As we argued in an  earlier post , if recent operations such as Anode, Sovereign Borders and the response to MH17 are any indication, Army and the Australian Federal Police (AFP) are likely to provide important collective contributions to land power into the future. While government policy may be pursued through the formation of joint agency headquarters with a continuance of relatively uninterrupted activities along existing departmental lines (e.g. Sovereign Borders), there are instances (e.g. Anode) in …

Clausewitz believed that the ways and means of warfare were determined by a combination of four factors; the characteristics of the belligerents, the context of their situation, the 'spirit of the age' of war, and the nature of war itself. 1 His view may seem self-evident to any student of war, but as strategist Colin S. Gray writes, militaries and strategic policy makers often conceptualise without a deep understanding of the conditions intrinsic to a military's approach to war. 2   Sir Julian Corbett’s …

In prefacing his classic work on military logistics  Pure Logistics , United States Marine Corps officer Colonel George C Thorpe declared that ‘the conclusion is irresistible that the military themselves know next to nothing about logistics’. As a marine infantryman teaching at the US Naval College in 1917, Thorpe had little professional compulsion or explicit need to write on logistics. However, personal experiences of American brush wars and observations made of the expeditionary war being fought on the …

When armies recognise that they face an uncertain, unknowable, future, more often than not their response is to undertake organisational and structural change. Their observations of recent military campaigns, supported by analysts, historians and other social scientists, all offer enticing reasons for structural and conceptual change. One such analysis, written in the context of an exploration into expeditionary warfare, was recently presented by RAND Corporation analyst Michael Shurkin. Shurkin, recently …

As described in my earlier blog  article , force design is a difficult process despite its fundamental importance to future performance in war. It briefly examined the US Army’s recent desires for change cognisant of recent French expeditionary operations in Mali on  Operation Serval ; an operation that demonstrated the value of the expeditionary characteristics of French forces. This impetus for change has also been driven by an evolutionary response to strategic conditions that see American forces …

The past decade has seen a steady decrease in aerial resupply tasking in support of the conventional Army. The reasons for this include the operational focus of the Australian Defence Force (ADF) in the Middle East Area of Operations (MEAO); the removal of the airborne role from the 3rd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment and the retirement of the DHC-4 Caribou and C130H fleet. Now, with the significant reduction of operations in the MEAO, the shift in strategic focus towards the  Indo-Pacific Strategic …

Tactical cyberspace control is rapidly becoming central to dominating the information environment and thus will emerge as paramount for forces campaigning in the information age. This is especially salient for the Australian Army given many of our traditional adversaries, both asymmetric and conventional, are relying on the internet and converging technologies for command and control. If we wish to retain our tactical acumen against a highly capable and determined adversary it is necessary to ensure that …

I agree with Dr Palazzo’s  pragmatic observation  that considering warfare from the perspective of different Services in their own specialised dimensions or domains is unhelpful and inefficient. Warfare is more effective when undertaken as an integrated endeavour. Archers and cavalry in the Middle Ages were the preserve of specialist soldiers and, in the case of heavy cavalry, an expensive elite. However, it was only when they were combined and integrated with infantry under the command of a well-educated …

In November 2001, Australia joined the United States-led coalition in the war against the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan. There was no indication that this would be Australia's longest war. For the Australian Army, Afghanistan was a proving ground and a monumental achievement. For the Australian soldier, it was a time to put into the practice the skills for which they had been trained. To commemorate the Australian Army soldiers' role in Afghanistan, an interactive website will soon be launched. 'The …

The increased availability of information collected by space based sensors is changing our battlespace by creating new threats and opportunities. Recent advancements in commercial satellite technology have resulted in widespread public access to information that was previously only obtainable through classified intelligence programs. This post examines some of the recent trends and capabilities of commercial satellite systems and their use to inform future Army thinking. That a picture paints a thousand …