All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?-  Life of Brian When thinking about future problems, there is always the chance that somebody in the past has experienced a similar situation and written about it. The Australian Army finds itself somewhat sympathetic to the  Roman   Army  in that it needs to innovate in order to maintain an acceptable level of …

The world is changed. I feel it in the water. I feel it in the earth. I smell it in the air. Lady Galadriel, The Lord of the Rings Our test must not be, “Have we changed?” It must be, “Have we changed enough?” GEN George W. Casey Jr, US Army Chief of Staff The fundamental challenge to national security is the management of change in order to reduce risk using a strategy that helps to deal with  uncertainty . The role of the military is essential for securing national defence particularly when it involves …

“Demography is a useful lens for understanding national security because population is intimately linked to resources, and resources are related to both capabilities and conflict. Additionally, demographic projections can be useful for contingency planning than economic or technological projections because there is less uncertainty.” Jennifer Dabbs Sciubba (author of The Future Faces of War: Population and National Security) “Defence will be required to make significant personnel policy changes…to account …

We do not keep security establishments merely to defend property or territory or rights abroad or at sea. We keep the security forces to defend a way of life. Dwight D. Eisenhower , 20 May 1954       We need an adequate  d efense , but every arms dollar we spend above adequacy has a long-term weakening effect upon the nation and its security. Dwight D. Eisenhower , Waging Peace What then is the overall strategic concept which we should inscribe today? It is nothing less than the safety and welfare, the …

A nation is secure to the extent to which it is not in danger of having to sacrifice core values, if it wishes to avoid war, and is able, if challenged, to maintain them by victory in such a war. Walter Lippmann We are living in a world where international relations display increasing complexity, interactivity, and unpredictability. There is wide acceptance of the view that security is fundamentally about protecting our way of life; yet, in practice, national security in the context of Australia addresses …

Artificial Intelligence (AI) offers exciting opportunities for Army; however, there are also significant limitations. One such limitation is the inherent biases.  AI systems  are only as good as the input data, and outcomes can be corrupted by ‘bad data’ that contains implicit racial, gender or ideological biases. There are more than  180 human biases , each of which can affect how decisions are made by the coder, and subsequently by the machine. Like bias in human society, the bias in AI must be actively …

The first part of this blog  focused on the risks of human bias inadvertently coded into AI. Part 2 explores the opportunities of AI to support Human Resource (HR) planning and management. One such opportunity is in preparing for, and adapting to, the disruptions associated with workforce trends such as the  transient (or contingent)  workforce. The exact number of transient workers in Australia is unknown, however, most estimates place the number at  around 30%  of the workforce and growing. No doubt an …

Information Warfare (IW) [1]  is a whole of government challenge in which Joint Forces must play an integral part. Preparing for and conducting IW is difficult and requires a change to the way the Joint Force currently conducts warfare. The Joint Force is predominantly organised, equipped, trained and prepared for the challenges of the physical domain. The Information Environment (IE) [2]  and IW present unique and unexpected challenges and complexities to the Joint Force that are outside of this more …

This is Part 2 of a blog on Information Warfare (IW), in case you missed it, you can read  Part 1 here . Through IW operations, actions and activities, the Joint Force will have the ability to shape and influence the decision-making and behaviour of the target audience in order to achieve mission success across the range of military operations. In order to effectively and efficiently compel the target audience to fulfil our will throughout the IE, traditional manoeuvre concepts should be evolved. Given the …

For the future Land Force, the ability to counter Information Warfare (IW) [1]  and operations in the Information Environment (IE) [2]  will be just as important as the ability to conduct them. This blog will look at countering IW influence activities using social media. Social media platforms are forums where information influence takes place, where narratives can be easily spread and countered, and where IW influence activities are already commonplace. The 2017 Director of National Intelligence  report …