Writer
Mike Scrafton
Mike Scrafton was a Deputy Secretary in the Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment, senior Defence executive, CEO of a state statutory body, and chief of staff and ministerial adviser to the minister for defence.
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Abbott, more than an embarrassment
Former prime minister Tony Abbott’s ignorance of history and of the Europe European Union, and his tragic adulation of all things British, is simply embarrassing. His licensing of a permissive setting for white supremacists and white replacement conspiracy theorists is dangerous, irresponsible, and inexcusable. Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. The Afghanistan failure
President Trump’s muddled and reactive approach to foreign and strategic policy regularly distracts the media and commentators away from the geopolitical consequences of America’s actions under his stewardship. The coverage of the negotiations with the Taliban and proposed withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan is a perfect example. After eighteen years of war the US Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. On the blindness of politicians
The Senate’s Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee has generated one of the great jargon infested documents of recent times. The introduction to The Inquiry into nationhood, national identity and democracy Discussion paperreveals much about what is wrong with politics in Australia. Like a first year tutorial paper it traverses multiple issues trying to mention Continue reading »
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Hong Kong and the ghost of Tiananmen
Michael Shoebridge of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute has artfully given the appearance of logic to a melding of fact, supposition and obsession in order to reach the conclusion that it is ‘time for the international community to step up to prevent a foreseeable massacre that will further cleave China—and other authoritarian regimes—from the rest Continue reading »
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Battles, campaigns, and wars
The United States Studies Centre’s latest publication, Averting Crisis: American strategy, military spending and collective defence in the Indo-Pacific, contrary to its title, offers up a path to crisis. While the report draws attention to the fading of the previously unchallengeable military dominance of the US, the recommendations for Australia are flawed. Continue reading »
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The conversation about China
Senator Wong’s call for a mature conversation aboutf the issue of China is more than welcome. A serious discussions of the implications for Australia flowing from the rise of China was sadly missing from the recent election. However, there is an unexpected naivety in her suggestion that MPs and Senators receive ‘foreign affairs and national Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. The persistence of white supremacists in the US is the problem
In the wake of the recent murders by white supremacists, blame has been apportioned partially to President Trump’s rhetoric and to the availability of white replacement theory and white genocide conspiracy material. Both are relevant but the policy challenge is far greater. Even in the absence of both, white supremacists will persist. Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Ministers and public servants
Geoff Gallop offers up eleven theses on Australian politics to provide public servants with a ‘nuanced understanding of politics’. His theses are more than a little condescending and simplistic. The theses seem directed at middle level or junior public servants, or maybe new entrants to the service. However, the nature of the relationship between senior Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. “I’m afraid of Americans”
The opinions to which we should pay most critical attention are those of commentators best placed to influence government. Peter Jennings, Executive Director of ASPI, is one. Now he is claiming a ‘new cold war with China is playing out in all but name’. Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. The real cost in How to Defend Australia.
In How to Defend Australia, Hugh White has produced a work that removes much of the mystery surrounding Australian defence policy making. The historical experiences and institutional influences affecting Australia’s major past and present strategic policy positions are lucidly set out. His main objective though is to make the case for a significant boost to Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. The Chief of the Defence Force and political warfare
General Angus Campbell’s presentation at ASPI’s conference War in 2015 was thoughtful and provocative. Some of the CDF’s views are germane and apt are others contestable. He opened by saying, ‘I sense a renewed concern in the world for the potential for state-on-state conflict’; however ‘political warfare’ was his main concern. Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Strategy In A Bubble: ASPI’s war plans
ASPI’s relentless push for ever greater defence spending gets another iteration in Malcolm Davis’s Forward defence in depth for Australia . As a breathless list of ‘key horizon technologies’, Davis’s paper makes entertaining and informative reading. As a justification for putting Australia on a permanent war footing it is wanting. Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. The new national security – protection from global warming
Ian Dunlop has argued persuasively that global warming now represents an emergency situation ‘akin to wartime’. The alarmingly obstinate year-on-year increase in the levels of greenhouse gases being pumped into the atmosphere has brought this about and will ensure the IPCC prediction that ‘[G]lobal warming is likely to reach 1.5°C between 2030 and 2052 if Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Unquantifiable strategic madness of war on Iran
There have been reports that President Trump is less enthusiastic about attacking Iran than his advisers. For the moment, an unanticipated source of sanity. The current US posturing against Iran seems confected. It also seems mad. A US attack on Iran would be blatant and naked aggression. The knock on consequences could have strategic dimensions Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. IPBES and IPCC: Calamity cannot be averted
The key messages contained Intergovernmental Science- Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services’ (IPBES) Summary For Policymakers are not surprising. The trends have been well known for a long time, perhaps only the current scale of the crisis might be news. But if earlier reports like the IPCC’s Global Warming of 1.5C or UN’s World Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. The rules-based international order; or a ‘dead parrot’.
Strategic policy is perhaps the most challenging area of government. For decades policy settings have largely been perfunctory with the US alliance occupying the central place. The post-Cold War setting of a single dominant hegemon has meant policy makers haven’t had to operate in an international order characterised by balance-of-power considerations. Even the confrontation between Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. China in Australia’s Defence and Strategic Policy
An incoming government addressing China in defence policy and strategic policy must overcome the natural impulse to assume the future will be a linear projection of the present. There is no reasonable scenario in which a major war in East Asia involving China does not end in disastrous outcomes for Australia and that determines the Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Political leadership and the next war.
If there is any consensus among commentators on geopolitics and strategic policy, it is that the world is entering into uncertain and dangerous times. In the term of the next Australian government political leadership could confront grave situations requiring decisions about war and peace. Few of Australia’s leaders, if any, have seen combat let alone Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Warner’s blinkered warnings
Geraldine Dooge interviewed Nick Warner Director General of the Office of National Intelligence (podcast) for Radio National. As Warner is the principal adviser to the Prime Minister on intelligence matters his assessments of the strategic environment are of great interest. Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. The Golan Heights: Whose rules?
President Trump has recognised the 1981 Israeli annexation of the Golan Heights. Whatever Trump’s motives—genuine concern for Israel’s security, geostrategic positioning in the struggle against Iran, fulfilling a divine mission, or domestic politics—his act raises important geopolitical issues and questions of international law. Trump’s move should force the Australian government to revisit its prioritisation of Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON.Extremism and race: slaying the phantom
There will be many views on the priority to be given to domestic race-based extremism and the best way in which it should be approached. Recently, Mike Pezzullo didn’t mention race-based violence among his ‘seven gathering storms’ facing Australia. An omission retrospectively corrected post-Christchurch at Senate Estimates. But his Harmony Day message displays a shallow Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Defending against the sacrificial knight errant on an existential crusade
Hopefully the security agencies won’t simply default to the jihadist archetype in their response to the atrocity in Christchurch, as the media has. Distinguishing between motives of the perpetrators of such unpardonable acts and understanding the internal logic by which they justify their actions is important. Marques like far right, white supremacist, white nationalist, neo-Nazi, Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Another American civil war?
The silhouette of yet another potential catastrophe is beginning to take shape. To add to the dissolution of the post war global order, global warming, mass species extinction, and great power conflict, there seems now the prospect of a post-Trump Presidency American civil war. Maybe. Not really? Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Morrison is not the man for the times
Last month Scott Morrison delivered ‘Our plan for keeping Australians safe and secure’ to the National Press Club. Not so much a headland speech as a report from the bookkeeper. Not FDR’s Four Freedoms address to Congress or Churchill’s Iron Curtain speech in Fulton, Missouri; the Prime Minister’s flat rhetoric avoided the big strategic issues Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. ASPI’s Agenda for change 2019
To pinch an epigram from former Air Force colleagues in Defence, ASPI’s ‘Agenda for change 2019: Strategic choices for the next government’ is a target rich environment. The contributors set out a smorgasbord of advice on strategic policy issues for the next government to chew on; some of which is commonplace, some keen insights, some Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Facilitating repression, abandoning values.
Admirable as Senator De Natale’s persistence was in pressing Defence on the issues of military sales to Saudi Arabia, he pursued the wrong issue. Australia is, and will remain, a trivial player in the global arms market and the Yemeni horror is not really pertinent to the sale the Senator was questioning. Clearly Australia’s reputation Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. The dangerous shibboleths of ‘strategists’
Some commentators on strategic policy seem to regard Australia’s national interests as close enough to immutable. That makes strategic policy a trivial and static matter. Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. Some possible implications for Australia’s strategic policy in Trump’s emergency
President Trump’s declaration of a national emergency over illegal immigration on the southern border of the US is destined to bring on a short term constitutional and political crisis in the US. The security of the US/Mexican border is not of direct interest to Australia but the longer term outcome of contest between the Executive Continue reading »
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The casual talk of war
The casual talk of war heard today is of great concern. War is treated as if it’s a board game and the only pieces are military forces. The experiences of the twentieth-century, and to a lesser extent those of this century, have demonstrated the widespread destruction and death, social dislocation and economic collapse, political disruption Continue reading »
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MIKE SCRAFTON. The Problem with the Nationhood Power
When influential public officials take the podium to tell us what’s what we should pay attention, close attention, to their words. Mike Pezzullo is one of the most powerful Federal public servants and therefore his view of the Australian political system in which he operates and the arguments he puts forward in support of those Continue reading »
