarity or obscurity? Does it lead to, or is it a barrier to, accountability? How do you know when you’ve achieved cultural change? In what other ways can deeply entrenched organisational issues be analysed and addressed?

This ‘fog of culture’ has created a barrier to achieving the desired cultural change that Defence has sought for some time.

This fog is made up of uncertainty about what culture and cultural change mean to all of the people involved. The fog has led to a diffusion of accountability, where cultural problems, so entrenched and based in history and tradition, are inherited but not owned. It has also led to an inability to ask the right questions, and confusion about what to measure and monitor in order to capture and evaluate change. Emerging from the fog of uncertainty surrounding culture are the loudest voices, the ‘hot’ issues, and individual change ‘champions’. But these do not necessarily lead to sustained, or ‘successful’, organisational change.

This fog is not unique to Defence. It is experienced by many organisations seeking to overturn outdated, yet entrenched, organisational practices, structures and norms.

With a decade of solid effort focused on changing Defence culture following the Skype scandal, why did the harmful aspects of special forces cultural issues remain out of sight and unaddressed?

Before the ‘culture problems’ of special forces were centre stage, gender, or more specifically the treatment of women, had been Defence’s signature cultural change focus.

The treatment of women, as a minority group, has undoubtedly been a systemic Defence issue. But more difficult problems, of which women were but one component, revolve around the systemic and symbolic marginalisation of all who fall out of a very small percentage of ‘pointy-end warfighters’—those who are ‘othered’.

In 2013, the then chief of the army, Lieutenant General David Morrison, publicly urged those who treated women disrespectfully to ‘get out’, but he never said that to those who treated reservists poorly, nor did he advocate on behalf of bullied Defence public servants. Those are much harder cultural issues to understand and change, and their root cause is not merely a lack of critical mass. Their manifestations are insidious and so deeply entrenched that they were not even mentioned as cultural issues among the suite of eight ‘culture reviews’ conducted in 2011–12—the same time that some of the worst atrocities were occurring in Afghanistan.

What was interesting in those reviews were the silences—about the reserves, the lack of cultural and linguistic diversity, the privileged norms of special forces, the sometimes toxic relationship between the ADF and Defence civilians. These issues have continued to frame the organisational culture yet have remained on the periphery for consideration.

Issues of gender are critically important. But what has been missing is an underpinning theory of change. Strategies and approaches that view women as a ‘problem’ to be solved are themselves deeply problematic. And the fervour with which gender became the focus had a price: a narrowed view of the cultural landscape.

The first question I ask when approached to do a culture review is for the problem to be described without using the word ‘culture’. The word becomes an easy proxy for the hard to articulate problem, which is usually something that is deeply ingrained, or political, or otherwise too hard to see from an internal vantage point. It has come to mean everything, and therefore nothing.

Abuse of power and the normalisation of deviance are at the heart of the ‘cultural issues’ that have plagued the ADF and militaries more broadly. In fact, this can be said of all institutions grappling with the same problems: histories of abuse and secrecy, sexual harassment, problems of diversity and inclusion.

In one sense the construct of culture has become a scapegoat for uncomfortable reform—it’s easier to point the finger at a ‘what’ rather than a ‘who’.

Questions about conflicts of interest have been asked of both the chief of the ADF, General Angus Campbell, and the army chief, Lieutenant General Rick Burr, due to their backgrounds in special operations. At one end of the spectrum, I am the ‘female civilian feminist’ criticised for not having enough knowledge of the reality of special operations forces to provide credible analysis. At the other are two men who are criticised for being ‘too close’. However, just as being an outsider actually enabled my hearing and reporting of the truth, Campbell’s and Burr’s vested interest in, and proximity to, special operations means they did something about it, unlike others before them.

Australian special forces have come a long way since their inception and a long way since 2012, when the worst of the war crimes is alleged to have occurred. I am proud to work with the Australian special forces of today. That doesn’t mean I shy away from asking difficult questions, or that I would be reluctant to disclose ugly truths. On the contrary.

I know my place as a privileged outsider to the defence organisation. I have spent almost a decade researching various facets of it, and have watched the anticipation of reviews, and the frustration and apathy of change and implementation fatigue. I have invested too much personally and professionally to not also be invested in the organisation’s transparency, accountability and change from this point forward.

The fog of culture will likely continue to hinder meaningful change. But now, with serious allegations of war crimes allowing other complex cultural issues to join gender at the front of the room, the prospects for meaningful and successful change have never been greater.

I have experienced utter disbelief at learning of the alleged atrocities and witnessed firsthand the psychological impact on witnesses, bystanders and whistleblowers, and the shame carried by those who aren’t associated in any way other than as members of the ADF. Yet, I am optimistic. I have had more time than most outsiders to process and reflect on what has occurred and have seen the want for change internally. But more than that, it is the genuine grief from defence leaders that has shaped my outlook. Grief for unit legacies shattered, for the misplaced trust they placed in many, and for esprit de corps. And above all, grief for the pervasive moral injury these crimes have caused. These are not the emotions of hypermasculine military men, desperate to hide war crimes.

I feel justified in the hope that Australians will increasingly trust special forces, the ADF and the broader defence organisation to represent the best in all of us.

The Australian Army had been focused intensely on rebuilding the cultural and ethical base of its special forces even before shocking allegations emerged that soldiers carried out multiple war crimes in Afghanistan.

New South Wales Supreme Court judge Paul Brereton, a major general in the Army Reserve, has spent four years investigating claims that members of the Special Operations Task Group breached the laws of armed conflict between 2005 and 2016.

Army commander Lieutenant General Rick Burr tells The Strategist he has not yet seen Justice Brereton’s report, as the inquiry is independent and ongoing. But as a special forces officer he finds the allegations deeply troubling. ‘These are extremely serious allegations and not reflective of who we are, and who we must be as a professional institution. We are all determined to establish the facts so that we can act on them.’

Burr has written today to all Australian soldiers explaining why the investigation was launched and telling them to prepare for serious findings. ‘This is not who we are and not what we stand for’, he says.

‘I am also concerned about the impact of those findings on those of you who served in Afghanistan and other operations and who served as professionals with pride and integrity. You did the right thing. You and your families should be proud of what you did and be confident to tell that story.’

He urges soldiers to reach out if they need help and says that support will be provided by the army.

Brereton’s initial brief from the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force (IGADF) was to ascertain whether there was truth in widespread rumours, but the result was much worse than most imagined. In February, the inspector-general’s annual report revealed that there were 55 separate incidents or issues under inquiry, ‘predominantly unlawful killings of persons who were non-combatants or were no longer combatants, but also cruel treatment of such persons’.

Defence Minister Linda Reynolds said weeks ago that the investigation was nearing its conclusion and warned that Australians would be dismayed by its findings.

ADF commanders have been working to rectify what they’ve described as ‘catastrophic cultural and professional shortfalls’ within Special Operations Command (SOCOMD) and ‘corrosive’ friction between the major special forces units, the Special Air Service Regiment and the commandos. Under the pressure of 20 intense rotations in Afghanistan over 11 years, the special forces had become isolated from the rest of the army.

They say this decline has been reversed and a restructured SOCOMD is now positioned to implement the Afghanistan inquiry’s findings and to rebuild the trust of government, the defence organisation and the public.

Identifying what went wrong on the Afghanistan missions, how deep a distorted warrior ethos went within the SAS, straightening out that ethos and ensuring that what appears to have been an entrenched culture of impunity in key parts of the special forces doesn’t emerge again, is a priority for the army.

Burr, who commanded the SAS in 2003 and 2004, says that the since the army became aware of the allegations it has focused strongly on changing elements of the culture in the special forces and introduced strong ethics training with the help of outside specialists.

‘We’re holding ourselves to account’, he says. ‘We asked for this inquiry when we became aware of rumours around these matters. We needed to understand exactly what had happened and an independent inquiry was the only way to gain a clear picture.’

Burr says the most important job now facing him and ADF chief General Angus Campbell is managing this issue and they will consider the report’s findings in detail.

He says he is concerned about the impact the findings will have on the thousands of men and women who have served in Afghanistan and who have behaved impeccably. ‘Most people in Afghanistan did the right thing. The veterans and their families need to know that. Waiting for this report is exacting a very heavy toll.’

Burr says the army has not been sitting back waiting for the Afghanistan report to be delivered.

After a continuous operational effort for the army and the ADF since East Timor in 1999, its leadership has focused on the need to consolidate lessons from operations and to implement reforms to be prepared for future operations.

Over the past five years, SOCOMD had been reintegrated within the broader army structure and the command had embraced significant organisational, cultural and capability reforms. ‘The leadership, structures and plans are now in place to assure the momentum of this substantial cultural and professional transformation’, Burr says.

‘Today our special forces are ready and deployable. They are a critical capability and there are many challenges on the horizon that we will need them for.’

Along with comprehensive reforms, the natural flow of new personnel through the ADF means that 80% of those serving in the SAS now had not deployed to Afghanistan in a special operations task group, Burr says. ‘That reflects how quickly we can refresh and regenerate capability and that gives us a strong platform to make sure we are embracing and inculcating these new initiatives and making sure that we are living these expectations every day.’

In 2015, the then special forces commander, Major General Jeff Sengelman, was concerned about the persistent allegations of special forces atrocities and raised them with Campbell, who was then chief of the army. Campbell, now chief of the ADF, is also a former special forces commander.

They commissioned sociologist Samantha Crompvoets to interview soldiers from the special forces and other ADF units and members of agencies who worked with them.

Crompvoets confirmed that there appeared to be serious problems with the behaviour of some members of the Special Operations Task Group in Afghanistan that may have extended to unsanctioned and illegal violence.

In 2018, Burr asked former ASIO chief David Irvine to review the comprehensive reforms that had been put in place in SOCOMD and gave him unfettered access to all aspects of the command.

Irvine found that after a decade of constant combat in Afghanistan and the Middle East, coupled with its other responsibilities, SOCOMD was ‘worn out and run down’. He warned that in an elite unit, esprit de corps could quickly turn into arrogance. In a closely knit, inward-looking unit, ‘can do’ could become ‘only we can do’. Australia’s special forces had to be well grounded and humble, he said.

Irvine stressed the importance of a ‘redemption initiative’ introduced by Sengelman which provided SOCOMD members with the opportunity to confess to transgressions and hold themselves to account. That enabled personnel who had conducted themselves in ways inconsistent with army values to be ‘managed out’.

He noted that the culture among some soldiers was such that they did not report serious crimes to senior officers, ‘sometimes for fear of ostracisation—or worse—within the unit’. Others did take the risk and spoke up, enabling the IGADF to investigate.

Burr says the army’s approach to bystander behaviour is very clear. ‘It’s critical to our profession that people call out bad behaviour when they see it. Concealing misconduct is not acceptable and does not align with our values. We want our people to call it out so it can be acted on quickly.

‘Moral courage and integrity are critical to our profession, and especially so for the sensitive capabilities held in our special forces. Army must be a safe environment where people feel empowered to come forward, confident that army will take action against reports of misconduct.

‘This culture is essential to being a trusted, respected, safe and high-performing organisation at every level.’

Asked if the fact that the special forces operate in small groups outside the immediate view of commanders played a role in what has happened and meant that the model was no longer sustainable, Burr says that the model does work and needs to be sustained.

‘It has delivered us enormous success over many years and it’s a model that is used in many armies and, in particular, in special forces.

‘The Australian Army relies on small teams. They have to be well led and they can make a big difference on the ground, whether that is supporting bushfire or counter-Covid operations, or warfighting. That is our command and control philosophy. In special forces it is an imperative.

‘They need to be able to act with autonomy, to take advantage of a local situation to achieve their mission’, Burr says.

‘For this operating model to continue to remain strong, trust in our junior leaders is critical. We must continue to invest in leadership, accountability and culture—which are my three key themes—and we will make our army as effective as it can be.’

One of Irvine’s recommendations was the appointment of a senior officer with considerable command experience from outside SOCOMD as an independent special forces adviser.

Major General Shane Caughey was appointed to that role in 2019 and he supports and monitors the implementation of reforms. ‘As a mentor, he’s lending his insight to SOCOMD and he’s an independent sounding board for me on special forces matters’, Burr says.

In any future operation, the adviser would ensure that SOCOMD maintained good governance and oversight.

A former warrant officer of the army has been appointed to ensure clear communications between the adviser and SOCOMD’s other ranks.

In March this year, to again assure himself that the necessary reforms were being implemented, Burr asked Irvine to re-examine the progress of the cultural and professional reforms within SOCOMD. Irvine concluded that the command was on track to meet its targets of major renewal and regeneration but the challenge remained substantial.

The three main goals were to deal with the most serious issues from Afghanistan, to reset the command to meet Australia’s special operations requirements and to prepare it for the changing strategic environment to come.

In terms of cultural change, there remained some pockets of resistance among old hands in the units, and these had been described as ‘pockets of permafrost’. And while pleasing progress had been made to restore the unit’s ethical base, more work could be done.

‘Mr Irvine gave me independent assurance that we are indeed doing all of the right things but never to be complacent, to absolutely stay focused on the further implementation and consolidation of these initiatives, which I’m determined to do’, Burr says.

‘And what I see every day in our army is truly inspiring—selfless service, good people helping others, soldiers doing exactly what our nation expects. But if people do misstep there are structures in place to take action quickly. It is understood that behaviour inconsistent with our values is not tolerated.’

As the army prepares for the release of Brereton’s report, the existence has emerged of an Instagram account tagged ‘State Sanctioned Violence’ which the ABC reported was run by one former and one serving special forces soldier. The site reportedly had thousands of followers and carried a photograph of a bumper sticker declaring: ‘Make Diggers Violent Again’.

Burr says the army is investigating. ‘I want to make it clear, this behaviour, this attitude, is not tolerated and does not align with the army’s values. Individuals who act contrary to our values compromise the respect and trust of their mates, their chain of command and the Australian public. If these allegations are substantiated, those at fault will be held accountable.’

He says that regardless of these challenges, the whole army is focused on strengthening the individual character of all soldiers and ensuring that they have a values-based approach to everything they do.

‘A “Good Soldiering” framework has been designed to ensure that the army builds leaders of character who make good decisions, who always expect the best of themselves and of their teammates and collectively build high-performing teams, teams based on trust and always operating in a legal, ethical and responsible way in everything that we do’, Burr says.

‘I want all Australians to be confident in their army. We remain resolute in our commitment to serve the nation.’

Media coverage and public discussion of alleged breaches of the laws of war by Australian special forces is heavily focused on individual personalities. Little attention has been paid to longstanding collective, structural and cultural drivers, or to decisions made over decades by the chain-of-command up to cabinet level.

After World War II, reservist commando companies were raised in Melbourne and Sydney in the mid-1950s and tasked with maintaining the army’s capacity for raiding from the sea or by parachute.

Britain’s re-forming of its Special Air Service regiment during the Malayan Emergency led to Australia raising its first full-time special forces unit, the 1st Special Air Services Company, in 1957. This became the 1st Special Air Service Regiment in 1964.

While sharing many attributes, the reservist commandos and the full-time SASR naturally developed cultural cleavages based on separate roles and conceptual development, army–army reserve distinctions, and then legislative restrictions limiting the employment of reserve units short of major war.

A further factor stemmed from the decision to base 1SAS Company in Perth. Both West Australian political pressure, and the perceived need to be based near the sea and a Royal Australian Air Force airfield, meant Campbell Barracks at Swanbourne seemed ideal.

This decision has had cultural and professional consequences. Over decades an elite unit developed, sometimes in relative isolation, from the rest of the army and the defence force. It’s also long been the army’s only full-time combat unit in WA and has much support among WA politicians and society.

In the early years, isolation was tempered by being part of the Royal Australian Regiment and, later, the respect the SASR won operationally in Borneo and Vietnam, mainly in their primary role of long-range reconnaissance. In Vietnam, SASR squadrons came under the command of the 1st Australian Task Force, as all units did, and did not have separate chain-of-command or tasking.

In the decades following the Vietnam War, the reservist commandos (who’d not been used there) remained focused on direct-action tasks. The SASR initially struggled to adapt its highly successful jungle warfare methodologies for long-range patrolling to strategic doctrine then focused on defending the Australian continent, especially our large and arid north.

In 1979 the contingency task of assisting civil police with assaults on terrorist strongholds during hostage incidents added a significant and burdensome role. Special recovery roles naturally followed. Significant resourcing eventually flowed, as did ministerial interest and great public curiosity.

The counterterrorist role also led to personnel receiving additional financial allowances tailored to very high levels of readiness, additional training and dangerous conditions. This added a financial incentive to the general unwillingness to serve elsewhere in the army once soldiers and non-commissioned officers had won a place in an elite unit.

The Directorate of Special Action Forces was created in 1979 to lead the SASR, the reserve commando units and, initially, Norforce as per the defence-of-Australia doctrine. This creation of a quasi-brigade headquarters effectively broke the last technical control link with the conventional infantry.

In 1981 the commando companies were grouped to form the 1st Commando Regiment with a full-time commanding officer who was often from the SASR. A full-time commando regiment, now known as 2 Commando Regiment, was formed in 1997.

Operations in East Timor, Iraq and Afghanistan saw DSAF morph into Special Operations Command. Its command level influentially rose from brigadier to major general, largely as the result of an election promise rather than an ADF decision.

Our Special Operations Task Group in Uruzgan combined both SASR and commando elements. It was under local Australian command but tasking was increasingly integrated with coalition special forces arrangements. Some physical segregation at Tarin Kowt, between the SOTG and other ADF elements, also hampered wider interactions.

In Iraq and Afghanistan, concern about possible political blowback from Australian casualties led to a ministerial preference for using special forces units instead of conventional ones. Given their necessarily much smaller numbers relative to conventional forces, this meant a high operational tempo, though tours were shorter than for conventional troops.

In special forces units there’s naturally a high dependence on small-group cohesion. However, throughout a career, officers tend to be posted in and out of the unit far more often than NCOs and soldiers.

With high operational tempos, dependence on group culture tends to increase. The professional continuity provided by longer-serving NCOs and soldiers is a pillar of unit resilience. But, if a culture becomes too elitist or inward-focused, wider perspective and accountability risks can develop.

The SASR has a high ratio of senior NCOs to officers because most of its small-group patrol operations are necessarily led by them and, in Afghanistan, were often dispersed geographically. Commando units tend to operate in larger groups, with a higher likelihood of on-scene command decisions being made by officers and more senior ones at that.

The interplays of rank, responsibility, perspective and accountability can vary between the two main types of special forces units. Unit cultural longevity also plays a part. Since 1999 and especially in the period from 2007 to 2013, a combination of factors seems to have been at play:

• Australia tried to fight modern wars without a whole-of-nation focus and commensurate community engagement. Unlike previous wars, much greater reliance was placed on special forces rather than conventional forces.
• Australia sent its special forces personnel ‘to the well too often’. The high operational tempo taxed individuals psychologically, pressured their families, stressed unit cultural norms, strained unit resilience and seems to have diluted accountability mechanisms.
• There was governmental reluctance to take coalition responsibility for Uruzgan Province after our Dutch partners left in 2010.
• Highly motivated and highly trained special forces personnel were finally able to undertake a range of the combat tasks they’d long prepared for, and they performed very professionally. Units were keen to prove their ‘tier-one’ special forces status to allies.
• SASR elements were used for direct-action tasks (principally a commando role) as well as covert reconnaissance. While good for morale and individual skills in the short term, this risked necessarily distinct specialisations.
• High operational tempo fostered both worthy and risky elements of elite-unit culture. As did regular tax-free pay and allowances when deployed, protected-identity status and public curiosity about high-security operations. Individual and collective recognition of these risks became obscured.
• The war in Afghanistan was fought under particularly difficult operational, legal and environmental conditions. Afghan society is riven with major and often intractable socio-cultural divisions.
• Enemy personnel were and remain often difficult to distinguish from the general populace. Even if captured, they could not be easily interned by international forces for more than three days. As capture invariably involved life-or-death risks for our personnel, the ‘catch and release’ situation was professionally and morally frustrating.

The ADF is the disciplined defence force of a democracy and rightly subject to the rule of law. Our troops and their leaders are rightly accountable for their combat actions, even in difficult situations. And our political leaders are also responsible for their decisions.

But great care must be exercised in publicly judging whether allegations of misconduct or breaches of the laws of war are valid or not. Analysis of why they may have occurred must acknowledge the actual context surrounding them.

Neither simplistically excusing possible fault by claiming ‘bad things happen in war’, nor context-free criticism of our troops using peacetime civil standards, meet the mark.

All allegations and any consequences need to account for complex structural causes stretching back to the mid-1950s. These include decisions made by the highest levels of government—particularly those that led to overdependence on special forces personnel in meeting Australia’s contemporary strategic challenges.