Australian Defence Force Journal, issue no. 190

At the time of publication the release of the 2013 Defence White Paper was pending, so the Board decided to publish a further selection of related articles in this issue, even though it meant deferring some articles and publishing several others via the Australian Defence College's website to the Commander's Paper series.

The first three articles in this edition of the ADFJ are recent speeches by the Service Chiefs. All three are pitched at the strategic/doctrinal level and expound the views of the Service Chiefs on the challenges and opportunities confronting the ADF—and Australia more broadly—in the 'Asian century'. The following article, by Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Stevens and Dr Haroro Ingram, addresses Defence's raison d'être, contending that Defence's 'black swan'—a defence of Australia campaign against conventional military forces—should continue to be the fundamental driver of all preparedness activities.

Three of the remaining eight articles—by Lieutenant Commander Josh Wilson, Major David Beaumont and Squadron Leader Adrian Reeve—are highly-graded papers completed while their authors were students on 2012 Australian Command and Staff College course. Two other articles draw lessons for contemporary operations from historical analyses. The first, by Colonel Graeme Sligo, has been awarded the 'best article' prize. It examines the counterinsurgency lessons that may be drawn from British operations on the North-West Frontier, along the border of Afghanistan and what is now Pakistan, from 1849 to 1947. The second, by Brigadier Mick Ryan, examines the US submarine campaign in the Pacific during the Second World War.

Linda McCann, a student on the 2012 Centre for Defence and Strategic Studies course at the Australian Defence College, examines Japan's energy security challenges in the aftermath of the March 2011 tsunami. With a similar geostrategic focus, but closer to home, Lieutenant Colonel Stephen Blair argues that Australia needs to enhance its longstanding bilateral relationship with PNG, to include a heightened role for the ADF. Finally, Lieutenant Colonel Michael Scott asserts that the ADF and allied militaries must urgently reassess their capability to operate in a degraded information environment, contending that current policy fails to address the possibility that an adversary may negate the information advantage of Australia and its allies.

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