21st Century Maritime Military Cooperation by Australia, USA and Japan

Greetings from the 21st Century Trilateral Maritime Cooperation Conference at the Australian National University in Canberra, where scholars and military personnel from Japan, the USA and Australia are speaking on issues of mutual interest, including "disputes over obscure maritime features" (as one speaker described territorial issues in the East and South China Seas). The conference is sponsored by the Sasakawa Peace Foundation, USA, Strategic and Defence Studies Centre and Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force Staff College. Interestingly, this is an open conference which the general public was invited to attend, no cost. Interestingly one speaker raised the issue of cyber-warfare. A few months ago I was teaching ANU students about Cyberwar Over the South China Sea.

Speakers include: 

ADM ret. (RAN) Chris Barrie, Adjunct Professor SDSC; ADM ret. (USN) Dennis Blair, Chairman and CEO Sasakawa Foundation; VADM (MSDF) Umio Otsuka, President JMSDF Command and Staff College; Dr. Jeffrey Hornung, Fellow Security and Foreign Affairs Program Sasakawa USA; Mr. Stanley Roth, Former US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs; Dr. Stephan Fruehling, Associate Professor SDSC; AMB Shingo Yamagami, Acting Director JIIA; VADM ret. (USN) Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Jr., CEO GeoOptics Inc.; Dr. Anthony Bergin, Deputy Director Australian Strategic Policy Institute; Dr. Toshio Yamagata, Director Application Laboratory of Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology; Mr. Yoshikiyo Ono, Secretary General Japanese Shipowners’ Association; Dr. Carol Anne Clayson, Director Ocean and Climate Change Institute, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute; Mr. Peter Jennings, Executive Director Australian Strategic Policy Institute; CAPT (MSDF) Katsuya Yamamoto, JMSDF Command and Staff College; RADM ret. (RAN) James Goldrick AO, CSC, Adjunct Professor SDSC; Dr. Isami Takeda, Professor of International Relations Dokkyo University; VADM ret. (USN) Robert Parker; Dr. Euan Graham, Director International Security Program at the Lowy Institute; ADM ret. (USN) Walter Doran, President Pacific Vision LLC; Dr. Brendan Taylor, Head of SDSC.

Climate Change and War

Greetings from the Australian National University, Strategic and Defence Center, where Dr Albert Palazzo (Director of Research in Strategic Plans, Australian Army Headquarters) is speaking on "Climate Change and the Future Character of War". Dr Palazzo emphasized that these were his own views and may not represent Army or Government policy. He has also written extensively on military topics.

Dr Palazzo argued that Australia had a stable government, "non-fragile" educated society an surplus food and energy. However, if carbon emissions are taken into account, Australia has a large energy deficit (most of the energy is in the form of highly polluting coal and slightly less polluting gas and may be rendered unusable). Also the education Australian society has may not suit severe climatic conditions brought about by climate change. A society which is used to dealing with food and energy shortages may be able to cope with hardships due directly to climate change, or indirectly from war caused by climate change. When staying in India and Indonesia, I noticed blackouts were a frequent occurrence (as were interruptions to town water supply). In an Australian city this would bring day to day activities to a halt, but where a common occurrence the population has learned to deal with it.

Dr Palazzo argues climate change will result in a time when wars are more frequent, longer, larger and lethal. However, he seemed to assume that wars will still be between nation states.

Dr Palazzo argued the Australian Defence Force (ADF) would need to be more self contained. That perhaps fits with his paper "Towards a Marine Force" on how the ADF needs to relearn the amphibious operations skills it had during WW2, to utilize the Australia's Landing Helicopter Dock Ships (LHDs).

Dr Palazzo  says the ADF has to become simpler and larger. I am not sure this is the case. Cyber-operations can use small numbers of highly skilled personnel to fight a war on-line. It may well be that the future is energy, food and water constrained, but there will be an abundance of information (and mis-information). As an example it is preferable to convince the enemy they have lost the war by hacking their information systems, rather than dropping bombs on them.

Sophisticated sensor based warfare will be possible at low cost using "commercial off the shelf" equipment. An example is that a smart phone can be put in a protective case and make a very sophisticated C4I device which each soldier can carry. The Raspberry PI 2 makes a very usable embeddable computer for military operations for $35. I asked Dr Palazzo about this and he agreed that such systems could be sued but would require a change in military culture and solving some technical issues.

One example which Australia could follow is Taiwan's locally developed Tuo Chiang class corvettes (沱江). These are relatively small, high speed, stealth wave piercing catamarans. They are intended to counter much larger vessels through guns, missiles and electronic warfare. Australia is a world leader in the production of high speed multi-hull warships, with both Incat and Austal 
making them for the US military. Australia is also a leader in the development of active phased array radar, at CEA Technologies in Canberra. These could be combined to make small, low cost, locally produced hi-tech warships. In a border dispute such vessels would have the advantage of looking less threatening in the media that a large warship and being able to disable an opponent using electronic warfare, without causing causalities.

One of the audience asked about Australia's dependency on fuel from Singapore (and the lesson of the Fall of Singapore in 1942).

The future of human civilisation requires mankind to solve two intersecting challenges. The first is to meet our sustainment, a requirement that grows more difficult as population continues to grow. The second is climate change and the changes it is causing in the earth environment. In combination, both of these challenges are destabilising the efficient and productive operation of the natural and built systems that humans exploit to meet their needs.

This presentation will propose that if humanity is unable to adapt to these changes in the natural and built  systems then the collapse of states or their descent into chaos is likely. This process appears already underway in the Middle East. Such destabilisation will mark an end to a period of relative tranquillity that mankind has enjoyed, and will herald the arrival of a future that will be defined by increasing violence and a more primitive fight for survival.

The presentation will highlight the role of the military in meeting these challenges. It will  also identify the societal characteristics that will help societies survive. Lastly, it will explain how the character of future wars will be different from those Australia has waged in the past.

Possible Use of Nuclear Weapons in Sino-Japanese War

Greetings from the Australian National University in Canberra, where Robert Ayson and Desmond Ball are speaking on the alarming topic of "Escalation in the East China Sea: A Political and Military Possibility". Their thesis is that a dispute between China and Japan in the East China Sea could result in a way which draws in the USA. A lack of crisis management and China’s command and control system's vulnerability could result in their use of nuclear weapons. Professor Ball stated that the USA had plans for "limited" use of nuclear weapons against China, including in a conventional war between China and Japan. Attacks on US undersea surveillance systems around China, some of which are collocated with Japanese facilities may also provoke a nuclear response on Chinese mainland bases. Knowing this China would then be tempted to make a preemptive nuclear strike. One area for concern is that the PLAN (Cihinese Navy) may become overconfident in its abilities.

Executive Summary:

• Political competition and a lack of crisis management mechanisms could make it very hard for China and Japan to resist escalatory pressures in the very plausible event of a minor armed clash in the East China Sea.
• Japan’s reluctance to use force may be less extensive than some assume and its connections to US strategy and C4SIR systems increase the prospect of early American participation.
• Command and control vulnerabilities could mean serious pre-emption pressures if Beijing thought a larger conflict was possible. American attacks on the PLA’s conventional war-fighting systems could create perverse incentives for China to use its nuclear weapons early while it was still confident in its physical ability to do so.

This would suggest some obvious actions:

• Crisis management mechanisms including a secure political hot-line and military to military communication channels which are regularly tested. Military personnel should visit each other, observe exercises and attend training courses.
• The USA could ensure it has a Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance System (C4SIR) which can operate separately from that of Japan. Japan could harden its system.
• China could make clear it has a robust C4SIR. China's deployment of military forces world wide recently may be in part to send such a message to potential enemies. This could include conducting exercises which the media and other nations military leaders are invited to attend. China could improve its C4SIR using its considerable commercial ICT industry capability and workforce.

Ayson and Ball recommend:

1. Australian planners should assume that China and Japan may not be able to continue avoiding minor hostilities over their conflicting East China Sea claims.

2. Australian planners should also assume that initial hostilities between Japan and China could easily escalate into a much more serious conflict, potentially involving the United States and possibly crossing the nuclear threshold.

3. Australian policymakers and decision-makers should encourage their Chinese and Japanese counterparts to treat the Sino-Japanese relationship as an adverse partnership involving common as well as competing interests.

All of this is worrying for Australia as a close partner of the USA and Japan. I suggest Australian could go further and help directly with some of the risk reduction measures, especially where China and Japan could not be seen to be doing this directly. Australia could provide some channels for communication in a crisis. If Australian politicians and military commanders know their Chinese and Japanese counterparts and have secure and robust technical communications with them, they could help defuse a crisis.

Use of Nuclear Weapons Possible in Sino-Japanese War

Robert Ayson and Desmond Ball will speak on "Escalation in the East China Sea: A Political and Military Possibility" at the Australian National University in Canberra, 5:30pm, 11 November 2014.

Event Details

Presented by the Strategic & Defence Studies Centre
Even if the leaders of China and Japan can lessen the significant political tensions between North Asia’s two biggest powers, the East China Sea dispute could still spark a bilateral war which might also bring in the United States. A recent spate of near misses shows that a minor armed clash is eminently possible. Nationalist sentiment and the lack of crisis management mechanisms could make restraint difficult once this occurs. Japan’s reluctance to use force may be less extensive than some assume and its connections to US strategy and C4SIR systems increase the prospects of early American participation. China’s command and control vulnerabilities could create serious pre-emption pressures if Beijing thought a larger conflict was possible. Moreover American attacks on China’s C4SIR systems and its conventional maritime and missile forces might create perverse incentives for China to use its nuclear weapons early while it was still confident in its physical ability to do so.

Australian defence planners should not assume that China and Japan are going to be able to keep their tense relationship in the East China Sea below the threshold of armed violence. Neither should they assume that China, Japan, and the United States will find it easy to avoid a very serious escalation once minor hostilities have occurred. This seminar presentation marks the launch of a new SDSC Centre of Gravity paper by Robert Ayson and Desmond Ball entitled "Escalation in North Asia: A Strategic Challenge for Australia", based on their forthcoming Survival article "Can a Sino-Japanese War Be Controlled?".

Counterinsurgency Iraq and Afghanistan

Dr. John A. Nagl, Lieutenant Colonel, United States Army (Retired) will speak on "Learning to eat soup with a knife - counterinsurgency Iraq and Afghanistan", at the Australian National University in Canberra, 13 August 2013. He is the author of "Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife: Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam" (University Of Chicago Press, 2005)

About the lecture:

In this lecture, celebrated counterinsurgency specialist John Nagl will discuss the lessons from the Iraq and Afghanistan war. As one of the chief authors of the US's Counterinsurgency field manual and celebrated scholar of counterinsurgency in history, John Nagl will offer insights into how counterinsurgency planning is developed, how, why and where it worked and did not work in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the implications for counterinsurgency operations in the future. With the rise of non-state threats to governments and increasing urbanisation of mankind, counterinsurgency conflicts are sure to remain a fundamental part of any militaries potential field of operations.
About the speaker
John A. Nagl is a retired Lieutenant Colonel in the United States Army who is an influential expert in counterinsurgency. He is former president of the Center for a New American Security and incoming headmaster of The Haverford School. Nagl served in both the Gulf and Iraq wars. He has a PhD from Oxford university. His dissertation Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife (drawing on a quote from T.E Lawrence) was later revised for publication and gained significant public and military debate. Nagl has worked as a Social Sciences Professor at Westpoint, and worked as a Military Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Defence. As part of a team overseen by General David Petreus, Nagl helped write the United States Army and Marine Corps Counterinsurgency field manuel. Nagl is a non-resident fellow with the Centre for a New American Security in DC, and has taught at Georgetown University, Kings College London and the US Naval Academy.

Lessons from USSR Intelligence Failure

Greetings from the Defence Studies Centre at the Australian National University, where Professor Paul Dibb is speaking on "Why did we get the collapse of the USSR so wrong?". It will be interesting to see what lessons there are for today. The ANU is expanding its defence teaching, providing strategic training for senior Australian Defence Force military staff.

Professor Dibb pointed out that the cold war was far higher risk that the current "War on Terrorism". He pointed out that as the USSR collapsed in the early 1990s, many students of strategic issues are too young to have lived through it.

Professor Dibb asked why the USSR's elite did not defend the state and how with a sudden collapse was a final conflagration avoided.

Professor Dibb recounted that when finishing his book "The Soviet Union: The Incomplete Superpower" in 1988, he was asked to meet the head of the public service, who said the DG of ONA would not accept him for a position because of his views on the USSR.

Professor Dibb then discussed the theory that military power depends on a strong economy. He argued that the USSR was a third world economy with a strong military. The USSR had a slowing economy, but not collapsing.

Professor Dibb then looked at the moral legitimacy of the USSR. He quoted Mikhail Gorbachev, for support of this view.

Professor Dibb argued that the arms race did not cause the collapse of the USSR. The USSR was able to build its own credible weapons systems, different to those of the West, from their own research resources.

Professor Dibb asserted that the Afghan war did not cause the collapse of the USSR, with their military doing well until the USA provided stinger missiles.

Professor Dibb pointed out that the USA had hundreds of people studying the USSR full time. The reasons he gave for them missing the collapse were:

1. Not seeing the woods for the trees: Analysis was at a detailed level, particularly on specific weapons systems and not "seeing the woods for the trees".
2. Just like us: Western analysts assumed their counterparts in the USSR would think the same as them. But the UK, USA and Australia have no hostile land borders and so have less worry of surprise attack.
3. Electronic Surveillance: Powerful satellite surveillance gave western analysts a false sense of knowledge. This resulted in seeing USSR weapons systems which looked more powerful than they actually were. The systems looked good in the satellite photos, but did not work so well. The T-72 main battle tank was given as an example.
4. Groupthink: There was a pressure for analysts to conform to the conventional view that the USSR was powerful.
   

Professor Dibb recommended The Dead Hand: The Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race and Its Dangerous Legacy by David E. Hoffman. He related several incidents where commercial airliners strayed into USSR airspace and the USA skirted the borders with military aircraft to collect intelligence.

Professor Dibb related that the NATO Able Archer 83 was close to proving a nuclear response from the USSR. UUSR aircraft were armed with nuclear weapons and were ready to retaliate to an expected attack.

Professor Dibb claimed that an agreement for nuclear reductions between President Regan and Gorbachev was vetoed at the last minute as the USA wanted to deploy its "star wars" strategic defense initiative (which was never deployed).

Professor Dibb said he did not know why the USSR military did not lash out in its final days. Had Gorbachev not precipitated the sudden collapse, Professor Dibb argued there could have been a gradual decline. What was not clear was if he saw this as less or more dangerous.

Professor Dibb argued the expansion of NATO to the Ukraine was an unnecessary provocation to Russia.

The collapse of the USSR brought about hubris in the USA. The USA made a mistake by not helping rebuild the USSR, with democratic institutions not taking hold.

Professor Dibb argued that the same intelligence mistakes are now being made over China, as were made with the USSR. China has some effective weapons (anti-ship missiles and a cyber-war capability) and significant "soft power", but has not fought a major war and it is not clear they are capable of doing so.

This was a very insightful presentation. At question time I asked Professor Dibb how Australian senior strategic thinkers should be trained differently (given ANU will be training some of them). He expressed concern in the decline in Asian language training generally in Australia and said that is one area to concentrate on. He also argued for encouraging broader thinking from analysts, without loss of rigor. He suggested that analysts should be asked what China's military weaknesses are, as well as their strengths: one might be that China can launch aircraft from its new aircraft carrier (Shi Lang), but not land them.

In answer to a question Professor Dibb pointed out that Russia has a sparsely populated region bordering China, which has potential for future conflict.

Professor Dibb pointed out that Australian policy developed under Kim Beasley was to welcome the USA to use Australian military bases but not have US based on Australian soil. There are differences in the USA and Australian world views which need to be kept in mind, despite much in common.

USSR Collapse Intelligence Failure

Professor Paul Dibb will speak on "Why did we get the collapse of the USSR so wrong?", at the Defence Studies Centre at the Australian National University, 7 November 2011.

Why did we get the collapse of the USSR so wrong?

It is now 20 years since the sudden and catastrophic collapse of the former Soviet Union. A huge amount of analytical effort in the West, both in academia and in the intelligence community, went into scrutinising every detail of the political, economic, military, technological, demographic and cultural progress of the USSR. And yet, when the end came it was surprisingly quick and ranks as one of the great intellectual and intelligence failures of the 20th century.

This lecture examines the reasons why we failed to see the end of the military superpower that was the former USSR. It looks at such issues as preconceived views of Soviet Communism’s strengths, the tendency not to see the intellectual wood for the trees, and the enormous pressures to conform with the conventional wisdom about Soviet strengths. It concludes by asking the question: can there be a recurrence of simplistic, straight-line extrapolations about another rising power, such as China?

Paul Dibb is Emeritus Professor of Strategic Studies in the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at the Australian National University. His previous positions include: Head of the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Deputy Secretary of the Department of Defence, Director of the Defence Intelligence Organisation, and Head of the National Assessments Staff (National Intelligence Committee).

He is the author of five books and four reports to government, as well as more than 120 academic articles and monographs about the global strategic outlook, the security of the Asia-Pacific region, the US alliance, and Australia’s defence policy. He wrote the 1986 Review of Australia’s Defence Capabilities (the Dibb Report) and was the primary author of the 1987 Defence White Paper. His book The Soviet Union: the Incomplete Superpower was published in 1986 by the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London.

Presented by the ANU Strategic and Defence Studies Centre

Click here to register.

Speaker/Host:	Professor Paul Dibb
Date:	Monday, 7 November 2011
Time:	5:30 PM - 7:00 PM
Website:	http://news.anu.edu.au/publiclectures
Enquiries:	Events on 6125 4144