Australian Defence Strategic Guidance, 1976–2020

Description

Between 1976 and 2020, Australia’s Department of Defence produced a range of strategic guidance documents. Some were classified, intended to inform and guide the government, while others were created for public release and ultimately became statements of government policy. These documents offer an insight into how successive Australian governments understood the nation’s security and what policy and institutional steps should be taken in response. Each paper aimed to develop or shape strategic concepts, provided the basis for significant budget and capability decisions, and directed reforms and policy change across the Defence organisation.

For the first time, the story of how these documents were developed, and the key ideas and debates that shaped them, can now be told. Based on unique access to archival records, this book is the product of a joint research project undertaken between the Australian Commonwealth’s Department of Defence and The Australian National University.

In response to regional instability and the War on Terror, the government developed the Australian Defence Force (ADF) as a ‘Balanced Force’, structured to serve a wider range of national interests. A Defence White Paper in 2000 was followed by three short Defence Updates as the Department and ADF grappled with the pace of overseas operations. Three White Papers followed in 2009, 2013 and 2016, produced through increasingly ambitious and lengthy processes that grappled with the emergence of great power competition in the Indo-Pacific and the need to prepare Australia’s defence forces for an increasingly complex region. By the end of the period, the 2020 Defence Strategic Update signalled a shift away from the White Paper model of strategic guidance, which has been replaced today by the National Defence Strategy.

‘At the heart of resilience is knowledge. We are in fraught times. We need to understand how we have seen our strategic requirements historically to benchmark what we need to do now, comprehending strengths and inadequacies in our thinking. These volumes are essential reading.’

—Kim Beazley, former Minister for Defence and leader of the Labor opposition

‘This history of Australian Defence Strategic Guidance shows the messy reality of policy development. Politics, personality, money and deadlines all make for a combustible mix. This is a white-knuckle ride for anyone who has ever worked in the strategy business. The book makes for compelling reading, explaining the, at times, mystifying policy results. It shows how Australia's strategic approach developed, setting the foundations for today's defence capabilities.’

—Peter Jennings, former Deputy Secretary in the Department of Defence and former Director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute

‘With unique, unfettered access to the classified files, this meticulous, scholarly, lively study illuminates the processes, the personalities and above all the ideas that have shaped Australia’s big defence decisions over the past 50 years. It is a remarkable resource and an essential foundation for the momentous debates we need to have about our defence in the challenging and very different decades ahead.’

—Hugh White AO, Emeritus Professor of Strategic Studies, ANU