By David Beaumont

This article is part of an updated version of a presentation given at the Australian National University titled ‘Logistics preparedness and mobilising the national support base: the effectiveness of ADF strategic logistics prior to Operation Warden 1999‘.

The prior articles in this series, published as Australia approaches the 25^th anniversary of the peacekeeping intervention in East Timor, paint a grim picture of the impact of logistics unpreparedness on a force called upon to respond to a crisis with limited warning to do so. There is an important story to tell about the circumstances which led to what could be described as logistics unpreparedness during Operation Warden. These articles only offers a few windows into institutional experiences, but I think these windows reveal a history including substantial missteps and an acceptance of risks that an under-resourced organised defence force had little chance of overcoming.   

Research confirms that post-Operation Warden Defence leaders were frustrated that Defence reforms had gone too far in starving military logistics capability; the Defence Committee (DC) directed the National Support Policy (NSP) branch to conduct a new study to focus upon how the ADF should approach strategic logistics. The DC, in early 2001, agreed to ‘the need for a joint study team to be commissioned ….. ‘to review the logistics arrangements in place at the strategic and operational levels to mount and sustain prolonged ADF offshore operations in the near region’. This study recommended that the DC endorse the creation of a new Strategic Logistics Division for the ADF; the new Chief of Air Force, Air Marshal Angus Houston, exemplified the concern of members stating ‘that current logistics arrangements at the strategic and operation levels present serious risks to the successful mounting and sustaining of prolonged ADF operations in the near region, largely due to organisational dysfunction and fragile staffing levels.’ This was quite an indictment that there was a way to go before the ADF possessed higher arrangements that were optimised for the potential of a repeat of Operation Warden. JLC has since (until 2023) operated as a ‘strategic’ and ‘operational’ logistics headquarters under such interim arrangements.

Government reinvested in the ADF’s logistics capabilities soon after Operation Warden concluded. The 2000 Defence White Paper saw funding allocated for around 500 positions in critical deployable logistics areas, and the ADF worked towards to the rebuilding of transportation and supply capabilities that were being considered for rationalisation only a matter of a few years prior. Commercialisation processes stalled virtually instantaneously as reviews of the deployable capacity of the ADF began and new concepts of logistics support to operations were developed. Logistics capability investments such as Joint Project 126 – Joint Theatre Distribution System were developed in response to the problems of supporting a force in a maritime expeditionary setting.

Leaders bravely touted that logistics capability gaps had been overcome only a matter of five years after East Timor. In 2006, Brigadier Mick Slater, as commander of a new operation to East Timor, Operation Astute, proudly declared that ‘we have largely solved the deployable logistics problem since 1999’ and that the ADF had ‘poured resources into rectifying the problems we had in getting water, POL [petrol, oils and lubricants] and key war stocks into theatre and sustaining ourselves away from our Australian bases.’ Operation Astute, of course,  was not of the same size as Operation Warden and the logistics burden was much less – even in the context of providing such support while operations in the Middle-east were well and truly underway.

The reality of resourcing was different to such panglossian views expressed in the 2000s. In fact, much of the resources that were purportedly poured into logistics problems were superficial. A Joint Operations Command investigation around ten years after East Timor ultimately confirmed that 25% of the personnel numbers identified in the 2000 White Paper had found their way into the logistics units.

And so, it seems, the habits of the 1980’s and 1990’s began to appear as soon as attention lifted.

It serves no one to be too overly critical of the ADF’s capacity to learn, as problematic its approach to logistics may be at times. There is little doubt that the ADF’s attention was fixed elsewhere – on global operations and the pressures of sustaining set commitments over decades of time.

Nonetheless, the lessons of Operation Warden, and the years leading up to it, are highly pertinent to modern-day ADF increasingly aware of the limits of its capability and capacity.

The strategic policy milieu of the 2020s is radically different from that of 2000, let alone 1987, though the issues affecting logistics preparedness, and the ADF’s approach to strategic logistics, are in many ways indistinct. It is conceivable that the ADF may be required to deploy, at short notice, much as it did in 1999. Though military planners and commentators may favour the learning of lessons from major wars when it comes to the potentialities which lie ahead, the East Timor deployment tells us much about how modern military organisations prepare for the inevitability that they will be surprised by crises. We therefore ignore the lessons of Op Warden at our peril.

With preparedness in mind, one can view the Australian Government’s ‘National Defence Statement 2023’ and the National Defence Strategy which followed as being a positive step towards recognising that the ADFs approach to strategic logistics needs further development. The Government’s concept of National Defence seeks ‘a renewed focus on national planning for Defence preparedness’ while nuclear submarines are built and maintained, supply-chain resilience in guided weapons and fuel is sought, force posture adjusted to reflect operations in the defence of Australia’s north and military preparedness is ‘accelerated’. Logistics factors and issues permeated the Defence Strategic Review and the National Defence Strategy, with recommendations that investment in logistics and health capabilities commence. Furthermore, a new National Support Division shall be established ‘to harness the nation’s economic, industrial and societal strength.’

There is reason to believe logistics preparedness, as highlighted in these articles, will be a topic of interest in Defence throughout the 2020’s. The ADF’s strategic logistics approach, as part of a new ‘resilience’ imperative, must be set within a whole-of-nation approach to national security and, most certainly, a national support approach defined by ‘assurance’ and ‘resilience’. Identifying contemporary logistics problems won’t be enough to respond to the challenges of the future. At these articles remind, there is often a chasm between strategic guidance and eventual implementation – especially in the context of logistics. Defence must yet cross that gap, though it is well on the way to doing so.

In concluding this series of articles about the circumstances of an operation decades ago, I’d like to leave you with a few broader thoughts about the placement of logistics in any professional study of military performance.

Operation Warden clearly shows that logistics preparedness matters to operational success, and all invested in national security must engage with the topic. Though history offers potent reminders of the impact of logistics on war and military operations, as it did in the case of Operation Warden, few militaries engage with the topic until the circumstances demand. Then, when is perhaps too late to prepare, the unrelenting grip of logistics on military strategy and operational performance is revealed amid a burst of revelation and introspection by surprised organisations and leaders.

Logistics should not be treated as an obtuse or inaccessible topic, or one the subject of specialists and technocrats, if surprises such as Defence experienced in 1999 is to be avoided. Australia may not be able to afford a repeat of the conspicuous failure of ADF logistics preparedness witnessed during Operation Warden. Logistics, as a subject, must therefore be understood from its roots for logistics is a function of command, and it holds a powerful grasp on the development of actionable, realistic, military strategy. It is about the resourcing of war, and the decisions commanders and Governments must make to ensure a military is prepared and able to win.  The treatment of logistics as a problem to be solved rather than a ‘well’ which a military ‘draws its strength to fight’, as was seen during the 1980s and 1990s, ensures the opposite.