Woke dogma at expense of defending our nation
Australia is run by an unaccountable, selfserving collective of almost 2.5 million federal, state and local government bureaucrats, 270,000 more than a year before.
Unelected public servants now set government agenda and fainthearted ministers do their bidding. The ballot box is simply a release for voters to register protests.
Take Defence.
Securing the nation from outside threats is one of government’s most solemn duties. Yet when today’s Defence chiefs determine that a cultural reset is more important than battle readiness, the parliament meekly goes along.
Examples include instructing Defence Force Academy cadets to wear purple in support of “Wear it Purple Day”, an annual event to celebrate the LGBTIQA+ community. Students also learn how to incorporate climate change into planning and conduct of operations.
Ensuring the military culture aligns with today’s woke orthodoxy, the Australian Defence Force has also ordered adherence to politically correct language.
“Bloke” is gender-triggering, so it is banned. Likewise the term “unmanned” when referring to drones. This is somewhat hypothetical as Australia lacks killer drones and counter-drone capability.
Important, too, in this gentler, caring age, Defence personnel who believe they are subject to bullying behaviour (like being shouted at) may seek confidential advice through the “Workplace Behaviour Adviser Network”. Whether this advice is available on the frontline is unknown.
Consistent with the culture refresh, Defence is enforcing diversity, equity and inclusion targets. Of course pursuing gender equity calls into question merit-based promotion, influences readiness and emphasises differences along sexuality, gender and racial lines, the antithesis of cohesive fighting units.
It’s little wonder Defence struggles to meet its manpower needs.
When the very nature of combat may be alien to some within the targeted groups, recruitment must be impacted. This may explain why last year the uniformed workforce contracted by 1161 personnel. The ADF is operating at 3400 below its average funded strength. Australians should be worried.
The Auditor General’s department found the current system lacks transparency and clarity. It discovered Defence failed to inform the Government when a classified $50m program blew out to $150m.
An audit of Defence’s future frigates program found a $423m cost blowout, delays and a lack of focus on value for money during the tender process. It claimed “the rationale for the procurement approach were not retained”.
A report on Defence’s decision to retire and secretly disassemble 46 Taipan helicopters before burying them will make for interesting reading.
Defence ignored a second-hand value of $30m for each and Ukraine’s request to take them. Safety concerns were given as the reason, yet New Zealand and 12 other nations keep flying the identical aircraft, having carried out necessary modifications. Now Australia lacks battlefield trooplift capability until its Black Hawk helicopters are delivered, who knows when?
Meanwhile, the ADF has no lethal unmanned systems or counter-drone capabilities to protect Australian troops. Defence is reported to have allowed eight years to evaluate the best type of counter-drone capability.
Then there’s the submarine debacle. Having committed to procuring 12 French submarines for $80bn, Defence spent $830m cancelling them.
Now it proposes to spend up to $368bn on eight nuclear submarines that won’t be delivered before 2040. Hopefully, our enemies will wait because, even if Defence hasn’t noticed, the world is rapidly becoming a more dangerous place.
Meanwhile, taxpayers continue to pour precious time and money into woke programs that do little, if anything, to prepare readiness.
No wonder. The very ADF leaders pushing the woke agenda are those charged with ensuring defence readiness and national security.
Defence Minister Richard Marles’s call for a “culture of excellence, making sure that procurement is happening as quickly as it can” is a fine aspiration.
However, to achieve it, he must replace the current Defence Department and ADF leadership with people who have the nation’s, rather than the Defence collective’s, interests at heart.