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ANNUAL REPORT2019-2020

ASPI

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www.aspistrategist.org.au

ANNUAL REPORT2019-2020

© The Australian Strategic Policy Institute Limited 2020

This publication is subject to copyright. Except as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part of it may in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, microcopying, photocopying, recording or otherwise) be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted without prior written permission. Enquiries should be addressed to the publishers.

First published October 2020

Published in Australia by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute

ASPI Level 2, 40 Macquarie Street Barton ACT 2600 Australia

Tel + 61 2 6270 5100 Fax + 61 2 6273 9566 Email enquiries@aspi.org.au Web www.aspi.org.au

www.aspistrategist.org.au

ABN 77 097 369 045 ISSN 1 447 5510 (print) ISSN 2651 8694 (online)

Cover photos:

Power energy fusion: iStockphoto/ktsimage

Bushmaster protected mobility vehicles from 2nd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, travel in convoy during a patrol at Shoalwater Bay Training Area in North Queensland during Exercise Talisman Sabre 2017. Photo: Australian Department of Defence.

Illustration by Badiucao/https://www.badiucao.com

Australian navy ship in the Timor Sea, Darwin, Australia: iStockphoto/EAGiven

Flight Lieutenant Brittany Lovett, who is deployed to Afghanistan on Operation Highroad. Photo: Australian Department of Defence

LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL

Senator the Honourable Linda Reynolds CSC

Minister for Defence

Parliament House

CANBERRA ACT 2600

Dear Minister

The Council of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute has pleasure in submitting to you the

annual report for the year ended 30 June 2020.

The report is presented to you in accordance with section 97 of the Public Governance,

Performance and Accountability Act 2013.

The report has been prepared to conform with the requirements of the Corporations Act 2001

and was approved by the Council at its meeting on 20 October 2020.

Yours sincerely

Lt Gen (Ret’d) Kenneth Gillespie AC DSC CSM

Chairman

20 October 2020

P: + 02 6270 5100 A BN 77 097 369 045 w ww.aspi.org.au w ww.aspistrategist.org.au

LEVEL 2, 40 MACQUARIE STREET, BARTON A CT 2 600

CONTENTS

LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL iii

MESSAGE FROM THE ASPI CHAIRMAN AND THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR vii

ChAPTER 1

OVERVIEW 1

Purposes 2

Staffing 19

Funding 21

ChAPTER 2

PROGRAMS 25

Defence and strategy 26

National security 28

ASPI professional development 36

ChAPTER 3

PUBLICATIONS 45

Contributions to the national debate, by publication type 48

Contributions to the national debate, by selected type 56

ChAPTER 4

EVENTS 65

ASPI podcast 67

ASPI’s International Conference 67

Women in Defence and Security Network 68

Evening presentations 68

International strategic dialogues 68

Roundtable discussions and forums 69

ASPI public events and workshops 69

Webinars 69

Other events 69

ChAPTER 5

CORPORATE GOVERNANCE 71

Council meeting attendance 72

Current council members 74

Council committees 84

ChAPTER 6

FINANCIALS 87

ASPI Directors' Report 88

ANAO Independent Audit Report 90

Statement by Directors 93

Financial Statements 94

ANNEXES

A ASPI PUBLICATIONS 124

B ARTICLES AND BOOK CHAPTERS BY ASPI STAFF 131

C OPINION PIECES BY ASPI STAFF 133

D ASPI EVENTS 138

E KEY ROLES AT INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES 144

F ACHIEVING ASPI’S PURPOSES 146

G INFORMATION ABOUT EXECUTIVE REMUNERATION 151

H ASPI BY THE NUMBERS 154

I INDEX OF ANNUAL REPORT REQUIREMENTS 161

J ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS 162

vi    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Minister for Defence, Senator the Honourable Linda Reynolds CSC, addressing the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) about the outcomes of the 2020 Defence Strategic Update and the 2020 Force Structure Plan, 2 July 2020. Photo: Defence image library.

‘I sincerely thank Peter Jennings, the Executive Director of ASPI, for hosting this event here

today. Peter and his team are critically important contributors to our national defence and also

to our security dialogue. So Peter, thank you very much.’

Minister for Defence, Senator the Honourable Linda Reynolds CSC

 Message fr om th e AS PI Ch airman an d th e Ex ecutive Di rector  vii

MESSAGE FROM THE ASPI CHAIRMAN AND THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

Clear strategic thinking and the value of contestable policy advice are never more important than

in moments of crisis. With the world enduring the worst health pandemic in a century,

an economic downturn second only to the Great Depression of the 1920s and 1930s, and

challenges to the international rule of law from authoritarianism and from democratic malaise,

2019-20 will be remembered as a dark and difficult year. Indeed, in launching the Government’s

2020 Defence Strategic Update and the 2020 Force Structure Plan at the Australian Defence Force

Academy on 1 July 2020, Prime Minister Scott Morrison observed: ’This simple truth is this: even

as we stare down the COVID pandemic at home, we need to also prepare for a post-COVID

world that is poorer, that is more dangerous, and that is more disorderly.’

The team at ASPI worked hard during the year to meet the objectives set for the institute in its

foundation Charter letter:

• First, to provide alternative sources of input to Government decision-making processes on

major strategic and defence policy issues.

• Second, ASPI is intended to help nourish public debate and understanding.

• Third, the Government believes that Australia needs to invest in nurturing a body of men

and women, working both inside and outside Government, who are expert in the strategic

policy issues faced by Government.

From mid-March 2020, like much of the Australian workforce, ASPI staff worked remotely

for several months before a staged return to the office. We are very proud of the efforts

of our staff. Despite the challenges, they have continued to produce high-quality research

with an Australian and indeed global policy impact. This 2019-20 annual report shows

continued growth in staff numbers, a widening funding base and a substantial upswing in our

publications through many channels and covering many issues.

ASPI continues to be prominent in explaining the trajectory of Australia-China relations and

locating in in the wider context of the shifting geopolitical balance. We see this as essential

work, providing a broader context in which to understand government decision-making on

viii    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

legislation designed to prevent covert foreign interference in Australian political and economic

life. ASPI remains heavily engaged with parliamentarians, officials, the diplomatic corps,

industry and the media on China and other subjects central to Australia’s path to recovery

from Covid-19, a return to healthy economic growth and strengthened national security.

The annual report also shows significant growth in funding support from some

international partners. In common with many think tanks, universities and research

institutions, ASPI depends on multiple sources of funding to grow our expertise and operations.

The report shows this in detail. It is important to state that, in entering any financial

relationship, ASPI insists on maintaining complete independence in its editorial judgements.

Indeed, that independence is why people see value in sponsoring ASPI work and why so

many people consider ASPI to be a touchstone of sound judgement and analysis.

We thank Professor Joan Beaumont AO, the Hon David Johnston and Mr Jim McDowell, who

have completed their terms on the ASPI Council, for their valued contributions to the council.

We welcome Ms Gai Brodtmann, Dr Lavina Lee and the Hon Dr Brendon Nelson AO to the

council and look forward to working with them as ASPI looks towards the 20th anniversary

of the institute’s founding in 2021.

We would like to thank the Minister for Defence, Senator the Hon Linda Reynolds CSC, for her

continuing close personal engagement and support, as well as the Defence Department,

the Australian Defence Force and our many sponsors.

Kenneth Gillespie

(Chairman)

Peter Jennings

(Executive Director)

   Message from the ASPI Chairman and the Executive Director    ix

PAGE INTENTIONALLY BLANK

CHAPTER 1 OVERVIEW

2    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Established by the Australian Government in 2001, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute

(ASPI) has established itself as a trusted source of analysis and advice on defence, strategic

policy and national security to government and the public. ASPI’s constitution, charter and

corporate plan guide our focus. As the international environment has changed since ASPI’s

establishment, that focus has broadened from defence through to a range of other strategic

and national security areas.

Since its inception, the institute has developed into one of the leading independent research

bodies in Australia. ASPI is unique in the scope of its research, capacity, expertise and ability to

independently engage across official and public domains. The institute is recognised nationally

and internationally for its significant contributions to important policy debates.

ASPI was again ranked as one of the world’s best think tanks in the University of Pennsylvania’s

2019 Global Go To Think Tank Index, which is the gold standard for annual assessments of think

tanks’ performance around the world. We featured in many of the notable rankings this year.

Ranked at 13th in the Top Defence and National Security category, ASPI is the highest ranked

defence and national security think tank in Australia.

ASPI operates out of an office in Canberra, with 64 staff at the end of June 2020. In addition,

we have one offsite staff member and some part-time Visiting Fellows located outside

of Canberra.

ASPI’s work covers all aspects of national decision-making related to Australia’s defence and

security interests and whole-of-government policy responses, with an emphasis on political,

economic and military security.

During 2019-20, Senator the Honourable Linda Reynolds CSC was the Minister for Defence,

to whom we report. We thank her for her active support of the institute and thank the

Opposition and parliament for their engagement with us.

PURPOSES

As outlined in our constitution, ASPI’s objective is to function as a strategic policy research

centre, independent of government, providing policy-relevant research and analysis to better

inform government decisions and public understanding of strategic and defence issues.

Four specific purposes are included in ASPI’s constitution and reflected in our corporate plan:

• Conducting and publishing research on issues related to Australia’s strategic and defence

policy choices

   Overview  3

• Preparing policy inputs on strategic and defence issues to government, as requested by

government, subject to funding

• Conducting a program of activities to increase understanding of strategic and defence

policy issues among Australians, and to encourage the development of expertise in topics

relevant to Australia’s strategic and defence policy choices

• Promoting international understanding of Australia’s strategic and defence

policy perspectives.

Conducting and publishing research

The institute produces a range of publications throughout the year dealing with the spectrum

of strategic and defence policy challenges and wider national security issues. In 2019-20,

we produced a total of 57 publications. Detailed information about the full range of ASPI

publications, including examples of media coverage, is in Chapter 3 and Annex A.

All ASPI publications are available for free download from our website. We have expanded our

readership base worldwide, and there have been more than half a million downloads of our

publications around the world since the introduction of free PDF downloads in 2007.

Readership of ASPI reports continues to grow year on year. In addition to the more traditional

downloadable PDF reports and the newer ‘feature’ reports formatted to be read online, we

have now produced several targeted websites that provide tools to support research efforts.

Examples of our supporting sites include the China Technology Map and the Chinese Defence

University Tracker.

The Chinese Defence University Tracker site is worth singling out this year, as it received a

massive number of views following a New York Times story on a new US Government policy

placing restrictions on scientists with defence interests from the People's Republic of China

(PRC). The New York Times story referenced the ASPI site, and overnight a massive number of

readers visited the site to check whether specific universities were referenced.

The readership of PDF and feature reports added an additional 36,000 and 328,000 views,

respectively, to the cumulative total. When we add the views that the supporting sites received

for the year (an additional 400,000), the new cumulative total is 1.3 million (see Figure 1).

4    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Figure 1: Cumulative total views of ASPI reports since the introduction of free PDF downloads in 2007

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Cumulative total downloads (for all time)

ASPI continues to enjoy a substantial presence in the media landscape through our daily online

publication, The Strategist, which allows us to examine contemporary security issues in a way

that is consistent with our reputation for considered analysis. A major benefit is the ability to

publish the views of analysts and commentators on current ‘hot topics’ quickly and in their

own words, rather than through a media filter.

At 30 June 2020, The Strategist had more than 4,300 daily subscribers and 5,550 weekly

subscribers. It recorded a total of 2,699,662 unique page views during the year, compared

with¸2,118,312 in 2018-19, an increase of 27.4%.

Strategist pieces have been quoted in other media reporting on numerous occasions.

The Strategist is a useful vehicle for the media to easily identify ASPI analysts with

particular subject-matter expertise, so pieces often lead to interviews. During 2019-20,

we¸published 1,070 posts from 357 individual authors, covering all of the major areas of

ASPI’s research interests.

ASPI staff are also frequent contributors to academic journals and other external publications.

A list of selected external publications is in Annex B.

   Overview  5

Contributing to government policy

ASPI’s contribution to government policy thinking occurs at many different levels.

More˛formally, the following submissions were provided during the year:

• submission to the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Intelligence and Security in respect

of a review of the Australian Citizenship Amendment (Citizenship Cessation) Bill 2019

(submission by Dr John Coyne)

• submission and evidence to the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor inquiry

into temporary exclusion orders (submission by Dr John Coyne)

• submission to Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security inquiry into

citizenship loss (submission by Dr John Coyne)

• submission to the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade

(full committee) as part of its inquiry into strengthening Australia’s relationships with

countries in the Pacific region (submission by Dr Paul Barnes)

• submission (no. 17) to the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade

Defence Subcommittee inquiry into Australia’s defence engagement with Pacific island

nations (submission by Lisa Sharland and Genevieve Feely).

More informally, ASPI senior staff engage frequently in meetings with parliamentarians and

senior bureaucrats to discuss a range of policy options.

Defence research projects

A portion of the funds that ASPI receives from the Department of Defence is directed to

mutually agreed Defence-specific projects. During the year, those projects focused on:

• change in Australia’s strategic environment and the implications for defence strategy

and policy

• cyber policy, security and technologies and their application to Australian national

decision-making and security

• capability assessment and change, including the implications of disruptive and emerging

technologies for militaries and national security agencies

• defence budget analysis, including analysis of cost drivers, the implementation of the

Integrated Investment Program and industry policy aspects.

6    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Participation in government advisory committees and expert panels

Recognised for their expertise, ASPI staff have been invited to participate in a number of

Australian Government advisory committees and expert panels, which include:

• member, consultative group: 2020 Asia-Pacific Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk

Reduction (DFAT)

• member of the Standards Australia committee MB-025: Security and resilience

• member of DFAT’s Advisory Group on Australia-Africa Relations

• ASEAN for the young cohort at the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

• Quadrilateral Security Dialogue

• Australia - Southeast Asia Engagement Roundtable

• DFAT Diplomatic Academy

• Defence Department pre-Shangri-La Dialogue briefings.

Level of involvement by other Australian Government entities in ASPI research programs

While ASPI’s core funding for defence work comes from the Department of Defence, funding

from other government entities has grown significantly. This has allowed us to expand the

Defence, Strategy and National Security Program’s areas of research, to undertake specific

training programs and to deliver contracted research and analysis. The commitment of other

government agencies to funding ASPI for those programs demonstrates their confidence in our

ability to provide high-quality, independent analysis and advice.

During 2019-20, ASPI received additional funds from:

• .au Domain Administration Ltd

• Attorney-General’s Department

• Australian Civil-Military Centre

• Australian Mission to the UN

• Australian Office Taipei

• Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre Limited

• Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment

• Department of Defence

• Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

   Overview  7

• Department of Home Affairs

• Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

• National Archives of Australia

• Services Australia.

Those funds contributed to the following research programs:

• International Cyber Policy Centre

• Defence, Strategy and National Security Program

• The North and Australia’s Security Program and Strategic Policing and Law

Enforcement Program

• International Program

• Risk and Resilience Program

• Counter-Terrorism Policy Centre

• Professional Development and Defence graduate programs.

Increasing understanding of and developing expertise in strategic and defence policy

Events

ASPI reaches a range of different audiences through a program of public and invitation-only

events. During 2019-20, we conducted a total of 103 events, which included roundtable

discussions, masterclasses and seminars attended by Australian and international participants.

ASPI events made a valuable contribution to discussions about defence and national security

issues in Australia.

The impact of Covid-19 on the events program has been significant. Most notably, the

in-person annual conference was postponed from the originally planned date in June 2020

to 2020-21. Many planned public events, evening presentations and strategic international

dialogues that were to be held from March 2020 through until the end of 2019-20 have been

postponed or cancelled for that reason. It is anticipated the impact on Covid-19 will continue in

the 2020-21 financial year.

Details about the full range of events that ASPI organises are in Chapter 4 and Annex D.

8    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Media commentary

ASPI continues to play an important role in the media as part of our strategy for encouraging

and informing public debate.

Every week, ASPI staff are contacted to provide comments or be interviewed for radio or

television on the full range of research program areas. This amounts to hundreds of interviews

throughout the year and reflects the standing that ASPI has established with the media as a

credible and reliable source of information on what are often very complex issues.

As well as comments and interviews, 87 opinion pieces by ASPI staff were published

during 2019-20. A list of the opinion pieces is in Annex C. Examples of media coverage and

contributions to the national debate through our publications are in Chapter 3.

ASPI communication channels

ASPI uses a number of different tools to communicate research and analysis to a broad

audience. In addition to the website and The Strategist, each element of our social media

presence is designed to provide a unique user experience, and each channel complements

the others.

Website and The Strategist

Visits to the ASPI website increased in 2019-20 year to a high of 1.1 million unique views,

up from 598,000 the previous year (an 87% increase in views). While this increase is very

encouraging, most of it related to a few specific reports that garnered wide attention;

for example, the Uyghurs for sale report received 163,000 views on its own.

Last year, we reported a steady increase in attention to our work from international audiences.

That trend appears to be continuing, as Australia was home to 32.9% of our readership in

2019-20, very closely followed by the US with 29.5%. Again, we expect that this surge in

interest from the US may be because of a few specific reports; however, it is encouraging to

see growth in ASPI’s international profile. Table 1 shows the breakdown of website visitors from

the top 10 countries of origin.

   Overview  9

Table 1: Visitors to the ASPI website, by country of origin, 2019-20

Country Percentage of total visitors

1. Australia 32.87

2. United States 29.47

3. United Kingdom 3.69

4. Canada 3.14

5. France 2.67

6. China 2.45

7. Japan 2.32

8. Hong Kong 2.19

9. Germany 1.63

10. India 1.50

Figure 2 shows the number of unique page views on the ASPI website from 2015-16 to 2019-20.

Figure 2: Number of unique page views on the ASPI website, 2015-16 to 2019-20

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Unique page views

Around half of the readers of The Strategist in 2019-20 were in Australia. The top 10 countries

of origin of Strategist readers (Table 2) differed slightly from those visiting the ASPI website.

Visits to The Strategist grew by 27.4%, from 2,118,312 in 2018-19 to 2,699,662 in 2019-20.

Total page views exceeded 3 million for the first time, growing by 29.1% from 2,348,898 in

2018-19 to 3,030,395 in 2019-20.

10    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Table 2: Visitors to The Strategist, by country of origin, 2019-20

Top 10 countries of origin Percentage of total visitors

1. Australia 46.56

2. United States 16.83

3. India 5.96

4. United Kingdom 3.71

5. Canada 2.19

6. Singapore 2.10

7. Indonesia 1.35

8. New Zealand 1.18

9. Philippines 1.04

10. Hong Kong 0.96

Figure 3 shows the number of unique page views on The Strategist from 2015-16 to 2019-20.

Figure 3: Number of unique page views on The Strategist, 2015-16 to 2019-20.

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   Overview  11

Twitter—@ASPI_org

We use Twitter to inform followers of newly released reports, articles and Strategist pieces,

as well as to alert audiences to ASPI events and other developments. We ‘live tweet’ updates,

images and quotes to Australian and international followers in near real time during ASPI public

events. Our Twitter followers increased by 39% to 31,800 in 2019-20 from 22,888 in 2018-19.

Facebook

On Facebook, we post information about ASPI, internship opportunities, images, videos,

event updates, news, newly released publications and The Strategist posts. Our Facebook

followers increased to 24,068 in 2019-20, which was an increase of 13% from 21,340 in 2018-19.

Linked In

ASPI uses LinkedIn to promote information about our reports, events, job and internship

opportunities and other notable developments. While data from 2018-19 is unavailable,

LinkedIn has been included in this report because growth on the platform in the last quarter

was significant, and interactions continue to grow. In June 2020, the page increased its

followers by 24%. This will be a useful figure to measure at the close of the next financial year.

In 2019-20, our page’s LinkedIn followers increased to 17,016.

Figure 4 shows the significant growth in the numbers of ASPI’s Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn

followers over the past five years.

Figure 4: Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn followers, 2013-14 to 2019-20

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12    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

YouTube

YouTube remains a strong channel for ASPI, recording over 100,000 views during 2019-20.

Some of the videos that resonated the most during this period were ‘To remake Australia’s

Defence force’ by Hugh White and General Angus Campbell’s address at the War in 2025

Conference.

Our videos attract a strong international audience: 13% of our viewers were based in the US,

and 8% were from Indonesia.

Policy, Guns and Money: The ASPI Podcast

Policy, Guns and Money: The ASPI Podcast continues to show strong growth, proving that

podcasts are an appealing channel for extending our discussions. We are attracting good

speakers and commentators from among ASPI staff and an increasing number of high-quality

external guests. This increase in effort and quality is being reflected in the statistics for the

product (see Figure 5). In 2018-19, we logged 35,000 plays of the podcast. This doubled to

77,000 plays 2019-20.

Figure 5: The ASPI Podcast, number of plays, 2018-19 and 2019-20

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   Overview  13

ASPI - Professional Development

ASPI-Professional Development (ASPI-PD) plays an important role in strengthening

understanding of strategic and defence policy issues, as well as developing the expertise

of Australian Government departments and agencies to deliver strategic policy excellence,

particularly the Australian Defence organisation.

In 2019-20, ASPI-PD delivered a total of 13 activities to 242 personnel (Table 3). Due to the

risks posed by Covid-19, several planned activities were pushed into the 2020-21 financial year.

Details of the full range of programs delivered by ASPI-PD are in Chapter 2.

Table 3: Breakdown of ASPI-PD activities, 2019-20

Activity Client Number

delivered

Total number

of participants

Crafting better policy for improved

decision-making workshops

Defence 2 31

Focused policy development workshops Defence 4 55

Advanced better policy workshops Defence 2 26

Red teaming activities Defence 1 10

Royal Australian Air Force professional

development programs

Defence 2 37

Regional symposiums Defence 1 50

Royal Australian Corps of Signals Army

modernisation workshop

Defence 1 33

Totals 13 242

Internships

The ASPI paid internship program gives recent graduates an opportunity to contribute to

our research projects and also to conduct their own research projects for future publication,

either by ASPI or independently. By attending many of ASPI’s events, they make contact with

senior officials, researchers and diplomats from Canberra and elsewhere as they begin to form

professional networks for their careers in strategic policy.

A strong field of capable applicants applies twice a year for internships. During 2019-20,

ASPI employed nine interns in two intakes for six-month placements.

14    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Interns make important contributions to research projects, publications and The Strategist and

gain hands-on experience in strategic policy development. Examples of reports, publications

and The Strategist articles authored by or contributed to by interns in 2019-20 included:

• publication—Retweeting though the Great Firewall

• publication—National security agencies and the cloud: an urgent capability issue

for Australia

• publication—Covid-19 disinformation and social media manipulation trends

• publication—Covid-19 attracts patriotic troll campaigns in support of China’s

geopolitical interests

• publication—ID2020, Bill Gates and the Mark of the Beast: how Covid-19 catalyses existing

online conspiracy movements

• publication—Running on empty? A case study of fuel security for civil and military air

operations at Darwin Airport

• publication—After Covid-19: Australia and the world rebuild (volume 1)

• publication—Hacking democracies

• The Strategist—‘New crisis, same old problems for the EU’

• The Strategist—‘Women’s rights in China and the legacy of the Feminist Five’

• The Strategist—‘India-China tensions flare up on new front: TikTok’

• The Strategist—‘Northern Australia needs to be ready to meet climate-change-driven

security challenges’

• The Strategist—‘Australia must fast-track new domestic storage to ensure fuel security’

• The Strategist—‘In a crisis, Australians might soon be running on empty’

• The Strategist—‘Renewable energy exports could be vital for Australia’s

post-fossil-fuel future’

• The Strategist—‘Thailand’s hashtag activism targets political change’

• The Strategist—‘Is Thailand heading for another political crisis?’

• The Strategist—‘Russia’s growing interests in the South China Sea’

• Weekly wraps—Five domains wrap and national security wrap

• Monthly wraps—Women, peace and security.

   Overview  15

Promoting international understanding of Australia’s strategic and defence policy perspectives

ASPI’s standing as a respected source of analysis is recognised both internationally and

domestically. It can be measured by our international ranking in a global index of think tanks,

being selected to co-host Track 1.5 dialogues with international institutions and government

partners on a regular basis, strengthening links with overseas think tanks through exchanges

and fellowships, and being invited to speak at international conferences.

Readers from around the world are increasingly accessing our website and The Strategist,

and our counterparts in other countries help us to foster the next generation of strategic

policy thinkers by inviting our staff to attend their meetings and conferences. In 2019-20,

we received invitations from:

• International Military Council on Climate and Security, Washington DC

• Geneva Centre for Security Policy

• World Economic Forum Expert Network (Risk and Resilience)

• International Association of Peacekeeping Training Centres via video conference in Lima,

Peru (on ASPI’s Evolution of the protection of civilians in UN peacekeeping report)

• ‘Protection of civilians in UN peacekeeping’ at the UN’s Senior Mission Leaders’ Course in

Seoul, Republic of Korea

• Mercator Institute for China Studies (MERICS) think tank on the Xi Jinping ideologies,

Berlin, Germany

• University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

• Indo-Pacific Strategies Conference hosted by the Japanese Embassy and the

National Security College

• Observer Research Foundation Raisina Dialogue

• International Institute for Strategic Studies Shangri-La Dialogue and Fullerton Forum

• Stimson Center’s workshop (video conference) on Mekong Hydro-politics

• US State Department funded US-ASEAN Partnership Forum

• Australia - New Zealand ASPI-CSS Track 1.5 strategic dialogue

• ASPI - S Rajaratnam School of International Studies Track 1.5 strategic dialogue in Singapore

• ASPI - National Institute for Defense Studies (Japan) senior exchange

• National Institute for Defense Studies, Tokyo, Japan, 19-20 November

• Australia-Japan-India Track 1.5 dialogue, hosted by the Griffith Asia Institute

• Indo-Pacific Strategic Futures: dialogue and simulation co-hosted by the US State

Department, the Australian Department of Defence and the US Studies Centre

16    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

• Asian-Australian Leadership Summit

• ‘Development of the South China Sea’ at the DFAT-initiated Lawfare and South China Sea

Strategy workshop, University of New South Wales

• US State Department Intelligence Research Unit

• Southeast Asia and Regional Security desks at the Pentagon

• Australia-US-ASEAN Trilateral Dialogue

• DFAT-UNSW closed-door workshop on infrastructure competition in Southeast Asia and

the Pacific

• Track 1.5 dialogue with the Vietnamese Academy of Social Sciences, ANU National

Security College

• Closed-door workshop on the Indo-Pacific, Embassy of the Republic of Korea

• Harvard-Columbia China and the World annual conference

• Raisina Dialogue in India

• National Security College, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University

(ANU)

• Crawford Leadership Forum, ANU

• Center for Strategic and International Studies conference, Washington DC

• Center for a New American Security

• Stimson Center, Washington DC

• Thammasat University, Thailand

• UKM, Malaysia

• Griffith Asia Institute, Griffith University

• US State Department in combination with the United States Studies Centre

• Western Australian Indo-Pacific Defence Conference

• S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Singapore

• National Chengchi University, Taipei.

International ranking

In the University of Pennsylvania’s 2019 Global Go To Think Tank Index, ASPI was the highest

ranked defence and national security think tank in Australia, ranking 13th out of 110 think tanks.

   Overview  17

Links with overseas think tanks

Our links with overseas think tanks take a number of forms. We engage formally through

hosting or co-hosting a range of Track 1.5 dialogues, exchanges or visiting fellowships,

co-writing publications, and visits to the institutes. The think tanks we engage with include:

• International Peace Institute (US)

• Hedayah (United Arab Emirates)

• Center for Strategic and International Studies (US)

• Council on Foreign Relations (US)

• New America (US)

• Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto (Canada)

• Center for a New American Security (US)

• Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (Germany)

• Mercator Institute for China Studies (Germany)

• Centre of Excellence for National Security, S Rajaratnam School of International Studies

(Singapore)

• Institute for Strategic and International Studies (Malaysia)

• Centre for Strategic and International Studies (Indonesia)

• Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies (Brunei Darussalam)

• ICT Faculty, Mahidol University (Thailand)

• Cyber Security Lab, University of Computer Sciences (Myanmar)

• Institute for Cooperation and Peace (Cambodia)

• International Military Council on Climate and Security (US)

• Geneva Centre for Security Policy (Switzerland)

• World Economic Forum Expert Network (Switzerland)

• Diplomatic Academy (Vietnam)

• Stratbase ADR Institute for Strategic and International Studies (Philippines)

• Stimson Center (US).

18    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Visiting Fellows

Expert Visiting Fellows exchange information and engage with ASPI, deepening our

understanding of a range of domestic and international defence and national security matters.

In 2019-20, five Visiting Fellows were on secondment in the ASPI office:

• Dr Robert Glasser (July 2019 - July 2020)

• Dr Yoedhi Swastano, Indonesia Defense University (September 2019 - October 2019)

• Dr MHD Halkis, Indonesia Defense University (September 2019 - October 2019)

• Colonel Ned Holt, US Army War College (July 2019 - June 2020)

• Associate Professor James Leibold, La Trobe University (January 2020 - July 2020)

In addition, ASPI appoints people with long and distinguished careers as ASPI Fellows.

They produce a range of written analyses, contribute to ASPI program areas and provide

mentoring for staff. The 18 ASPI Fellows are:

• Vice Admiral Timothy Barrett—Senior Fellow

• Dr Anthony Bergin—Senior Fellow

• Dr Andrew Davies—Senior Fellow

• Hon David Feeney—Senior Fellow

• Simeon Gilding—Senior Fellow

• Stan Grant—Senior Fellow

• Nick Kaldas—Senior Fellow

• Stephen Loosley AM—Senior Fellow

• Dr Rod Lyon—Senior Fellow

• Bill Paterson—Senior Fellow

• Campbell Darby—Fellow

• Anne Lyons—Fellow

• Stephen Merchant PSM—Fellow

• Dr Rajiv Shah—Fellow

• John Garnaut—Non-Resident Fellow

• Sophia Patel—Non-resident Fellow

• Senator (Canada) Vern White—Non-Resident Fellow

• Graeme Dobell—Journalist Fellow

   Overview  19

International dialogues

ASPI supports Australian diplomacy by conducting regular Track 1.5 and Track 2 dialogues with

international institutions and government partners; however, many dialogues planned for

2020 were postponed due to Covid-19.

During 2019-20, we were involved in organising six international dialogues (Table 4).

Table 4: International Track 1.5 and Track 2 dialogues, 2019-20

No. Date Dialogue

1 22-23 July 2019 Australia-Indonesia Track 1.5 dialogue co-hosted with

foreign policy community of Indonesia

2 26 September 2019 Australia-Pakistan Track 1.5 security dialogue

3 8-11 October 2019 Australia-Indonesia-US-Japan Quadrilateral Track 1.5

security dialogue

4 14-18 October 2019 ASPI - Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung Track 1.5

counterterrorism dialogue

5 29-30 October 2019 Australia-Israel Track 1.5 ‘Beersheba’ dialogue

6 5 November 2019 ICPC Australia-Taiwan Track 1.5 cybersecurity dialogue

Invitations to speak at international conferences

ASPI’s international standing is reflected in the number of invitations that staff receive to

speak at international conferences. In 2019-20, they spoke at more than five conferences in the

US, India, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Further details are in Annex E.

STAFFING

In 2019-20, ASPI employed 64 non-ongoing staff: 45 were full time (22 female and 23 male) and

15 were part time (11 female and four male). ASPI employed four casual staff (all male).

During the year, 16 new staff joined ASPI and 13 staff members departed. There were also

two intakes of interns during the year (nine in total).

Figure 6 shows our organisational structure at 30 June 2020.

20    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Figure 6: Organisational structure at 30 June 2020

Chief Operating Officer Karen Edwards

HR Manager Fiona Torline

Finance Manager Putri Handrianti

PM Finance Anush Raventhiraraja

Bookkeeper Lorna Chow

IT Manager Jerry Cashman

Events & Comms Manager Renee Jones (pl)/Kelly Smith

Assistant Manager Olivia Nelson

Publications Manager Steve Clark

Reception Emily French

ICPC Program Coordinator Louisa Bochner

Director Defence, Strategy & National Security Michael Shoebridge

Senior Analysts Malcolm Davis Marcus Hellyer Huong Le Thu*

Researcher Aakriti Bachhawat Charles Lyon Jones

Internationl Program Lisa Sharland Genevieve Feely

SPLE/Nth & Aus Security John Coyne

Risk & Resilience Paul Barnes

Counter Terrorism Leanne Close

The Strategist Brendan Nicholson Larissa Joseph Jack Norton

Patrick Walters

Deputy Vacant

Director International Cyber Policy Centre Fergus Hanson

Senior Analysts Tom Uren* Jacob Wallis Kelsey Munro

Analysts

Samantha Hoffman Alex Joske Fergus Ryan Jocelinn Kang

Program Manager Vicky Xu Heidi Winter

Researchers Hannah Smith Elise Thomas Sarah O'Connor

Nathan Ruser

Indigenous Engagement Specialist Dion Devow

EA

Audrey Millard

Admin/Research Emilia Currey

PM

Alison Howe

Capacity Building Program Bart Hogeveen

Deputy Danielle Cave

Director Professional Development Mike Norris

Program Development David Millar Tony McCormack Grant Fergusson

Ben Coleman

Program Coordinator James Brorson Julia Butler

Interns

Hal Crichton-Standish Daria Impiombato Alexandra Pascoe Albert Zhang

Tracy Beattie

Deputy Gillian Savage

Executive Director Peter Jennings

* and Intern Coordinator

   Overview  21

FUNDING

Department of Defence

ASPI entered into a five-year funding agreement with the Australian Government through the

Department of Defence. Under the agreement, the department provides ASPI with a one-off

grant of $4 million for each of financial years 2018-19, 2019-20, 2020-21, 2021-22 and 2022-23.

Australian Government funding is a key enabler of our operations. It covers much of our annual

employee costs and operating overheads and those elements of the research and events

programs that are defined in the funding agreement.

Figure 7: Department of Defence core funding as a proportion of ASPI’s total income, 2000-01 to 2019-20

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

120%

2011-12

2012-13

2013-14

2016-17

2017-18

2018-19

2019-20

2015-16

2014-15

2010-11

2009-10

2008-09

2007-08

2006-07

2005-06

2004-05

2003-04

2002-03

2001-02

2000-01

83%

76%

60%

100%

55%

47%

50%

97%

95%

91%

87%

74%

78%

74%

78%

82%

84%

43%

34%

46%

* During FY2019-20, ASPI adopted two new accounting standards for the recognition of sponsorship income. For comparison, had we treated sponsorship income in the same way to previous financial years, the result would have been 39%.

Other sources of funding

The government requires ASPI to develop funding options in addition to the Defence

funding agreement to enable the institute to grow and pursue additional research. With

the growth of ASPI’s areas of research, the percentage of income provided by Defence has

been diminishing (Figure 7). Our wider work on non-Defence national security is sustained by

other sources of funding, most notably other government entities, through contributions for

specific program areas or projects (shown as ‘Revenue from Contracts’ in Figure 8) and from

private-sector sponsorship.

22    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Figure 8: Sources of income other than Department of Defence core funding, 2001-02 to 2019-20

Revenue from Contracts Sponsorship Events, interest and other

2011-12

2012-13

2013-14

2016-17

2017-18

2018-19

2019-20

2015-16

2014-15

2010-11

2009-10

2008-09

2007-08

2006-07

2005-06

2004-05

2003-04

2002-03

2001-02

0

$1,000,000

$2,000,000

$3,000,000

$4,000,000

$5,000,000

$6,000,000

$7,000,000

$8,000,000

Sponsorship is also an important source of additional funding for ASPI and is the key enabler

for many events. We have worked hard to secure sponsors and in 2019-20 continued to

foster deeper relationships with sponsors through our corporate sponsorship program.

Under the program, ASPI seeks continuing commitments from private enterprises that share

our objectives for national security and public debate, while unambiguously maintaining our

independence in research, publications, advice and comment.

During FY2019-2020, ASPI adopted two new accounting standards (AASB 15 Revenue from

Contracts with Customers and AASB 1058 Income of Not-for-Profit Entities ) for the recognition

of our revenue. As a result, sponsorship agreements signed during the financial year were

immediately recognised as revenue upon receipt, rather than gradually throughout the

12 months period. For comparison, under the old standard, the result would have been

approximately $6.3M or 61% of total funding.

Other additional income derives from event registration fees and interest on retained funds

(‘Other’ in Figure 8).

   Overview  23

Corporate sponsors during 2019-20 were:

• .au Domain Administration Ltd

• Alion Science and Technology Corporation

• Amazon Web Services Australia Pty Ltd

• Attorney-General’s Department

• Australian Civil-Military Centre

• Australian Computer Society

• Australian Mission to the UN

• Australian National University

• Australian Office Taipei

• Bond University

• Carnegie Endowment for

International Peace

• Cisco Systems Australia Pty Ltd

• CT Intelligence and Insights

• Cyber Security Cooperative Research

Centre Limited

• Defence Portfolio

• Department of Agriculture, Water and

the Environment

• Department of Defence

• Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

• Department of Home Affairs

• Department of the Prime Minister

and Cabinet

• Embassy of Israel

• Embassy of Japan

• Embassy of the Kingdom of

the Netherlands

• Engineers Australia

• Facebook Australia Pty Ltd

• Fortinet

• German Marshall Fund

• Google Australia Pty Limited

• Institute for War and Peace Reporting

• IQPC Ltd

• Jacobs Australia

• Japan Institute of International Affairs

• Kiah Consulting

• Lendlease

• Lockheed Martin

• Macquarie Telecom Pty Ltd

• Microsoft Pty Ltd

• National Archives of Australia

• NATO Strategic Communications Centre

of Excellence

• Naval Group Australia

• Northern Territory Airports Pty Ltd

• Northern Territory Government

• Northrop Grumman

• Omni Executive

• Oracle Australia

• Palo Alto Networks (Australia) Pty Ltd

• Queensland Police Service

• Rafael

• Raytheon

• Saab Australia

• Senetas Corporation Limited

• Services Australia

• Splunk Technology

• Thales Australia

• The Pratt Foundation

• UK Embassy in China

• University of Melbourne

• Twitter Inc.

• UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office

• University of British Columbia

• UpGuard, Inc

• US State Department

• US Embassy Canberra

CHAPTER 2 PROGRAMS

26    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

In 2019-20, ASPI’s core work in the strategic policy field focused on broad strategic policy

settings, the global and regional security environments, the operational needs of the

Australian Defence Force (ADF), the development of defence capabilities, and issues associated

with defence funding and budgets. Over the years, ASPI has made nationally recognised

contributions in all those fields. They remain central to our work agenda even as we expand to

embrace new programs and responsibilities.

Research staff conduct their work in program areas organised under two themes:

• Defence, Strategy and National Security

• International Cyber Policy Centre (ICPC).

DEFENCE AND STRATEGY

Defence, Strategy and National Security Program

Michael Shoebridge

Rod Lyon

John Coyne

Isaac Kfir/Leanne Close

Lisa Sharland

Marcus Hellyer

Huong Le Thu

Malcolm Davis

Genevieve Feely

Aakriti Bachhawat

Charlie Lyons Jones

The Defence, Strategy and National Security Program analyses shifts and developments in

Australia’s strategic environment, including in the balance and uses of military capabilities.

It covers topics including:

• the interaction between economics and security, where the connection with technology

and investment is intense and where the international and domestic boundaries are blurring

• developments and trends in the Indo-Pacific strategic environment, driven by increasingly

assertive authoritarian regimes such as China, Russia and North Korea, and by the

policies and actions of states such as India, Japan, the US and Indonesia, with a focus on

strategic relationships, military calculations, risks of escalation and conflict, and Australia’s

national interests

   Programs  27

• Australia’s near region, with a particular focus on the impact of broad political, economic

and strategic engagement by China in the South Pacific and the Indian Ocean

• deterrence, including how it is affected by the practice of grey-zone or political warfare

below the threshold of armed conflict

• the role of conventional and nuclear weapons in deterring aggression and

major-power conflict

• regional capability developments

• counter terrorism, law enforcement and peacekeeping.

The program also analyses the capability of the ADF and the broader Defence organisation

through all stages of the capability life cycle, including by assessing capability programs,

options and implementation, and analyses the management of the Defence organisation.

This involves assessments of Australia’s defence budgets and the wider range of activities

required to produce and support the ADF’s capabilities, including:

• defence funding over the short and long terms

• policies and capabilities of the defence industry, with a focus on the implementation of the

new suite of defence industry policies and programs

• defence economic trends, especially as they apply to materiel

• emerging capability issues and challenges, including from powerful new technologies, and

concepts for applying them in military operations.

Over 2019-20, the program’s analysis and policy recommendations for Australian

decision-makers focused on:

• the further deterioration in Australia’s strategic environment and the deepening explicit

strategic, technological and economic struggle between China and the US

• a Chinese state growing in assertiveness and willingness to conduct interference in other

states, including Australia

• a US more likely to act unilaterally in transactional ways than in coalition with allies

and partners.

Boundaries between international and domestic issues blurred, and the rate of technological

change, including in the defence and national security spheres, continued at a pace that

challenged the Australian Defence organisation and the broader national security community’s

processes and structures.

28    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

A core implication flowing from our work over the year is that Australia’s national interests are

engaged and affected by those broad developments in ways that go beyond any US-China

construct and require Australia to decide and act in our own national security interests,

working with like-minded partners and influencing global debates as we do so. Enhancing

national cohesion, notably between the federal and state levels of government, is an essential

element in this approach. The coronavirus pandemic’s impact on strategic and defence issues

has been covered in ASPI’s After Covid series, of which volume 1 was published in 2019-20, and

has been incorporated into a range of other articles and products from the Defence, Strategy

and National Security Program.

Orbiting around those themes, the program produced reports, shorter Strategist articles,

podcasts and media commentary and used both ASPI staff and commissioned authors

during 2019-20.

NATIONAL SECURITY

Five interlinked program areas combine to provide comprehensive coverage of national

security issues. A modern approach to national security must be designed to respond to

major security threats as they affect citizens, rather than just the institutions of the state.

Counter-Terrorism Policy Centre

Leanne Close

ASPI’s Counter-Terrorism Program was established in late 2015. The program aims to:

• explain the counter-terrorism environment, including policy, legislation, terrorist threats,

and cross-jurisdictional and international issues

• provide counter-terrorism policy advice, alternatives and contestability.

The program undertakes research across the spectrum of counterterrorism topics, facilitates

dialogue and discussion among stakeholders and provides advice to government, community

and industry stakeholders, with a particular focus on what can be done to counter terrorism.

Isaac Kfir led the program from July to December 2019 and is now engaged at Charles Sturt

University as an adjunct instructor. Leanne Close commenced as head of the Counter-terrorism

Policy Centre in April 2020. Before joining ASPI, she spent over 33 years as a police officer in the

Australian Federal Police, rising to become Deputy Commissioner National Security. Leanne is

also a member of the ACT Sentence Administration Board and the Victorian Expert Advisory

Panel on Countering Violent Extremism.

   Programs  29

In July 2019, three written submissions were provided to the Parliamentary Joint Committee

on Intelligence and Security regarding its review of the mandatory data retention regime, and,

jointly with Dr John Coyne, on the operation, effectiveness and implications of sections 33AA,

35, 35AA and 35A of the Australian Citizenship Act 2007.

From 14 to 18 October 2019, the fourth ASPI - Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (KAS) Australia-Europe

Counter-Terrorism Dialogue was held in Germany and Belgium. The theme of the dialogue

was ‘Terrorism realities old and new: assessing and continuing evolving challenges’. The

annual ASPI-KAS dialogue brings together senior government representatives, policymakers,

academic experts, practitioners and members of the diplomatic corps to share their views,

develop better understandings and explore how cooperation could be strengthened.

The participants worked together through a combination of roundtables, an in-depth seminar

and meetings at various relevant institutions and ministries at federal, state and EU levels.

ASPI’s Counterterrorism yearbook 2020, edited by Isaac Kfir and Dr John Coyne, was published

in March. This edition of the annual yearbook continued to provide assessments of various

international approaches to managing terrorist threats. It also included thematic chapters

on mental health, strategic policing, the media and the terror-crime nexus. The key themes

that emerged from the yearbook include the decline in Salafi-jihadi terrorist activities and

the resultant need for the international community to adopt a united, cohesive approach

to deal with foreign fighters and their families, the increase of right-wing extremist activity,

deradicalisation approaches in prisons, and the role of technology, particularly social media, in

the evolution of violent extremism.

In April, Leanne Close contributed a chapter on policing in ASPIs publication After Covid-19:

Australia and the world rebuild (volume 1) and participated in a webinar event on 13 May 2020,

discussing her findings.

A special ASPI publication by Professor Boaz Ganor titled Terrorism is terrorism: the Christchurch

terror attack from an Israeli perspective was released on 19 May 2020. Professor Ganor is the

Ronald S Chair for Counter-Terrorism at the Interdisciplinary Centre (IDC Herzliya), Israel, and

the founder and executive director of the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism. In

2019-20, on sabbatical from IDC Herzliya, he served as a Visiting Fellow at ASPI. An overview

of his report was published in The Strategist on 19 May and republished in The Mandarin on

20 May. Professor Ganor participated in an ASPI podcast to discuss his findings on 27 May.

Leanne Close published several articles in The Strategist on various topics including:

• Australia’s police need priority access to fuel in times of crisis

• ASIO powers to question children - a difficult balancing act—jointly with Michael Shoebridge

• Militarisation of Policing in America and lessons for trust and legitimacy in Australia

• Militarisation of Policing in America and lessons for accountability in Australia.

30    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

On 10 June, Steven R Casstevens, who is the president of the International Association of Chiefs

of Police, participated in an ASPI podcast regarding the civil unrest in the US following the

death of George Floyd through the actions of police officers in Minnesota.

On 20 June, Leanne Close participated in a podcast, on behalf of the ACT Bar Association, for its

professional development series. The other panellists included the president of the ACT Bar

Association, barrister Steve Whybrow, ACT barrister Jack Pappas and Anthony Dowsley, who is

a journalist for the Herald Sun. The panel discussed various topics, including legal professional

privilege, ethics, integrity and media engagement.

Risk and Resilience Program

Paul Barnes

The Risk and Resilience Program continued to provide opinion and commentary on and develop

ideas about managing the impacts of natural and sociotechnical hazards in Australia. This work

included developing advice and commentary informing policy choices in Australia’s federal,

state and local governments and the private sector, as well as enhancing the assessment of

vulnerability and mitigation options to promote resilience in human systems.

The program continued to pursue its key aims, which include:

• promoting inclusive dialogues on ensuring readiness for complex emergencies

through better planning and preparation, and considering capability needs for future

emergency events

• engaging practitioner and industry groups (including the civilian services and the ADF) with

practical discussions aimed at improving policies and planning

• sponsoring issues papers and research on building resilience into future infrastructure

• exploring capacity needs for disaster risk reduction in the Indo-Pacific region.

In addition to numerous media engagements and publications on issues ranging from fuel

security vulnerabilities, the 2019-20 bushfire crises and implications of Covid-19 for national

risk exposures and biosecurity issues, publishing highlights included:

• a co-sponsored report with Engineers Australia, Designing for resilient energy systems:

choices in future engineering, which gathered the thoughts of a younger generation of

Australian engineers on future developments on energy resilience in Australia

• a DFAT-supported edited volume, A Pacific disaster prevention review , which examined

independent views on the challenges to implementing the Sendai Disaster Risk Reduction

Framework across eight Pacific island economies.

   Programs  31

Other highlights of the program’s work in 2019-20 were invitations to Dr Paul Barnes to

participate in a number of international advisory groups.

He was appointed as a council member of the International Military Council on Climate and

Security, which is based in Washington DC. The council is supported by a consortium that

includes the Netherlands Institute of International Relations (Clingendael), the French Institute

for International and Strategic Affairs, the Hague Centre for Strategic Studies and the Center

for Climate and Security. A key role of the council is commentary and advocacy on the national

security implications of a changing climate and related environmental and weather crises.

He was also invited to participate in the working groups of the UN Global Risk Assessment

Framework. The working groups enhance decision-making and advisory capabilities for the UN

across a range of sectors to enable all-source risk reduction globally.

Both Dr Barnes and Visiting Fellow Dr Robert Glasser supported DFAT as members of

an intergovernmental consultative planning group for the 2020 Asia-Pacific Ministerial

Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction.

ASPI’s focus on risk and resilience outcomes will continue with the production of opinion

pieces, media commentary and targeted views for The Strategist, the completion of more

detailed papers on national resilience building and the delivery of invited presentations at

national and international forums on emerging issues in these nationally important areas.

Strategic Policing and Law Enforcement Program

John Coyne

ASPI’s Strategic Policing and Law Enforcement Program examines the contribution of law

enforcement to national security and to broader strategic policy. The program has three

main aims:

• Develop understanding of the link between law enforcement issues and national

security concerns.

• Explain the contribution of law enforcement agencies to Australia’s international

strategic objectives.

• Help law enforcement agencies position themselves for the future.

In 2019-20, the program focused on technological innovation, regional security-sector reform

and illicit drug production in the Mekong region. The program contributed to a security-sector

reform analysis in the Philippines, illicit drug production discussions in the Mekong and

national assessments for the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime.

32    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

During the year, we made significant policy and opinion contributions to domestic and

international print, radio and television media.

Our research resulted in the production of the following reports during the year:

• Special Report: Towards a Commonwealth law enforcement innovation framework

• a chapter for the 2020 Counterterrorism yearbook

• a chapter for the book After Covid-19: Australia and the world rebuild (volume 1)

• Special Report: National security agencies and the cloud: an urgent capability issue

for Australia.

The program continued to produce opinion pieces and The Strategist posts, to provide

media commentary on law enforcement and organised crime issues and to deliver invited

presentations at national and international forums on emerging issues in this field.

The North and Australia’s Security Program

John Coyne

The North and Australia’s Security Program provides a sustained research focus on the

security of Australia’s north and the north’s critical role in contributing to the broader

security of Australia.

Established in 2019, the program concentrates on:

• maintaining a strong public policy focus on the role of the north in the broader security of

Australia at a time when strategic circumstances are driving new policy thinking in Canberra

• developing a modernised way of thinking about the north and security by updating

strategic frameworks that remain anchored in the 1980s ‘defence of Australia’ context

• situating the north in a broader discussion about national security interests beyond

defence—encompassing home affairs, border security and customs; space; cybersecurity;

humanitarian and disaster response; biosecurity; and energy security.

The strategic importance of Australia’s north to Australia’s defence has long been recognised

by government and policymakers. Despite strategic policy commitments to northern Australia,

there is a growing body of evidence indicating that the gap between strategic policy and

Defence’s activities and presence in the north is widening. This could well be symptomatic of a

gap in Australia’s northern development policies.

   Programs  33

Since the publication of the 2016 Defence White Paper, Australia’s strategic environment has

deteriorated significantly and can be characterised as increasingly unpredictable. For a third

time since federation, Australia’s government must seriously consider continental defence

and national security. But that thinking must go well beyond continental defence to include

force projection, enhanced regional surveillance and support for the new US approach to force

posture in the Pacific and contribute to national resilience and broader defence capabilities.

To date, Australia’s defence strategy remains focused on taking advantage of the country’s

strategic geography. In this construct, maritime security is critical to the defence of Australia.

Similarly, self-reliance through the support of a sovereign defence industry has been central.

Of course, much thought has also been applied to the challenge of war’s newest domains:

the cybersphere and space.

Today, there is an increasing body of public discourse on Australia’s strategic outlook, its

defence strategy and the ADF’s future force structure and posture. In sharp contrast, there

has been no substantial public policy dialogue on the role of northern Australia in defence

strategy and national security since the late 1980s.

In addition to the establishment of the highly successful North of 26 Degree South Strategist

series, the program’s research resulted in the production of the following reports during

the year:

• Strategic Insights report: North of 26 degrees south and the security of Australia:

views from ‘The Strategis’ (volume 1)

• Special Report: Strong and free? The future security of Australia’s north

• Special Report: Running on empty? A case study of fuel security for civil and military air

operations at Darwin Airport

• a chapter for ASPI’s After Covid report (volume 1)

• Strategic Insights report: North of 26° south and the security of Australia: views from

‘The Strategist’ (volume 2).

The program continued to produce opinion pieces and The Strategist posts, to provide media

commentary on the north and Australia’s security and to deliver invited presentations at

national forums on emerging issues in this field.

34    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

International Program

Lisa Sharland

Genevieve Feely

ASPI’s International Program explores challenges and opportunities for Australia as they relate

to maintaining international peace and security. It also contributes to broader international

research efforts on multilateral security issues. The program aims to:

• deepen understanding within Australia and internationally of global security issues and

multilateral peace operations

• facilitate engagement among key stakeholders in government, the private sector and civil

society on issues relating to international peace and security

• provide policy advice on emerging challenges and opportunities for Australia to contribute

to efforts to maintain international peace and security.

In 2019-20, the program focused on three strands of work:

• multilateralism and the UN peace and security agenda, with a focus on the reform of UN

peace operations and the protection of civilians

• women, peace and security (WPS)

• Australia’s relationship and engagement with Africa.

The program focused on a major project throughout 2019-20 examining the contributions of

countries in the Pacific to UN peacekeeping. The project, which is being undertaken with the

support of the Australian Civil-Military Centre, examined the different objectives and priorities

of countries in the region when it comes to deploying personnel to UN peace operations. The

head of the International Program, Lisa Sharland, and researcher Genevieve Feely conducted

research in Timor-Leste, Tonga, Fiji, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands before

Covid-19 restricted international travel. While the timeline for the project was delayed due to

Covid-19, preliminary research findings from the project informed a submission to the Joint

Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade’s inquiry into Defence engagement

with Pacific Island nations in June 2020. A research report on the findings from the research

will be published by early 2021.

Program staff also continued to engage in collaborative research projects with other think

tanks and researchers. Lisa Sharland co-authored a research paper for the International

Peace Institute titled Partners and competitors: forces operating in parallel to UN peace

operations, presenting at a launch of the paper to member states and UN officials in New

York in November 2019. She also engaged in research for a project for the Effectiveness of

Peace Operations Network examining the UN missions in Cyprus, which will continue into

   Programs  35

2020-21. The program also continued to deliver analysis on the protection of civilians in the

context of UN peacekeeping missions, publishing a Special Report on Protection of civilians

in UN peacekeeping in July 2019, and Lisa Sharland presented to participants at a UN Senior

Mission Leaders’ Course on the topic in November 2019.

WPS remained an ongoing priority for research and engagement. In March 2020, the

program published a Special Report by external contributor Louise Allen titled Australia’s

implementation of women, peace and security: promoting regional security. For the

fourth year in a row, the program worked closely with The Strategist team to commission

another series of posts on WPS to coincide with International Women’s Day in 2020, as

well as the 20th anniversary of the agenda. The series included analysis from UN Institute

for Disarmament Research director Renata Dwan, as well as a range of academics and

practitioners. The series will be published in a forthcoming Strategic Insights report.

Lisa Sharland also contributed a chapter on gender equality and international security to

the first volume of After Covid-19.

Plans to host masterclasses on WPS and gender, cyber and technology were postponed due to

Covid-19; however, the International Program continued to work closely with the International

Cyber Policy Centre to further research on the intersection of gender and cybersecurity with a

range of international stakeholders.

The program’s engagement on WPS continues to complement activities being undertaken as

part of ASPI’s Women in Defence and Security Network, as well as interviews on ASPI’s podcast

Policy, Guns and Money. For example, the program facilitated the delivery of a podcast with

three gender advisers from the ADF in early 2020 to facilitate a broader discussion on the role

of gender advice in the ADF.

The program continued to foster public debate and discussion through the delivery of

presentations on a range of topics, including the protection of civilians and peacekeeping and

women, peace and security at seminars and conferences hosted by the Australian War College,

the Australian Civil-Military Centre, the Australian Council for International Development

annual conference, the International Association of Peacekeeping Training Centres and the

International Forum for the Challenges of Peace Operations.

In terms of Australia-Africa engagement, Lisa Sharland continued to engage as a member of

DFAT’s Advisory Group on Australia-Africa Relations and take part in discussions on security at

the annual Africa Down Under conference in Perth. The program also initiated the delivery of a

special episode of the ASPI podcast for Africa Day 2020.

36    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

ASPI PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Staff

Mike Norris

Gillian Savage

Amanda Coghlan (until December 2019)

Grant Ferguson

Tony McCormack

David Millar

Anne Lyons

James Bronson

Declan Connor (until April 2020)

Julia Butler

Senior Fellows

Campbell Darby

Vice Admiral Tim Barrett AO CSC RAN (Ret’d)

William Paterson

David Feeney

Stephen Merchant

Steve Meekin

ASPI Professional Development (ASPI-PD) programs and workshops are short, intense and highly

interactive, fostering close engagement between facilitators, expert presenters and participants

to explore current and emerging policy challenges and build effective policymaking and strategic

analysis skills. This experience is enhanced through our use of real-world scenarios, case studies,

simulations and desktop exercises, in which participants address current and emerging strategic

policy and operational issues. These practical exercises provide an opportunity for participants

to directly develop and apply a range of strategic policy development skills, bringing context and

meaning to the learning objectives and ensuring relevance for their current and future roles.

Delivered by a core team of specified personnel, ASPI-PD programs are supplemented by

subject-matter experts from across ASPI and the Australian national security community.

Facilitators and presenters include current and retired senior government and Defence personnel,

leading industry experts and the best academics from across Australia and internationally.

ASPI-PD has the unique capability to build Australia’s capacity for strategic policy excellence.

Programs are tailorable and designed to meet the needs of our government partners

to deliver key outcomes on some of the most complex security and policy challenges.

Bespoke program design ensures that facilitators and presenters are carefully matched to

each activity so that participants engage with relevant experts, leading-edge thinking and

best practice.

   Programs  37

All programs are delivered in a purpose-built, state-of-the-art facility that enables open and

candid discussion, reinforced through controlled swipe and coded access, which enables

sensitive conversations to be conducted throughout the day, including during catered breaks.

Throughout 2019-20, ASPI-PD designed and delivered a diverse range of programs and

services for government departments and agencies. We facilitated 13 workshops and

intensive programs for 242 personnel, supporting the development of strategies, policies

and frameworks.

Despite the difficulties presented by the Covid-19 crisis and the resulting postponement of

several workshops, the ASPI-PD team pursued an active period of development and planning

during which program content was updated in preparation for the resumption of activities,

as well as designing, planning and developing new programs for 2020-21. We will continue

to look for new opportunities over the next 12 months to expand our programs and deliver

outcomes for Australian governments.

ASPI-PD is continuing to build on our existing programs and well-known reputation for

collaboratively and innovatively applying our diverse expertise to design and deliver tailored,

outcomes-driven programs and solutions. Taking advantage of emerging opportunities,

ASPI-PD is looking to develop new programs to assist the evolving priorities and challenges

facing government.

Key programs delivered in 2019-20 are highlighted below.

Crafting Better Policy for Improved Decision-Making workshops

The Crafting Better Policy workshops are delivered to Defence personnel in two variants:

Strategy and Administration. The Strategy variant examines policy through the lens of

Defence’s contribution to national and international security and government decision-making.

The Administration variant focuses on developing internal Defence policy.

A third variant of the Crafting Better Policy workshop is tailored for delivery to Defence

graduates. The workshop provides an effective introduction to Defence policymaking

in the Canberra environment, stakeholder engagement, and the practical application of

policymaking tools.

In 2019-20, ASPI-PD delivered two workshops for 31 Defence public service and military

personnel. Workshop participants advised that the program and practical exercises vastly

improved their understanding of policymaking.

38    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Advanced Better Policy workshops

Advanced Better Policy workshops span two days and offer a more in-depth and hands-on

experience. By expanding the workshop into two days, we were able to give participants

greater insights into policy analysis and the opportunity to work with practical policymaking

tools to a greater extent through a full-day, real-world practical scenario.

In 2019-20, ASPI-PD worked with Defence Strategic Policy to deliver two Advanced Better

Policy workshops. Feedback from participants indicated that the course successfully

consolidated and increased their knowledge of essential policymaking tools. Participants

also stated that they believed the course should be an essential professional development

program for policymakers and felt they benefited from this targeted training.

Focused workshops and programs

Focused workshops and programs are designed in partnership with individual government

departments and agencies, groups or services to meet specific requirements and produce

targeted outcomes.

They are designed to build discrete policy skills, provide direct support to the development of

policies, frameworks, strategies and plans, develop and test new business models, or foster

senior executive policy leadership.

In 2019-20, a one-day workshop was delivered for 11 Defence Strategic Policy personnel centred

on the design of a new program combining leadership skills and strategic thinking within the

group’s immediate policy environment.

ASPI-PD also designed and delivered a one-day workshop for the Australian Army that covered

topics such as strategic planning, the current strategic environment and practical policy advice.

Participants agreed that the workshop enhanced their knowledge of Defence policy processes

and how Defence works within the whole of government.

A focused workshop was designed and delivered for the Military Strategic Plans Division

within Defence. The program focused on developing a framework for critical stakeholder

engagement.

ASPI-PD delivered a focused workshop for Defence Honours and Awards. The workshop

facilitated the development of high-level policy and supporting guidance documents for the

ADF and the Australian Public Service Rewards and Recognition Program. The 12 participants

included key project leads, as well as essential stakeholders.

   Programs  39

Invitation-only masterclass

ASPI-PD’s invitation-only masterclasses bring together subject-matter experts and senior

leaders for an in-depth examination of an emerging strategic policy challenge facing

Australia and to identify options to address that challenge. The theme and design for each

masterclass are developed in close consultation with key stakeholders and target their highest

priority challenges.

Senior ASPI staff, subject-matter experts and strategic leaders facilitate the day, which

provides expert and timely advice and facilitates open and frank discussions on portfolio-wide

issues in a non-public setting.

In 2019-20, ASPI-PD designed and developed a masterclass to address a challenge presented

by the Chief of the Defence Force. However, due to the impact of Covid-19, the delivery of the

masterclass was postponed.

Red teaming

Red teaming is designed to test and evaluate the development of strategies, policies,

frameworks and strategic-level plans. In 2019-20, a red teaming exercise was delivered

to Defence’s Military Strategic Plans Division to establish and test effective policymaking

processes. Participants were guided by highly experienced facilitators and guest presenters

who provided expert insight into whole-of-government interactions.

Royal Australian Air Force professional development

In 2019-20, ASPI-PD partnered with the RAAF to design and deliver two levels of tailored

professional development: a 10-day senior officer program and an 11-day junior officer program.

Senior Officer Professional Development Program—Niagara

ASPI-PD designed the Niagara program for senior air force personnel. Unfortunately, due to the

limits imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic, the 2019-20 program was pushed back to 2020-21.

Details are currently being finalised in preparation for delivery in September 2020.

Junior Officer Professional Development Program

ASPI-PD designed and delivered two sessions of the Air Practitioners in a Joint Environment

program for RAAF officers selected for the Australian Command and Staff Course.

40    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

This 11-day program was designed to enhance the air power mastery of high-performing

squadron leaders and to prepare them for attendance at the Australian War College

Command and Staff Course in the following year. It provided participants with the knowledge,

tools, context and awareness to communicate with influence on air power and developed

participants’ strategic comprehension, thinking and communication skills. The program also

included an essay-writing and expert mentorship element to assist participants with their

academic skills.

Feedback provided by participants demonstrated an appreciation for ASPI’s access to an

impressive range of expert speakers, as well as acknowledging how valuable the course was for

their professional development by expanding their understanding of government processes

and current domestic and international issues.

Services Australia Shared Services Cyber Security Governance Framework

In 2018-19, ASPI-PD and staff from ICPC commenced a focused program of work with the

Department of Human Services (now Services Australia) supporting the development of a

model and framework for cybersecurity shared services governance. The framework guides

Services Australia and its partners in the development, standardisation and delivery of

cybersecurity governance for shared services across smaller portfolio or functionally alike

government agencies.

Phase 1 of this project, completed in June 2019, included the development of the governance

model and initial draft of the framework in consultation with key stakeholders. Phase 2,

which concluded in June 2020, included in-depth research, interviews and a series of

workshops designed to facilitate broader stakeholder engagement and to finalise the model

and framework for cybersecurity shared services governance and the development of

implementation guidance.

   Programs  41

International Cyber Policy Centre

Louisa Bochner

Danielle Cave

Emilia Currey

Dion Devow

Audrey Fritz

Fergus Hanson

Samantha Hoffman

Bart Hogeveen

Alison Howe

Alex Joske

Jocelinn Kang

Elsa Kania, Non-resident Fellow

James Leibold, Non-resident Senior Fellow

Audrey Millard

Kelsey Munro

Sarah O’Connor

Nathan Ruser

Fergus Ryan

Hannah Smith

Elise Thomas

Tom Uren

Jake Wallis

Heidi Winter

Vicky Xu

ASPI’s International Cyber Policy Centre (ICPC) is a leading voice in global debates on

technology, security and democracy. ICPC informs public debate and supports sound public

policy by producing original empirical research. To develop capability in Australia and our

region, the centre has a capacity-building team that conducts workshops, training programs

and large-scale exercises in Australia and overseas for the public and private sectors. ICPC also

enriches the national debate by running an international visits program that brings leading

experts to Australia.

Conduct and publish research

During 2019-20, ICPC published a wide range of publications that sparked and fed into

national and international debates. Many of them were the most read ASPI publications of

the year. In March 2020, the centre released Uyghurs for sale (authored by Vicky Xu, Danielle

42    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Cave, Dr James Leibold, Kelsey Munro and Nathan Ruser), which became ASPI’s most read

report of all time, producing 212,000 unique page views as of August 2020. The report has

been raised and discussed in the US Congress and other legislatures by politicians in the

US, the UK, Australia and Europe. A bipartisan bill to ban all imports to the US from Xinjiang

or otherwise involving forced Uyghur labour was tabled in Congress days after the report’s

release, citing ASPI’s work. In June 2020, ICPC Senior Fellow Dr James Leibold published a report

titled Genomic surveillance: inside China’s DNA dragnet.

In 2020, ICPC published a range of other reports, including reports on ‘clean pipes’ that looked

at whether internet service providers should provide a more secure internet, on Cyber Crime

in Southeast Asia by Jonathan Lusthaus, on Facebook diplomacy by Dr Damien Spry, on Pacific

islands ICT issues by Bart Hogeveen, and on foreign interference and the Chinese Communist

Party’s united front system, by Alex Joske.

Tweeting through the Great Firewall was released in September 2019 (Tom Uren, Elise Thomas

and Dr Jacob Wallis), was the first report to analyse the 3.6 million tweets linked by Twitter

to a Chinese disinformation campaign targeting Hong Kong, and received global coverage.

Following on from that in June 2020, Retweeting through the Great Firewall (Dr Jacob Wallis,

Tom Uren, Elise Thomas, Dr Samantha Hoffman, Alert Zhang, Alexandra Pascoe, Danielle Cave)

analysed a persistent, large-scale influence campaign linked to Chinese state actors on Twitter

and Facebook. This team is continuing to analyse online disinformation and information

operations taking place during the Covid-19 pandemic and has conducted research into

information operations conducted by other state actors, including Russia, and by non-state

actors involved in pushing conspiracy theories online.

In November 2019, The China Defence Universities Tracker (Alex Joske) was released as a tool

to help universities and researchers make more informed decisions about their collaboration

partners. It provided details on the defence links of 160 Chinese universities. The report has

been used to inform policy in several countries, including Australia, the US and Japan.

Building upon our previous publication, Mapping China’s tech giants, ICPC continued to

contribute to the global discussion on the expansion of key Chinese technology companies

through the publication of Mapping more of China’s tech giants: AI and surveillance.

In April 2019, we published a policy report on weaponised deep fake technologies, including

their implications for national security and democracies, authored by former ICPC researcher

Hannah Smith and ANU National Security College adviser Katherine Mansted. The report was

launched via an oversubscribed online event and attracted a lot of online debate.

   Programs  43

In October 2019, Dr Samantha Hoffman released Engineering global consent: the Chinese

Communist Party’s data-driven power expansion, which revealed that the party is using

technology to understand and control global debate in a far more sophisticated manner than

previously thought.

Provide an alternative source of strategic policy ideas and advice

Our written research was supplemented by ongoing engagement with government, industry

and civil society across Australia and with key Australian partners internationally. This included

public events, private roundtables and closed-door meetings. In October 2019, Fergus Hanson

facilitated two consultations, in Sydney and Melbourne, on behalf of the Department of Home

Affairs. The consultations were held to give industry experts the opportunity to discuss and

provide advice and direction on the next national cyber strategy.

In October 2019, ICPC hosted public and private events with Peter W Singer, who is a strategist

and Senior Fellow at the New America think tank.

The centre’s growing focus on information operations and information warfare—across

a range of countries in the Indo-Pacific—was credited multiple times during the ADF’s

Information Warfare Conference (iWar), and ICPC’s input is regularly sought by government

officials, politicians and the media in Australia and overseas.

In December 2019, ICPC launched the new Indigenous Engagement Program, running a

cybersecurity workshop for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children. ICPC has received

Australian Government grants to expand and continue that work through to 2022.

Promote international understanding

Before the Covid-19 lockdown, the ICPC supported the development of cyber

confidence-building measures across the region and worldwide through a number of activities.

From February 2019 to March 2021, through a project supported by DFAT and the UK’s Foreign

and Commonwealth Office, the centre is promoting international cyber norms and confidence

building in the ASEAN region via in-country training workshops. During 2019-20, we held

workshops in Hanoi and Jakarta.

We also hosted a Track 1.5 cyber dialogue in Taiwan which included representatives

from government, social media and cybersecurity organisations. Staff also conducted

trips to Europe, India, Singapore and the US to talk about 5G, foreign interference, online

disinformation and defending democracy initiatives.

CHAPTER 3 PUBLICATIONS

46    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

ASPI’s publications program offers practical and influential policy advice through publications

that are:

• accessible and readable

• accurate and authoritative

• well presented and cost-effective.

The key performance indicators for the program of published research are:

• Publication of the program of major studies and annuals according to schedule and

within budget.

• Each publication meeting the following criteria to a high degree:

- independent and non-partisan

- rigorous, accurate and well informed

- innovative and original

- well presented and accessible to wide and diverse audiences

- integrated into wider national debates within government and in the public arena.

• Responses to publications from our customer groups and stakeholders are monitored by

staff and reported to the Research Committee:

- Government’s evaluation of the products, in terms of their contribution to policy

development—to be evaluated on the basis of responses and structured feedback.

- Public responses, gauged by the extent to which the publications are used and discussed

in further public comment.

In 2019-20, ASPI publications were produced in seven major formats.

   Publications  47

The flagship publications are in the Strategy series, which provides detailed analyses of major

strategic policy questions of critical importance to Australia and our region and informed

recommendations for consideration by government and the broader community.

Strategic Insights are shorter papers providing background information or comment on specific

issues and considering policy ramifications as those issues arise in the public debate.

The Special Report series is a vehicle for the dissemination of analyses and comment on a wide

range of issues. Special reports are usually focused on specific issues that require more detailed

or quantitative information for deeper analysis.

The fourth style of publication is the Annual series. ASPI’s fourth Counterterrorism yearbook

was produced in 2019-20. This annual report looks at those areas around the world where

terrorism and counterterrorism are in the sharpest focus.

The fifth style of publication is for our International Cyber Policy Centre. Through its publications,

the centre aims to facilitate conversations between governments, the private sector and

academia across the Asia-Pacific region to increase constructive dialogue on cyber issues and do

its part to create a common understanding of problems and possible solutions in cyberspace.

The sixth style is the ASPI Case Studies series. The third publication in this series was titled

Sticking to our guns: a troubled past produces a superb weapon. The fourth publication in

this series was titled: The Bushmaster: from concept to combat. This series of publications is

dedicated to telling the ‘warts and all’ stories of major undertakings in Australian defence

procurement and project management. The ‘dates and dollars’ of defence projects are

available in reporting from Defence and the Australian National Audit Office, so this series

explores the less-quantified but nonetheless crucial aspects of project management—the

organisational, human and technological challenges that occur along the way. ASPI hopes

that future project managers will be able to turn to this series to see how their predecessors

dealt with the problems they faced and be able to see how outcomes—good or bad—were

shaped by events.

The seventh style of publication is a series titled Strategist Selections. This series brings

together contributions on a specific theme or by a single author. The second issue was

published in October 2019 and featured Rod Lyon’s writings for The Strategist during his

time at ASPI.

ASPI also occasionally produces discussion papers for distribution within the policy community.

Those reports usually deal with near-term planning and management issues and discuss

options, often including some not previously considered by officials.

Table 5 shows the numbers of each publication type published in 2018-19 and 2019-20.

48    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Table 5: ASPI publications, by format, 2018-19 and 2019-20

Publication type 2018-19 2019-20

Strategy 3 2

Strategic Insights 9 11

Special Report 17 19

Annuals 2 1

Discussion paper 0 0

International Cyber Policy Centre 13 20

Case Studies 1 2

Strategist Selections 1 1

Other 1

Total 46 57

A complete list of ASPI’s 2019-20 publications is in Annex A.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE NATIONAL DEBATE, BY PUBLICATION TYPE

The following pages describe some selected ASPI publications and outline how they have

contributed to the national debate.

Strategy

After Covid-19: Australia and the world rebuild (volume 1) Edited by John Coyne and Peter Jennings

2 May 2020

This Strategy report offers policy-focused analysis of the world we will

face once the pandemic has passed. At a time when all our assumptions

about the shape of Australian society and the broader global order are

being challenged, we need to take stock of likely future directions.

The report analyses 26 key topics, countries and themes, ranging from

Australia’s domestic situation through to the global balance of power,

climate and technology issues. In each case, we asked the authors

   Publications  49

to consider four questions. What impact did Covid-19 have on their

research topic? What will recovery mean? Will there be differences

in future? What policy prescriptions would you recommend for the

Australian Government?

Strategic Insights

Indo-Pacific election pulse 2019: Thailand, Indonesia, India and Australia: Views from The Strategist Edited by Huong Le Thu

14 August 2019

With democracy under stress globally, a deeper understanding of the

impact that elections in the Indo-Pacific in 2019 will have on the region’s

strategic direction is crucial.

The editor of this volume, Dr Huong Le Thu, identified the consequential

elections in 2019 as those in India, Indonesia, Australia and Thailand.

This Strategic Insight is a collection of articles from The Strategist

that delves into the complexities and implications of the democratic

elections, including the issues of foreign interference, populism and the

effect of technology on voting behaviours.

The report is one of the more popular Strategic Insights produced. It was

a popular download from the ASPI website, it generated international

media attention, and parts of it have been republished in many online

publication outlets as well as being referenced in academic articles.

The publication is well read across different government departments

and training, education and research centres in Australia and abroad.

It has featured in the resources of DFAT, the Defence Department, the

Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, the Parliamentary

Research Unit, all major Australian universities, the National Library

of Australia and many high-ranking international universities and

think tanks.

50    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Special Report

Strong and free? The future security of Australia’s north John Coyne

19 August 2019

This report argues that ‘there is a need to reconceptualise northern

Australia … as a single scalable defence and national security ecosystem’.

This ecosystem should be developed to ‘deliver integrated support to

current and future ADF and national security operations’.

With significantly reduced warning times of future conflict, it is likely

that the north of Australia will increasingly become either Australia’s

forward operating base (FOB) or a ‘lily pad’ to another forward location

within the Pacific or the first or second island chain.

The northern Australian industry base needs to be enhanced to be

able to provide a permanent and scalable civilianised replenishment

and depot repair capacity for Defence capabilities deployed across the

various physical nodes of FOB North. If the northern Australian industry

base is not scalable, then the ADF might not be able to optimally

configure to undertake ‘defence of Australia’ tasks or short-notification

joint expeditionary operations in our regional neighbourhood.

The development of FOB North needs to be part of, and supported

by, Australia’s sovereign nation building efforts. As both a sovereign

defence and a national security concept, FOB North is an integral part of

building national resilience in northern Australia and therefore should

not be simply planned and delivered through a Defence White Paper.

This kind of ambitious national approach will involve Defence working

with a diverse array of stakeholders and partners. It will also allow

Defence to make a significant and lasting contribution to its most basic

strategic interest; a secure, resilient Australia.

The report was widely reported in the media over several days, including

on the front page of The Australian, in an opinion piece in The Australian

with a response from the Northern Territory Chief Minister, in the

Adelaide Advertiser, and in several reports on Sky News, ABC RN

Drive, ABC Radio, ABC TV, 3AW, Northern Territory News, Taipei Times,

Daily Mail UK. Both the Defence Minister and the shadow defence

minister responded to the report.

   Publications  51

Annuals

Counterterrorism yearbook 2020 Edited by Isaac Kfir and John Coyne

20 March 2020

The annual Counterterrorism yearbook was published for the fourth

time in 2020. This year’s yearbook draws upon 19 contributing authors,

each a renowned thought leader in their field, to promote practical

counterterrorism solutions by reviewing a global range of terrorism

developments and counterterrorism responses.

ASIO Director-General Mike Burgess commended the publication for its

‘valuable contribution to the public discourse on counterterrorism’.

While maintaining its geographical focus, the yearbook now includes

thematic chapters on mental health, strategic policing, the media, the

terror-crime nexus and terrorist innovation.

Those new thematic chapters have been included to encourage

governments to consider more proactive counterterrorism agendas that

move beyond the current focus on disrupting plots and discouraging

people from joining and supporting terrorist groups. The focus here has

been on promoting new thinking on how to deal with emergent areas

of concern, such as the comorbidity of mental health, the use of gaming

platforms, and artificial intelligence.

Feedback from the federal and state governments, embassies and think

tanks indicates that the publication is being used as a reference tool in

defence and foreign policy circles.

52    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

International Cyber Policy Centre

Uyghurs for sale: ‘Re-education’, forced labour and surveillance beyond Xinjiang Vicky Xiuzhong Xu et al

1 March 2020

This report found that the Chinese Government has facilitated the

mass transfer of Uyghur and other ethnic minority citizens from

the far west region of Xinjiang to factories across the country. The

report revealed that, under conditions that strongly suggest forced

labour, Uyghurs are working in factories in the supply chains of at

least 83 well-known global brands in the technology, clothing and

automotive sectors, including Apple, BMW, Gap, Huawei, Nike, Samsung,

Sony and Volkswagen.

The report found that more than 80,000 Uyghurs were transferred to

work in factories across China between 2017 and 2019, and some of

them were sent directly from detention camps. The estimated figure

is conservative, and the real figure is likely to be far higher. The workers

typically live in segregated dormitories, undergo organised Mandarin

and ideological training outside working hours, are subject to constant

surveillance, and are forbidden to participate in religious observances.

Numerous sources, including government documents, show that

transferred workers are assigned minders, work under ‘military style

management’ and have limited freedom of movement.

This report, drawing on open-source Chinese documents, exposed a

new phase in China’s social re-engineering campaign targeting minority

citizens, revealing new evidence that some factories across China are

using forced Uyghur labour under a state-sponsored labour transfer

scheme that is tainting the global supply chain.

The report became the most read ASPI report of all time within 24 hours

of being published on 1 March. It received global news coverage in

top-tier media, including an exclusive in The Washington Post, and

post-publication coverage from the BBC, CNN, PBS, The Financial

Times, The Economist, al-Jazeera, South China Morning Post, Le Monde,

The Straits Times, The Guardian and The Jakarta Post, among others.

The authors have since been invited to brief Australian and European

parliamentary committees; large US industry groups with corporate

members that manufacture in China; US officials; and ministers and

   Publications  53

political advisers in a wide range of countries. US members of Congress

and members of the European Parliament have written to the CEOs of

companies named in the report, demanding that they take action on

forced labour supply-chain risks in China. The authors have contributed

expert opinions to draft legislation on the issue in foreign parliaments.

Lead author Vicky Xu said, ‘This is now a global problem. We’re seeing

the practices of the “re-education camps” in Xinjiang being exported

to major factories across China and implicating both global brands and

their hundreds of millions of consumers. Regardless of where these

factories are in a company’s supply chain, what these global brands all

have in common is a supply chain that appears to be tainted by forced

and surveilled labour. And at no stage can we forget this forced and

surveilled labour is coming from one of the most repressed regions

of the world where huge parts of the population remain under active

surveillance, house arrest or arbitrary detention.’

The China Defence Universities Tracker: Exploring the military and security links of China’s universities Alex Joske

25 November 2020

This project analysed the growing ties between China’s People’s

Liberation Army and Chinese universities, companies and research

institutes. It produced a unique online database of the military links

of Chinese institutions and a report analysing the project’s findings.

The project found that Chinese universities are increasingly engaged

in military research, and many have been implicated in cases of

illegal exports or espionage. Seven of China’s leading universities are

particularly close to the military and are often referred to as the ‘Seven

Sons of National Defence’.

The project was designed as a tool to address the high level of

concerning collaboration with Chinese military-linked entities that was

identified in earlier ASPI research. By providing greater transparency

about ‘military-civil fusion’ in China’s university sector, it aims to

encourage better practices by universities as they partner with

Chinese institutions.

54    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

The China Defence Universities Tracker project has been highly

influential since its November 2019 launch. Its dedicated website has

attracted more than 300,000 readers worldwide, who have totalled

over 750,000 unique page views, making it the most viewed single

resource that ASPI has published. The report also received 52,214

unique views, which was the second most of any ASPI report. It has

been consulted by governments and universities in Australia, the US,

Canada, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, the UK and Japan. In particular,

it informed the recent US Government decision to restrict visas for

Chinese military-linked scientists.

ASPI Case Studies

Sticking to our guns: a troubled past produces a superb weapon Chris Masters

31 October 2019

ASPI case studies in defence projects is a series dedicated to telling

the ‘warts and all’ stories of major undertakings in Australian defence

procurement and project management. The ‘dates and dollars’ of

defence projects are available in reporting from Defence and the

Australian National Audit Office, so this series explores the less

quantified but nonetheless crucial aspects of project management—

the organisational, human and technological challenges that occur

along the way. ASPI hopes that future project managers will be able to

turn to this series to see how their predecessors dealt with the problems

they faced, and be able to see how outcomes—good or bad—were

shaped by events along the way.

In Sticking to our guns, Chris Masters delivers a cracking read about the

‘funny plastic weapon’ that replaced the Vietnam-era L1A1 assault rifle in

the 1980s, the successors to which remain the ADF’s primary personal

weapon. And what a history it is. Chris skilfully weaves the political,

design, industrial, economic and battlefield factors that have driven

decision-making about the weapon earlier known as the Steyr AUG, F88

and Austeyr and now known as the EF88.

   Publications  55

The Bushmaster: from concept to combat Brendan Nicholson

12 December 2019

This account of the Bushmaster protected mobility vehicle by Brendan

Nicholson is the classic story of an ugly duckling—an ‘armoured

Winnebago’—transformed, swan-like, into a vital lifesaver for Australian

and Dutch troops on combat operations in Afghanistan. It was never

designed to play that role. Based on South African and Rhodesian

experiments with landmine-blast-deflecting V-shaped hulls, the

Bushmaster was first conceived as a lightly armoured truck. In 1980s

‘defence of Australia’ planning, the Bushmaster would move troops

around the vastness of northern Australia pursuing ‘thugs in thongs’

bent on harassing locals.

As with earlier ASPI case studies on defence projects, The Bushmaster:

from concept to combat is designed to help those in Defence, industry

and parliament and other interested observers to better understand

the complexities of the business, all with the aim of improving how

Australia equips its defence force.

Strategist Selections

Nuclear strategy in a changing world Rod Lyon

24 October 2019

The immense destructive power of nuclear weapons continues to shape

the international strategic balance, not least Australia’s place as a close

ally of the US in an increasingly risky Indo-Pacific region.

What is the continuing utility to America’s allies of extended nuclear

deterrence? Where is the risk of nuclear proliferation greatest? How

should the world deal with the growing nuclear capabilities of North

Korea? Is the nuclear order as sturdy and stable as it needs to be?

These and other pressing issues are addressed in this volume by one of

Australia’s leading thinkers on nuclear weapons and the global strategic

balance, Rod Lyon.

56    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Rod’s career spans academic research and teaching at the University

of Queensland and strategic analysis for Australia’s peak intelligence

agency, the Office of National Assessments (now the Office of National

Intelligence). Since 2006, he has been a senior analyst at ASPI and a

frequent contributor on nuclear issues to The Strategist, Australia’s best

online source of analysis on defence and strategic issues.

The 36 pithy articles in this volume offer Rod Lyon’s distilled wisdom on

critical nuclear issues, which are increasingly occupying the minds of

Australia’s best policy and intelligence thinkers.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE NATIONAL DEBATE, BY SELECTED TOPIC

Change in Australia’s strategic environment and the implications for defence strategy and policy

Publications

How the geopolitical partnership between China and Russia threatens the West Paul Dibb

29 November 2019

We are in an era when the risks of major-power conflict are growing.

The most likely contenders are China, the rising power, and the US, the

formerly dominant power that’s now in relative decline.

The other worrying contingency is conflict between Russia and US-led

NATO. But what about the third possibility: the prospect of China and

Russia collaborating to challenge American power? The most dangerous

scenario for America would be a grand coalition of China and Russia

united not by ideology but by complementary grievances.

This paper examines Russian and Chinese concepts of great-power war

in the 21st century, their views of the West and its military capabilities,

and what risks they might both take to regain lost territories.

The paper concludes by examining how America might react, the

implications of all this for the West, including Australia, and what sort of

armed conflict might be involved.

   Publications  57

Selected posts from The Strategist

• ‘Blowing up diplomacy on the Korean peninsula’, Malcolm Davis, 22 June 2020

• ‘White Paper update must not be about defending the 2016 status quo’, Michael Shoebridge,

8 June 2020

• ‘The US and Hong Kong: a chance to contrast freedom with repression’, Michael Shoebridge,

3 June 2020

• ‘Global action needed as Beijing ramps up pressure on Hong Kong and Taiwan’, Michael

Shoebridge, 29 May 2020

• ‘Victoria’s Belt and Road Initiative deal undermines cohesive national China policy’, Michael

Shoebridge, 22 May 2020

• ‘China won’t save the global economy this time’, Michael Shoebridge, 20 May 2020

• ‘Resolution, recovery and reinvention: how Australia can help Southeast Asia respond to

Covid-19’, Huong Le Thu, 20 May 2020

• ‘How to deal with the increasing risk of doing business with China’, Michael Shoebridge,

16 May 2020

• ‘Is China in breach of its nuclear-testing commitments?’, Rod Lyon, 14 May 2020

• ‘US-China rivalry must not derail international inquiry into Covid-19’, Michael Shoebridge,

8 May 2020

• ‘Australia and New Zealand should plan to expand the trans-Tasman bubble to the Pacific

islands’, Michael Shoebridge, 7 May 2020

• ‘Why Singapore, Taiwan and Vietnam have been effective in fighting Covid-19’, Huong Le

Thu, 16 April 2020

• ‘Geopolitics in the time of corona’, Rod Lyon, 1 April 2020

• ‘How much will coronavirus change the global strategic balance?’, Brendan Nicholson and

Michael Shoebridge, 1 April 2020

• ‘Will the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty survive the 2020s?’, Rod Lyon, 20 February 2020

• ‘Solomon Islands and Kiribati switching sides isn’t just about Taiwan’, Michael Shoebridge,

24 September 2019

• ‘How Hong Kong plays out will define both China and our world’, Michael Shoebridge,

7 August 2019

• ‘China’s Cambodia gambit’, Malcolm Davis, 29 July 2019

58    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Cyber policy, security and technologies and their application to Australian national decision-making and security

Publications

National security agencies and the cloud: an urgent capability issue for Australia John Coyne, Michael Shoebridge and Albert Zhang

27 May 2020

This report argues for a rapid, large-scale investment in secure cloud

infrastructure for Australia’s national security community, making

the intelligence agencies an early focus. The report seeks to shift

perceptions of new technology as capabilities, rather than as business

enablers, and calls on agency executives to drive the required change.

US national security agencies already have at least five years lead over

their Australian partner agencies. Decisions in the US now are not about

whether to adopt cloud infrastructure and functionality, but how best

to orchestrate and manage what has become a reasonably crowded and

chaotic multi-cloud environment.

A major investment in secure national cloud capabilities must be made

by at least the intelligence organisations, with big defence and other

less agile agencies following suit. This report identifies four obstacles

that agencies will need to overcome.

First, they have not planned or budgeted for a move such as

this. Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said he has already kicked in to

raise the defence budget and is hesitant to increase government

spending further.

Second, agencies usually function independently. Cloud infrastructure,

however, will be most effective as a joint initiative, at least between

the intelligence agencies and defence organisations. This will require

massive organisational and cultural shifts towards greater collaboration

and interdependence. In addition, by leveraging the purchasing power

across the national security community, Australia can get the best bang

for its buck and share the responsibility for security.

Third, there is a lack of knowledge and skills in cloud computing

in Australia that is part of a broader shortage of skills in science,

technology, engineering and maths. To be able to operate cloud

   Publications  59

infrastructure efficiently and effectively in the long term, agencies will

need to be able to build and retain expertise in those areas.

Last, establishing trust and assessing risk will be key issues. The number

of providers that could work with the Australian national security

community to build a cloud foundation is relatively limited. It includes

global providers as well as credible Australian cloud providers that have

designed their approaches with security and sovereignty in mind.

To succeed, organisational and cultural changes to overcome these

obstacles need to be driven by ministers and agency heads. Chief

information and technology officers and security staff have important

and useful internal roles to keep systems and services running and

identify new risks. Security, however, is merely one important factor

in the decision-making process. The capability benefits of cloud

infrastructure and services that we all understand when looking at the

world’s tech giants must weigh heavily in the decision-making.

The report attracted widespread attention from industry and

government. The authors continue to be actively engaged with both

the public and private sectors on developing Australia’s national

security cloud.

Selected posts from The Strategist

• ‘Cloud computing transformation must be led by ministers and agency heads’, John Coyne,

Michael Shoebridge and Albert Zhang, 27 May 2020

• ‘Harnessing Defence’s technological strengths for combat and coronavirus’, Michael

Shoebridge, 23 April 2020

• ‘Democratisation of technology: Iran shows Australia what’s possible’, Michael Shoebridge,

9 December 2019

• ‘How China’s 5G ascent could herald the end of big tech’, Michael Shoebridge,

3 December 2019

• ‘Lessons from the ANU cyberattack’, Michael Shoebridge, 4 October 2019

• ‘The cyber threat to satellites’, Malcolm Davis, 9 September 2019

• ‘Why Australia’s national security agencies need the cloud’, Michael Shoebridge, 30 July 2019

60    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Capability assessment and change, including the implications of disruptive and emerging technologies for militaries and national security agencies

Publications

Accelerating autonomy: autonomous systems and the Tiger helicopter replacement Marcus Hellyer

11 December 2019

Accelerating autonomy: autonomous systems and the Tiger helicopter

replacement examines how Defence can jump start the transition to

greater use of autonomous systems.

Report author Dr Marcus Hellyer said that ‘Defence has slowly been

developing trust in unmanned systems. It’s laid a foundation; now it’s

time to do a lot more.’ The report argues that Defence needs to identify

areas of capability in which autonomous systems can deliver disruptive

innovation. Investing in those systems can deliver more capability at

less cost than traditional manned systems.

The report makes the following recommendations for Defence:

• Double the budget of the Next Generation Technologies Fund and

Defence Innovation Hub to boost investment in the development of

emergent technologies—around $850 million over the next six years.

• Continue to prioritise autonomous systems and their enablers, such

as artificial intelligence, for innovation funding.

• Retain the Tiger armed reconnaissance helicopter in service beyond

2025 to at least 2030 and invest a portion of the funding saved in

obsolescence management and limited upgrade of the Tiger—

indicatively, around $750 million.

• Redefine the Tiger replacement in its Integrated Investment

Program to clearly set out the effects sought rather than specify

a particular platform solution, so that a full range of options to

deliver those effects can be identified and explored; avoid acquiring

another manned helicopter to replace the Tiger unless it can be

clearly demonstrated after extended development, acquisition

and evaluation that autonomous systems combined with other

capabilities in or entering service will not be able to deliver the effects

sought by 2030.

   Publications  61

• Acquire a broader range of small, precision-guided munitions for the

Reaper and other capabilities already in service or currently being

acquired, at an indicative cost of around $300 million.

• Explore whether munitions these systems use can be domestically

designed and manufactured. The munitions could also be integrated

onto the autonomous battlefield aviation systems to be developed

and acquired under other recommendations.

• Establish a funding line of $1 billion over the next decade in its

investment plan to support experimentation with and acquisition

of unmanned autonomous systems to deliver disruptive battlefield

aviation effects.

Defence budget analysis, including analysis of cost drivers, implementation of the Integrated Investment Program and industry policy aspects.

Publications

Defence projects and the economy Rob Bourke

21 August 2019

This report examines what the national economy stands to gain from

nearly $100 billion of planned investment in new defence capital

equipment, including submarines, frigates and military vehicles.

The report emphasises that, although the general public has been

informed about some of the economic benefits of those projects, it has

limited access to reliable information on most of their economic costs.

Nor has the public been fully informed of how much of what goes into

the projects will be produced in Australia.

The picture emerging from information available publicly contrasts with

the image of vessel and vehicle projects as a major source of ‘jobs and

growth’. At best, the projects appear to have a small positive impact on

economic activity due to the substantial economic costs involved.

Author Rob Bourke said that ‘for such large projects whose economic

benefits have been portrayed as being far above their economic costs,

it’s surprising how little supporting evidence has been made available to

Australian taxpayers.

62    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

‘With the economic upside of projects touted widely but the economic

downside largely hidden from public view, it’s difficult to assess the

merits of investments of national significance.

‘Government messaging suggests that projects add much more to the

economy than they take away. The evidence available publicly paints a

different picture: Australia potentially paying a lot to protect a little.

‘Vessel and vehicle acquisitions might now be difficult to alter.

Nonetheless, the lessons in transparency that they provide are

important to consider for future investments by Defence, especially

with calls for its budget to move well above the current target of

2% of GDP.’

Selected posts from The Strategist

• ‘Australia’s defence budget in the age of Covid-19: unsustainable sustainment?’,

Marcus Hellyer, 23 June 2020

• ‘Australia needs to ensure it has the advanced missiles it needs’, Michael Shoebridge,

30 Jun 2020

• ‘Australia’s defence budget in the age of Covid-19: room for a cut?’, Marcus Hellyer,

1 June 2020

• ‘Australia’s defence budget in the age of Covid-19: where are we now?’, Marcus Hellyer,

15 May 2020

• ‘Urgent lessons for Australia in US defence budget’, Michael Shoebridge, 10 March 2020

• ‘Has the cost of Australia’s future submarines gone up?’, parts 1 and 2, Marcus Hellyer,

April 2020

   Publications  63

PAGE INTENTIONALLY BLANK

CHAPTER 4: EVENTS

66    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

ASPI’s events program embraces a range of different audiences and tailors events for each

type. By-invitation events, which include roundtables and strategic dialogues, involve mainly

members of the security community, address specific issues related to policy development and

are normally conducted under the Chatham House rule.

Public events, such as ASPI report launches, panel discussions and public addresses, are

designed to allow the widest possible audience to engage with leading Australian and

international strategic thinkers, to exchange different perspectives on strategic and security

matters and to network with like-minded attendees.

The impact of Covid-19 on the events program has been significant. Most notably, the

in-person annual conference was postponed from the originally planned date in June 2020 to

2020-21. All planned public events, evening presentations and many strategic international

dialogues that were to be held from March 2020 through until the end of 2019-20 have been

postponed or cancelled for that reason.

ASPI has adapted the events and communications delivery model to ensure that the goal of

promoting discussion in the defence and strategic space is still achieved. The events team

has introduced a series of webinars (akin to public events) to allow space for discussions and

for engagement with audiences to continue. This format has allowed those interested in

participating in or attending ASPI events to not be constrained by location. The webinars have

continued to grow in impact and will remain a useful capability until the end of the pandemic

and beyond.

Table 6 summarises the major events conducted by ASPI in 2018-19 and 2019-20.

More detailed descriptions of the events held during 2019-20 are given in this section,

while a detailed listing of the 2019-20 events program is in Annex D.

Table 6: ASPI events, 2018-19 and 2019-20

Events 2018-19 2019-20

Conferences 1 0

Evening presentations 5 0

International strategic dialogues 10 6

Roundtable discussions and forums 65 50

Public events and workshops 45 22

Special meetings 16 14

Webinars 0 11

Total 142 103

   Events  67

ASPI PODCAST

As in-person events and travel were made increasingly impossible due to the pandemic, the

events and communications team increased the communications output and pivoted to

use online communications to a much more significant degree. That included increasing

newsletters to our growing list of subscribers to update them on report launches, online

events, podcast episodes, notable Strategist pieces and ASPI media content, such as op-eds

and television or radio interviews. The impact of the newsletter and the increase in curated

communications on our social media platform has been large, as more people and a broader

global audience engage with our content.

The ASPI podcast, Policy, Guns and Money, continues to go from strength to strength, as

the frequency of the series was increased from fortnightly to weekly. With ever-increasing

listenership, we continue to develop the podcast as an important format for discussions of

strategic issues, reaching new audiences with a variety of content.

In 2019-20, ASPI produced a four-part podcast series titled ‘Australia’s next steps’. The series’

exceptional guests attracted a great listenership and much media interest.

As opportunities to expand ASPI’s online events and communications grow, the audience for

such content is extended, reinforcing ASPI’s role as a thought leader.

Table 7 shows number of podcasts in 2019-20.

Table 7: ASPI podcasts, 2019-20

Communications Numbers

Podcast regular episodes 34 episodes

Average listenership per regular episode 2,070 average listeners per episode on

soundcloud

Podcast special episodes 7 special episodes

Podcast short series 4 episodes in 1 short series

ASPI’S INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

ASPI holds an international conference annually in June. Unfortunately, this year’s conference

was postponed due to Covid-19. A reimagined, virtual conference was held in lieu of this event

in July-August 2020, outside of the reporting period for this annual report.

68    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

WOMEN IN DEFENCE AND SECURITY NETWORK

The Women in Defence and Security Network (WDSN) is designed to support the career

development of women in the defence and security communities in Australia.

It provides networking opportunities and facilitates discussion on issues related to women’s

participation and gender perspectives in the context of defence, national security and

foreign policy.

Interest in the WDSN continued to grow in 2019-20, but Covid-19 disrupted planned events.

WDSN events are being adapted to be delivered from a distance to ensure that the network

remains strong.

The WDSN continues to publish profiles of women working within the sector, showcasing

talent and career options to those in the network.

Table 8 shows the WDSN events held in 2019-20

Table 8: WDSN events, 2019-20

Date Event

1 August Public event: ASPI - Young Australians in International Affairs

speed mentoring

4 November Public event: In conversation with Assistant Secretary-General

Michele Coninsx, Executive Director of the UN Counter-Terrorism

Executive Directorate

7 November Event: Melbourne speed mentoring

EVENING PRESENTATIONS

Due to Covid-19, evening presentations planned for 2019-20 were postponed, cancelled or

turned into virtual events.

INTERNATIONAL STRATEGIC DIALOGUES

ASPI supports Australian diplomacy by conducting Track 1.5 and Track 2 dialogues with

international institutions and government partners on a regular basis. In 2019-20, we

conducted six such dialogues. Unfortunately, many have been postponed due to Covid-19

and may now take virtual forms.

   Events  69

ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSIONS AND FORUMS

ASPI hosted many roundtable discussions at our Canberra premises during 2019-20, engaging

a wide range of international and Australian experts in discussions about strategic and

national security affairs. Many roundtables were convened at the request of overseas visitors

seeking direct interaction with ASPI staff. Others were initiated by ASPI in support of our

research program. Details of the roundtables held in 2019-20 are in Annex D.

ASPI PUBLIC EVENTS AND WORKSHOPS

ASPI hosted many public events in the form of keynote speaker or panel discussions

throughout the year. Our public events are very popular, are officially moderated and

attract media attention.

Our public event schedule was disrupted by Covid-19, so many events were postponed or

cancelled. Some events were adapted into webinars (see below).

Details of ASPI’s public events in 2019-20 are in Annex D.

WEBINARS

While Covid-19 meant that ASPI was unable to host in-person events, the events and

communications team pivoted to host events such as panel discussions, publication launches

and in-conversations online. Eleven webinars were delivered between April and June 2020.

Participants, both panel guests and attendees, have been able to participate from across the

globe and watch either live or on demand after the webinar has aired. This has allowed us to

develop the capability to deliver webinars. As the world returns to normal once the pandemic

concludes, this will be a useful capability to continue to use, as it increases our reach well

beyond Canberra. More details of webinars in 2019-20 are in Annex D.

OTHER EVENTS

From year to year, ASPI hosts a range of other events on topical issues, including panel

discussions and workshops. Further details are in Annex D.

CHAPTER 5 CORPORATE GOVERNANCE

72    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

The ASPI Council is the governing body of ASPI, which is a Commonwealth company.

The council reports annually to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission.

As well as meeting legislative requirements, a governance framework guides the

development of policies, plans and strategies that are approved by the council, covering

areas such as risk, fraud and business continuity. A number of internal policies for staff are

reviewed as required or scheduled.

The council comprises up to twelve directors with experience, expertise and excellence in a

range of professions, including business, academia, government and the military. Provision is

also made to have council members who are nominees of the Prime Minister and the Leader of

the Opposition, emphasising that ASPI is politically non-partisan.

COUNCIL MEETING ATTENDANCE

During 2019-20, the following directors completed their terms on the ASPI Council:

• the Hon David Johnston

• Professor Joan Beaumont

• Mr Jim McDowell

The following directors were appointed to the ASPI Council:

• Ms Gai Brodtmann

• Dr Brendan Nelson AO

• Dr Lavina Lee

Table 9 lists meeting attendance by ASPI Council members throughout the year.

Mr Peter Jennings is the only executive member of the council. All other council members

are non-executive directors.

   Corporate governance  73

Table 9: Attendance at ASPI Council meetings, 2019-20

30 August

2019

29 November

2019

6 March

2020

30 June

2020

Lieutenant General (Ret’d)

Kenneth Gillespie AC DSC CSM (Chair) ü ü ü ü

Mr Peter Jennings PSM ü ü ü ü

Air Vice Marshal (Ret’d)

Margaret Staib AM CSC

ü ü ü ü

Professor Joan Beaumont ü Î ü -

Ms Jane Halton AO PSM ü ü ü ü

Mr Jim McDowell Î Î Î -

The Hon Stephen Conroy ü ü ü ü

The Hon David Johnston ü Î ü -

The Hon Robert Hill AC ü ü Î ü

Mr Stephen Brady AO CVO ü ü ü ü

Dr Denis Dragovic ü ü ü ü

Ms Jennifer Ma ü ü ü ü

The Hon Dr Brendan Nelson AO - - - ü

Ms Gai Brodtmann - - - ü

Dr Lavina Lee - - - ü

74    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

CURRENT COUNCIL MEMBERS

CHAIRMAN

Lt Gen (Ret’d) Kenneth J Gillespie AC DSC CSM Grad Dip Strat Studies

Kenneth Gillespie is an experienced and highly decorated national leader.

Formerly Chief of the Australian Army, he has had a diverse range of

practical experience, including military high command, diplomacy and

private and public sector leadership. He has an enviable and successful

track record for strategic review, structural reform, team building and

leadership in diverse and challenging work environments and workforces.

Lt Gen Gillespie currently sits on several boards, both public and

not-for-profit, and provides consulting services to government

departments, corporations and small companies. He possesses a strong

network of contacts in government, defence, security and commercial

fields and has considerable experience communicating with and

building consensus among diverse stakeholder groups.

Lt Gen Gillespie was appointed to the ASPI Council in January 2015 and

was appointed as ASPI Council Chairman in December 2016.

MEMBERS

Mr Stephen Brady AO CVO BA (Hons)

Stephen Brady completed his 36-year career with the Australian

Government as Ambassador to France, coinciding with a series

of terrorist attacks and the government’s decision to buy

12 French-designed submarines. He was also accredited to Morocco,

Algeria and Monaco.

Before then, he was Official Secretary to two Governors-General

of Australia. He has also served as Ambassador to the Netherlands

(2004-07) where he was responsible for handling Australia’s political

cooperation with the Netherlands in Afghanistan. He was also

Permanent Representative to the Organisation for the Prohibition of

Chemical Weapons, the International Court of Justice, the International

Criminal Court and the Permanent Court of Arbitration.

   Corporate governance  75

Mr Brady has been Australia’s Ambassador to Sweden, where he was

accredited to Denmark, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania

and Estonia. On two occasions, he served as a Senior Adviser to Prime

Minister John Howard.

In 2013, the Queen made him a Commander of the Royal Victorian

Order, and in 2015 he was appointed an Officer of the Order of

Australia for ‘distinguished service to successive governments in

the area of international affairs’. At the conclusion of his posting in

Paris, the French Government awarded him a Commander of the

Legion d’Honneur. He is currently the only Australian civilian to hold

that honour.

Mr Brady now serves as Adjunct Professor of International Relations

at Bond University and is a director on the boards of the European

Australian Business Council, The Ethics Centre and Bangarra, and is

Chairman of the National Gallery of Australia Foundation and a member

of the NGA Council.

Mr Brady was appointed to the ASPI Council in February 2019.

Ms Gai Brodtmann BPR (RMIT), GradCertBus (Monash), BA (ANU)

In addition to being an ASPI Council member, Gai Brodtmann is a

member of the boards of Old Parliament House and Endometriosis

Australia and the Sapien Cyber advisory board.

She is also an occasional presenter and panellist at the National

Security College and Australian Defence College and a contributor to

The Strategist.

Ms Brodtmann served as the Member for Canberra from 2010 to 2019.

She was shadow Assistant Minister for Cyber Security and Defence from

2016 to 2019 and shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence from

2013 to 2016.

She is a former member and deputy chair of the joint parliamentary

committees on Public Accounts and Audit and the National

Capital and External Territories and a former member of the Joint

Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade and the

Defence subcommittee.

76    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Before her political career, Ms Brodtmann ran her own small business

for 10 years and was a federal public servant, primarily with Foreign

Affairs and Trade and Attorney-General’s, for a decade.

From 2000 to 2009, she consulted in Defence in a broad range of

areas, including capability acquisition and sustainment; financial and

personnel management; youth development; science and technology;

and cultural change and diversity policy.

During her time in Foreign Affairs and Trade, Ms Brodtmann was posted

to New Delhi and served on the Middle East desk, where she worked on

the normalisation of the relationship with Iran and bilateral policy on

Iraq, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon.

Her national security policy interests include cybersecurity

(across a broad range of fields); the women, peace and security agenda;

critical infrastructure; capability sustainment; sovereign capacity;

and community education.

Ms Brodtmann is a member of the Australian Institute of Company

Directors and a Fellow of the Public Relations Institute of Australia.

Ms Brodtmann was appointed to the ASPI Council in June 2020.

The Hon Stephen Conroy BEc (ANU)

Stephen Conroy served as a Senator for Victoria in the Australian

Parliament for more than 20 years, including as the Leader of the

Government in the Senate and as Deputy Leader of the Opposition in

the Senate.

During his time in parliament, Mr Conroy worked in multiple portfolio

areas, most notably as the Minister for Broadband, Communications

and the Digital Economy, when he was responsible for the design and

implementation of the National Broadband Network between 2007

and 2013.

Before entering parliament, he worked at the Transport Workers Union.

In 1993, he was elected to Footscray City Council.

In November 2016, Mr Conroy was appointed as the Executive Director

of Responsible Wagering Australia.

Mr Conroy was appointed to the ASPI Council in March 2017.

   Corporate governance  77

Dr Denis Dragovic BEng (Hons), MSFS, PhD

Denis is a former humanitarian aid worker with experience in war zones

around the world, a scholar of religion and society, public commentator

and currently sits on Australia’s Administrative Appeals Tribunal.

A graduate from the University of Adelaide with a degree in civil

engineering Denis relocated to Singapore to work on major construction

projects before moving to Washington D.C. to complete the Master of

Science in Foreign Service degree at Georgetown University.

Following the 1999 civil war in East Timor, Denis was hired as a

shelter engineer for the International Rescue Committee, a leading US

humanitarian organisation. Over the subsequent twelve years Denis

worked in war zones and disaster-stricken areas in South East Asia,

the Middle East and Africa running humanitarian and development

programs including in Iraq where he led one of the world’s largest

community development programs. During this period, he led the

successful efforts to release the first aid worker kidnapped by militants

in Iraq, provided consulting services to various United Nations agencies

and helped establish an Iraqi NGO.

Drawing on his experiences working in conflict and post-conflict

environments Denis completed a PhD from the University of St Andrews’

School of Divinity which led to the book Religion and Post-Conflict

Statebuilding: Roman Catholic and Sunni Islamic Perspectives. His second

book, No Dancing, No Dancing: Inside the Global Humanitarian Crisis, is

a narrative non-fiction based on his return journey to Iraq, South Sudan

and East Timor to see what happened to the people and aid projects.

He is currently a senior member on the Administrative Appeals Tribunal

hearing asylum claims, a regular commentator in the media on the

intersection of religion and society as well as an honorary senior fellow

at the University of Melbourne.

Dr Dragovic was appointed to the ASPI Council in February 2019.

78    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Jane Halton AO PSM BA (Hons) Psychology, FAIM, FIPAA, Hon FAHMS, Hon FACHSE, Hon Dr Letters (UNSW), GAICD

Jane Halton has had a 33-year public sector career, having served as

Secretary of the Department of Finance (2014-2016), Secretary of

the Department of Health (and Ageing) (2002-2014) and Executive

Co-ordinator (Deputy Secretary) of the Department of the Prime

Minister and Cabinet.

In her most recent role as Secretary of the Department of Finance,

she was responsible for a range of significant services delivered by

the department, including the delivery of the Australian Government

Budget; oversight of the financial framework of Australian Government

agencies; shareholder aspects of government business enterprises;

the ongoing management of the Australian Government’s non-defence

domestic property portfolio and key asset sales; and key projects,

including the Air Warfare Destroyer Project.

Ms Halton is currently the Chair of Board Vault Systems, the Coalition for

Epidemic Innovations and COTA Australia.

She is a board member of ANZ Bank; Crown Resorts; Clayton Utz and

Ngamuru Advisory; the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation,

University of Washington; the Australian Genomics Advisory Board;

and the Corporate Council of the European Australian Business Council.

She is also an adjunct professor at the University of Sydney and the

University of Canberra.

She has had significant experience in global health governance, playing

key roles in global health security, and has held leadership roles with

the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and the

World Health Organization.

Ms Halton has been awarded the Public Service Medal (2002), the

Centenary Medal (2003) and the Order of Australia (2015).

Ms Halton was appointed to the ASPI Council in December 2016.

   Corporate governance  79

Mr Peter Jennings PSM BA (Hons), MA, MSc

Peter Jennings is the executive director of ASPI—a position he has held

since May 2012.

Mr Jennings has worked at senior levels in the Australian Public Service

on defence and national security. Career highlights include being

Deputy Secretary for Strategy in the Defence Department (2009-12),

Chief of Staff to the Minister for Defence (1996-98) and Senior Adviser

for Strategic Policy to the Prime Minister (2002-03).

Since 2012, Mr Jennings has expanded ASPI’s role from its original

high-quality research on defence to include research on cybersecurity;

policing and international law enforcement; border security; national

resilience; and counterterrorism studies. Now with around 60 staff

and close working relations with government, parliament, industry

and international partners, ASPI is Australia’s leading think tank on

national security.

Mr Jennings’s research interests include Australian and regional

defence policies, military operations, crisis management, government

decision-making and future defence capabilities.

He led the External Expert Panel appointed by government in early

2014 to advise ministers and the Defence Department on the Defence

White Paper released in February 2016. He was a member of the

Australia-Germany Advisory Group appointed by the Prime Minister

and German Chancellor in 2015 to develop closer bilateral relations.

He has also been a member of the Advisory Group on Australia-Africa

Relations, advising DFAT.

Mr Jennings has previously held a number Senior Executive Service

positions in Defence, including as First Assistant Secretary International

Policy Division and First Assistant Secretary Coordination and

Public Affairs.

He was Director of Programs at ASPI between late 2003 and January

2006 and has taught postgraduate studies on terrorism at the

Australian Defence Force Academy (ADFA).

In the Defence Department, Mr Jennings has been the Deputy Director

of the then titled Defence Imagery and Geospatial Organisation (2002)

and head of the Strategic Policy Branch (1998-1999). In late 1999,

80    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

he was co-director of the East Timor Policy Unit, responsible for

developing Australia’s policy approaches to the international

peacekeeping operation in East Timor.

Mr Jennings studied at the London Business School in 2000 and 2001 as

a Sloan Fellow and was awarded a Masters of Science (Management)

with Distinction. He has a Master of Arts degree in International

Relations from the Australian National University (1987) and a BA

(Honours) in History from the University of Tasmania (1980-1984).

He has been a Fulbright Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of

Technology (1985). He taught politics and international relations at the

University of New South Wales / ADFA (1987-1990).

He was awarded the Public Service Medal in the Australia Day 2013

Honours list for outstanding public service through the development

of Australia’s strategic and defence policy, particularly in the areas of

ADF operations in East Timor, Iraq and Afghanistan. In February 2016,

he was awarded the French decoration of Knight in the National Order

of Legion d’Honneur.

Dr Lavina Lee BComm/LLB, MA, PhD

Lavina Lee is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Politics and

International Relations at Macquarie University, Sydney. She has

commerce and law degrees from the University of NSW, an MA in

International Peace and Security from King’s College, University of

London, and a PhD in International Relations from Sydney University.

Prior to joining Macquarie University, she was a political risk consultant

with Control Risks Group.

Dr Lee has been an academic at Macquarie University since 2007,

teaching both undergraduate and postgraduate students in the field of

international relations. At Macquarie, she has served as the Convenor of

the Master of International Relations program, and is currently Director

of Higher Degree Research for the department as well as an appointed

member of the University Academic Standards and Quality Committee.

Dr Lee is the author of the book US hegemony and international

legitimacy: norms, power and followership in the wars on Iraq

(Routledge, 2010), and has published numerous articles, book chapters,

research reports and commentary on Indian foreign and security

policy, nuclear proliferation, US foreign policy and security relations

   Corporate governance  81

in the Indo-Pacific. She also periodically publishes opinion pieces in

The Australian, the Australian Financial Review, the Hindustan Times and

the New Straits Times, as well as with specialist policy outlets such as

the Lowy Institute’s The Interpreter and ASPI’s The Strategist.

She has led projects for the Australian Government and think tanks

on opportunities and weaknesses of the ‘Quad’, Chinese influence in

Southeast Asia, the role of democracy promotion in the free and open

Indo-Pacific strategy and the role of India in the Indo-Pacific. Her work

integrates academic and policy approaches, and she speaks widely to

expert and lay audiences on international and security issues.

Before joining the ASPI Council, Dr Lee was a Director of the Institute for

Regional Security.

Dr Lee was appointed to the ASPI Council in June 2020.

The Hon Dr Brendan Nelson AO MBBS, FAMA, FRACP (Hons), MRACGP

Brendan Nelson is president of Boeing Australia, New Zealand and

South Pacific. He is the senior company leader in the Oceania region

and is the chairman of the board for Boeing Australia Holdings. In that

role, he coordinates all Boeing activities, leads government relations

and directs the implementation of Boeing’s strategy to expand its local

presence and grow the business. Appointed in February 2020, he is

based in Sydney.

Dr Nelson is also Chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce

in Australia (AmCham), a board director of the United States Studies

Centre at the University of Sydney and a member of the Space Industry

Leaders Forum and the Business Council of Australia.

Before joining Boeing, he served as director of the Australian War

Memorial for seven years. Prior to that, he was the Australian

Ambassador to Belgium, Luxembourg, the European Union and NATO

(2010-12). Apart from overseeing a major transformation in Australia’s

relationships with the European Union and NATO, Dr Nelson forged

deep links with the communities of Flanders, where almost 14,000

Australians lost their lives during World War I.

Born in Coburg, Victoria, in 1958, Dr Nelson studied at Flinders University,

South Australia, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Medicine and

Surgery degree. He worked as a medical practitioner in Hobart from

82    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

1985 to 1995. In 1993, he was elected unopposed as National President

of the Australian Medical Association (AMA), becoming the youngest

person ever to hold that position. He had previously served as National

Vice President and Tasmanian Branch President of the AMA. In 1995,

he retired as president of the AMA following his preselection as the

Liberal candidate for the Sydney seat of Bradfield.

Dr Nelson was elected to the federal parliament in March 1996. After

the 2001 election, he was promoted from Parliamentary Secretary to

the Minister for Defence to cabinet in the senior portfolio of Minister

for Education, Science and Training. There, he drove major reforms to

universities and a focus on school standards and reporting. In 2006,

he was appointed Minister for Defence when troops were deployed

to Iraq, Afghanistan, East Timor and Solomon Islands. In November

2007, Dr Nelson was elected leader of the Liberal Party of Australia,

serving as Leader of the Opposition until September 2008. The

following year, he retired from federal politics before taking up his

ambassadorial appointment.

In 1995, Dr Nelson was awarded the AMA’s highest honour: the

Gold Medal for Distinguished Service to Medicine and Humanity.

In recognition of his commitment to public health, he was awarded

an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians.

He is the recipient of three honorary doctorates: from the Flinders

University of South Australia in 2011, the Australian National University

in 2017 and the University of South Australia in 2019. He is a Fellow

of the Royal Society of NSW (2017), a Rotary Paul Harris Fellow and a

Sydney University John Lowenthal Medallist.

Dr Nelson was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia in January

2016 for his services to the community, the parliament of Australia,

diplomacy and cultural leadership.

In 2018, the Returned and Services League (RSL) conferred Honorary Life

Membership upon Dr Nelson for his services to and support of veterans

and ex-service organisations. He was also awarded honorary citizenship

of the Belgian city of Ypres in recognition of his support for the city,

its commemorations and Last Post Association.

Dr Nelson was appointed to the ASPI Council in June 2020.

   Corporate governance  83

Air Vice Marshal (Ret’d) Margaret Staib AM CSC GAICD BBus, MBusLog, MA Strat Studies

Margaret Staib is a non-executive director of the Commonwealth

Superannuation Corporation and the Australian Royal Aeronautical

Society, and a member of the Industry Advisory Board for the Centre

for Supply Chain and Logistics at Deakin University. She was recently

appointed as Chair of the Strategic Defence Advisory Board to the

Chief Minister of the Northern Territory and the Northern Territory

Defence and National Security Advocate.

Ms Staib is a certified practising logistician, a Fellow of the Chartered

Institute of Logistics and Transport, a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical

Society and a member of the RAAF Active Reserve.

She commenced her professional career as a military logistician with

the RAAF after completing a business degree at the University of

South Queensland. Her military service included an exchange with

the US Air Force in the Pentagon and a period as Commandant of the

Australian Defence Force Academy. In 2009, she was promoted to the

rank of Air Vice Marshal and assumed the role of Commander Joint

Logistics Australian Defence Force.

From the Air Force, Ms Staib continued her executive career as the CEO

and Managing Director of Airservices Australia—the air navigation

and air traffic management organisation for Australia. There, she led

significant transformation in air safety, air navigation technology

and cultural change. She has subsequently pursued a career as a

non-executive director.

Her expertise is in defence; national security; transport, infrastructure

and logistics; aviation and aerospace; cultural change; and

organisational transformation.

In addition to her business degree, Ms Staib holds a Master of Business

Studies (Logistics) and a Master of Arts (Strategic Studies). She was

awarded the Conspicuous Service Cross and is a member of the Order of

Australia. She was also a finalist in the Telstra Business Women’s Awards

(2012) and AFR 100 Women of Influence (2012), and a participant in the

2017-18 AICD Chairs Mentoring Program.

Ms Staib was appointed to the ASPI Council in January 2015.

84    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

COUNCIL COMMITTEES

Audit Committee

The functions of the ASPI Audit Committee include reviewing the appropriateness of ASPI’s

financial reporting; performance reporting; the risk oversight and management system;

and the internal control system.

The committee’s members in 2019-20 were:

• Kate Freebody, FreebodyCogent Pty Ltd, Chair

• Geoff Brown, Chief Audit Executive, Department of Defence

• Air Vice Marshall (Ret’d) Margaret Staib AM CSC, ASPI Council member

The Audit Committee invites the Executive Director and Director Corporate of ASPI and a

representative from the Australian National Audit Office to its meetings.

During 2019-20, the committee met four times.

Research Committee

The ASPI Research Committee comprises senior ASPI staff, ASPI Council members and at

least one senior representative from the Department of Defence. Under the current funding

agreement, a portion of the funds received from the Department of Defence is directed

to mutually agreed Defence-specific projects. Due to Covid-19 restrictions, the Research

Committee did not meet during 2019-20. ASPI’s Executive Director met with the Secretary

of the Department of Defence and agreed on seven research themes for the 2020-21

financial year.

   Corporate governance  85

PAGE INTENTIONALLY BLANK

CHAPTER 6 FINANCIALS

88    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

P: + 02 6270 5100 ABN 77 097 369 045 www.aspi.org.au www.aspistrategist.org.au

•

•

•

•

LEVEL 2, 40 MACQUARIE STREET, BARTON ACT 2600

   Financials  89

P: + 02 6270 5100 ABN 77 097 369 045 www.aspi.org.au www.aspistrategist.org.au

90    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

GPO Box 707 CANBERRA ACT 2601 38 Sydney Avenue BARTON ACT Phone (02) 6203 7300 Fax (02) 6203 7777

INDEPENDENT AUDITOR’S REPORT

To the members of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute Limited

Opinion

In my opinion, the financial report of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute Limited (the Company) for the year ended 30 June 2020 is in accordance with the Corporations Act 2001, including:

(a) giving a true and fair view of the Company’s financial position as at 30 June 2020 and of its performance for the year then ended; and

(b) complying with Australian Accounting Standards including the Australian Accounting Interpretations, and the Corporations Regulations 2001.

The financial report of the Company, which I have audited, comprises the following as at 30 June 2020 and for the year then ended:

• Statement by the Directors, Executive Director and Company Secretary; • Statement of Comprehensive Income; • Statement of Financial Position; • Statement of Changes in Equity; • Cash Flow Statement; and • Notes to the financial report, comprising a summary of significant accounting policies and other explanatory

information.

Basis for opinion

I conducted my audit in accordance with the Australian National Audit Office Auditing Standards, which incorporate the Australian Auditing Standards. My responsibilities under those standards are further described in the Auditor’s Responsibilities for the Audit of the Financial Report section of my report. I am independent of the Company in accordance with the auditor independence requirements of the Corporations Act 2001 and the relevant ethical requirements for financial report audits conducted by the Auditor-General and his delegates. These include the relevant independence requirements of the Accounting Professional and Ethical Standards Board’s APES 110 Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants (including Independence Standards) (the Code) to the extent that they are not in conflict with the Auditor-General Act 1997. I have also fulfilled my other responsibilities in accordance with the Code.

I confirm that the independence declaration required by the Corporations Act 2001, which has been given to the directors of the Company, would be in the same terms if given to the directors as at the time of this auditor’s report.

I believe that the audit evidence I have obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for my opinion.

Directors’ responsibility for the financial report

The directors of the Company are responsible for the preparation of the financial report that gives a true and fair view in accordance with Australian Accounting Standards and the Corporations Act 2001 and for such internal control the directors determine is necessary to enable the preparation of the financial report that gives a true and fair view and is free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error.

In preparing the financial report, the directors are responsible for assessing the ability of the Company to continue as a going concern, disclosing, as applicable, matters related to going concern and using the going concern basis of accounting unless the directors either intend to liquidate the Company or to cease operations, or have no realistic alternative but to do so.

   Financials  91

Auditor’s responsibilities for the audit of the financial report

My objective is to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial report as a whole is free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error, and to issue an auditor’s report that includes my opinion. Reasonable assurance is a high level of assurance, but is not a guarantee that an audit conducted in accordance with the Australian National Audit Office Auditing Standards will always detect a material misstatement when it exists. Misstatements can arise from fraud or error and are considered material if, individually or in the aggregate, they could reasonably be expected to influence the economic decisions of users taken on the basis of the financial report.

As part of an audit in accordance with the Australian National Audit Office Auditing Standards, I exercise professional judgement and maintain professional scepticism throughout the audit. I also:

• Identify and assess the risks of material misstatement of the financial report, whether due to fraud or error, design and perform audit procedures responsive to those risks, and obtain audit evidence that is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for my opinion. The risk of not detecting a material misstatement resulting from fraud is higher than for one resulting from error, as fraud may involve collusion, forgery, intentional omissions, misrepresentations, or the override of internal control.

• Obtain an understanding of internal control relevant to the audit in order to design audit procedures that are appropriate in the circumstances, but not for the purpose of expressing an opinion on the effectiveness of the Company’s internal control.

• Evaluate the appropriateness of accounting policies used and the reasonableness of accounting estimates and related disclosures made by the directors.

• Conclude on the appropriateness of the directors’ use of the going concern basis of accounting and, based on the audit evidence obtained, whether a material uncertainty exists related to events or conditions that may cast significant doubt on the Company’s ability to continue as a going concern. If I conclude that a material uncertainty exists, I am required to draw attention in my auditor’s report to the related disclosures in the financial report or, if such disclosures are inadequate, to modify my opinion. My conclusions are based on the audit evidence obtained up to the date of my auditor’s report. However, future events or conditions may cause the Company to cease to continue as a going concern.

• Evaluate the overall presentation, structure and content of the financial report, including the disclosures, and whether the financial report represents the underlying transactions and events in a manner that achieves fair presentation.

I communicate with the directors regarding, among other matters, the planned scope and timing of the audit and significant audit findings, including any significant deficiencies in internal control that I identify during my audit.

Australian National Audit Office

Jennifer Carter

Senior Director

Delegate of the Auditor-General

Canberra

20 October 2020

92    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

GPO Box 707 CANBERRA ACT 2601 38 Sydney Avenue BARTON ACT Phone (02) 6203 7300 Fax (02) 6203 7777

LtGen (Ret’d) Kenneth J Gillespie AC DSC Chairman Australian Strategic Policy Institute Limited Level 2, 40 Macquarie Street BARTON ACT 2600

AUSTRALIAN STRATEGIC POLICY INSTITUTE LIMITED FINANCIAL REPORT 2019-20 AUDITOR’S INDEPENDENCE DECLARATION

In relation to my audit of the financial report of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute Limited for the year ended 30 June 2020, to the best of my knowledge and belief, there have been:

(a) no contraventions of the auditor independence requirements of the Corporations Act 2001; and

(b) no contravention of any applicable code of professional conduct.

Australian National Audit Office

Jennifer Carter

Senior Director

Delegate of the Auditor-General

Canberra

20 October 2020

   Financials  93

P: + 02 6270 5100 www.aspi.org.au ABN 77 097 369 045

S ST TA AT TE EM ME EN NT T B BY Y T TH HE E D DI IR RE EC CT TO OR RS S, , E EX XE EC CU UT TI IV VE E D DI IR RE EC CT TO OR R A AN ND D C CO OM MP PA AN NY Y S SE EC CR RE ET TA AR RY Y

In our opinion:

a) the financial report and notes of the Company are in accordance with the Corporations Act 2001 and:

i) comply with the Accounting Standards (including Australian Accounting Interpretations), and the Corporations Regulations 2001; and

ii) give a true and fair view of the Company's financial position as at 30 June 2020 and of the Company's performance for the year ended on that date; and

b) there are reasonable grounds to believe that the Company will be able to pay its debts as and when they become due and payable.

This declaration is made in accordance with a resolution of the directors.

L Lt tG Ge en n ( (R Re et t’ ’d d) ) K Ke en nn ne et th h J J G Gi il ll le es sp pi ie e A AC C D DS SC C Chairman 20 October 2020

P Pe et te er r J Je en nn ni in ng gs s P PS SM M Executive Director 20 October 2020

K Ka ar re en n E Ed dw wa ar rd ds s Company Secretary 20 October 2020

LEVEL 2, 40 MACQUARIE STREET, BARTON ACT 2600

94    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

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The above statement should be read in conjunction with the accompanying notes.

   Financials  95

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96    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

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The above statement should be read in conjunction with the accompanying notes.

   Financials  97

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The above statement should be read in conjunction with the accompanying notes.

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98    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

*** ************** for the year ended 30 June 2020 **/ . *A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H

*¶ *¶

**************** **.#*- * $1 * * ! )* *!0)*$)" *C*v*?*?*?*v*?*?*? *C*v*?*?*?*v*?*?*?

* 1 )0 *!-*(***)/-**/. *E*v*H*D*A*v*H*G*G *E*v*?*E*E*v*E*H*@

)/ - ./ *E*D*v*?*@*@ *F*G*v*?*@*C

Total cash received *@*@*v*?*@*F*v*H*H*H *@*?*v*@*C*C*v*F*?*D

**.#*0. * *(+'*4 . *ó*E*v*G*C*G*v*B*A*?*ò *ó*D*v*A*G*@*v*H*@*F*ò

*0++'$ -. *ó*B*v*B*C*F*v*G*C*@*ò *ó*B*v*H*B*?*v*@*D*C*ò

* /*****+*$* *ó*@*E*F*v*A*E*B*ò *ó*B*H*G*v*@*G*A*ò

Total cash used *ó*@*?*v*B*E*B*v*C*A*C*ò *ó*H*v*E*@*?*v*A*D*C*ò

* /***.#*!-*(**+ -*/$)"***/$1$/$ . *A*u*B* *E*D*C*v*D*F*E*D*B*C*v*C*D*@

*************** **.#*0. * *0-*#*. **!*+-*+ -/4*v*+'*)/**)** ,0$+( )/* *ó*C*?*C*v*?*A*?*ò *ó*C*D*@*v*E*@*A*ò

Total cash used *ó*C*?*C*v*?*A*?*ò *ó*C*D*@*v*E*@*A*ò

* /***.#**ó0. ***4*ò*$)1 ./$)"***/$1$/$ . *ó*C*?*C*v*?*A*?*ò *ó*C*D*@*v*E*@*A*ò

*************** **.#*0. * *-$)*$+*'**)**$)/ - ./*+*4( )/**!*' *. *'$**$'$/4 *ó*G*F*E*v*E*?*G*ò *ä

Total cash used *ó*G*F*E*v*E*?*G*ò *ä

* /***.#**ó0. ***4*ò*!$)*)*$)"***/$1$/$ . *ó*G*F*E*v*E*?*G*ò *ä

Net increase/(decrease) in cash held *ó*E*A*E*v*?*D*A*ò *G*A*v*G*C*?

**.#**)****.#* ,0$1*' )/.**/*/# ** "$))$)"**!*/# *- +*-/$)"*+ -$** *B*v*D*G*?*v*A*B*A *B*v*C*H*F*v*B*H*B Cash and cash equivalents at the end of the reporting period *A*u*@* *A*v*H*D*C*v*@*G*? *B*v*D*G*?*v*A*B*A

The above statement should be read in conjunction with the accompanying notes.

   Financials  99

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

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* 2*****0)/$)"**/*)**-*.

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*# *$(+**/**!*/# ****+/$*)**!*******@*D**)********@*?*D*G*#*.*- .0'/ **$)***(*/ -$*'**) *ä*!!***%0./( )/**!**¶*@*u*?*E(*/***+*).*-.#$+* * 1 )0 **ó$)**( *ò**)***) *-) *** 1 )0 **ó'$**$'$/4*ò**0 */**/# *- **")$/$*)**!*.+*).*-.#$+*- * $+/.*- * $1 **$)***1*)* **.* $)**( *!*-*/# *!$)*)*$*'*4 *-* )* ***B*?**0) **A*?*A*?*u***#$.*#*.*- .0'/ **$)*****- +*-/$)"***.0-+'0.**!**¶*u*D*G(*u

AASB 16 - Leases * ****#*.****+/ ********@*E* !! */$1 *!-*(**@**0'4**A*?*@*H*$)*/#$.*!$)*)*$*'*- +*-/*u******#*.*- **")$. **/# ******!!$* *+- ($. .*' *. * *.****$"#/*ä*!*ä*. **.. /**)******-- .+*)*$)"*' *. *'$**$'$/4*!*-*/# */ -(**!*/# *' *. **ó/***@*@***1 (* -**A*?*A*D*ò*u** *# *$(+**/**!*/# ****+/$*)**!*******@*E*#*.*- .0'/ **$)***(*/ -$*'**) *ä*!!***%0./( )/**!**¶*u*F*A(*/*** /*$) ****-)$)".** $)"*/# * - 1 -.*'**!*+-$*-*4 *-*' *. *$)* )/$1 .**)**./-*$"#/*'$)$)"*' *. *+*4**' .*u** ! -*/**)*/ **A*u*B**u

100    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

*******

**3*/$*)

*1 )/.**!/ -*/# *- +*-/$)"*+ -$**

(+**/**!******ä*@*H

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   Financials  101

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

******************

for the year ended 30 June 2020

*A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H *¶ *¶

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This section analyses the financial performance of the company

102    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

******************

for the year ended 30 June 2020

*A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H *¶ *¶

This section analyses the financial performance of the company

*/# -*.0++'$ -.

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**-& -.*~***(+ ).*/$*) *@*F*v*@*C*A *A*?*v*D*G*C

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**/*'*.0++'$ -. *A*v*H*C*?*v*C*D*C *B*v*G*A*D*v*F*B*H*

   Financials  103

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

******************

for the year ended 30 June 2020

*A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H *¶ *¶

This section analyses the financial performance of the company

*@*u*A***ä**2)***0-* ** 1 )0

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104    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

************* This section analyses the company's assets used to conduct its

operations and the operating liabilities incurred as a result as at 30 June 2020.

*A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H

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   Financials  105

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

************* This section analyses the company's assets used to conduct its

operations and the operating liabilities incurred as a result as at 30 June 2020.

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106    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */* ************* This section analyses the company's assets used to conduct its

operations and the operating liabilities incurred as a result as at 30 June 2020.

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   Financials  107

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108    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

************* This section analyses the company's assets used to conduct its

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   Financials  109

Derecognition

Building right-of-use asset

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110    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

************* This section analyses the company's assets used to conduct its

*A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H *¶ *¶

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operations and the operating liabilities incurred as a result as at 30 June 2020.

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   Financials  111

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112    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

************* This section analyses the company's assets used to conduct its

*A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H *¶ *¶

operations and the operating liabilities incurred as a result as at 30 June 2020.

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*.**/**@**0'4**A*?*@*H

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   Financials  113

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */* ************* This section analyses the company's assets used to conduct its

operations and the operating liabilities incurred as a result as at 30 June 2020. *A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H *¶ *¶

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114    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

***************** ** This section describes a range of employment and post

employment benefits provided to our people and our

relationships with other key people as at 30 June 2020. *A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H *¶ *¶

*B*u*@**ä**(+'*4 **-*1$.$*).

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**/*'* (+'*4 *+-*1$.$*). *@*v*@*?*?*v*G*D*E* *@*v*?*?*E*v*F*G*E*

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$**$'$/$ .*!*-*.#*-/*/ -(* (+'*4 ** ) !$/.**)**/ -($)*/$*)** ) !$/.* 3+ */ **2$/#$)*/2 '1 *(*)/#.**!*/# * )***!*/# *- +*-/$)"*+ -$****- *( *.0- ***/*/# $-*)*($)*'**(*0)/.*u

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   Financials  115

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */* ***************** ** This section describes a range of employment and post

employment benefits provided to our people and our

relationships with other key people as at 30 June 2020.

*B*u*A**ä**$- */*-.**)*** 4***)*" ( )/** -.*)) '** (0) -*/$*)

*A*?*A*? *A*?*@*H *¶ *¶

*#*-/*/ -(* (+'*4 ** ) !$/.

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*/# -*'*)"*/ -(* (+'*4 ** ) !$/.

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**./**(+'*4( )/** ) !$/.

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* 4*(*)*" ( )/*+ -.*)) '**- */#*. *+ -.*).*#*1$)"**0/#*-$/4**)**- .+*).$*$'$/4*!*-*+'*))$)"*v**$- */$)"**)****)/-*''$)"* /# ***/$1$/$ .**!*/# * )/$/4*v**$- */'4**-*$)*$- */'4*u******#*.** / -($) **/# *& 4*(*)*" ( )/*+ -.*)) '*/*** *$/.***0)*$'* ( (* -.**)**/# **3 *0/$1 **$- */*-*u*** 4*(*)*" ( )/*+ -.*)) '*- (0) -*/$*)*$.*- +*-/ **$)*/# */**' ** '*2*w

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116    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */* ***************** ** This section describes a range of employment and post

employment benefits provided to our people and our

relationships with other key people as at 30 June 2020.

*B*u*B**ä** '*/ ****-/4**$.*'*.0- .

* ! -*/****/ **B*u*@**(+'*4 **-*1$.$*).*!*-** /*$'.**)*.0+ -*))0*/$*)**--*)" ( )/.*2$/#*/# **0*'$*** */*-* *0+ -*))0*/$*)***# ( **ó****ò**)**/# ********0(0'*/$*)*+'*)**ó****+*ò*u****& 4*(*)*" ( )/*+ -.*)) '*2*.****$- */*-**!* /# ***((*)2 *'/#**0+ -*))0*/$*)***-+*-*/$*)*2#$*#*$.*/-0./ */**/# ******)******+*.0+ -*))0*/$*)*.*# ( .*u

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   Financials  117

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

******************* This section analyses how ASPI manages financial risks

within its operating environment.

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118    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

*0./-*'$*)**/-*/ "$****'$*4*)./$/0/ */*

******************* This section analyses how ASPI manages financial risks

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120    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

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   Financials  121

PAGE INTENTIONALLY BLANK

ANNEXES

124    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Annex A

ASPI PUBLICATIONS

STRATEGIES

The Australian Defence Force and contested space Malcolm Davis

15 August 2019

After Covid-19: Australia and the world rebuild (volume 1) John Coyne and Peter Jennings et al

2 May 2020

STRATEGIC INSIGHTS

North of 26 degrees south and the security of Australia: views from The Strategist John Coyne, Paul Barnes, Malcolm Davis, Rhys De Wilde, Paul Dibb, Genevieve Feely,

Michael Shoebridge, Dr Richard Brabin-Smith AO, Chris Clark, Michael Crane, Len Notaras

and Scott Wallis

3 July 2019

The post-caliphate Salafi-jihadi environment Isaac Kfir

10 July 2019

From boardroom to situation room. Why corporate security is national security Anthony Bergin

24 July 2019

Jokowi’s second term: economic challenges and outlook Siwage Negara

25 July 2019

Indo-Pacific election pulse 2019: Thailand, Indonesia, India and Australia: views from The Strategist Huong Le Thu

14 August 2019

   Annexes  125

Towards a Commonwealth law enforcement innovation framework Genevieve Feely and John Coyne

20 August 2019

Indo-Pacific immune systems to enable healthy engagement with the Chinese state and China’s economy Michael Shoebridge

27 November 2019

Australia’s next cybersecurity strategy: views from The Strategist Fergus Hanson, Gai Brodtmann, Rachael Falk, Nigel Phair, Lesley Seebeck and Peter Dutton

5 February 2020

Returning to work during the pandemic: testing, surveillance, apps and data as our near term future Michael Shoebridge

15 April 2020

North of 26 degrees south and the security of Australia: views from The Strategist (volume 2) John Coyne et al.

26 May 2020

Thailand’s strategic drift: Domestic determinants amidst superpower competition Thitinan Pongsudhirak

18 June 2020

SPECIAL REPORTS

Evolution of the protection of civilians in UN peacekeeping Lisa Sharland

9 July 2019

The Marawi crisis—urban conflict and information operations Charles Knight and Katja Theodorakis

31 July 2019

Projecting national power: reconceiving Australian air power strategy for an age of high contest Peter Hunter

7 August 2019

126    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Strong and free? The future security of Australia’s north John Coyne

19 August 2019

Defence projects and the economy Rob Bourke

21 August 2019

ASPI-KAS 4th Australia-Europe Counter-Terrorism Dialogue: ‘Shifting frontiers: addressing post-caliphate terrorism dynamics’ Isaac Kfir and Katja Theodorakis

8 October 2019

Designing for resilient energy systems: choices in future engineering Paul Barnes and Neil Greet

9 October 2019

How the geopolitical partnership between China and Russia threatens the West Paul Dibb

29 November 2019

Ocean horizons: strengthening maritime security in Indo-Pacific island states Anthony Bergin, David Brewster and Aakriti Bachhawat

5 December 2019

Accelerating autonomy: autonomous systems and the Tiger helicopter replacement Marcus Hellyer

11 December 2019

Augmenting maritime domain awareness in Southeast Asia: boosting national capabilities in the Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia Peter Chalk

13 December 2019

Rethinking Taiwan policy: history, politics, ideology Mark Harrison

17 December 2019

Australia’s implementation of women, peace and security: promoting regional security Louise Allen

19 February 2020

   Annexes  127

Eyes wide open: managing the Australia-China Antarctic relationship Anthony Bergin and Tony Press

27 April 2020

Running on empty? A case study of fuel security for civil and military air operations at Darwin Airport John Coyne, Tony McCormack and Hal Crichton-Standish

13 May 2020

‘Terrorism is terrorism’: the Christchurch terror attack from an Israeli CT perspective Professor Boaz Ganor

19 May 2020

National security agencies and the cloud: an urgent capability issue for Australia John Coyne, Michael Shoebridge and Albert Zhang

27 May 2020

From concentrated vulnerability to distributed lethality—or how to get more maritime bang for the buck with our offshore patrol vessels Dr Marcus Hellyer

3 June 2016

A Pacific disaster prevention review Dr Paul Barnes

9 June 2020

INTERNATIONAL CYBER POLICY CENTRE

Protecting critical national infrastructure in an era of IT and OT convergence Rajiv Shah

2 July 2019

Capabilities, competition and communication: why the West needs a strategy for technology Mike Rogers

11 July 2019

Mapping conditions in Rakhine State Nathan Ruser, Elise Thomas and Mali Walker

24 July 2019

128    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Tweeting through the Great Firewall Tom Uren, Elise Thomas and Dr Jacob Wallis

3 September 2019

Mind your tongue: language, public diplomacy and community cohesion in contemporary Australia-China relations John Fitzgerald

2 October 2019

Engineering global consent: the Chinese Communist Party’s data-driven power expansion Samantha Hoffman

14 October 2019

A new Sino-Russian high-tech partnership: authoritarian innovation in an era of great-power rivalry Samuel Bendett and Elsa Kania

29 October 2019

The China Defence Universities Tracker: exploring the military and security links of China’s universities Alex Joske

25 November 2019

Mapping more of China’s technology giants: AI and surveillance Fergus Ryan, Danielle Cave and Vicky Xiuzhong Xu

28 November 2019

ICT for development in the Pacific islands: an assessment of e-government capabilities in Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga and Vanuatu Bart Hogeveen

19 February 2020

Uyghurs for sale: ‘re-education’, forced labour and surveillance beyond Xinjiang Vicky Xiuzhong Xu, with Danielle Cave, Dr James Leibold, Kelsey Munro and Nathan Ruser

1 March 2020

Covid-19 disinformation and social media manipulation trends Jacob Wallis

17 April 2020

   Annexes  129

Covid-19 attracts patriotic troll campaigns in support of China’s geopolitical interests Elise Thomas and Albert Zhang

23 April 2020

Weaponised deep fakes: national security and democracy Hannah Smith and Katherine Mansted

29 April 2020

Cybercrime in Southeast Asia: combating a global threat locally Jonathan Lusthaus

20 May 2020

Winning hearts and likes: how foreign affairs and defence agencies use Facebook Damien Spry

2 June 2020

The party speaks for you: foreign interference and the Chinese Communist Party’s united front system Alex Joske

9 June 2020

Retweeting through the great firewall: a persistent and undeterred threat actor Dr Jacob Wallis, Tom Uren, Elise Thomas, Albert Zhang, Dr Samantha Hoffman, Lin Li,

Alex Pascoe and Danielle Cave

12 June 2020

Genomic surveillance: inside China’s DNA dragnet Emile Dirks and James Leibold

17 June 2020

ID2020, Bill Gates and the Mark of the Beast: how Covid-19 catalyses existing online conspiracy movements Elise Thomas and Albert Zhang

25 June 2020

130    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

ANNUALS

Counterterrorism yearbook 2020 Isaac Kfir and John Coyne (eds)

30 March 2020

ASPI CASE STUDIES

Sticking to our guns: a troubled past produces a superb weapon Chris Masters

31 October 2019

The Bushmaster: from concept to combat Brendan Nicholson

12 December 2019

THE STRATEGIST SELECTIONS

Nuclear strategy in a changing world Rod Lyon

24 October 2019

OTHER

Australia-Afghanistan relations William Maley

10 September 2019

   Annexes  131

Annex B

ARTICLES AND BOOK CHAPTERS BY ASPI STAFF

Paul Barnes

• Increasing disaster resilience through coordination and collaboration, Committee for

Economic Development of Australia (CEDA), February 2020

• Preparing for climate catastrophe (The policy possibilities of climate security—a matter for

the whole Indo-Pacific?) , 28 January 2020

Lisa Sharland

• Alexandra Novosseloff and Lisa Sharland, Partners and competitors: forces operating in

parallel to UN peace operations, International Peace Institute, November 2019

• Charles T Hunt and Lisa Sharland, ‘Implementing R2P through United Nations peacekeeping

operations’, in Cecilia Jacobs and Martin Mennecke (eds), Implementing the Responsibility to

Protect: a future agenda, Routledge, September 2019

John Coyne

• Exploring security and policing reform options in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in

Muslim Mindanao, UN Office on Drugs and Crime

• UNODC transnational organised impact assessment framework, UN Office on Drugs

and Crime

• Roadmap for security and economic integration, ASEAN

• ‘Australia—you have a drug problem’, Policing Insights, 18 March 2020

• ‘Surveillance of the north’, Australian Security Magazine

• ‘The north and national security’, Australian Defence Magazine

Huong Le Thu

• ‘China’s feverish overreach wasted an opportunity offered by Covid’, The Straits Times,

26 June 2020

• ‘Vietnam shows ASEAN’s valuable new form of leadership’, Nikkei Asian Review, 25 June 2020

• ‘Fishing while the water is muddy: China’s newly announced administrative districts in the

South China Sea’, Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, 6 May 2020

132    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

• ‘Vietnam: a successful battle against the virus’, Asia Unbound, Council on Foreign Relations,

30 April 2020

• ‘Vietnam draws lines in the sea’, Foreign Policy, 6 December 2019

• ‘Vietnam asserts its maritime sovereignty’, Real Clear World, 9 December 2019

• ‘Vietnam’s approach to South China Sea disputes and the test of the Haiyang Dizhi 8’,

Australian Outlook, Australian Institute of International Affairs, 1 December 2019

• ‘Why Tsai’s victory in Taiwan has China very worried’, The National Interest, 25 January 2020

(republishing a Strategist piece)

• ‘As America worries about China, Russia eyes the South China Sea’, The National Interest,

14 January 2020 (republishing a Strategist piece)

• ‘Russia: Another great power interested in the South China Sea?’, The National Interest,

21 December 2019 (republishing a Strategist piece)

• ‘Duterte pivots away from the US in South China Sea’, The Maritime Executive,

21 February 2020 (republishing a Strategist piece)

• ‘China’s incursion into Vietnam’s EEZ and lessons from the past’, Asia Maritime Transparency

Initiative, 8 August 2019

• ‘What Vietnam is looking for from Scott Morrison’s visit’, Australian Financial Review,

21 August 2019

• ‘A collision of cybersecurity and geopolitics: why Southeast Asia is wary of a Huawei ban’,

Global Asia, October 2019.

• ‘China’s sharp power in Southeast Asia: different tactics, same outcome’, Defence Security

Brief, Institute for National Defense and Security Research, Taiwan, April 2019, 8(1)

• ‘Why the region has given up on “shaping China”’, Asia Society Australia

   Annexes  133

Annex C

OPINION PIECES BY ASPI STAFF

July 2019

‘Why is the Morrison government pushing for new terrorism legislation?’, Coyne, ABC

‘Wise to bolster our regional French connection’, Bergin and Brewster, The Australian

‘The unspoken threat that’s hurting Australians’, Coyne, APPS Policy Forum

‘Moscow is making friends in the Middle East’, Kfir, APPS Policy Forum

‘The AFP is at a crossroads, and Peter Dutton’s “old school” style isn’t what it needs’, Coyne, ABC

‘Corporations must co-operate on security’, Bergin, The Australian

‘Morrison’s ineffective proposal to counter online extremism’, Kfir, APPS Policy Forum

August 2019

‘AUSMIN sets the stage for Morrison’s White House visit’, Shoebridge, Australian Financial Review

‘What’s China up to in the Arab world?’, Kfir, APPS Policy Forum

‘China’s incursion into Vietnam’s EEZ and lessons from the past’, Le Thu, Asia Maritime

Transparency Initiative

‘New Cold War traps Australia between our traditional rock and global hard case’, Jennings,

The Weekend Australian

‘Illicit drugs—how can Australia protect its people?’, Coyne, APPS Policy Forum

‘How should the world tackle far-right extremism?’, Kfir, APPS Policy Forum

‘What Vietnam is looking for from Scott Morrison’s visit’, Le Thu, Australian Financial Review

‘Balancing secrecy and openness: getting it right and getting it wrong’, Shoebridge,

Canberra Times.

134    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

September 2019

‘Pacific islanders’ boots would help defence step up’, Bergin, The Australian

‘It’s going to cost us to point in the right direction’, Shoebridge, The Australian

‘Britain as a failed state? Don’t laugh, it’s that serious’, Dobell, The Sydney Morning Herald

‘Morrison must make most of his “golden opportunities” in US’, Jennings, The Australian

‘Here’s a plan to break volunteer drought’, Bergin and Barnes, The Australian

‘Australia’s northern surveillance’, Coyne, Asia Pacific Security Magazine

October 2019

‘A collision of cybersecurity and geopolitics: why Southeast Asia is wary of a Huawei ban’,

Le Thu, Global Asia

‘Clarifying expectations on protection of civilians’, Sharland, IPI Global Observatory

‘In naval warfare, just zapping attacking missiles can be cheap and effective’, Davis,

The Australian

‘Autonomous military and naval logic gains life of its own’, Davis, The Australian

‘Royal Australian Navy is under-gunned for denying long-range attackers’, Davis, The Australian

‘Peacekeeping and the evolving Australia-Fiji relationship’, Sharland and Wyeth, The Diplomat

November 2019

‘Victoria takes wrong track with China’s Belt and Road Initiative’, Bergin, The Australian

‘Defence forces can play a broader role in disaster management’, Bergin and Templeman,

The Australian

‘Security challenges rule the waves in Pacific’, Bergin, The Australian

‘Defections are messy and we may never know the full story’, Joske, The Age

‘Political parties must take foreign interference seriously’, Shoebridge,

Australian Financial Review

‘Cyber risk rising with Internet of Things’, Hanson, Australian Financial Review

   Annexes  135

December 2019

‘Category collapse-making governing hard and leadership essential’, Shoebridge,

The Canberra Times

‘Vietnam draws lines in the sea’, Le Thu, Foreign Policy

‘Bushfire crisis demands a rethink on defence’s role in national disasters’, Bergin and Barnes,

Sydney Morning Herald

January 2020

‘Bold decision puts ADF specialists to work’, Barnes, Sydney Morning Herald

‘National bushfires emergency? Let’s have a national response’, Bergin and Templeman,

The Australian

‘Ending secrecy key to filling the void on cybersecurity’, Bergin, Australian Financial Review

‘Recant or die: alleged threat to self-confessed Chinese spy Wang Liqiang’, Joske and McKenzie,

The Age

‘Middle East tensions: so many pathways to conflict, so few off-ramps to peace’, Jennings,

The Australian

‘What the US must do next to avoid war with Iran’, Shoebridge, Herald Sun

‘Northern Australia’s value not lost on friends and rivals’, Jennings, The Australian

‘Preparing for climate catastrophe’, Barnes, APPS Policy Forum

‘Australia should take the next steps to be a new and importance space power’, Davis,

Canberra Times

February 2020

‘If we’re at war with nature, let’s call in the military professionals’, Jennings, Weekend Australian

‘Business’ role in disaster response needs to be planned’, Bergin, Australian Financial Review

‘Australia will pay for PM’s about-face on $1000 Wuhan co-payment’, Coyne, The Sydney

Morning Herald

‘Nothing federal about disasters’, Bergin, The Australian

‘Increasing disaster resilience through coordination and collaboration’, Barnes, Committee for

Economic Development

136    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

‘Australia’s war on drugs is a failure’, White, APPS Policy Forum

‘Tales of military heroism’, Loosley, The Australian

‘Israel’s president is a powerful supporter of peace and unity’, Bergin, The Australian

‘Letting the Beijing bully know this is our neighbourhood’, Jennings, The Australian

‘Far-right groups and conspiracy theories are being brought together through the internet’,

Thomas, ABC

March 2020

‘ASIO sounds the alarm’, Coyne, APPS Policy Forum

‘Australia, you have a drug problem’, Coyne, APPS Policy Forum

‘Your favourite Nikes might be made from forced labour. Here’s why’, Xiuzhong Xu and Leibold,

The Washington Post

‘Spanish flu lessons can help combat coronavirus’, Bergin and Feim, The Australian

‘Military must find a new balance’, Shoebridge, The Australian

‘The heart of a reconnected world’, Dobell, Inside Story

‘Don’t kick China’s propagandists off Twitter’, Ryan, Foreign Policy

April 2020

‘Coronavirus response a chance to reimagine future for Australia’, Shoebridge,

The Canberra Times

‘Should I download the coronavirus tracing app? Here’s how to decide’, Coyne, ABC

‘Coronavirus: China wants to be saviour of the world’, Jennings, The Australian

‘We can’t just go with the floe in Antarctica’, Bergin and Press, The Australian

‘China threatens boycott in response to Australia’s call for COVID-19 inquiry’,

Shoebridge and Kelly, ABC

   Annexes  137

May 2020

‘We need to reduce our dependence on China, and have the courage to call it out when

required’, Jennings, The Guardian

‘National security strategy can help us build key alliances to counter China’, Jennings,

The Australian

‘Fishing while the water is muddy’, Le Thu, Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative

‘Better safe than sorry on China’, Jennings, The Australian

‘Australia is not the only country asking questions about the origins of coronavirus,

and China is not happy’, Jennings, The Guardian

‘Why Australia must not bow to China but seek wider trade options’, Xiuzhong Xu,

Sydney Morning Herald

‘Party’s over for the bullies of Beijing’, Jennings, The Australian

‘How COVID-19 is driving a booming conspiracy industry’, Thomas, Sydney Morning Herald

‘Our universities must rethink their broken business model or risk failure’, Hellyer and Jennings,

Canberra Times

‘Should Defence Department take a budget hit?’, Hellyer, The Australian

June 2020

‘On anniversary of Tiananmen, time for Australia to open its heart again’, Ruser,

Sydney Morning Herald

‘China will be surprised how long it took us to act on foreign investment laws’, Jennings,

The Australian

‘Vietnam shows ASEAN valuable new form of leadership’, Le Thu, Nikkei Asian Review

‘China’s feverish overreach wasted an opportunity offered by Covid-19’, Le Thu,

The Straits Times

‘Defence faces up to China threat’, Jennings and Shoebridge, The Australian

138    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Annex D

ASPI EVENTS

Women in Defence and National Security Network events No. Date Name of event

1 1 August Public event: ASPI - Young Australians in International Affairs

speed mentoring

2 4 November Public event: In conversation with Assistant Secretary-General

Michele Coninsx, Executive Director of the UN Counter-Terrorism

Executive Directorate

3 7 November Event: Melbourne speed mentoring

International Strategic Dialogues No. Date Name of event

1 22-23 July Australia-Indonesia Track 1.5 dialogue co-hosted with foreign policy

community of Indonesia

2 26 September Australia-Pakistan Track 1.5 security dialogue

3 8-11 October Australia-Indonesia-US-Japan Quadrilateral Track 1.5 security

dialogue

4 14-18 October ASPI-KAS Counterterrorism Track 1.5 dialogue

5 29-30 October Australia-Israel Track 1.5 ‘Beersheba’ dialogue

6 5 November ICPC Australia-Taiwan Track 1.5 cybersecurity dialogue

Roundtables No. Date Name of event

1 4 July Protecting critical national infrastructure in an era of IT and OT

convergence paper

2 25 July Professor Ihsan Yilmaz

3 1 August Brian Adeba, Deputy Director of the Enough Project

4 7 August Dr Jim Boutilier

5 8 August Quarterly TSOC with Troels Vester, Country Manager for UNODC

in Myanmar

   Annexes  139

No. Date Name of event

6 15 August Singaporean defence officials

7 3 September Brigadier General Bonifasius Widiyanto, Director of Strategic Policy,

Indonesian Ministry of Defence, and delegation

8 6 September Vernon White, Senator in the Senate of Canada and Visiting Fellow

at ASPI

9 9 September Mr Babar Amin, High Commissioner for Pakistan

10 24 September Sofia Patel, Non-Resident Fellow, ASPI

11 24 September Mainland Affairs Council, Republic of China (Taiwan)

12 25 September Mr Wang Yiwei, Renmin University of China and Belt and Road

Initiative experts

13 26 September Professor Andrew Wilson, John A van Beuren Chair of Asia-Pacific

Studies at the US Naval War College

14 26 September Maya Wang, China Senior Researcher, Human Rights Watch

15 2 October Captain Mike Macarthur, Commander Australian Maritime Warfare

Centre and Visiting Five-Eyes heads of delegation for Maritime

Warfighting Forum

16 4 October Inaugural ASEAN-Australia Defence Postgraduate Scholarship

Program cohort

17 11 October Mr Hidetaka Hamada, Deputy Director, Minerals and Mining Division,

METI

18 21 October Dr Robbin Laird

19 22 October German-Australian Chamber of Industry and Commerce

20 23 October Ehud Yaari, Lafer International Fellow, Washington Institute

21 23 October Mr Andries Oosthuizen and Mr Munzhelele, South African

Department of International Relations and Cooperation

22 24 October Patrick Hamilton, ICRC Head of Project for the Supporting

Relationships in Armed Conflict Initiative and Elpida Papachatzi,

ICRC’s Head of the Protection Global Affairs Unit

23 30 October Swedish regional defence attachés

24 11 November Mr Matsumoto, Director of Strategic Planning Division, Japanese

Ministry of Defence

25 14 November Dr Michito Tsuruoka, Associate Professor, Keio University

140    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

No. Date Name of event

26 19 November Governor’s strategic roundtable: Dr Samantha Hoffman

27 20 November Jagello 2000 Chairman Zbynek Pavlacik and former Czech Republic

Deputy Foreign Minister Amb Tomas Pojar

28 25 November Dr Ganeshan Wignaraja, Executive Director, Lakshman Kadrigamar

Institute of International Relations and Strategic Studies

29 2 December Delegation of pan-democratic leaders in Hong Kong

30 4 December Alex Pinfield, Head of China Department for UK Foreign and

Commonwealth Office

31 4 December Dr Elnigar Iltebir

32 5 December Rushan Abbas, Director of Campaign for Uyghurs

33 5 December Visiting Indonesian counterterrorism delegation

34 6 December Jan Rudolph, head of the Political Department at the German

Embassy in Beijing

35 10 December Dr Oriana Skylar Mastro

36 13 December Dr Courtney J Fung, Assistant Professor of Politics and Public

Administration, University of Hong Kong

37 13 December Defence attaché from the South Korean Ministry of Defence

budgeting team

38 17 December Justin Brown, Australian Ambassador to the EU, NATO, Belgium and

Luxembourg

39 22 January High Commissioner Designate to New Delhi

40 3 February Mr Hirokazu Kobayashi

41 6 February Ambassador Ted Osius, Google’s Head of Public Policy for the Asia

Pacific and former US Ambassador to Vietnam

42 11 February Dr Ahmed Al-Dawoody, Legal adviser for Islamic law, ICRC

43 12 February Mr Ehud Yaari

44 17 February Samantha Custer and Mihir Prakash, report launch (AidData)

45 19 February Mr Heino Klink, Deputy Secretary of Defense for East Asia (US)

46 3 March National Bureau of Asian Research

47 16 April ‘Global Voices’

   Annexes  141

No. Date Name of event

48 30 April Blavatnik Interdisciplinary Cyber Research Center

49 1 May Australia’s future cybersecurity resilience

50 14 May Antony Dapiran

Public events No. Date Name of event

1 2 July 2019 Publication launch: Protecting critical national infrastructure in an

era of IT and OT convergence

2 1 August Public event: ASPI - Young Australians in International Affairs speed

mentoring

3 19 August Publication launch: Strong and free

4 10 September Publication launch: Australia-Afghanistan relations: reflections on a

half-century

5 25 September Publication launch, Kabul: Australia-Afghanistan relations:

reflections on a half-century (hosted by Australian Embassy in Kabul)

6 3 October Public event: The digital revolution in the Pacific

7 9 October WDSN Sydney event: ASPI and Navy speed mentoring at Sea Power

Conference

8 9 October Melbourne publication launch: Designing for resilient energy systems

9 29 October Public event: In conversation with Peter W Singer

10 31 October Publication launch: Sticking to our guns: a troubled past produces a

superb weapon

11 4 November WDSN public event: In conversation with Assistant

Secretary-General Michele Coninsx, Executive Director of the

UN Counter-Terrorism Executive Directorate

12 7 November WDSN event: Melbourne speed mentoring

13 12 November Public event: In conversation with Megan Clark AC, head of the

Australian Space Agency

14 26 November Public event: Launch of China Defence Universities Database

15 28 November Public event: Panel discussion: ‘Violent extremism and terrorist

content online’

142    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

No. Date Name of event

16 5 December Public event: ‘Ocean horizons: strengthening maritime security in

Indo-Pacific island states’

17 10 December Public event: ASPI film screening: Danger close: the Battle of Long Tan

18 12 December Publication launch: The Bushmaster: from concept to combat

19 5 February Public event: In conversation with Kim Beazley and Paul Dibb

Masterclasses No. Date Name of event

1 14 August State of the Region 2019 masterclass

2 3 December ASPI Space Policy masterclass

Webinars No. Date Name of event

1 13 April ASPI Presents: Covid-19 and radicalisation (pre-recorded)

2 16 April Roundtable: ICT and the emerging technologies in the Pacific (live)

3 16 April ASPI Presents: Covid-19 and the Asia Pacific (pre-recorded)

4 29 April Publication launch: Weaponised deep fakes

5 7 May Publication launch: After Covid-19: Australia and the world rebuild

(volume 1)

6 13 May Publication launch: ‘After Covid-19’: national security in focus (part 2)

7 10 June Publication launch: National security agencies and the cloud

8 11 June Hong Kong and Beijing: why now and what does it mean?

9 16 June The changing nature of Philippines-US defence relations

10 18 June Publication launch: Unravelling the CCP’s overseas influence

11 25 June UN cyber negotiations—What they mean for Australian diplomacy

   Annexes  143

Special meetings No. Date Name of event

1 25 July ICPC Advisory Council

2 27 August Zohar Palti

3 1 October IKAHAN Visiting Fellow, Lieutenant General Yoedhi

4 16 October The Hon Melissa Price MP, Minister for Defence Industry

5 17 October ICPC: Mr Andrew Hastie MP, Member for Canning and Chair of the

Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security

6 24 October Australia’s 2020 Cyber Security Strategy

7 29 October Peter W Singer

8 8 November The Hon Dan Tehan MP, Minister for Education

9 13 November Training our future cyber warfighters

10 4 December Ocean horizons: strengthening maritime security in Indo-Pacific

island states report

11 25 February ICPC Advisory Council

12 1-2 March ASPI’s 2020 Five Eyes seminar

13 3 March Vietnamese Ambassador to Australia

14 5 March Official Histories project, Australian War Memorial

144    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Annex E

KEY ROLES AT INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES

Staff member Conference

Dr Paul Barnes • Presented ‘Navigating the future risk landscape’, an online discussion at the 2020 Australian Securities Investment Corporation (Markets) Senior Leadership Group Forum

• Presented ‘Managing national crises (policy level issues)’ with Robert Cameron (Director General EMA), Prof. Jane McAdam (Scientia Professor of Law, UNSW) and Cheryl Durrant, hosted by Vice Admiral Paul Maddison (Ret’d), 7 May 2020

• Presented ‘Bolstering national disaster resilience—what can be done?’, 44th annual conference of the Environmental Health Association Australia, Adelaide, 7 November 2019

• Spoke in ‘Designing resilient infrastructure’, roundtable discussion, Jo Da Silva, Arup Fellow and acting director of the Resilience Shift, London, 4 November 2019

• Presented ‘Addressing critical infrastructure challenges: a national risk and resilience lens’, 2019 Industrial Control System Security Conference, Sydney, 1 October 2019

• Presented ‘Many moving parts—the challenges of crisis readiness in airports’ in a panel session at the APAC Airport Security Summit, Sydney, 31 July 2019

• Participated in a UNSW (Canberra) alumni webinar ‘Managing national crises at a policy level’ with Robert Cameron (Director General EMA) and Prof. Jane McAdam (Scientia Professor of Law and Director of the Andrew and Renata Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW), hosted by Vice Admiral Paul Maddison (Ret’d), 7 May 2020

• Presented at a breakfast seminar on ‘Managing mission critical communications’ with Nick Kaldas and Rob Cameron (Department of Home Affairs), hosted by The Mandarin

• Member of a taskforce actioning a Track 2.0 track process to design an independent ‘National Resilience Institute’ for Australia, coordinated by the Global Access Partners and Gravity iLabs; taskforce members included Prof. John Hewson, Philip Ruddock, Ian Irving, Kate Lundy. AdmDC, 13-14 November 2019

   Annexes  145

Staff member Conference

Lisa Sharland • Presented via video on ASPI’s Evolution of the protection of civilians in UN peacekeeping report at the annual conference of the International Association of Peacekeeping Training Centres, Lima, Peru, October 2019

• Presented on ‘Protection of civilians in UN peacekeeping’ at UN Senior Mission Leaders’ Course, Seoul, Republic of Korea, November 2019

Huong Le Thu • Spoke at Australia - New Zealand ASPI-CSS Track 1.5 strategic dialogue, Wellington, 19-21 November 2019

• Spoke at ASPI-RSIS Track 1.5 strategic dialogue, Singapore, 24-27 September 2019

• Spoke at ASPI - National Institute for Defense Studies (Japan) senior exchange, Canberra, 3 October 2019

• Invited to participate in Australia-Indonesia Track 1.5 dialogue, 24 July 2019, Canberra

• Represented ASPI at the ASPI - National Institute for Defense Studies of Japan forum, Tokyo, 19-20 November 2019

Peter Jennings • Participated in the Australian American Leadership Dialogue forum, 9-10 August 2019

• Attended and presented at the 5th GSAG of KAS, Cadenabbia, Milan, 4-6 September 2019

• Presented at the China Choices Workshop, Vancouver, Canada, 19-21 September 2019

• Facilitated the Joint Heads of Pacific Security Forum, 9-11 October

• Attended the KAS-ASPI closed-door RT Workshop on China, Berlin and Brussels 20-22 October 2019

• Attended the first Tokyo Global Dialogue and participated in ‘Seeking out a new order in the Indo-Pacific region’ panel discussion, 1-4 December 2019

• Presented at the SEB Nordic CEO Conference, 10-11 February 2020

• Attended the American Chamber of Commerce in Australia Council of Governors Dialogue (virtual), 21 May 2020

• Presented at the New Zealand High Commissioner Covid-19 Roundtable (virtual), 25 May 2020

146    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Annex F

ACHIEVING ASPI’S PURPOSES

Table 10 outlines how ASPI worked in 2019-20 to achieve our purposes, as listed in our

corporate plan. It provides either specific information or references to the relevant chapter of

the annual report.

Table 10: How ASPI achieved its purposes, 2019-20

Purpose

How do we measure achievement? Who benefits?

What we achieved in 2019-20

Conduct and publish research

The number and type of publications and The Strategist pieces produced by ASPI, together with

examples of how the publications have contributed to the national debate

ASPI informs the public by publishing information and analysis on a full range of strategic, defence and national security issues that bear on the choices facing Australia over

coming years.

Through seven series of publications, 57 publications were produced. There were 1,070 pieces on The Strategist

from 357 individual authors. Information about the contribution to the national debate of some of ASPI’s publications is in Chapter 3 of this report.

Provide an alternative source of strategic policy ideas and advice

Participation in government advisory committees and expert panels

ASPI is a source of new ideas and innovative solutions for government, both through our published work and through policy analyses specifically commissioned by government.

ASPI staff were invited to participate in eight government advisory committees and expert panels.

Submissions to parliamentary inquiries

ASPI provided five submissions to parliamentary inquiries. A list of the submissions is in Chapter 1.

   Annexes  147

Purpose

How do we measure achievement? Who benefits?

What we achieved in 2019-20

Stimulate public discussion

Number and range of ASPI public events ASPI informs the public by hosting

several events open to the public and through readily accessible online material on ASPI’s

website each year, including opinion pieces, reports, podcasts and The Strategist.

ASPI conducted 103 events during 2019-20. A list of the events is in Chapter 4 and

Annex D.

Published opinion pieces

87 opinion pieces written by ASPI staff were published.

Examples of media coverage contributing to the national debate

Examples of media commentary are in Chapter 3.

Website, The Strategist and social media usage

Information and graphs on social media usage are in Chapter 1.

Promote international under- standing

Ranking in University of Pennsylvania’s Global Go To Think Tank Index

ASPI’s standing as a respected source of analysis is recognised globally. This allows us to

strengthen links and engage regularly with overseas think tanks to inform the international community of Australia’s strategic

and defence policy perspectives.

Information about ASPI’s ranking in the University of Pennsylvania’s Global Go To Think Tank Index is

in Chapter 1.

148    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Purpose

How do we measure achievement? Who benefits?

What we achieved in 2019-20

Invitations to speak at international conferences

ASPI staff attended three international conferences as speakers. See Annex D for more details.

Links with overseas think tanks

Information about ASPI’s links to other think tanks is in Chapter 1.

International Visiting Fellowships

ASPI hosted five Visiting Fellows.

Participation in and hosting of international dialogues.

ASPI hosted six Track 1.5 and Track 2 dialogues. A list of the dialogues is in Chapter 1.

Develop expertise

Number of interns whom ASPI supports

ASPI has an internship program that engages four interns on a six-monthly rotation.

Published pieces by interns

Reports, publications and The Strategist pieces with sole and co-authorship by interns in 2019-20 included:

• Publication: Retweeting though the Great Firewall

• Publication: National security agencies and the cloud: an urgent capability issue for Australia

• Publication: Covid-19 disinformation and social media manipulation trends

• Publication: Covid-19 attracts patriotic troll campaigns in support of China’s geopolitical interests

   Annexes  149

Purpose

How do we measure achievement? Who benefits?

What we achieved in 2019-20

• Publication: ID2020, Bill Gates and the Mark of the Beast: how Covid-19 catalyses existing online conspiracy movements

• Publication: Running on empty? A case study of fuel security for civil and military air operations at Darwin Airport

• Publication: After Covid-19: Australia and the world rebuild (volume 1)

• Publication: Hacking democracies

• The Strategist post: ‘New crisis, same old problems for the EU’, Alexandra Pascoe, 18 May 2020

• The Strategist post: ‘Women’s rights in China and the legacy of the Feminist Five’, Daria Impiombato, 8 May 2020

• The Strategist post: ‘India- China tensions flare up on new front: TikTok’, Daria Impiombato, 4 June 2020

• The Strategist post: ‘Northern Australia needs to be ready to meet climate-change-driven security challenges’, Hal Crichton-Standish, 20 March 2020

150    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Purpose

How do we measure achievement? Who benefits?

What we achieved in 2019-20

• The Strategist post: ‘Australia must fast-track new domestic storage to ensure fuel security’, Hal Crichton-Standish, 7 May 2020

• The Strategist post: ‘In a crisis, Australians might soon be running on empty’, Hal Crichton-Standish, 13 May 2020

• The Strategist post: ‘Renewable energy exports could be vital for Australia’s post-fossil-fuel future’, Hal Crichton-Standish, 26 June 2020

• The Strategist post: ‘Thailand’s hashtag activism targets political change’, Tracy Beattie, 20 April 2020

• The Strategist post: ‘Is Thailand heading for another political crisis?’, Tracy Beattie, 29 May 2020

• The Strategist post: ‘Russia’s growing interests in the South China Sea’, Sunny Cao, 18 December 2019

• Weekly wraps: Five domains wrap and national security wrap

• Monthly wraps: Women, peace and security

Participants in ASPI professional development courses

ASPI conducted 13 courses and workshops. A detailed list is in Chapter 2.

   Annexes  151

Annex G

INFORMATION ABOUT EXECUTIVE REMUNERATION

Australian Strategic Policy Institute Ltd

The following three tables in this section describe a range of employment and post

employment benefits provided to our key management personnel, Senior Executives

and other highly paid staff.

152    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Table 11:

Remuneration information for key management personnel

Name

Position title

Short-term benefits

Other long-term benefits

Post-

employment benefits

Total

Remuneration

Salary

Bonuses

Annual leave

1

Long service

leave

2

Superannuation

contribution

Mr Peter Jennings PSM

Executive Director

286,974.54

53,342.10

23,277.45

6,576.17

56,247.57

426,417.83

Lieutenant General (Ret’d) Kenneth Gillespie AC DSC CSM

Chair of Council

3,560.00

391.60

3,951.60

Air Vice Marshal (Ret’d) Margaret Staib AM CSC

Council member

2,848.00

313.28

3,161.28

Professor Joan Beaumont

Council member

2,136.00

234.96

2,370.96

Mr Stephen Brady AO CVO

Council member

2,848.00

313.28

3,161.28

The Hon Stephen Conroy

Council member

2,848.00

313.28

3,161.28

Ms Jane Halton AO PSM

Council member

2,848.00

313.28

3,161.28

Mr Jim McDowell

Council member

712.00

78.32

790.32

The Hon David Johnston

Council member

1,424.00

156.64

1,580.64

Ms Gai Brodtmann

Council member

712.00

-

712.00

The Hon Robert Hill AC

Council member

2,136.00

234.96

2,370.96

Dr Lavina Lee

Council member

712.00

152.00

864.00

Ms Jennifer Ma

Council member

3,560.00

380.92

3,940.92

Total

313,318.54

53,342.10

23,277.45

6,576.17

59,130.09

455,644.35

Notes: 1. Annual leave is calculated on an acrrual basis as 20 working days per year based on the salary as at 30 June 2020 2. Long service leave is calculated on an acrrual basis as 4.33 working days per year based on the salary as at 30 June 2020

   Annexes  153

Table 12:

Remuneration information for Senior Executives

Total remuneration bands

Number of

Senior Executives

Short-term benefits

Post-employment

benefits

Other long-term

benefits

Average total remuneration

Average

base salary

Annual leave

1

Average

supperanuation contributions

Average long service leave

2

$0 to $250,000

4

180,771.02

15,063.83

28,272.66

3,261.32

227,368.82

Notes: 1. Annual leave is calculated on an acrrual basis as 20 working days per year based on the salary as at 30 June 2020 2. Long service leave is calculated on an acrrual basis as 4.33 working days per year based on the salary as at 30 June 2020 Table 13:

Remuneration information for other highly paid staff

Total remuneration bands

Number of other highly paid staff

Short-term benefits

Post-employment

benefits

Other long-term

benefits

Average total remuneration

Average

base salary

Other benefits

Average

supperanuation contributions

Average long service leave

$200,000 to $250,000

0

154    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Annex H

ASPI BY THE NUMBERS

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute is a wholly owned Commonwealth company formed

in 2001 as an independent, non-partisan think tank. ASPI receives funding from Australian

and overseas governments, industry and civil society groups for sponsorship, research and

project support. ASPI remains independent in the content of our research and in all editorial

judgements and employs a rigorous internal and external peer review process.

ASPI’s sources of funding are identified in our annual report, online at www.aspi.org.au and in

the ‘Acknowledgements’ section of individual publications.

For the 2019-20 financial year, this funding is broken down as shown in Table 14 and Figure 9.

Table 14: Revenue, 2019-20

Funding source Amount % of total

Department of Defence core funding $4,000,000.00 35%

Federal government agencies $3,636,542.91 32%

State and territory government agencies $121,525.00 1%

Overseas government agencies $1,891,206.43 17%

Defence industries $369,924.91 3%

Private sector $1,241,364.20 11%

Civil society and universities $151,533.26 1%

Total $11,412,096.71

* In addition, ASPI received a total of $148,218.00 from events and miscellaneous income.

   Annexes  155

Figure 9: Sources of revenue, 2019-20

Department of Defence core funding (35%)

Federal Government agencies (32%)

State and Territory Government Agencies (1%)

Overseas Government Agencies (17%)

Defence Industries (3%)

Private sector (11%)

Civil Society and Universities (1%)

2019-20 Funding breakdown, by sector

1: Australian Department of Defence

The Australian Department of Defence makes a single annual core funding payment of

$4,000,000.

2: Other Australian federal government agencies

In addition to the core funding provided by the Department of Defence, the following

Australian federal government departments and agencies provided funding, as shown in Table 15.

Table 15: Australian federal government funding (non-Defence), 2019-20

Department or agency Purpose Amount

.au Domain Administration Ltd .auDA test tool project $276,969.66

Attorney-General’s Department Counterterrorism and ICPC sponsorship $205,000.00

Australian Civil-Military Centre Pacific Peacekeeping project $90,724.55

Department of Defence ICPC sponsorship $105,645.13

Australian Mission to the UN Protection of Civilians in UN

Peacekeeping project

$11,444.00

Australian Office Taipei Taiwan track dialogue sponsorship $12,000.00

Cyber Security Cooperative

Research Centre Limited

ICPC sponsorship $40,000.00

156    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Department or agency Purpose Amount

Department of Agriculture,

Water and the Environment

ASPI advisory service $25,000.00

Defence Portfolio Professional development: Symposium

and Better Policy Program

$341,183.78

Defence Portfolio NA Think Tank Symposium, IKAHAN

Fellows

$111,100.00

Defence Portfolio Sydney Quadrilateral Dialogue $210,000.00

Defence Portfolio Professional development: Senior

Executive program

$9,000.00

Defence Portfolio Professional development: Executive

program

$334,000.00

Defence Portfolio ICPC project $253,950.00

Defence Portfolio ASPI-CASG Austeyr rifle book $65,000.00

Defence Portfolio ASPI-CASG Bushmaster book $45,454.55

Defence Portfolio Skilling Northern Australia project $8,455.85

Department of Foreign Affairs

and Trade

e-Governance workshops Indo-Pacific,

UNGGE ASEAN project, critical

technology project

$477,153.83

Department of Foreign Affairs

and Trade

Risk and Resilience Pacific project $40,000.00

Department of Home Affairs Media project $150,000.00

Department of the Prime

Minister and Cabinet

ICPC sponsorship $50,000.00

Federal government ASPI research and projects $198,863.64

National Archives of Australia ICPC sponsorship $20,833.33

Services Australia ICPC sponsorship and professional

development Strategic Framework

project 2.1

$554,764.59

Total $3,636,542.91

   Annexes  157

3: Australian state and territory government agencies

The following funding was received from Australian state and territory government

departments and agencies, as shown in Table 16.

Table 16: Australian state and territory governments, funding, 2019-20

Department or agency Purpose Amount

Northern Territory Government North of 26 degrees south project $112,000.00

Queensland Police Service Counterterrorism workshop $9,525.00

Total $121,525.00

4: Overseas government agencies

The following funding was received from overseas government agencies, as shown in Table 17.

Where appropriate, ASPI reports funding under the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme at

https://www.ag.gov.au/integrity/foreign-influence -transparency-scheme.

Table 17: Overseas government agencies, funding, 2019-20

Department or agency Purpose Amount

Embassy of Israel Beersheba Dialogue preparation

meeting

$909.09

Embassy of Japan Defence and Strategy Pacific project $39,364.96

Embassy of the Kingdom of the

Netherlands

Support for ‘The party speaks for you’

research project

$20,000.00

Foreign and Commonwealth

Office—UK Embassy in China

Support for ‘Uyghurs for sale’

research project

$18,334.00

US State Department

(via Institute for War and

Peace Reporting)

Multiple research projects, including

‘Mapping China’s technology giants’

$762,559.52

US Department of Defense

(via Alion Science and Technology

Corporation)

Smart tech project $201,136.68

NATO Strategic Communications

Center of Excellence

Social media research project $5,799.12

158    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Department or agency Purpose Amount

UK Foreign and Commonwealth

Office

Multi-year UNGGE ASEAN cyber

capacity-building project

$437,026.04

US Department of State Travel sponsorship $5,500.26

US Embassy, Canberra Project support for research, including

the ‘China defence universities tracker‘

$400,576.76

Total $1,891,206.43

5: Defence industries

The following funding was received from defence-related private-sector organisations, as

shown in Table 18.

Table 18: Defence-related private sector organisations, funding, 2019-20

Organisation Purpose Amount

Lockheed Martin The Strategist sponsorship $25,000.00

Naval Group Australia ASPI sponsorship $100,000.00

Northrop Grumman ASPI sponsorship $67,500.00

Rafael Bersheeba Dialogue sponsorship $20,000.00

Raytheon ASPI Sponsorship $19,090.91

Saab Australia ASPI sponsorship $25,000.00

Thales Australia ASPI conference, ICPC and The Strategist

sponsorship

$113,334.00

Total $369,924.91

   Annexes  159

6: Private sector

The following funding was received from private-sector organisations, as shown in Table 19.

Table 19: Private-sector organisations, funding, 2019-20

Organisation Purpose Amount

Amazon Web Services Australia

Pty Ltd

ICPC sponsorship $125,000.00

Cisco Systems Australia Pty Ltd ICPC sponsorship $50,000.00

CT Intelligence and Insights Speakers’ fees $569.02

Engineers Australia Risk and Resilience project $32,272.73

Facebook Australia Pty Ltd ICPC sponsorship $100,000.00

Fortinet ICPC sponsorship $50,000.00

Google Australia Pty Limited ICPC sponsorship $75,000.00

IQPC Ltd Travel sponsorship $4,409.95

Jacobs Australia ICPC sponsorship $40,000.00

Kiah Consulting Professional development: workshop $45,000.00

Lendlease ASPI sponsorship $10,000.00

Macquarie Telecom Pty Ltd Cyber policy brief and report launch $70,000.00

Microsoft Pty Ltd ICPC sponsorship $158,272.74

Northern Territory Airports

Pty Ltd

Fuel Reserve project $45,000.00

Omni Executive Risk and Resilience Project $19,520.53

Oracle Australia National Security research project and

podcast sponsorship

$70,000.00

Palo Alto Networks (Australia)

Pty Ltd

ICPC sponsorship $80,000.00

Senetas Corporation Limited ICPC sponsorship $25,000.00

Splunk Technology ICPC sponsorship $50,000.00

Twitter Inc. ICPC research support and sponsorship $147,319.23

UpGuard, Inc ICPC sponsorship $44,000.00

Total $1,241,364.20

160    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

7: Civil society and universities

The following funding was received from civil society organisations and Australian and

overseas universities, as shown in Table 20.

Table 20: Civil society organisations and universities, funding, 2019-20

Organisation Purpose Amount

Australian Computer Society ICPC project $39,000.00

Australian National University ICPC staff secondment fee $3,030.30

Bond University Travel sponsorship $366.36

Carnegie Endowment for

International Peace

Research collaboration $11,119.96

German Marshall Fund Travel sponsorship $1,801.09

German Marshall Fund Travel sponsorship $2,393.28

Japan Institute of International

Affairs

Travel sponsorship to participate in

Japan Track 1.5 dialogue

$5,603.79

The Pratt Foundation Bersheeba dialogue sponsorship $70,000.00

The University of Melbourne Travel sponsorship to participate in

counterterrorism workshop in Brussels

$1,857.26

University of British Columbia Workshop in Vancouver $16,361.22

Total $151,533.26

   Annexes  161

Annex I

INDEX OF ANNUAL REPORT REQUIREMENTS

This index is included to meet the requirements of section 28E of the Public Governance,

Performance and Accountability Rule 2014.

Content Location in

the Rule

Location in

this report

ASPI’s purposes s 28E(a) Chapter 1

Responsible minister s 28E(b) Chapter 1

Ministerial directions and government policy orders s 28E(c) - (e) Not applicable

Information about directors s 28E(f) Chapter 5

Organisational structure s 28E(g) Chapter 1

Location of organisation s 28E(h) Chapter 1

Corporate governance s 28E(i) Chapter 5

Related entity transactions s 28E(j) - (k) Not applicable

Significant activities and changes affecting the company s 28E(l) Not applicable

Judicial decisions and decisions by administrative tribunals s 28E(m) Not applicable

Reports by the Auditor-General, parliament,

Commonwealth Ombudsman, Australian

Information Commissioner or Australian Securities

and Investments Commission

s 28E(n) Not applicable

Information from subsidiaries s 28E(o) Not applicable

Index identifying requirements of section 28E s 28E(p) Annex G

The audited financial statements have been prepared in accordance with the requirements

under the Corporations Act 2001; see Chapter 6.

162    ASPI Annual Report 2019-2020    

Annex J

ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS

ADF Australian Defence Force

ANU Australian National University

APS Australian Public Service

ASEAN Association of Southeast Asian Nations

ASPI-PD ASPI - Professional Development

DFAT Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

EL Executive Level

EU European Union

ICPC International Cyber Policy Centre

KAS Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung

NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization

RAAF Royal Australian Air Force

RAN Royal Australian Navy

SES Senior Executive Service

UK United Kingdom

UN United Nations

UNODC UN Office on Drugs and Crime

WDSN Women in Defence and Security Network

WPS Women, Peace and Security