National Security Strategies, it seems, are like London Buses: You wait for ages for one and then three turn up at once. In March of this year the UK Government published Security in an Interdependent World. A few months later, the French President Nicolas Sarkozy unveiled the snappily titled French White Paper on defence and national security (pdf). This week it was the turn of the Australian Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, to outline his Government’s national security strategy.
While each of the three strategies are important in their own right; reflecting the approach, culture and system of the British, French and Australian governments, it is the commonality of approach and their shared awareness of the security environment that is far more significant.
When the British Government published the UKNSS, politicians and officials were quick to remark that the strategy was a ‘first iteration’, and would be updated annually (led by the new National Security Secretariat in the Cabinet Office). Whereas the UKNSS adopted a very conceptual approach, the French document went into more detail, reflecting both the scale of work necessary to make the French Government more joined-up but also a desire to identify what capabilities and resources were necessary to achieve this. In doing the docuement identified five basic strategic functions that would, in combination, allow them to achieve our overall national security:
– knowledge and anticipation
– prevention
– deterrence
– protection
– intervention
While the British Government might claim that they too had identified these functions the difference was in the level of detail that matters – an indication perhaps that, for the British Government, that power and resources would remain within departments and not in the Cabinet Office. Not to be beaten Kevin Rudd has gone several steps further. Not content with grandiose statements and meaningless rhetoric Rudd wants action. The Australian National Security Strategy:
‘Provides context for the Defence White Paper, which will detail the way forward for our defence over the next twenty years. It will inform a regular Foreign Policy Statement to the Parliament. It will shape the upcoming Counter-Terrorism White Paper. As well as guide the development of the Government’s first National Energy Security Assessment. It incorporates the recommendations of the Homeland and Border Security Review commissioned by the Government early this year.’
Furthermore, in his statement to Parliament Rudd outlined what the strategy would lead to:
- Duncan Lewis is to become National Security Adviser
- A National Security Statement to Parliament
- A coordinated budget process for national security
- An evaluation mechanism, coordinated by the National Security Adviser. It will consider performance against whole-of-government outcomes in light of the priorities set out in the National Security Statement and help inform future resource allocation.
- A Secretaries Committee on National Security, known as SCNS
- A Crisis Coordination Centre (similar to UK COBRA)
Over on The Interpreter, the Lowy Institute’s excellent blog, the AusNSS has been met with a mixture of consternation, disappointment and just a whiff of optimism.
