Category: Defence

ALMOST 80 members of Australia’s defence force have killed themselves since 1997. Oh my god, that’s awfull!

…opposition defence personnel spokesman Mark Bishop said the suicides were a result of defence culture. He said the suicide rate should force the Government into releasing the findings of a review of suicides.

No it shouldn’t. Reading on we find that the national rate is 1.6 of all deaths while the ADF is about half that. What’s his bloody point. He has taken a positive stat and reversed it and then pointed out why this stat is bad. False premise springs to mind. Sexual harrassment is a problem in the ADF! In a force the size of the ADF, with it’s tens of thousands of mainly young, fit men and woman there has been 107 cases of harrassment. 107! My God, I wonder how they get time to soldier. Well, actually, it’s only 88 substantiated cases but let’s not let exceptionally good figures ruin a good beat-up. I’m neither making light of suicides nor sexual harrassment but could we have some balance. With both the listed figures being less than national averages the Senator could have just as well congratulated the ADF considering they are going through a difficult time at the moment with deployments all over the world as they fight terrorists and help stabalize our volatile island cousins. This subject was reported three days ago but with other matters on my plate I hadn’t posted this piece. It is more relevant now as I have been a part of a ex-service network email distribution that made much of the Bishop report. Of late I’ve been receiving emails extremely critical of the government from an ex member of my battalion who forwards emails from one Keith Tennant, an advocate of sorts for the ex service community. I received one last night and was so moved as to answer in a theme that was critical of the political posturing contained within. Amongst other things, I said;

Your links on your website detract from your purpose. Linking to activist sites, 9/11 conspiracy theorists and people like Margo Kingston clearly put you in that angry left wing area that sees no good in the country, no good in the military and definitely no good in our current fight against terrorism. My opinion, after reading your website, is that your political leanings detract from your mission. I’m not so much questioning your work but the more the angry political attacks…they can’t serve much purpose, they annoy me and I’m representative of your target.

I also took him to task for his email signature that says;

Veterans Will Continue To Advise Young Australians Not To Enlist In The Military Under Current Circumstances

There was some to’ing and fro’ing of emails that culminated in my being blackbanned from his email list. Keith’s final email read;

You really are one sick puppy. So, anybody who doesn’t fit your vision of the world and your profile of what is right and proper in Gillett’s mad head is a commo and rabble rouser. and …well, just about anything else I suppose. Of course you wouldn’t at all be one of those mad, war mongering right wingers who want to send everybody else’s kids and grandkids off to the latest War EXCEPT YOUR OWN, would you? With lunatics like you around I marvel how we ever gained any respect at all and how Governments have ever listened to us. You are blacklisted so don’t bother replying. We are busy every day and have been for years fighting for the entitlements and rights of lunatics like you. My advice to you is…….. Stick a tampon up your arse, light the wick and blow your brains out.

Which pretty well proves, in an ad hominem sort of way, the point of my earlier email. Keith’s web page, The Aussie Digger is loaded with compassion for his fellow ex serviceman..you might like to drop in – I’m sure he would appreciate the extra traffic. I received another answer to my email that raised points in a rational and calm manner and I replied in a similar vein. Some members of the veterans community are concerned about suicide and I am one of those. I did some quick reading here and at the ABS on the subject of suicide, or more relevant to this issue, youth suicide and found the reports do not paint a rosy picture. Suicide has touched me personally and it can only be defined as ‘painful’ and raises reflections on ‘what could I have done?’ and the answer is all too often…nothing. Notwithstanding, I don’t think the government should necessarily be hauled over the coals for it. I’m of the opinion that there needs to be a precondition of some physciatric disorder that prevails regardless of profession that can be triggered by, what to many others, is an inconsequential event. So even though good works are being carried out by the military and society generally to alleviate the problem, it will always exist and we need to keep that in mind instead of mindlessly thowing accusations around. Youth suicide is an across border problem. It is not a pretty picture but it does suggest that the Army doen’t stand alone with it’s suicide problem. No one carries press about suicide rates for wharfies, or airline pilots or rural workers as there are no such figures readily available and it’s a good way to bash the government or generals anyway. UPDATE: I sent Keith an email linking to this post but he was right, I’m black banned and the email was rejected.

The Australian reports a survivor from the WW2 sinking of HMAS Sydney with the loss of all hands, has been located in a grave in Christmas Island. Us Gilletts have a long association with HMAS Sydney. Two of my Great Uncles witnessed the first Sydney sinking the Emden in WW1, my father served on the second Sydney during WW2 and I returned home from my war (Vietnam) on the third Sydney. Just over a year ago I posted on my father’s time on the Sydney and his very lucky escape from a watery grave. The ‘survivor’ exhumed at Christmas Island is not recent news. All investigations into the loss of the cruiser make note of a body found in a RAN life raft at Christmas Island but in the days before DNA identifciation little could be gained from the body. Without evidence, the RAN never listed the body as a sailor from the Sydney. Today it should be different and at least one family of the 645 lost can hopefully gain closure. In this case, the family may have already been identified.

TED McGowan thought he was going to take it all in his stride. Then on Tuesday evening, the call came from Canberra; the final resting place of the unknown sailor had been unearthed on remote Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean.

John Perryman, the Royal Australian Navy historian, told him a forensic team was dusting off the skeletal remains of what may be the only physical link to Australia’s worst maritime disaster, the sinking of HMAS Sydney in November 1941 off Western Australia.

It may also turn out to be Mr McGowan’s brother Tom. “I feel exhausted,” Mr McGowan admitted yesterday. “I thought I would be able to handle it, but I was completely overcome.” He has been the driving force behind the navy-led expedition to Christmas Island.

Two issues give Mr McGowan hope: a good set of teeth and a canvas shoe. When the body was examined by the island doctor on or about February 6, 1942, the corpse had a “perfect set of teeth”, as did Tom McGowan, a rarity in those days, and a shoe in the raft had “McCowan” or “McEwan” branded on it. I hope it works out for you, Ted

THE Chinese military allegedly offered an Australian weapons inventor more than $US100 million ($A134 million) to go to Beijing and work on one of the deadliest guns in the world, the Nine Network reports. But Australian and US military forces are said to be determined to ensure the gun, known as Metal Storm and developed in Brisbane, does not end up in enemy hands.

Metal Storm technology is an electronically initiated, stacked projectile system that removes the mechanisms required to fire a conventional weapon. Effectively, the only parts that move in Metal Storm’s technology are the projectiles contained within the barrels. Multiple projectiles are stacked in a barrel. The technology allows each projectile to be fired sequentially from the barrel. Metal Storm’s fully loaded barrel tubes are essentially serviceable weapons, without the traditional ammunition feed or ejection system, breech opening or any other moving parts. Metal Storm barrels can be effectively grouped in multiple configurations to meet a diversity of applications.

The technology is all about firing of projectiles or rounds being controlled by a computer chip rather than a comparatively slow human operating with a mechanical reload system. Both the human and mechanical aspects of automatic weapons that have been with us for more than a century, limit the speed of reload. As computers function in nanoseconds, or a billionth of a second, and the round is not being reloaded the cyclic rate of fire can be measured in milliseconds. The barrels come prestacked and what Mike O’Dwyer has done is work out how to fire the forward round without sympatheic detonation of the following rounds .As each round is fired by electronic signal it arms the following round This was the breakthrough and in itself will change the face of war and policing. Metal Storm cite a round leaving the barrel every three milliseconds or 333.333 rounds a second or 20,000 rounds per minute. These figures are for a single 40mm grenade launcher! The barrels themselves are then stacked so the weapon system consists of multiple barrels that can be fired in any sequence and any number of rounds per sequence. It’s all in the software. This sort of weapon invalidates the human wave attacks that China used so well in Korea. No wonder they want to buy the technology! The Metal Storm website makes interesting reading.

I just love the way the Australians are conducting the Afghanistan chapter of the War on Terror. Not for them some ABC/SBS/The Age type anti-military embedded journalist evere eager to put his bid in for a Purlitzer by reporting Pte X shot at some poor ‘Freedom Fighter” and killed him without even trying to understand his motivation; no not at all. The only reason we know 4RAR Cdo were in action recently was courtesy General Mike Hindmarsh, a mate from my previous life, who told the press and the people what they needed to know.

IN a rugged mountain valley in Afghanistan, the Australian commandos were fighting for their lives under an afternoon rain of rocket-propelled grenades.

The small band of 4RAR fighters were on their way across the Chora valley, trying to help another coalition unit under attack when they were caught up in the heaviest battle fought by Australians since the Vietnam War.

The Australians were hit by a sustained barrage from RPGs, mortars and machineguns fired by Taliban guerillas who wounded six of their platoon.

Well done, guys Further reading; The Australian , News.com and here for a report on medals to be awarded to some of the diggers.

I was all on fire with the possibilities of the Israeli around-corner weapons in last week post, but a service contact has pointed to a much simpler version. Typical of Australia to do it simpler, cheaper and just as effective. Nothing flash…no video of surpised targets to post on YouTube but it will obviously do the job. Here for more details.

Earlier this year when I tried to get my LR Discovery on the Indian Pacific railway from Sydney to Perth I found I had to load it at Adelaide. The reason? The vehicle was too high for the rail link from Sydney to Perth. So I’m not surprise when I read in the Australian article that the Abrams tank is likewise to high to go on the same line. It is also too wide and too heavy. Not only am I not surprised but neither are the military, the government nor the railway companies. The only people surprised are the media; at least that’s my interpretation of the tone of article.

THE army’s newest frontline weapon, the Abrams battle tank, arrived in Australia yesterday and immediately encountered problems, with no rail transport available to carry the tank to the Northern Territory.

It didn’t immediately encounter problems at all. The problems were long known and plans already in place to impliment additions to rolling stock to carry them. The fact that they aren’t in-service today reflects on the speed of the Abrams purchase and the subsequent need for logisitc tail to catch up; it doesn’t reflect poor planning. The article also mentions the weight limitations of the bridge at Katherine, a fact I remember well from my army days, but since then I have travelled extensively in North Queensland and the Territory and have often been forced to the side of the road by alarmingly large low loaders carrying trucks and plant to mines that make the Abrams look like a mere baby. But still, the tone of the article serves its purpose; to make the military look guilty of poor planning and of having made the wrong decision in the first place to buy the Abrams. As if the journalist, Mark Dodd knows better. He is of a politiical conviction that damns the Abrams project from day-one. It’s American, it’s defence orientated and the purchase was initiated by a conservative government. Mark’s most recently ran his colours up the flag pole with Martin Chulov; the defender of the indefencable “Israel deliberately attacked an ambulance” hoax. He is tainted with an anti-military/Howard/Bush/US brush and would be better employed at The Age, rather than at the Australian. I posted previously on the Abrams tank deal and comments were left doubting the wisdom of the the purchase but they were by people who know and make their calls based on experience, knowledge and training; not ideology. UPDATE: Lt Gen Peter Leahy, Chief of Army agrees with me;

THE article on the Abrams tank by Mark Dodd (“Army’s $500m tanks in the wars”, 23-24/9) is disappointingly negative and ill-informed. With regard to rail transportation, when the next shipment of 41 tanks arrive by sea in Darwin in March 2007, Army will have in process the acquisition of rail carriages to move them on the north-south railway. There is no need to acquire these carriages yet. The tanks that arrived in Melbourne will be stationed in Puckapunyal and used for training at the School of Armour. There is no need for these tanks to move to Darwin.

In the bad old days when I was carrying an M16 with murderous intent in my heart, there always existed one distinct disadvantage and that was to fire the thing effectively I had to expose, at the very least, the right hand side of my face. This sort of thing clearly comes under the heading of a poor life style activity and had I done a Risk Assessment like I did last week for guys climbing a ladder to remove an antenna, I would have approached the Lieutenant and told him it was just so against all Work Place Health and Safety issues that I couldn’t in all honesty condone the activity. Of course the Lieutenant wasn’t known for his sense of humour and I had a job to do……that was the name of the game. Roll on forty years and the name of the game has changed courtesy of the Israeli weapons R&D guys. I presume the soldier can also press ‘Record’ to get a lasting image of the look of astonishment on the face of the target and his last words…Holy Mohammed, where did that come fr……… Heads up from old Army mate Joe.

DEFENCE chief Angus Houston has ordered a full investigation into video images posted on the internet showing skylarking Australian soldiers in Baghdad brandishing weapons. I was alerted to this yesterday with receipt of a Defence Media release that the Australian used as a basis for their front page ‘serious news’ type headlines. OK, slightly off-key, a bit tacky, maybe not very professional but all indications are that it is really a minor misdemeanor and should be handled at company/Major level and certainly shouldn’t be remanded past the Commanding Officer. Brig Jim Wallace, ex SASR officer and now a devoted christian sees it this way as well while predicably, a ‘never heard of him before’ academic, has been assailed in his ivory tower by the ABC to put the episode and Defence in a poor light. He meets the requirement by stating;

… the offensive videos at the centre of the latest army scandal show soldiers see themselves as separate from the rest of the community. The soldiers found responsible for the video, in which one holds a gun to the head of a man in Arab dress and another is shown quickdrawing his handgun, could be thrown out of the army.

Identified as Social researcher at Flinders University and former infantry soldier Dr Ben Wadham he reiterates his point;

“Trophy shots are like an artefact of military culture – they show us that the military sees itself as separate from the broader community,” he said.

I wonder what regiment Ben served in….I’ve got a quid it was the local University Regiment as he gives the impression of considering himself a far more worthy person than us common infantrymen. A bit tacky, as Ive said but it really doesn’t warrant headlines unless balanced with articles on the pressures that these guys operate under. A beat-up. UPDATE: CB has supplied the good doctor’s resume in comments Nothing there to change my original thoughts. UPDATE I: The good doctor has commented and I withdraw the put-down “I’ve got a quid it was the local University” as has seen real service in 2/4RAR.  (read comments)