We will know around Friday afternoon whether Australia has been successful in winning its bid for a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council. Having just returned from a trip to New York, the vibe I picked up there was cautious, perhaps even a little worried, about our chances. Our rivals for the seat, Finland and Luxembourg, have run effective campaigns and are not be underestimated: the outcome could be nail-bitingly close. Anthony Bergin and I wrote last week about why it’s very much in Australia’s interest to hold a seat on the Security Council. We are a middle power with global interests and being able to steer the UN—imperfect as it is—along tracks important to us is no small benefit. But good strategists also consider the down side risks: what happens if we lose the bid?

First up, recrimination will be the order of the day. A loss will mean that this weekend’s media will be full of astonished pundits expressing wonder about how it is that two of Europe’s minnows beat us to the seat: ‘Luxembourg, are you serious?’ It will be like losing the World Cup bid to Qatar. No attention will be paid to the fact that our competitors were campaigning for years before Australia started its bid. As the world is seen from New York, no one owes Australia a free lunch no matter how consequential we think we are. Although the Opposition has endorsed the bid in a low key way, a loss will lead to predictable charges of mismanagement. Some might wonder why the Prime Minister was bought so strongly and publicly into the last weeks of the campaign. Read more

I read with interest Robert Ayson’s take on the mending of relations between the United States and New Zealand. Rob believes that New Zealand is the prodigal son from the Good Book, welcomed home by the doting parent despite the other son’s (Australia’s) resentment. But there are three parables in Luke Chapter 15. And given the Land of the Long White Cloud’s heavy dependence upon four-legged beasts who are white and woolly, perhaps it might be appropriate to rehearse the parable of the lost sheep (Luke, 15: 4-7). The finding of the lost sheep is a metaphor for a sinner’s repentance; the lesson being that there is more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.

This message of a sinner’s repentance can also be found in the parable of the lost coin (Luke, 15: 8-10). And if Professor Ayson re-reads his own parable of the prodigal son I’m sure he will find a similar theme there too. The younger son tells his father than he has ‘sinned against heaven and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son’ (Luke, 15: 18-19).

All three parables make the same point: that the sinner who repents may be washed in the blood of the lamb. None says anything about sinners who don’t repent. Since New Zealand shows no sign of abandoning its anti-nuclear policy, perhaps we have to look for its ‘repentance’ in other areas. A case could be made that New Zealand has attempted to help carry some of the weight in Afghanistan and more so in the South Pacific. And Washington certainly has no pressing need to bring nuclear-armed vessels into New Zealand’s ports. But the return of strategic cooperation seems likely to be on a case by case basis.

On a final point, I would say that Rob is wrong if he believes that Australia resents—and opposes—New Zealand’s return. It is in Canberra’s interest to have Wellington on board in relation to common strategic interests, and for New Zealand to bring what weight and influence it can to shared positions. The brutal truth though, is that it can’t bring much weight—so it’s very much in Canberra’s interest, as in Washington’s, to know when and where Wellington sees itself as indulging in ‘riotous living’ (Luke, 15:13) and when and where it sees itself as a strategic player.

Rod Lyon is a non-residential fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.

In an age of increasingly competitive multilateralism, success will go to those countries best able to diversify their interests and manage a wide range of bilateral relationships. This will be no small challenge for Australia. We have a small and dramatically over-stretched diplomatic service and a tendency to think we carry more impact in foreign capitals than is really the case. Imagine, though, if an opportunity arose to build closer ties with an Asian country that is substantially democratic, with a largely free press, has a close defence association with the United States and significant economic potential of interest to Australian resource companies. There is such a country: Mongolia. Tomorrow, September 15, will mark the 40th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Canberra and Ulaanbaatar. In an ASPI Policy Analysis published today, Mendee Jargalsaikhan—a PhD student in politics at the University of British Columbia and a fellow of the Mongolian Institute for Strategic Studies—makes the case for Australia and Mongolia to strengthen their ties.

On defence and security, Mendee argues that the two countries would benefit from a closer exchange on North Asian security, noting that Mongolia has particularly close relations with both North and South Korea. He argues that peacekeeping training should become a focus for defence cooperation, and points out that Mongolia has deployed more than 6000 personnel to international peacekeeping operations, with 400 currently deployed with the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan.

When Mongolian Prime Minister Batbold visited Australia in February last year, a joint statement was issued saying that ‘Australia and Mongolia share common strategic interests and objectives in the Asia–Pacific region’. It makes sense to start exploring what can be made of these common interests and objectives. As Defence designs its own pivot to the region, it should establish a stronger connection with Mongolia. As a small first step towards closer strategic engagement, Defence should consider cross-accrediting its attaché in Seoul to Ulaanbaatar, as is already the case with Australia’s ambassador in South Korea.

Peter Jennings is executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.

The recent Senate committee report ‘Procurement procedures for Defence capital projects’ was naturally of great interest to us, concerned as it was with our core business. We weren’t dispassionate observers of the process either; we put in a submission and tendered some of our relevant work, and we appeared before the committee on occasion.

The Committee grappled with some of the perennial issues that surround Defence projects, and (in our view) through their recommendations put their finger squarely on the biggest challenges that face the Department:

The key recommendations deal with much needed organisational change directed at achieving the correct alignment of responsibilities and functions of relevant agencies, and providing them with the skills and resources they need to fulfil their obligations. They underscore the importance of Defence becoming a self critical, self evaluating and self correcting organisation.

In many ways, and as the Committee recognises, these observations are following a well-trodden path, behind many reviews of the acquisition, support and general management practices of the Department, including those by Kinnaird (2003), Mortimer (2008), Rizzo (2011), Cole (2011) and Black (2011). The alignment of responsibilities, functions and resources has been a common theme in those reports. The degree of contestability and rigour within the capability development process has been a subject that ASPI has visited in the past as well. Read more

The term ‘Indo-Pacific’ has recently slipped into the lexicon of Australian policymakers, in quiet supplement to ‘Asian Century’ and ‘Asia–Pacific Century’, with little questioning as to what this semantic shift actually means and achieves in strategic terms.

There’s nothing wrong with placing Australia in the spotlight and geographic centre of these two oceans and vast surrounding region; it cements Australia’s identity and role as a potential key actor in this emerging epoch, yet I would suggest that there is limited utility in defining Australian interests so broadly.

If you accept the broad concept of the ‘Indo-Pacific’—and there would be many that would stumble at this first hurdle—it would be hard to refute the importance of what happens both on land and within the maritime domain encapsulated by its vast boundaries (from the shores of East Africa to the western seaboard of the United States). What is of primary importance when defining our own region and area of strategic interest is our ability to influence and shape what happens within that region, and create favourable outcomes.

Key to this is presence, and presence credibility. Two core tools that enable states to project successfully are reflected in both the strength of their diplomatic representation (and overseas presence), and military strength and capabilities (including actual and perceived ability to have and sustain overseas presence). Geographically characterising and increasing Australia’s strategic region as the ‘Indo-Pacific’ would require quantum shifts, on both these fronts, in both will and capacity; two things that prima facie under the current environment look unlikely to happen. Read more