Defence: No Higher Priority

Three of Australia’s top strategic and defence analysts in conjunction with the Institute of Public Affairs have – in these times of global turmoil – published a significant milestone report into the latest geopolitical crossroads. It is a pivotal publication.

The Australian Naval Institute’s membership and subscriber base is an enormous resource of maritime and strategic thinking and the ANI is keen to get significant commentary on the report into the pubic domain. We are publishing the key recommendations of the report and links to it and other commentary. We invite our subscribers to comment and we will publish the comments and an overall detailed report on them.

No Higher Priority. A Blueprint for Immediate Action on Australia’s Defence 2025-28

Background

No Higher Priority was published in March 2025 by The Institute of Public Affairs – https://ipa.org.au/publications-ipa/books/no-higher-priority-a-blueprint-for-immediate-action-on-australias-defence-2025-2028.

The authors are Peter Jennings, Michael Shoebridge and Marcus Hellyer. All three are principals in Strategic Analysis Australia –   https://strategicanalysis.org.

Peter, Michael and Marcus are former senior Defence Department officials and, subsequently, senior office holders at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. They are well-known to the national security debate for the depth and detail of their assessments, based on their years of experience in national defence policy.

INTRODUCTION

The national defence and security debate is front of mind in government policy, national security academic faculties and strategic analysis organisations. The 2023 Defence Strategy Review, and subsequent Updates, have incrementally raised the immediacy of the regional  threat warning, calling into question the ADF’s readiness and capabilities to counter contingencies in the near future.

While the Reviews and Updates clearly articulate the threat and measures to mitigate it, well-credentialled critics have accused the Defence Department of not demonstrating a parallel urgency to address the materiel, funding, personnel, and logistics shortfalls.

These are the issues addressed in No Higher Priority. The arguments are not new to observers of the national security debate; however, the authors present a masterfully presented commentary, to readers in a book framed around 36 Recommendations. These Recommendations are argued through supporting chapters which encapsulate the debate.

The great advantage of the book’s framework is to not only present the authors’ views but allows readers to add to the debate by supporting or arguing against the Recommendations and advancing their own considered views. This is an on-going live debate, exacerbated by a growing sentiment within the Australian community questioning the continuance of the US alliance.

Who can contribute?

Any ANI member can contribute. Ideally, they should acquire a copy of No Higher Priority (available through Amazon and other outlets); however, this isn’t mandatory. All ANI members have an interest in maritime issues and are thus qualified to express their opinions. Overseas contributors are especially welcomed as many defence and security issues are common to many countries.

Because of the over-riding importance and breadth of the issues covered in this paper, the Australian Naval Institute is particularly keen to get comments on this post. To submit a comment go to the bottom of this post (below the advertisements and other matter at the end of the article). Comments are “moderated” only to prevent spam attacks or defamatory or obscene matter getting on the site from outside.

Contributors can submit opinions under their own names or pseudonyms – but no submissions from ‘anonymous’.

We aim to have an active and provocative conversation – so we encourage provocative and well-argued contributions. Political rants are not welcome.

 

STRUCTURE

The Themes listed below follow the book’s Chapters and incorporate the Recommendations. Contributors need simply to refer to the number of the recommendation they are commenting on.

THEMES

NATIONAL SECURITY AND AUSTRALIA’S NORTHERN DEFENCE

Recommendation One:

The government should seek to acquire the B-21 Raider stealth bomber as an additional element to AUKUS, also offering to host a US B-21 contingent in Australia. This is to strengthen deterrence in the 202s and manage the risk of delays in the AUKUS submarine.

Recommendation 2:

Expand between 2025 and 2028 the US Marine Corps rotational presence in northern Australia to around 16,000 – a Marine Expeditionary Brigade – working with the Australian Army’s developing littoral warfare capability.

Recommendation 3:

Bring Japan as close as possible into ANZUS cooperation and invite the Self-Defence Force to permanently join rotational deployments with the Australian and US military units in northern Australia.

Recommendation 4:

Develop a stronger defence and intelligence relationship with India recognising that country’s long-term strengths and trajectory.

Recommendation 5:

Build a Pacific Response Force with the Pacific Island countries focussed on humanitarian assistance, disaster relief and building PIC community resilience.

Recommendation 6:

Establish permanent links, a stronger ADF presence and supporting infrastructure in the Top End, the Cocos and Christmas Islands and Norfolk Island.

HOW TO BUILD AN AUSRTALIAN DEFENCE FORCE THAT MEETS AUSTTRALIA’S STRATEGIC INTERESTS

Recommendation 7:

The Commonwealth Government should immediately reopen the Australian Embassy in Kyiv and seek Ukraine’s permission to locate a Defence and defence industry team at the Embassy to build an understanding of the war.

Recommendation 8:

The next government should direct Parliament’s Joint Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee to convene a major enquiry into the lessons learnt from recent conflicts, in particular the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and how  these lessons should be applied to Australia’s circumstances.

Recommendation 9:

Government should establish an initial $1 billion annual Rapid Acquisition Fund in the Defence budget getting Australian small and medium-sized enterprises to produce key ‘consumables’ of war, including munitions, autonomous systems and counter-drone systems. The Fund must bypass Defence’s glacial acquisition processes. Government should direct Defence to have programs underway with industry no later than six months from the election.

Recommendation 10:

The Government must restore air and maritime missile defence procurement plans that were cut in the April 2024 National Defence Strategy. Protecting Australia from missile and air attack cannot be regarded as a low priority that can be traded off in Defence’s capability planning.

Recommendation 11:

The Government must direct Defence to publicly report, no later than 100 days after the election, on the capability impact of deferrals, removals and reductions in the April 2024 National Defence Strategy. The Government should then decide which equipment projects must be returned to actively funded programs in order to restore a capable ADF in the 2020s.

Recommendation12:

The Prime Minister needs to take charge of fixing he ADF workforce crisis by convening a high-level group of eminent Australians that will develop new ways to grow and sustain the ADF, enlisting the support of the broader Australian community.

RIGHT HERE RIGHT NOW: UNLEASHING AUSTRALIAN KNOW-HOW TO GROW MILITARY POWER FAST

Recommendation 13:

Government should commit to having delivered, in its the next term, at least one type of armed combat drone designed and produced in Australia into service with the ADF.

Recommendation 14:

Government must bring non-traditional firms into the defence market by initiating a program of accelerated access to the market via an Australian Industry Mobilisation and Resilience Council, utilising the best innovative minds in the broader private sector.

Recommendation 15:

Government must direct Defence to contract directly with medium and small Australian companies instead of the current practice of working almost exclusively with big traditional defence primes.

Recommendation 16:

Start building stockpiles of ammunition and other consumables of war.

Recommendation 17:

Work with the private sector to radically simplify Defence’s overly-complicated contracting documentation and provide entirely new simple short form contracts based on the core Commonwealth purchasing principle of value for money.

Recommendation 18:

Significantly lift the offer of Australian-developed weapons and countermeasures to the Ukrainian military and cooperate with Kyiv on weapons development.

FUNDING THE DEFENCE OF AUSTRAIA

Recommendation 19:

Parliament’s Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade must produce an annual inquiry into Australia’s regional threat environment, recommending necessary policy steps, including on the scale of defence spending needed to address our worsening strategic environment.

Recommendation 20:

Australia must lift its performance as a contributor to global security. The Government should engage the incoming US administration to discuss burden sharing on both defence spending and capabilities.

Recommendation 21:

The Commonwealth Government must put the Defence budget on a rapid trajectory to reach 3% of GDP in the next term of government.

Recommendation 22:

The Defence budget should be regularly reviewed and increased to compensate for the effects of inflation, particularly on military systems.

Recommendation 23:

The Commonwealth Government should establish an Advisory Board of eminent persons, separate from the Defence Department, and reporting to the Prime Minister along the lines of the US Defense Department Policy Board, to advise on required military capabilities; assess progress and risks in equipment delivery, identify efficiencies in spending and promote speedy innovation.

Recommendation 24:

Defence must be radically overhauled to stress openness and accountability in delivering equipment projects. Government must itself commit to greater openness in policymaking and not hide behind false claims of the need or secrecy.

FIXING DEFENCE INFRASTRUCTURE AND ENERGY VULNERABILITIES

Recommendation 25:

Government must develop a homeland defence strategy to protect key civilian population centres and critical infrastructure against enemy long-range strikes. The strategy must advance a layered air and missile defence capacity to protect against evolving risks.

Recommendation 26:

The next Federal Government must urgently harden military bases against attack.

Recommendation 27:

Government must develop a mobilisation plan with industry to harness Defence use of national critical infrastructure in wartime.

Recommendation 28:

Government must make key commercial northern ports and airfield facilities capable of military operations during a crisis.

FUELLING THE DEFENCE FORCE – AND FUELLING AUSTRALIA

Recommendation 29:

Government must build an onshore fuel reserve.

Recommendation 30:

Defence must devise a plan to disperse fuel stocks widely across our Defence bases, particularly in the North.

DEFENCE – THE US ALLIANCES, THE NORTH AND CULTURAL CHANGE

Recommendation 31:

Australia and the US should issue a new directions statement for the alliance – we can call this the Darwin Statement – detailing a shared approach to regional security. The value of this is to sustain alliance momentum and find a basis for closer engagement with the Trump Administration.

Recommendation 32:

The next government must end the 99-year lease of the Port of Darwin to a Chinese-owned company and drive the redevelopment of this facility to support an expanded Australian military presence in the North. The Port will also be of increasing use to the United States’ military.

Recommendation 33:

To strengthen the ADF’s hitting power and underwrite deterrence in the 2020s, the Government should acquire two additional squadrons of the F35 fighter jets, with these being the F-35B short take-off and landing variant, which will support ADF amphibious and littoral warfare capability and be able to operate closely with the US Marines’ own F-35B variants,

Recommendation 34:

We should seek Papua New Guinea’s agreement to locating significant ADF military assets in that country, emphasising air and maritime power. A new treaty between Australia and PNG should underwrite the closest of alliances between the two countries.

Recommendation 35:

Government should reduce by one third the numbers of ADF senior officers and Senior Executive Service public servants in Defence. We must rapidly shrink a level of senior management which has become too unimaginative and risk averse, strengthening Defence’s ability to make quick decisions and push delegated decision-making to the right management and accountability levels.

Recommendation 36:

The Australian Defence Force Academy – our military university – should close its Canberra campus and relocate to campuses around the country. We need an officer corps connected to Australian society, not schooled in the Canberra bubble.

The Moderator is Tim Coyle PhD – a former Defence intelligence analyst.