The RAAF is a very fine air force, skilled and experienced, well on its way to becoming a true fifth generation force and either equipped with or set to acquire some very advanced platforms. But what if things don’t go to plan?
Throughout history, military forces have been surprised because the enemy used new and different weapons or tactics.
This very topic was examined at the recent Air Power Conference. Titled Air power in a Disruptive World, the two-day conference featured a diverse range of speakers, discussing a range of potential disruptors.
Chief of Air Force Air Marshal Leo Davies presented the opening address, this was absolutely an age of disruption and nowhere was this more evident than in our own region.
Airpower characteristics of reach, speed and precision effects remained important elements of a nation’s defence strategy, he said.
“The question for us to ponder at this 2018 Air Power conference is whether we are postured to apply this significant capability in a way that counters these disruptors,” he said.
But more nations are using their growing wealth to invest in high-end warfighting capabilities, challenging the historical western advantage.
“Investments in stealth, networks, ISR and precision weapons are no longer a guarantee of capability overmatch. We now need to seek alternate solutions to reinstate a military superiority,” he said.
Air Marshal Davies said the RAAF was highly capable but it was facing the greatest evolution of airpower in its history. Despite those challenges, we were not destined for war.
“But the complexity of the environment and severity of the possible consequences means we cannot be complacent,” he said.
Chief of Joint Operations Vice Admiral David Johnston said he feared what had been learned over the last couple of decades of operations could be misleading.
“We have enjoyed, generally, an uninterrupted electromagnetic spectrum. We haven’t had to worry about air superiority. Sea control when we have needed to move equipment around to various areas of operation has been inherently available to us,” he said. “We’ve got to used to working in that environment and I’m very uncertain that that is the environment that our future operations, cyber or otherwise, will be performed in.”
Defence Minister Marise Payne said the world had been characterised by unprecedented technological disruption which was affecting all parts of society including the military.
The Minister said Australia was a large country with a small population which took an active role in the Asia-Pacific region as well as globally.
“In what is a period of rapid change, we must continue to embrace the benefits of innovation, and this has a number of implications for Air Force,” she said.
Senator Payne said air power could no longer be viewed in isolation and it must be integrated. New aircraft, including F-35, Poseidon and Wedgetail, would underpin creation of a fifth generation force. However there were risks to this comprehensive embrace of technology.
“Twenty years ago, our thoughts would not necessarily have gone to the need to protect our aircraft from cyber security threats. But that is exactly what we are now doing for our F-35s and other aircraft,” she said.
AI
And 20 years back, the idea that artificial intelligence (AI) was a serious consideration for national security might have been regarded as something from a Hollywood movie.
“But, today in 2018, we find ourselves discussing these matters with the consideration and attention that they rightfully deserve,” she said.
Marc Ablong, Defence Department acting deputy secretary for strategic policy and intelligence, said the strategic environment was changing at a rate faster than expected in the 2016 Defence White Paper.
He said new technology such as hypersonic weapons, advanced materials, autonomous systems and artificial intelligence, quantum computing, biotechnology, and augmented reality were now starting to feature in the military environment.
“The fundamental question you have got to ask yourself is at what point are the very exquisite and very expensive capabilities that we are acquiring in the white paper overtaken in terms of their military comparative advantage by some of those new technologies and new capabilities,” he said.
Ablong said he didn’t want to leave the impression that we’re all doomed or that the outlook is particularly dark and bleak.
“But there is a fundamental question about how long that is going to continue to be the case and at what point we will need to start thinking about a realignment of those three elements of strategy, capability and resources,” he said.
Almost every aspect of defence involves energy, whether it’s fuel for Abrams tanks, guided missile destroyers or F-35 fighters or electricity to power computer systems. But what happens if either is in short supply or worse, runs out?
Retired Deputy chief of Air Force Air Vice-Marshal John Blackburn put the problem succinctly. He said national security depended on energy security but the government took the view that this was the responsibility of industry while industry said it was a responsibility of government.
“What is it that we know, that gives us so much confidence that we don’t have to mandate stocks, we don’t have to hold stocks, and we don’t need a refining industry, when we’re at the end of a very long supply chain,” he said. “We’re 100 per cent reliant on the market and there is no plan B. If there’s a market failure, we’re stuffed.”
Many nations maintain strategic fuel reserves, just in case. The US has the largest, more than 700 million barrels of oil stored in four underground facilities and able to replace around two months of imports.
Australia has no dedicated strategic reserve and is almost wholly dependent on imports. What’s in country might last perhaps three weeks. AVM Blackburn said he had discussed this with oil company executives, with one saying energy security wasn’t his job. Government officials said if there was an oil shortage they would just increase imports.
In essence, government thinks industry will take care of the problem but industry sees government’s role as ensuring supply in the case of market failure with fingers pointed at one another rather than at a potential solution.
Different perspective
Australia sees the world a certain way but keynote speaker Bilahari Kausikan provided a useful reminder than even our close neighbours don’t necessarily see things the way we do.
Kausikan, chairman of the Middle East Institute at the National University of Singapore, presented a regional perspective on some global developments viewed with alarm in Australia and elsewhere.
He said the US and China were changing and changing the world and in absolute terms both would remain substantial powers.
“Simply put the US under President Trump is not as bad as the American media and large parts of the American establishment, still anguishing over his unexpected victory, portrays,” he said. “China under Xi Jinping is not the juggernaut that the Communist Party’s propaganda apparatus would have us believe. This again ought to be obvious but the obvious is clouded by the emotional shock of Trump’s election and the confidence with which Xi presents China’s ambition for a new era.”
Kausikan said the South China Sea had become something of a proxy for the contest between American and Chinese ideas for regional order and it had turned into a stalemate.
“Nobody can make the Chinese drop their claims to almost the entire South China Sea or make them give up the artificial islands they've constructed and throw the sand back into the sea,” he said.
China would surely deploy military assets onto the islands, perhaps periodically, maybe in time permanently.
“But crucially, China cannot stop the US and its allies operating in, through, and over the South China Sea without risking war. If war breaks out those islands and the military assets on them are only targets,” he said.
This article first appeared in the May 2018 edition of ADM.