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Speaker 1: The bombing of Darwin commemorations well and truly underway along

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Speaker 1: the Esplanade at the moment. And you know, we often

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Speaker 1: talk about our defense presence here in the Northern Territory.

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Speaker 1: And while Australia's strategy is rightly looking north, our force posture,

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Speaker 1: infrastructure investments and alliance settings reflect the reality of our

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Speaker 1: geography and the demands of deterrence. But according to the

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Speaker 1: latest Strategist piece written by Raylen Lockhurst, Well it examines

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Speaker 1: the disconnect between this strategic intent and personnel distribution, particularly

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Speaker 1: the decline in permanent ADF numbers in the Northern Territory

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Speaker 1: at a time when Northern Australia is becoming central to

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Speaker 1: our national defense strategy.

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Speaker 2: Now joining us on.

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Speaker 1: The line is a man who we always love talking

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Speaker 1: to about these subjects. It is doctor John Coin from

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Speaker 1: the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.

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Speaker 2: Good morning to you.

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Speaker 3: John, and hey, I'm not a wappy man's plaining today.

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Speaker 3: Paul Raylen had surgery yesterday. Otherwise she would be on here.

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Speaker 3: It is her work and she would much rather be

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Speaker 3: here with us rather than in the ICU where she currently.

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Speaker 2: Well, I hope she's okay.

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Speaker 1: And I know that she will appreciate you speaking this

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Speaker 1: morning because we really wanted to get her on obviously

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Speaker 1: she wasn't available. What we always love a chat with

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Speaker 1: you as well. John.

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Speaker 3: Look, thanks Katie, And look this story here is really simple.

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Speaker 3: You know, at the end of the day, my Northern

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Speaker 3: Australian Strategic Policy Center, we're focused on Northern Australia from

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Speaker 3: an economic sense of growth sent and of course where

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Speaker 3: we started a national security sense. Last ten years, the

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Speaker 3: ADF has grown by about thirteen percent over the last

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Speaker 3: ten years. The number of permanent ADF people in the

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Speaker 3: Northern Territory has reduced by twelve percent.

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Speaker 2: How is this possible? John?

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Speaker 1: You know we're always talking about our strategic importance. You know,

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Speaker 1: there's all this discussion of facing north. How are we then,

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Speaker 1: if that is the case, how are those numbers declining?

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Speaker 3: Look, you know it's that mix up between and catch

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Speaker 3: up between. For thirty odd years, we've said we've had

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Speaker 3: more than ten years notice of a future major conflict.

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Speaker 3: We've now entered a period of time and that started

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Speaker 3: with the release of the Defense Strategic Review a few

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Speaker 3: years ago. That there's less than ten years now there's

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Speaker 3: been a slow creep south. And you know, people give

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Speaker 3: you all sorts of reasons that many of them around

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Speaker 3: HR workforce type issues. But at the end of the day,

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Speaker 3: we've seen armored vehicles leave a number of years ago

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Speaker 3: leave and Clinton tanks for Adelaide. We've seen helicopters leave,

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Speaker 3: and we're probably going to see a further reduction with

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Speaker 3: the planned reduction and overall number of patrol boats based

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Speaker 3: in Darwen.

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Speaker 1: John From a strategic perspective, why does this matter so much?

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Speaker 3: Look, because presence means something. It matters because we have

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Speaker 3: to show at the moment we see an increased the

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Speaker 3: US force posture initiative in Northern Australia and decreasing numbers

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Speaker 3: of Australians. It matters because at the end of the day,

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Speaker 3: where our Australian troops need to be both to defend

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Speaker 3: our maritime approaches, but also in terms of projecting power

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Speaker 3: and in terms of raising training sustaining ourselves is in

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Speaker 3: Northern Australia and in Darwin, Northern Territory.

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Speaker 1: And it's an interesting day to be speaking about this.

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Speaker 1: I mean, today is the day that we commemorate the

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Speaker 1: bombing of Darwin.

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Speaker 2: On this day, all of those years.

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Speaker 1: Ago, we were shook in a way that Australia really

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Speaker 1: has never been shook before. And it is just it's

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Speaker 1: sort of always a reminder of our strategic importance. But

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Speaker 1: also I guess our vulnerability.

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Speaker 3: Look absolutely and I think it's also about a deep

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Speaker 3: seated sense of national security defense in the Northern Territory culturally,

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Speaker 3: and I think that exists in some ways very differently

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Speaker 3: than the rest of Australia. So unfortunately the attacks on Darwen,

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Speaker 3: the bombings on Darwin, left an indelible mark. So Territorians

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Speaker 3: understand their connection to the region, so quite the opposite

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Speaker 3: the stereotype of you know, the wild frontier of Territorians,

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Speaker 3: et cetera. You know, they're very aware of Indonesia, very

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Speaker 3: aware of Paven, New Guinea, very aware of Team or

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Speaker 3: less than the connections into the region.

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Speaker 1: John, do you think, like, you know, how do we

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Speaker 1: increase the defense numbers here. Does it come down to,

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Speaker 1: you know, to our politicians wanting you know, wanting us

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Speaker 1: to have that greater defense presence and increasing those numbers,

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Speaker 1: or do we need to have incentives and things to

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Speaker 1: sort of make long term service in Northern Australia more attractive.

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Speaker 3: Look, there's a couple of different factors in here. I

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Speaker 3: think in the first place is you know, you don't

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Speaker 3: have a problem until you admit you have a problem.

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Speaker 3: So everyone talking north. The reason we're on here today

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Speaker 3: is because Raylen sat down and did an analysis of

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Speaker 3: the numbers of staff. So you know, there's a question.

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Speaker 3: I've breached some industry people in the territory about this

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Speaker 3: and they said, oh, that sort of makes sense now

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Speaker 3: because the number of DHA houses being built in Darwin

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Speaker 3: has really slowed down. And so the first part is

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Speaker 3: about being really honest about this. The second part is

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Speaker 3: going if there is indeed a workforce problem, if there's

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Speaker 3: a workforce retention problem for defense posting people to Darwin,

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Speaker 3: and that's the reason that it's undermining the national security

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Speaker 3: requirements for having defense posture in Northern Australia, and let's

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Speaker 3: find a way to address that. But also let's be

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Speaker 3: really clear about it as well. You know, well people

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Speaker 3: will say that it's really really hot and often very

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Speaker 3: very wet, and subject a long way away, et cetera,

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Speaker 3: and all those sorts of points about living in Darwin

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Speaker 3: or in the Northern territory in general numbers significantly more

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Speaker 3: numbers of people live in such conditions across Southeast Asia. Secondly,

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Speaker 3: is that if I joined, you know, I wasn't the

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Speaker 3: I mean I joined from Emerald and Central Queensland and

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Speaker 3: my first posting I found myself in Sydney, So you

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Speaker 3: know that's a long way from my heart. You know,

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Speaker 3: I live in Canberra right now. And let me assure you,

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Speaker 3: freezing cold winters and stinking hot summers and dry summers

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Speaker 3: a reality. So I think some of these mythologies need

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Speaker 3: to be busted, some need to be addressed. So if

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Speaker 3: it's being too far away from family, then let's find

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Speaker 3: a rationale and a way of dealing with them.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, really good point, hey, John.

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Speaker 1: Before I let you go this morning, there's been a

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Speaker 1: bit of talk today about you know, just when we

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Speaker 1: talk more about developing the North, the government said that

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Speaker 1: their driving investment into the territory with this new onshore

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Speaker 1: petroleum acreage release in the Beaterloo sub basin five times

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Speaker 1: the size of Singapore. So are the government saying this

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Speaker 1: release is being promoted this week at North America Prospect

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Speaker 1: Expo in Houston, one of the world's largest upstream energy

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Speaker 1: investment events. When we talk about developing the North and

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Speaker 1: we talk about our gas, I mean, is it important

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Speaker 1: that we're involved in this kind of thing and what

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Speaker 1: kind of industry I guess aside from gas, like what else?

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Speaker 2: What could the onflows of this be?

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Speaker 3: Look? Absolutely, you know, I'm just passionate about Northern Australia

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Speaker 3: and economic development in Northern Australia as you are. We

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Speaker 3: talk about all the time and have fierce agreement. But look,

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Speaker 3: at the end of the day, there's some people out

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Speaker 3: there say that the Beloo Basin gas is dead. The

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Speaker 3: truth is the long term projections are that gas will

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Speaker 3: be around for a long time to come and the

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Speaker 3: demand will continue to be strong in terms of flow

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Speaker 3: on industry. So if your question is is you know,

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Speaker 3: is there money, longer term and economic opportunities for Northern

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Speaker 3: Australia from the Beaterloo Basin. Absolutely. The other component is

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Speaker 3: is that it's a rapidly moving world. I've sort of

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Speaker 3: pushed on this the idea of we've seen undersea cables

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Speaker 3: make their landfalling Darwin. We've talked about the digital evolution

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Speaker 3: of the Northern Territory. If you've got cheap power, okay,

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Speaker 3: And here we've got it both ways. So we've got

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Speaker 3: the possibility of beatle loop, so cheap gas power that

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Speaker 3: we don't have to move over long bustances, and we

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Speaker 3: have the possibility of great renewables from projects like sun Cable.

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Speaker 3: Why couldn't the Northern Territory become an AI hub? Why

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Speaker 3: couldn't it be a place where we use that energy,

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Speaker 3: that water and drive whole new industries.

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Speaker 2: How would we be an AI hub?

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Speaker 1: Tell me more, John, I'm fascinated by AI and slightly

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Speaker 1: scared as well.

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Speaker 3: Well, look at the end of the day, every time,

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Speaker 3: every time one of us jumps on to our official

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Speaker 3: intelligence and I'm using a glib example, but it's fun,

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Speaker 3: you know, and wants to have created a picture of

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Speaker 3: a Teddy Bear with our face on. It uses a

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Speaker 3: huge amount of power to do so, so globally, the

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Speaker 3: how we needed to do that? So the likes of

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Speaker 3: Microsoft and others are looking at nuclear power and old

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Speaker 3: nuclear power stations for a moment, imagine creating a data

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Speaker 3: center that's going to do that sort of analytical heft

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Speaker 3: up in the Northern Territory that takes advantage not only

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Speaker 3: of gas but of renewables and then is able to

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Speaker 3: make use of the infrastructure that's being built now with

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Speaker 3: subsea cables, and all of a sudden, the whole new

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Speaker 3: industry grows out of that.

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Speaker 2: John, is that like, is that possible?

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Speaker 1: Do you think, like, are we you know, is it

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Speaker 1: a possible reality or are we you know, are we

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Speaker 1: going to have a lot.

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Speaker 2: Of NASAs saying oh no, that's never going to happen.

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Speaker 3: Well, look, I think a couple of things. The first

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Speaker 3: one is is, you know, I'm known generally for being

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Speaker 3: very pragmatic about analysis. So I'm saying it's possible, so

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Speaker 3: you can take or leave that. So I think that

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Speaker 3: the commercial numbers do stack up. I do think that,

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Speaker 3: you know, there's always they say is in Northern Australia

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Speaker 3: because to do anything up there is tough and you

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Speaker 3: have to think big, and that's one of the challenges.

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Speaker 3: But what we're talking about for you is and enduring

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Speaker 3: demand for energy and enduring demand for commute power compute power,

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Speaker 3: and we have solutions to both of those. Some people

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Speaker 3: will say there's been and I've had this discussion over

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Speaker 3: the last week or two going, oh, you know, what

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Speaker 3: about water? You know, and I'm reminded of a certain

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Speaker 3: territory and I'm sure she's listening out there. Pointed me

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Speaker 3: to a report from NASA. We've turned around and said,

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Speaker 3: you know, in a good wet season, the amount of

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Speaker 3: water that sits in the Northern Territory actually impacts the earth,

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Speaker 3: so you know there is water up there. It's those

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Speaker 3: perfect combinations. So if the UAE and other countries in

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Speaker 3: the Middle East are looking at doing it there, why

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Speaker 3: couldn't we do it in Australia and Northern Territory.

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Speaker 1: Well, doctor John Coyn, it is always an insightful and

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Speaker 1: fascinating conversation. I really appreciate your time this morning. Thank

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Speaker 1: you for stepping in for Raylane for so I hope

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Speaker 1: she's okay.

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Speaker 3: Yep, and we'll get her on here as soon as

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Speaker 3: we can.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely good on your job. Lovely to talk to you.

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Speaker 2: Thank you,