A history of Australian strategic policy since 1945
Date
2009
Authors
Frühling, Stephan
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Publisher
Defence Publishing Service, Department of Defence, Australia
Abstract
From the late 1940s until the early 1980s, the Australian government provided strategic guidance for the Defence group of Departments and armed services in so called ‘Strategic Basis’ papers. Unlike the ‘White Papers’ of the modern era, the ‘Strategic Basis’ was written by the government’s senior advisors on the Defence Committee. Classified and closely held, these papers were only known to few people at the time, but provide a unique insight into the concerns that government and its most senior advisors had about the threats to Australia and how they envisaged the role of Defence in Australia’s security. This edition includes the texts of fifteen such declassified strategic guidance documents of the Defence organisation in Australia between 1946 and 1976. All of them were submitted to the government of the day for formal consideration, which made them a key guidance mechanism at the interface between the government’s policy directive, and the Defence organisation’s professional advice. In addition, the book also contains an introductory essay that examines the nature of strategic guidance, and reviews the development of Australian defence strategic guidance since the Second World War. Commissioned and published by the Department of Defence, it was released in the lead-up to the 2009 Defence White Paper.
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Book
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Open Access