By Dougal Robertson & Chris McInnes

Australia’s commitment to nuclear-powered submarines confirms that, when it comes to military technology, there is the US defence industry, and then there is everyone else. 

It’s a prudent decision for the Commonwealth to take a long-term position on a proven weapon system that will deliver ancillary national security benefits and access to new technology over the next 20 years which will bind us into deeply-beneficial intelligence sharing arrangements and industrial cooperation with the UK and US. But what can Australia do to advance its cause in the next five or 10 years? 

Australia’s national security enterprise must accelerate change to capitalise on the AUKUS opportunities. This involves developing inputs like a nuclear workforce, but the broader Australian national security operating system and infrastructure needs attention too, as all the inputs in the world won’t help you if the operating system isn’t optimised for the prevailing geo-strategic circumstances. The good news is Australia can learn from the US and UK, as both countries have decades of experience in building and breaking national security systems. 

Our open-source analysis suggests the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) People’s Liberation Army (PLA) may perceive a technological advantage over the US military in key areas that could be used in a PLA invasion of Taiwan. But the geopolitical trigger remains opaque, and military action would require rapid action and a short series of engagements to prevent the US from intervening in the Taiwan Strait long enough for the PLA to achieve the CCP’s goals and gain de facto control of Taiwan. 

PLA advances in anti-ship and air-to-air missile technology, counter-stealth radars, airborne and space-based surveillance systems, and ballistic missiles could raise the cost of US intervention to the point where a nuclear threshold may be reached. The CCP’s likely reasoning is the US will not cross this threshold for Taiwan. 

The size and scale of American industry, the depth and breadth of Western technical education, and the stiffening resistance to CCP over-reach in Asia, and in the Pacific and Indian Oceans means Beijing probably thinks the PLA’s advantage – whether it exists or not – is temporary. The CCP may feel compelled to act before it is too late: in years, not decades. 

This possibility engages US force-planners. The US military divides the globe into Combatant Commands, or COCOMs in military parlance. The US Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM) is headquartered in Hawaii and its commander, Admiral John Aquilino, represents US strategic interests in the Pacific and eastern Indian Oceans. 

Speaking at a change of command ceremony in April this year, Aquilino said, “the Indo-Pacific is the most consequential region for America’s future, hosts our greatest security challenge, and remains the priority theatre for the United States”. He added, “we are committed to providing the deterrence needed to prevent great power conflict and, should it be directed, to fight tonight and win”.

If the ADF is prepared to uphold regional stability and the rule of law – and an invasion of Taiwan would be considered an even more egregious breach of international law than Saddam Hussein’s “annexation” of Kuwait in 1991 – then it too must be prepared to ‘fight tonight’. Based on equipment and relationships, the Royal Australian Air Force, Royal Australian Navy, and agencies of the National Intelligence Community would be the first elements of Australia’s national security enterprise to integrate and operate with the US military. 

But is Defence and the national security community ready to ‘fight tonight’? Ongoing reform in three key areas is required to ensure Australia becomes a credible military partner capable of integrating into a coalition and defending Australian citizens from external aggression.  

First, Australia’s national security enterprise must fully commit to the new strategic paradigm. This will be expensive and will force the clear-eyed evaluation of equipment, weapons, and support systems purchased or approved during the years of discretionary ‘boots on the ground’ counterinsurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan. It may even mean the cancellation of projects only just delivered or not yet completed. 

These decisions are hard to make because money committed will be seen as wasted. Reaction to the submarine announcement shows the sunk cost fallacy is alive and well, but it is a fallacy and should not be the basis for decisions on national security.

Second, Australia must update policy, procedures, and processes (including training) that are no longer fit for purpose. For example, distinctions between intelligence operations conducted by civilian agencies and military operations by the ADF cannot be permitted to impede the flow of information. The US has mostly progressed from the idea that military
and intelligence activities are somehow unique and separate (the so called ‘Title 10-Title 50 debate’), to a more results-oriented approach, while still maintaining regulation and Congressional oversight. 

Australia’s national security enterprise must remove non-technical obstructions preventing intelligence flowing directly to and from airborne cockpits, afloat combat information centres, and across networks. As the ADF’s predominant operator of in-service advanced technical systems, the RAAF should lead the ADF in breaking down those silos inhibiting tactical exploitation of national capabilities and the ‘national-to-tactical’ information flow. A corollary benefit will be more realistic training and operational plans that demand and enable full national-to-tactical integration.

Third, immediate technical solutions are needed for hardened, distributed, and highly-secure information networks. Effective and survivable communications are neither cheap nor efficient because they make no compromises up and down the hardware and software chain. But without wired and wireless communication networks that can function under constant cyber, electromagnetic, and physical attack, Australia’s national security enterprise will be unable to synchronise as a system and exploit its exquisite platforms and weapons technology, including full interoperability with the US military. 

The tough-but-fair termination of the Attack class program proved the willingness to break free of sunk costs. AUKUS and the nuclear submarines show a capacity to change course. This watershed moment should create new energy and freedom to remove technical and non-technical impediments to full national-to-tactical integration across the national security enterprise. 

These steps can and should be taken so that we’re ready for what AUKUS delivers and, more importantly, prepared to ‘fight tonight’.  

This article appeared in the Sep-Dec 2021 issue of ADBR.