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The Minister of Defense of Japan, Mr. Kono Taro, and Australian Minister for Defence, Senator Linda Reynolds, committed to driving bilateral defence cooperation forward during Minister Reynolds’ first official visit to Tokyo on 20 November 2019. They emphasized that as Indo-Pacific security dynamics became more challenging, the strategic logic underpinning Japan-Australia cooperation was only getting stronger.
The Ministers welcomed the significant progress in the defence relationship in 2019, including the first bilateral fighter jet exercise BUSHIDO GUARDIAN and Japan’s largest ever participation in the Australia-United States joint exercise TALISMAN SABRE.
Ministers committed to building on this momentum in 2020, deepening the Special Strategic Partnership between the two countries and aimed at contributing to a free, open, inclusive and prosperous Indo-Pacific region.
United in their shared ambition, the Ministers affirmed that they will accelerate defence cooperation in the coming years including in the fields of military exercises, personnel exchanges, space and cyber policy, defence science and technology. To this end, the Ministers affirmed:
Regularising Japan Air Self-Defense Force’s participation in Exercise PITCH BLACK commencing in 2020 in Australia, and fighter exercise BUSHIDO GUARDIAN in Japan.
Progressing the establishment of an Australian Army liaison officer in the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force to further enhance cooperation and deepen interoperability.
The establishment of a program to exchange defence scientists and engineers to deepen bilateral collaborative defence research and development between Japan`s Acquisition, Technology and Logistics Agency and Australia`s Defence Science and Technology Group.
They confirmed that both sides continue to make efforts towards concluding a reciprocal access agreement which would improve administrative, policy, and legal procedures to facilitate joint operations and exercises.
The Ministers reiterated their determination to work bilaterally to enhance defence and security cooperation with partners in the Indo-Pacific region including in the fields of, capacity building, maritime security and humanitarian assistance and disaster relief.
The Ministers reaffirmed their intention to develop defence cooperation among Australia, Japan and the United States.
The Ministers exchanged their views on regional issues including the South China Sea, the East China Sea and North Korea.
The Ministers discussed the recent series of ballistic missile launches by North Korea, which is a serious threat to the regional security and condemned the launches as violation of United Nations Security Council Resolutions (UNSCRs).
The Ministers remained committed to efforts to achieve North Korea’s complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantlement of all weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles of all ranges of North Korea in accordance with all relevant UNSCRs and urged North Korea to fully comply with its international obligations.
The Ministers welcomed and reaffirmed their commitment to implement the relevant UNSCRs and sustained international cooperation to deter, disrupt, and ultimately eliminate illicit activities, such as illegal ship-to-ship transfers.
The featured photo shows Japanese Ship Chiyoda departs HMAS Stirling in preparation for the commencement of the sea phase of Exercise Pacific Reach 2019.
HMAS Sheean in company with Republic Of Korea Submarine Lee Sun-Sin, Japanese Ship Chiyoda, MV Mega Bakti, MV Stoker and MV Besant sail in formation for the commencement of the sea phase during Exercise Pacific Reach 2019.
Pacific Reach is a triennial Asia-Pacific submarine rescue exercise designed to promote regional cooperation on submarine rescue.
The exercise this year is the fourth in the series and is being hosted by Australia between 26 November and 7 December 2007.
Pacific Reach 07 is a significant exercise involving six ships, three submarines, two submarine rescue systems, a multi-national dive team and the UK SPAGÜ all up 1000 personnel from 15 nations will be directly involved in the exercise.
Pacific Reach is an extraordinarily valuable opportunity to work with our regional neighbours and it is our pleasure to host this years activities, said Commander Australian Naval Submarine Group, Commodore Rick Shalders.
Pacific Reach is a truly international exercise, with units and equipment from the following countries participating: Canada, China, Republic of Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, the United States and the United Kingdom. In addition, military observers from Chile, India, Indonesia, NATO, Pakistan, Peru, Russia and South Africa will also attend.
Credit: Australian Department of Defence
Rescue Submarine LR5 is winched out of the water and onto the deck after completing a sortie to the South Korean Submarine ROKS Lee Sun-sin located on the sea floor during Exercise Pacific Reach 19.
The LR5 rescue submersible is launched off the back of MV Stoker during Exercise Pacific Reach 19.
Japanese Ship Chiyoda and MV Besant sail in formation for the commencement of the sea phase during Exercise Pacific Reach 2019.
Japanese Ship Chiyoda and MV Mega Bakti sail in formation for the commencement of the sea phase during Exercise Pacific Reach 2019.
Japanese Submarine Tender, JMSDF (Japanese Maritime Self Defence Force) Chiyoda berths alongside Fleet Base West before taking part in international exercise Exercise Pacific Reach 2019.
The Japanese Self Defence Force Submarine Rescue Ship JS Chiyoda, berths at Fleet Base West, Western Australia to take part in Exercise Pacific Reach 19.
Republic of Korea Submarine Lee Sun Sin comes alongside Diamantina Pier at Fleet Base West, Western Australia, to take part in Exercise Pacific Reach 2019.
Republic of Korea Submarine Lee Sun Sin comes alongside Diamantina Pier at Fleet Base West, Western Australia, to take part in Exercise Pacific Reach 2019.
Republic of Korea Submarine Lee Sun Sin comes alongside Diamantina Pier at Fleet Base West, Western Australia, to take part in Exercise Pacific Reach 2019.
HMAS Collins sails out through the channel to meet HMAS Waller and HMAS Rankin at Gage Roads at sunrise.
HMAS Manoora's SK50 Sea King helicopter flies over Collins Class submarine, HMAS Waller. Collins Class Submarines, HMAS Rankin, HMAS Waller and HMAS Collins transitting in formation through Gage Roads, Cockburn Sound.
HMAS Manoora's SK50 Sea King helicopter flies over Collins Class submarine, HMAS Collins. Collins Class Submarines, HMAS Rankin, HMAS Waller and HMAS Collins transitting in formation through Gage Roads, Cockburn Sound.
At last year’s International Fighter Conference, the Future Combat Air System or FCAS was introduced as a new Franco-German Initiative.
At this year’s IFC, an update on the program was provided by the French Air Force, the German Ministry of Defence and Airbus Space and Defence.
A key development has been the addition of Spain to the program.
The objective is to replace the current core European industrial produced fighters, the French Rafale and the Eurofighter.
Since last year, industry leaders have been identified for the FCAS program; industrial agreements have been signed; a Joint Concept Study was awarded earlier this year, with the second phase launched this Fall. A Combined Project Team has been established with Spain to join in early 2020.
The focus has been to shape joint understanding of operational needs and national concepts, to identify relevant key operational requirements, to build tools to work at the classified level and above all to build confidence between governments, among governments, and among and with industry.
And the goal is to shape a more integrated approach which can deliver incremental products along the way.
The focus is upon generating new capabilities that will deliver an increasingly connected force able to operate by leveraging data from a “combat cloud” and to do so up to and including contested airspace.
The new fighter needs able to work effectively in a multi-domain environment and to share C2 in the battlespace, one in which situational awareness is shared through the combat cloud.
Clearly, one challenge is to ensure that the current efforts to modernize Eurofighter and Rafale do not go on parallel paths or as one French Air Force officer put the challenge: “We don’t want to diverge before we converge.”
This same French Air Force General highlighted that from the FAF’s perspective they would be flying Rafale for four more decades.
Then the question is how the system of systems was being put in place.
This means that in the decades ahead to being able to operate the new FCAS fighter, a number of key capabilities would need to be delivered.
Among these capabilities: To be able to provide a balance between interoperability and sovereignty; to be able to do collaborative warfighting engaging manned systems with remotes; and to build out a cognitive air battle management system in which new man-machine relationships and new digital transformation was generated.
He highlighted as well the need for France to be able to work with allies to be able to engage and fight in “intense digital conflict” as well.
He argued that collaborative collaboration between manned and unmanned platforms clearly would require mastering how artificial intelligence can be built into new C2 systems.
He saw the F-4 standard of the Rafale as the test bed for a number of these new capabilities going forward for the FAF.
In the presentation by Airbus Defence and Space a key target was seen that by 2025, that significantly greater C2 integration can be generated by the two aircraft.
The objective is to have a new communication standard by 2025-2030.
The French Air Force is focused on the build out of a new variant of the Rafale, the F-4, which will make the aircraft more software upgradeable, and clearly, one objective clearly is to ensure that it can work effectively with the F-35 being introduced into Europe as well.
The French approach also is focused on the F-5 variant of Rafale which is being developed to carry next generation nuclear weapons in support of the evolving capabilities of the French nuclear deterrent.
The very fact that the French Air Force has been tasked to deliver air-delivered weapons in the European theater of operations, makes France a distinctive player in FCAS for sure.
And another distinctive aspect is that the new fighter will need to be operate off of French carriers, and getting a low observable aircraft which by necessity needs to be built from composites to be able to do so is no easy task.
That is why the F-35C is quite different from the F-35A.
As for Eurofighter, briefings were provided on the approach to modernization, which I will discuss in a separate piece, but for the Airbus Defence and Space presenter, the focus was on how Eurofighter as a platform, could become the launch point over time for several of the “technology streams” being generated by FCAS, up to and including manned-unmanned teaming.
That discussion is highlighted in a separate interview with the head of FCAS in Airbus Defence and Space.
A number of the key capabilities which FCAS is targeting are the focus of non-FCAS air forces currently flying fifth-generation aircraft.
Clearly, how the latter sort through how they will do some of the key tasks identified with FCAS will interact with and shape the approach of FCAS itself.
And this cross-learning will be a key driver of change among allied air forces.
Indeed, the combat cloud was introduced in an interview I did with Lt. General (Retired) Deptula, and then head of the Air Combat Command Mike Hostage.
In that interview, the focus was very much on how fifth generation aircraft were part of what Hostage referred to as the combat cloud transition affecting the USAF which he labelled the coming combat cloud.
With allies focused on a common target, namely the next generation connected force, and one operating probably more accurately with combat clouds than a single combat cloud, significant operational experience and investments in new ISR and C2 technologies will lead to significant change in concepts of operations.
FCAS can clearly contribute to this effort, notably, as the effort is defined as incremental in nature, and driven to a significant part of a very busy operational air force, namely the French Air Force.
And FCAS is not being done alone by the FAF and its sister Air Forces and European Industry.
The other partner in the French led approach is clearly the French led NATO Transformation Command.
Even though Norfolk is not close to Berlin, the work of NATO’s Transformation Command clearly is with regard to the FCAS thinking and approach was as the change being driven by fifth generation systems.
Shortly after the Fighter Conference was meeting in Berlin, Col. Cécile Marly, acting branch head for Federated Interoperability at Supreme Allied Command Transformation, was telling a AFCEA’s Military Communications conference in Norfolk, Virginia that the NATO Industry Advisory Group (NIAG) is readying its recommendations on how NATO members can build interoperability into next-generation airpower systems.
“The industry advice is aimed at helping NATO “build standards for tomorrow” to enable “interoperability by design,” rather than as an add-on to incompatible platforms, Marly told AFCEA’s Military Communications conference in Norfolk, Virginia.”
In short, FCAS is a focused European effort but occurring in the context of a broader NATO military transformation effort.
What does it mean to be a logistician now, and what will a future logistician look like?
These are big questions.
Impossibly big questions.
To have a sense of a ‘profession’ you must first have an idea of what I mean by the term ‘we’. Everyone in the room is probably quite confident that they have a definition of what a logistician is; whether you agree with one another is another question.
Are we talking about military staff only, does the definition include acquisition specialists, what about health professionals, and are we interested in Service logisticians operating at the tactical level?
Perhaps we could start by questioning what logistics is. We often choose to define a logistician in terms of a discrete capability. Logistics, much like strategy and tactics, is a process or a way of thinking. It is a comprehensive behaviour that combines science and art to achieve an outcome – the creation and sustainment of combat forces.
Behind logistics is theory and practice, a confluence of activities that takes the raw material – often literally – and creates combat capability and actual firepower.
About the logistician – the logistician is the one that controls this activity, comprising many technical specialities at different levels of Defence, or facilitates the activities of others outside the enterprise. This might include industry partners, research institutions and other organisations. The logistics discipline is defined by systemic thinking, technical competencies, complexity, a balance between logistics organisation and command requirements, collective effort in a shared endeavour; but as we all know, in an environment usually defined by organisational disruption, resource limitations, lack of investment, tremendous oversight and sometimes even contempt, and without a doubt inter-agency conflict.
Now that I say it, it does sound like a difficult business to be in!
Why we are, what we are
It is a difficult business to be in. It is a business that has, in the context of Australian Defence at least, endured tremendous change in recent years. How did we get here, and where did the contemporary logistician come from?
Fortunately for you all, I won’t be giving a long and detailed history of logistics in warfare. Allow me to summarise two or three hundred years of major developments in creating and sustaining deployed forces by telling you that logistics has become increasingly important to the fulfilment of strategy. The industrialisation of war, invention of steam and later combustion engines, the electronic age, the post-WW2 invention of modern business science – all have contributed to increasing the importance of the logistician.
Of course, with increased importance comes expectations and alongside these important technological, technical and theoretical changes have been investigations as to the role of logisticians in war, and what professional skills are required.
Lt. Col. Beaumont at the Williams Foundation Seminar, April 11, 2109
Let’s put the topic in our own context and in terms of our own experiences.
The first thing I will say is that we all come from different parts of the Defence organisation, but I feel quite confident in saying that the modern Defence logistician was born nearly thirty years ago.
This is not just because the senior-most members of the audience have been in the Services for about that long! It is because the world was changing, strategy was changing, and logistics was consequently changing. The spectre of great power conflict was receding, and force posture adjusting. The US commenced demobilisation, and forward positions underwritten by war-stocks and strategic reserves, supported by a supply-centric methodology and process, became untenable.
Defence budgets began to decline, and strategy redeveloped to suit a ‘peace dividend’.
Our militaries were faced by considerable pressure as modernisation and ‘block obsolescence’ required a substantial capital expenditure, and personnel expenses were beyond the capacity of defence forces to sustain.
Government pressure accelerated the rationalisation of strategic logistics systems, Services chose to bear the brunt of pressure in their logistics organisations and mass commercialisation began to occur through programs such as the Commercial Support Program. The 1991 Commercial Support program and 1997 Defence Efficiency Review (DER) had profound consequences for the ADF and Department.
As General David Hurley describes in Nicholas Jans’s The Chiefs (p54), without a compelling intellectual argument to counter, outsourcing and commercialisation irrevocably changed the logistics and organisational landscape. Logisticians were compelled to be more efficient, and the language of the time echoed ‘best business practice’. Increased industry involvement and other factors created new professional requirements.
Operational experiences, set in this strategic and organisational climate, accentuated the evolutionary path. American performance in the 1991 Gulf War, an operation which truly showed how importance logistics was to the ability of a military to prosecute a war quickly, was a catalyst for even more reform. The ‘iron mountains’ that enabled a tremendous success in this war were perceived to be the vestiges of outdated supply-based concepts, and with the ‘revolution in military affairs’ came the ‘revolution in military logistics’ (RML). RML, originating in the US military, desired a revolution in process, organisation and skills relevant to logisticians.
Professional pathways were efficiently amalgamated, distribution-based logistics instituted, centralisation emphasised, and the military and public service logistician increasingly compared to their private sector equivalents. These changes became a phenomenon among most Western militaries, who substantially adjusted their logistics force structures. This period truly defined the approach logisticians would take for the next twenty-five years.
This period resulted in a significant transfer of skills as jobs formerly performed by military logisticians were increasingly performed by public servants and industry partners. The establishment of the first truly joint logistics command in Support Command Australia as a key outcome of the DER was not just to improve the ADF’s operational effectiveness. Commander Support Command Australia, Lieutenant General Des Mueller, was directed to centralise, consolidate and outsource many strategic logistics functions.
The subsequent consolidation of SCA, National Support Division and the Defence Acquisition Organisation into the Defence Materiel Organisation over the 2000-01 period cemented the expectations of whom would perform what.
These were immensely significant changes a decade in the making, conducted in a time of strategic and organisational turbulence we have not seen since. In my own Service, the training of military logisticians – reformed during the 1996 creation of the Army Logistics Training Centre – was largely focussed on military logistics operations.
With this, the expectation of military logisticians to perform certain strategic and operational functions had certainly diminished. I don’t want to overstate the importance of these changes at the individual training level, but they were important indicators of the shifting ‘professional tide’ in terms of the expectations placed upon logisticians.
The operations came quickly, and with little opportunity to bed in changes.
East Timor was an immensely challenging experience for the ADF and its coalition partners, but before adequate responses to capability and professional gaps could be addressed, we were part of a new coalition in the Middle-east. Much of the impetus to reform Defence logistics in an operational or professional context withered away.
Keeping the pace with these operations was organisationally difficult, especially for those in the DMO which as was assailed by successive reviews. In the ADF, infant joint organisations stagnated as resources were directed to sustaining combat forces. Reform was attempted in the Air Force, and Army focussed upon relatively significant changes in its organisational structure and capability.
There was little time to invest in professional development, little time to do much else than support the sustainment of operations, and few resources and people available to give substance to the intent of successive logistics commanders.
Why we are, where we are
The Defence logistician is built by training systems primarily focussed on tactical command or technical ability, an amorphous approach to professional military education, an over-reliance on experience, in an environment of fractured professional leadership, and often because of good luck.
Thirty years of change, including two decades of sustained operations, has impeded the development of a coherent approach to professionalisation. It has made it exceptionally difficult to approach skilling and technical expertise as a collective, and a variety of professional workarounds have consequently emerged. The preparation of logisticians is done so within federation of like-minded individuals.
Although the Defence organisation may be increasingly centralised and joint in nature, its collective approach to professional development and training is immature. The shifting organisation has traditionally separated natural sources of leadership and made ownership of the ‘professional problem’ unclear. Without advocacy and engagement, gains achieved in logistics performance and capability development have been limited.
Reform within the Services, sometimes because of responding to operational deficiencies and others in recovery from the lean 1990s, also meant some efforts undertaken in the enterprise had diverged from another.
These points of divergence have been exacerbated by operational experiences.
The last decade and a half has been one in which the enterprise has done the best it can.
However, while we have focussed on supporting individual achievement through an overemphasis on posting experiences (operational service, secondments and other activities) – the approach to training and educating the collective has been lacking. This approach has affected the basic level of competency of Defence logistics staff.
We do not have a systemic approach to preparing Defence logisticians; a good training system is present, especially for our junior military members, but there is no agreed upon model to take the most junior military and public servant logistician to senior appointments.
This is a symptom of fractured professional leadership and, for some time, no clear ‘owner’ of the task to prepare logisticians at the enterprise level.
A complex task
Our history reveals much about the reasons why the contemporary logistician ‘looks’ and ‘acts’ the way they do, what skills they possess, and how they relate to one another.
Of course, it is not the only reason we – as logisticians – are where we are. Logistics is an enormous problem. It is simply impossible to adequately prepare the logistician for the full range of tasks, employment opportunities and requirements across the full breadth of the Defence enterprise. A logistician, even at a junior level, faces a challenge that other career paths in military organisations will not be exposed to until senior ranks. It is massively complex, and to be successful as a logistician requires you to be able to navigate a substantial portion of the institution.
It is an activity that begins with the national economy, with policy making and resourcing, and ends with the delivery of materiel and personnel to the combat force fighting at the forward edge of the battlefield. It comprises and enormous number of functions across the breadth of Defence – Department and ADF – performed by large numbers of technical specialists, generalist officers and public servants, industry partners and contractors and officials.
The graphic below shows the generic logistics functions that are performed within the Defence enterprise.
These functions are divided into two main areas.
The bottom half of the slide shows that logistics is concerned with the development of the means for, and the sustainment of, military operations.
It comprises a substantial proportion of the tasks a Defence logistician is expected to perform, as well as a number performed by others.
The second area relates to the formulation of strategy, including policy, and military tactics.
You might think logisticians are only responsible for the provision of staff advice, but the real important work of the strategic logistician is in this space where their work sets in motion the Defence approach to industry policy and engagement, national support, acquisition inputs into strategy and other planning responsibilities.
Logisticians are not the sole owners of these problems, but they are quite clearly critical in traversing the spectrum.
Success in this environment requires us all to understand which areas require emphasis given circumstances, and where the authority for decision making and activity lies.
This, unfortunately, is hardly an easy task!
This transcript is the first half of a speech given at the 2018 Australian and New Zealand Defence Logistics Conference.
The session was titled ‘The Future Logistician’.
The second part of this transcript will be posted soon.
David Beaumont is a serving Australian Army officer and the thoughts here are is own.
This article was originally published on the website Logistics in War on November 10, 2019.
In November 2019, No. 36 Squadron at RAAF Base Amberley hosted United States Air Force crews from 535th Air Lift Squadron to participate in Exercise Global Dexterity.
The inter-fly exercise saw mixed RAAF and USAF C-17 Globemaster III crews maintain, load and fly the aircraft – a major milestone for both nations. Participating in ‘three-ship’ air-to-air refuelling training with RAAF KC-10A Multi-role Tanker Transport aircraft, and airdrop formations, the C-17s descended to an altitude of 100 metres at times along the Queensland coast between the Whitsundays and Noosa passing over Fraser Island and Rainbow Beach.
U.S. Marines with 1st Marine Aircraft Wing, conduct a rapid deployment exercise to increase the confidence of III MEF’s ability to rapidly deploy and maintain a secure Indo-Pacific region while showcasing the lethality and operational flexibility of 1st MAW, on Okinawa, Japan, Oct. 24-25, 2019.
As the only forward-deployed MEF, III MEF is strategically postured to quickly and effectively respond to any crisis within the Indo-Pacific region.
Edwards Air Force Base, California, said farewell to six of its F-35 Lightning II’s in October.
The F-35s were transferred to Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, to continue initial operational testing.
The 31st Test and Evaluation Squadron, a tenant unit at Edwards, recently completed their portion of the mission of conducting initial operational evaluation tests of the aircraft.
The 31st TES, whose parent unit is the 53rd Wing out of Eglin Air Force Base in Florida, served as part of the F-35 Joint Operational Test Team.
In an article by Giancarlo Casem of the 412th Test Wing, published on November 4, 2019, the transfer was highlighted:
EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. —
Edwards Air Force Base said farewell to six of its F-35 Lightning II’s in October. The F-35s were transferred to Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, to continue initial operational testing.
The 31st Test and Evaluation Squadron, a tenant unit at Edwards, recently completed their portion of the mission of conducting initial operational evaluation tests of the aircraft. The 31st TES, whose parent unit is the 53rd Wing at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida, served as part of the F-35 Joint Operational Test Team.
“The F-35 will continue through its operational test program,” said Lt. Col. Ryan Thulin, 31st TES commander. “We consolidated the fleets at Nellis, so they can launch operationally relevant numbers of instrumented airplanes.”
Completing IOT&E allows for the Full Rate Production decision to be made and leads into the production and fielding of more F-35s. The six F-35s are now assigned to the 422nd TES at Nellis. Following the F-35 movement, the 31st TES will continue to work on, or provide support for other test programs, Thulin said.
“We will continue to do operational test of our legacy bomber programs as well as our C2ISR (Command and Control and Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance) operational test and we’ll posture up for follow-on programs,” Thulin said.
Thulin said the squadron’s success could be attributed to the people that make up the 31st.
During our visit to Edwards AFB, we met with several members of the integrated team, and published several interviews after that 2016 visit.