There was some really ‘heavy lifting’ in some of the responses to my original thread on the state of our armed forces. I particularly thank Wayne Mapp, Major Star and Udea Station for their responses. They all come with a degree of insider knowledge far greater than mine given I’ve been out of the system for nigh on four decades. The conversation needs to continue so (and not necessarily tongue in cheek) I pose the following questions for debate …
First … given where we are and given our increasingly independent foreign policy why should we not go the whole hog and declare ourselves neutral? Without being overly political I suspect such a policy would be welcomed by the hard left and hard right of NZ politics. It would allow us to further reduce defence spending reaping a dividend that could (arguably) be better spent internally or returned to the taxpayer by way of tax relief. There would be no more frigate debate; the RNZN could bcome a Coastguard Service restructured around a new generation of OPVs. The Army could divest itself of its combat capability and restructure around a fully manned infantry battalion configured for peacekeeping operations (much like the FMF). Waiouru could be let go completely (or perhaps leased to the Singaporeans). The Airforce could divest itself of two of its Poseidon’s and two of its C130s and let go Whenuapai. Understand It would be almost a given that such a move would see us out of Five Eyes.
I have repeatedly questioned whether there is the political will to fund the NZDF properly. Perhaps we should turn the question around … is there the political will to do what I suggest?
And a second question not related to the first. I have it from a variety of sources that morale in the NZDF is at a long time low. What is the reason for that and it has to be more than pay and allowances (effectively frozen). Do serving members see the Ministry of Defence (as opposed to HQ NZDF) as a friend or the enemy. Has the neutering of the powers and responsibilities of the three service chiefs been a plus or a minus. What needs to change?
I would particularly welcome the comments of Wayne Mapp, Major Star and Udea Station. For Udea Station … it maybe useful if you were to provide a synopsis of your two comments made on the previous thread. You made them late and I suspect many readers will not have picked up on them.
OTY folks …..
No Minister 
I’ve already written to “Udea Station” and asked him to compile his two comments together into a post he can publish here anonymously, which he has agreed to do although it will be a couple of weeks.
In answer to the first question regarding neutrality, that only works if the opposing side respects your point of view. It didn’t work for the Moriori BTW.
Regarding the second question, since we are so ill equiped to defend ourselves, let only help a friendly country in need, is there any surprise that morale is so low?
`In answer to the first question regarding neutrality, that only works if the opposing side respects your point of view.’
Uncoffined is right with this sentence and we expose New Zealand to huge risk if it means `walking away’ from our long time allies – namely Australia, USA and UK.
Another question that comes to mind is what impact would such a move have on our ability to export our products. Would we be welcome in our current markets?
Thanks Veteran,
I have nothing of value to add on the subject at hand but these two posts have been really interesting and having people with actual knowledge of the subject is great. I know Wayne cops some stick when he posts on Kiwiblog (which is a shame) but I find his insight on this subject fascinating. Thanks to everyone who has contributed.
To answer your question directly, why shouldn’t New Zealand become a non aligned country?
Simple answer, we would destroy our relationship with Australia. No more visa free entry. No easier to visit and work in Australia than say it would be for the Japanese. No New Zealanders would think non alignment would be worth such a price. Much of CER would hard to implement since much of it is tied to us being an ally.
Having dealt with that, do we need to improve our relationship with Australia, especially given current circumstances?
Probably yes, but we don’t need to become a mini clone of Australia. We are not one of their states.
However, in my view we do need to do more. New Zealand needs to be seen to pull our weight on things that matter, particularly around maritime security. It is no accident that AUKUS is primarily about maritime competence. New Zealand needs to do enough in this domain to be taken seriously. In 1987, when the ANZAC ship programme was first mooted, New Zealand was to get four such ships, out of a planned total of 12. One third of the overall capability.
Two new Type 31 ships won’t cut it, although it is better than nothing. Two Type 31’s will look like we still believe in a “benign strategic environment”.
In the new strategic environment we will need to go for 3 or 4 such vessels to be taken seriously. Four ships would require lifting our defence spending to around 2% of GDP (NATO measure). That is what Germany has done, up from 1.2% of GDP. Circumstances have required it.
A political programme that lifted spending to 2% of GDP would look serious, both to New Zealanders and also to our partners. As a political message, 2% is easy to understand. In my experience people get clear message, not sophistry. Of course the voters have to understand and agree with the reasoning. That is the political challenge.
Having been a member of the RNZN and leaving 10 years ago but still in regular contact with many who still serve I believe the problem facing the navy is retaining competent technical personal without whom the ships cannot sail. The main problem is the cost of living in Auckland, sailors leave the navy not because of the navy but because it is to expensive to own a home on the North Shore of Auckland on a sailors salary.
Another factor is work life balance I remember as an Marine Engineer (stoker) having done a 6 to 8 month deployment and then as soon as the ship comes back it goes into a maintenance period which requires the engineers so they cannot go on leave and enjoy some time with their family and R & R.
I believe one way to fix the problem of lack of work life balance would be to run the ships like the merchant navy does, with even time on and off. A sailor does 3 months at sea and then has 3 months off, this type of rotation could kick in for a sailor when he reaches Petty Officer level, by that stage in their life they will have started a family and in their time off they could live anywhere in NZ where housing is cheaper. And before any old salts starting piping up and saying “back in my day” and “these young sailors are soft” just remember, back in “your day” once a service person had done their 20 years service, there pay out meant they could buy a house, have money left over plus have a pension too when they retired. None of which exists now for this current generation of service person.
Another thing I would like to see is that with each promotion a sailor gets they attend a professional course from which they obtain a higher qualification that could be bonded with a return of service. When I became a leading hand I gained a trade but after that promotion their was no further civilian qualification gained that I could use on the outside so what was the point of staying in? Especially when the the super scheme had been round up and sailors where now on kiwisaver. My suggestion to my superiors was when a stoker got promoted to Petty Officer they get an advanced trade, Chief Petty Officer, Diploma and Warrant Officer qualified a Bachelor of Technology/Engineering. This would incentivize technical sailors to stay in for the next promotion, bond them in once they had gained it plus when they finally leave the service they are highly qualified and are able to have a good job on civy street which is the best advertisement to join the armed forces.
Thank you Stephen … I appreciate your ‘lower deck’ perspective. The NZDF really lost the plot over service housing at Devonport. It wasn’t the sailors fault that Devonport was/is prime real estate with rental housing almost impossible to access on a junior rates salary. If ever there was a case for heavily subsidised ‘Navy’ rental housing on the Shore with spouses able to access wrap around support while their husbands were away on extended deployments then I can’t think of a better one. The family factor has only ever been paid lip service to by those who should know better.
Great points Stephen. This was a massive own goal by the previous National Government giving over the RNZN housing to the local Iwi for a treaty settlement. Which decreased stock overall, having not added to housing stock in many, many years. The implications then became a limit of 6 years in service housing, and in the interests of equal treatment, this was applied to the whole NZDF, even regions where there wasn’t such a big pressure on housing. The CA had to fight to get Waiouru exempt from this regulation.
With regards to education, NZDF centralised (and largely civilianised) all training support and education assistance into the ‘NZ Defence College’, one of their roles is to map trade courses with civilian qualifications. They do their best, but being one further step removed from the single services, there’s that much more friction in terms of being able to accurately and rapidly map courses to quals.
Wayne … thank you for pointing out the political fallout that would occasion from us going ‘neutral’ particularly as it applies to the ANZAC relationship which is already under stress. Nevertheless I think there are elements in both ACT and the Greens that would support such a move. We have discussed two vs three frigates on a number of occasions and I am encouraged to see that you have now accepted (with reservations) that two frigates are, to an extent, just window dressing. NZF, bless their cotton picking sox have long advocated for defence spending at 2% of GDP. That was when NZL was in a more benign strategic environment. Times change. 2% is doable and necessary.
Neutrality presupposes our ability to defend ourselves.
We would need a big stick.
Right now our big stick is called the US Pacific Fleet and the ADF.
Vet
Thanks for some good questions! I only have time for some brief answers, here’s my two cents:
One – countries can only be truly neutral if they are willing to defend themselves from any actual threat without relying on anyone else. David Lange once said “NZ is a strategic dagger pointed straight at the hearty of Antarctica”, and Helen Clark infamously said that we live in a “benign strategic environment.” Therefore the question might instead be, if we choose to be neutral, what threat must we arm ourselves against? I’d argue that the threat would be PLA submarines and aircraft against our shipping, therefore RNZN would need good anti-air and anti sub ships, probably a mix of Frigates and Destroyers. RNZAF would need anti-submarine surveillance aircraft (ie the P-8s). The army could potentially be downsized seeing as we wouldn’t be fighting any land battles in NZ.
BUT – as Dr Mapp points out, the political ramifications of being neutral letting Aus and UK and US (and others) fight the land battles against future adversaries would probably be too much to stomach.
Two – is there political will to equip the NZDF more than what it is now? Clearly not with Labour. Chris Penk clearly has the will from National. Although he is no longer Opposition Spokesman and former TF Platoon Commander Tim van de Molen is now the spokesman, I’d bet on Mr Penk taking up the position of Minister. But he’s just one man – he’d be up against a media openly hostile to the NZDF and what is stands for, to say nothing of a Treasury that has always been sceptical of large purchases for NZDF (perhaps not without good reason based on past peformance…). There is no political lobby pushing for higher defence spending, and most NZers are at best ambivalent about defence spending.
Three – Ministry of Defence has some good people, but why does a country as small as NZ need a separate ministry? This was a decision made in the early 1990s / late 1980s, surely the situation has changed? There is massive duplication of effort (in terms of acquiring capabilities), and we end up with some bizarre policy decisions not linked to warfighting capability. The MoD is simply not seen favourably by NZDF rank and file – they’re seen as unambitious second-rate bureaucrats, who if they were any good would be working for either MFAT or Treasury!
My biggest bugbear (which you have clearly heard loud and clear!) is the neutering of the service chiefs. Chief of Army is a figurehead who can do nothing of note – the formations belong to the Land Component Commander, who is part of HQ Joint Forces NZ, the HR function now fully belongs to the ‘Chief People Officer’ under the CDF, recruitment is centralised and largely run by civilians, health has been taken off each service chief and now comes under a bloated ‘Defence Health Directorate’, which even includes chaplains for goodness sake! Logistics is centralised in an effort to find efficiencies across the three services, but I’m buggered if I’ve seen any efficiencies. So there is no longer any ‘raise, train and sustain’ role for Chief of Army – which begs the question, what can he or she do? These were all own goals by the NZDF by the way, I’m not aware of any Minister of any colour putting any pressure on for this to occur. The result of it is that the services now operate at the whim of highly centralised and highly civilianised HQNDF / HQJFNZ. I’d far rather the services focus on warfighting at sea and on land, supported by an air force with world class aircraft and pilots.
We should gut HQ, reinvigorate the services and merge MoD with HQNZDF. But maybe that’s rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic given the lack of will in NZ for NZDF other than for it to be the bare minimum?
Major Star … I would be interested in your take of how the Chief of Army’s essay writing debacle went down among your peers and how you think it impacted on junior soldiers.
Vet… what a debacle that was! Huge hit to credibility. We were already cynical about Kea (the forum it was published on), now the cynicism is even greater. The points made were not actually harmful – he was saying let’s not give a damn about identity or intersectionality or trying to reflect society’s demographics, rather let’s just focus on warfighting. Two other essays on that topic very much toed the party line, this was a dissenting opinion that if it had been kept up, would have enhanced the debate. You don’t have to agree with the position to allow the position to be held.
The kick back from HQNZDF was massive, particularly some very influential civilians in some very influential lobby groups within NZDF.
I saw some extremely inappropriate emails and opinions shared around by some senior officers from the other services punching down on the Private who submitted the essay – it is clear that there is no place in the NZDF for people who hold views that everyone in society all agreed on 15 minutes ago, but are now ‘hateful’.
The impact on junior soldiers was to see that they are only welcome in the organisation if they believe one particular political viewpoint regarding recent societal changes. Which is nothing to do with our profession of arms.
I covered that at the time, NZ Military once more follows the Pentagon’s lead and finished on this note:
I wonder if he did resign?
Thank you Tom for that … the Minister said jump and Chief of Defence and CA said ‘How high Sir’. One would think/hope that Pte Dell has a real future outside of the military as someone prepared to question the reasoning behind decision making. Actually the SAS have a tradition of doing just that with their ‘Chinese Parliament’ style to operational planning.
There’s an interesting column in The Australian this morning, re air defence and Australia’s requirements. F35 unsuitable, F22 might be and China having an aircraft superior to anything currently available to Oz. The detail Is beyond me – I thought the Harvard too complicated – but the thrust is relevant to this topic. One suggestion for the summary Udea is preparing: try to minimize the acronyms and jargon. I am semi-literate re this subject but the earlier posts were hard to follow.
It is worth looking at the comments to the article. They were quite critical about the author dissing the F35, which is proving very successful. Nearly 1,000 have been built so far with another 1,000 on order. It is the go to western multirole aircraft for the next twenty years or more.
Finland, Germany and Canada have all put in orders for a total of 250 aircraft, just in the last month.
The F35 is way superior to anything from China or Russia, especially in its networked and targeting capabilities.
Not all comments (339 and counting) support the F35. But it’s not about which aircraft is better – the point is that they’re having the discussion. NZ meanwhile does almost nothing. When was there something in a NZ publication regarding this country’s defence needs?
And for the old soldiers here: Brig Ray Andrews died yesterday aged 87. A really nice man, who will be remembered with affection by all who knew him.
Ray Andrews … stood tall among his pear group … Hitchings, Dudman. Taylor, Bestic, Torrence … all one stars I hold in the greatest rerspect …. have I missed anybody out?
Brig Birch comes to mind and Brig D-W as well from a bit later, I respected Brig Jameson very much but his career as a Brig was very short
One last comment. Muldoon was ejected from power in 1984 because the NZ Party took right wing votes. The NZP defence and foreign affairs policy was to emulate Costa Rica viz. no armed services and neutrality.
Right. I’ve received a reply from “Udea Station” and I’m just cleaning it up a bit for publishing on Monday morning. It deals with the frigate purchase options and in another week or two he’s going to send another one through i dealing with aircraft.
Perhaps to end and yes I know this is from the dim dark ages. But when I was poodle faking as the Minister’s ADC he used to share with me his thoughts and seek my reaction to the point where the then CDF (‘louige’ Webb) took me aside and said ‘junior offers don’t have opinions and just remember I own you and he doesn’t’.
All that aside and Faulkner once said me that he continued to be amazed the the service chiefs (back then the service chiefs had real power and enjoyed direct access to the Minister) came to him with what they thought they might get away with, beautifully and well crafted proposals, rather than what they really wanted. Faulkner said they should have asked for more but, as a politician, he was bound to focus on what he was presented with. Not sure anything has changed. The military doesn’t really understand the political dimension. Wayne may have a comment on this.
I was always of the view that the NZDF were way too keen to put everything in writing as firm proposals in the course of developing their concepts and ideas, and then presenting them to Ministers as “yes/no” options.
I was always of the view a more collaborative and iterative approach was better. This did occur with the 2010 Deference Review, but actually more so with the 2016 Review which took on board the issues that had arisen with the 2010 Defence Review.
As it happened, both Ron Mark’s acquisitions of the 4 P8’s and the 5 C130J’s was exactly what the 2016 Defence Review recommended.
I am also of the view that a new Defence Review is needed. A lot has happened since 2016.
As for the role off Ministers’s ADC, when I was Minister, the rank level was upgraded to Col/Group Captain/Captain. The then CDF (Lt Gen Jerry Mateparae) understood I needed someone in that role who had the authority to relay my views through the system. I must say it worked very well, much better than the lower ranked ADC level when I first became Minister.
Defence! Auto correct!