Graham Kennedy: Defence Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Graham Kennedy: Defence Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:678;Page:861] 
Dr KENNEDY GRAHAM (Green) 
: 
 Let me first pay tribute on behalf of the Green Party to the armed forces personnel and particularly to the individuals cited by the Minister of Defence who have fallen in the line of duty. We pay tribute to those individuals and to the armed forces personnel generally. Notwithstanding any differences in policy we remain all united in support of them. 
The aim of this bill is to amend the Defence Act to implement Government policy as set out in the white paper of 2010. The bill addresses a number of administrative issues: redefining senior roles sharing information and strengthening ministerial advice. It also addresses a few issues of substance: terminating the Territorials and creating an effective active and inactive reserve force and transforming some military positions into civilian positions. These changes might appear on the surface to be essentially administrative. It is tempting perhaps to go with the flow and simply support them. But we are all obliged more so to understand the strategic trends that have underpinned these changes and that informed the white paper and the Hunn report of 2002 before it. 
The Hunn report noted that whether there should be two defence organisations or one depended on whether the then Government was prepared to amend and revise the Act. The problem said the report was cultural and attitudinal more than organisational and systemic. The report called for new cultural values to create a habit of mutual support and information sharing. It went as far as to recommend a single organisation. 
The white paper set out the overall strategic direction for New Zealand’s defence over the next 25 years. It describes our defence policy as contributing to four overarching national security interests and these are a secure New Zealand a rules-based international order a network of strong international linkages and a sound global economy as I think Mr Hayes identified in his speech. If that sounds like old 20th century diplomacy it is because it is. The Prime Minister in his elliptical and carefree way said that the white paper “looks at global security [and] the challenges New Zealand is likely to face” kind of kicking the tyres and it sets out the best approach to meet them. But having introduced the term “global security” he slipped back into international diplomacy thinking. 
The paper identifies the strategic outlook to 2035 concluding that the defence tasks over that period would remain much as they have been albeit with potentially intensified demands. The main tasks in New Zealand and the South Pacific should be the starting point the report said for choosing the military capabilities. The requirements were to upgrade our military capabilities develop a people-centred force engage in organisational reform and modernise the infrastructure while making all of this affordable. With an uncertain strategic outlook there would be a need for a Defence Force that is responsive versatile and professional. The bill before us aims to implement these recommendations of the white paper. In short it is a step closer to the reintegration of the New Zealand Defence Force and the Ministry of Defence in managing our defence capability. 
The Green Party endorses change to our defence structure in so far as it introduces greater efficiency and renders the force more effective in the pursuit of our overall strategic goals. But the problem arises with the identification of those strategic goals because the Green Party has a different strategic vision of New Zealand from that of this Government. When the white paper emerged in November 2010 we said at the time that the report was a missed opportunity to formulate an independent and positive defence policy for the 21st century. 
The paper explicitly stressed the benefits of New Zealand being a stalwart partner of the United States. It saw a need to lock into a defence relationship with Australia as “our principal defence and security partner.” The review failed to project further moves towards an independent defence policy in the wake of our strategic move away from the US and Australia since the 1980s and our termination of the air combat force. New Zealand does not need a formal alliance with other countries to undertake military cooperation with them. We should be politically prepared and militarily able to cooperate in the South Pacific not just with those two countries but with others: the Island States themselves and the larger powers in the Asia-Pacific region. 
Indeed the most far-reaching and positive thing New Zealand can do is develop a military capability operating through the United Nations. For the past 20 years the United Nations has been developing a coherent approach to global and regional stability. The seminal document  
An Agenda for Peace 
 developed a conceptual framework for conflict prevention peacemaking peacekeeping and peace-building. It called upon member States to provide it with a capability for a ready reaction force with rapid deployment capability. Some 10 years ago the Brahimi report took this a step further calling for explicit mandates from the Security Council clear operational mission objectives and advanced exit strategies that reflect a proper goal accomplishment. 
The UN Security Council resolved then to give peacekeeping and enforcement operations clear credible and achievable mandates. It recognised the critical importance of UN peacekeeping operations having a credible deterrent capability. Such operations needed to meet minimum conditions: a clear political objective practicability of designated tasks and compliance with international legal principles. The council called for a clear chain of UN military command for unity and cohesion of UN force structures for proper training and equipment including UN military helicopters for due risk-assessment capability and for clear rules of engagement. 
Over these last two decades the UN has developed significant capability and stabilisation force capability notwithstanding the difficulties it has encountered and the poor troop behaviour of a few contributing countries which incidentally falls short of the atrocious behaviour of some of our own political friends in Iraq and Afghanistan. The UN’s New Horizon 
initiative of 2009 for strengthening its military operational capacity is already making headway. 
More recently at the world summit of 2005 the UN General Assembly reiterated the importance of the multilateral process. Member States acknowledged that we are living in an interdependent and global world and that many of today’s threats know no national boundaries yet all reaffirmed that the charter remains able to address the full range of threats to peace and security. That is to say between the Hunn report and the white paper New Zealand reaffirmed that the UN charter is adequate to address all our security threats. So the focus cannot be on old-fashioned strategic alliance diplomacy. It needs to be on New Zealand’s contribution to both global missions through the UN and regional mission capability through the Pacific Islands Forum. Such a focus and capability would also be applied to resource protection in our exclusive economic zone in those of our Island neighbours and in the Southern Ocean and Antarctic waters. 
We should be concentrating our resources where we can make the most positive contribution: in UN peacekeeping and peacemaking in maritime surveillance and in disaster relief. The white paper and this bill which seeks to implement it reflect a wrong strategic orientation for this country and the bill sends the wrong political signals to our region and the world. 
It is a question of world view. The National Party world view is based on an anticipation of hostility between nation States as the natural order. It is based on a felt need to keep a military combat capability for what even it concedes is a remote prospect of direct attack. It is based on a felt need to succour to the more militarily powerful countries with which we have a passing cultural affinity. 
The Green Party world view is based on the need to cooperate with all nation States as a natural and realistic outlook in the 21st century. It looks to meet the needs beyond 19th and even 20th century alliances whether formal through ANZUS or informal through protestations of good friendship to the strengthening and the capacity of regional and global organisations. The white paper and this bill do not reflect that world view. They reflect a fundamentally different one which we judge to be obsolete and dangerously misguided. It is with a solemn sense of responsibility therefore that we shall oppose this bill.