Hamlet’s glass and the Brereton Report: the radical reality of Australia’s security culture

It is almost an invariable rule that the citizens of nation-states in their generality, and Australia in particular, are obsessed with security and fascinated with violence; equally, they are illiterate in understanding their own traditions and practices. And when they ostensibly honour international law, rules-based orders, add peace, they require a more suspecting glance than they are accorded. An iconic play provides the invitation.

In a passionate outburst, Hamlet commands his mother as follows, “You shall not budge. You go not till I set you up a glass / Where you may see the inmost part of you.” Major-General Paul Brereton is neither Shakespeare nor a Danish prince, but his report on what appears to be atrocities and war crimes by units of the Australian Defence Force in Afghanistan requires the same obedience.

The reflection, being determined by the laws of optics, is indifferent to national pretences and self-images; it simply reports back the unadorned behaviour that takes place within its view. What it says about Australia’s national security culture is, to say the least, unflattering, even derisive and excoriating.

By way of a philosophical beginning, the relevant facts with I propose to start with here as undeniable are:

  1. that civilization itself is founded on violence;
  2. that political collectivities which emphasis self-interest and collective egoism are inherently brutal;
  3. that “a nation is a group of people united by a common mistake regarding its origins and a collective hostility towards its neighbours;”
  4. that nationalism is, ultimately, a “community of blood,” and
  5. that we are all embedded in violence and, to a greater or lesser extent, benefit from it. As well, there is a pronounced tendency to forget the true past which of death and destruction because it might just be unbearable.

These underlie a search for, and an elaboration of, that which is at the core of security culture – namely the methods by which a nation’s security is pursued and achieved through requiring its citizens to fight, kill, and perhaps, to die. Foreign and defence policy may be politely, disingenuously configured in monetary terms but the reserve currency of a nation is always its people; more precisely, it is the number and quality of disposable bodies it possesses.

Now, consider Australia popularly understood – for too many, a country that dates its useable history, national identity, and sense of nationhood not from the politics and history which culminated in Federation in 1901, but from the Gallipoli landing in the Dardanelles in April 1915, and the subsequent years of the Great War in which some 60,000 Australians were killed, and then heralded as the blood sacrifice that demonstrated national worthiness.

Then let us consider Australia’s national capital, Canberra – probably the only inhabited, or residential, war memorial in the world. With its proliferation of prominent monuments commemorating past wars, and the imposing Australian War Memorial, it might even be accurately described as a necropolis form which the bodies have been banned (the exception being the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the Australian War Memorial (and that could change if ever the proposal to bury, inter alia, dead servicemen in a national cemetery on the shores of Lake Burley Griffin comes to fruition).

But it is Sydney that provides the most powerful illustration of the attempt to establish a warrior culture, a militarised society, and a cult of the dead: it is found at the ANZAC Memorial in Hyde Park South.

The central motif of the design is Rayner Hoff’s The Sacrifice, officially described as a bronze group of sculptures depicting the recumbent figure of a young warrior who has made the supreme sacrifice; his naked body lies, cruciform, upon a shield that is supported by three womenfolk – his best-loved Mother, Wife and Sister and in the arms of one is a child, the future generations for whom the sacrifice has been made.

According to the associated educational publicity, “it illustrates the sacrifice engendered by war, self-sacrifice for duty and the beautiful quality of womanhood which, in the war years, with quiet courage and noble resignation, bore its burdens, the loss of sons, husbands and lovers.”

This is a formative, cultural experience if a certain caution is observed: reject as anathema any attempt to interrogate this historical record according to the principle of being sceptical about all claims that cannot be substantiated by evidence and logical argument.

What this civil religion demands of the mind (suspension of all critical faculties and incuriosity) and the conscience (subordination and conformity) extends to the surrender of the body, and even life itself.

Obedience to this principle provides not only the origin but the elaboration of national security myths, and the places and events which are venerated in manners and forms which create a fatal environment which sanctions the blood sacrifice which security culture holds dear, but cannot afford to admit is a demand of its own making.

Moreover, the same environment ensures that, for many, what they choose to call their identity is no more than a process of imitating others who, like them, are engulfed in a background that allows a measure of individuality but at the cost of accepting that serious and prolonged resistance is unacceptable.

A tolerance, even encouragement, of indefensible behaviour grows in such an environment. Warriors are indulged because they are a caste apart from the mass of the citizenry – a division of labour that is deemed acceptable and desirable by both, the latter not wishing to be discomforted by inquiring too deeply, let alone having to perform something along the lines of national military service.

Over time, and without constant and successful resistance, warrior cultures, militarised societies, and cults of the dead lead logically to what Brereton discovered – namely, that such a substantial body of evidence exists certain personnel should be investigated for the commission of atrocities and war crimes.

That this pathological and criminal behaviour is not ADF-wide is no counter-argument: it is enough to know that it exists in the venerated national security culture; indeed, can be held to be a consequence of it, not the dark, unheralded revelations which are detailed, and, in some cases, had to be redacted in the public interest.

Recall the recent, immediate reactions at all levels. A poet from another time, James Clarence Mangan, encapsulates them so well in these few lines:

Kings, nobles, all,

Looked aghast and strange;

The minstrel group sate in dumbest show!

Had some great crime

Wrought this dread amaze,

This terror? None seems to understand . . .

But lo! The sky

Showed flecked with blood, and an alien sun

Glared from the north,

And there stood on high,

Amid his shorn beams, a skeleton!

Comments

14 responses to “Hamlet’s glass and the Brereton Report: the radical reality of Australia’s security culture”

  1. Malcolm Harrison Avatar
    Malcolm Harrison

    ‘These underlie a search for, and an elaboration of, that which is at the core of security culture – namely the methods by which a nation’s security is pursued and achieved through requiring its citizens to fight, kill, and perhaps, to die. ‘ Personally I’d replace the ‘perhaps’ in the last sentence with ‘perchance’, to keep the Hamlet allusion active.

  2. julianp Avatar
    julianp

    Thank you Dr. McKinley.

    It is absolutely necessary I believe to be forcefully reminded of the noxious influence of the Australian “security industry” together with its self-appointed camp-followers, including many politicians past and present. At the same time, it’s a rare voice that tackles the persistent untruth of the Anzac myth of sacrifice as the foundation of modern Australia. It’s an even rarer voice that calls out those mercenary bastards who favour conflict as the answer to all disagreements, confected or otherwise. Clearly there are those among us who won’t be satisfied unless there’s war with China.

    As you rightly imply Dr. McKinley, our history of settlement contains many violent episodes, but those who pointed this out or sought redress have in the past been dismissed as having a “black-armband” view of our
    history, and so the violence inherent in our culture disappears from view and from memory.

    It cannot be disputed IMO that the security industry has the primary responsibility for Australian involvement in overseas conflicts. It’s ironic that the website of the NSW Anzac memorial reminds us that: “On this day 29 December 1860, Sailors from the Victorian Colonial warship VICTORIA took part in an action at MATARIKOIKO, New Zealand. This action during the Second ANGLO-MAORI WAR was the first overseas military action by an Australian unit – the beginning of Australia’s overseas war history”.

    Try telling a Maori descendant that our military history had such a noble beginning.

    1. Michael McKinley Avatar
      Michael McKinley

      Julian, you make several valuable points and I would like to endorse two of them: first, there is, in Australian and especially in Canberra, an ostensible “community” that talks war in manner which excites itself and is intended to excite others; second, having become increasingly acquainted with the wars of between Maori and Pakeha over the last several years, I simply could not contemplate the exercise which you clearly also find incredible and no doubt insulting to Maori. I wonder whether, if the alliance with the US did not exist, or the US itself did not exist, the discourse in Australia (and elsewhere, for that matter) would be more amenable to one of engagement with the region in terms that are not over-determined by being a follower of an imperial power.

  3. Patrick M P Donnelly Avatar
    Patrick M P Donnelly

    Earth’s surface bears witness to catastrophe. Mountain ranges are stretched like toffee across the face of continents. It has been a dangerous environment until recent times.

    Those who have fought for centuries, using the easily persuaded, continue to prosper. These are the great families. Being ruthless and clever makes wealth and power. Creating situations that are challenging is part of their M.O. They do not only exist in Europe and the “New World”.

    The world is not at a crossroads. We have enough for all, but that requires a decision to share and not just make it ‘earned’. The families want fewer weak bloodlines, while they improve their own. Sending opium and heroin into cities makes sense to them. Profit, while killing off the weak. Do not forget that the worst drug is lawful within bounds: alcohol. War is now limited and nearly automated. The need for humans to be involved means blood and lots of it. A sound weapon requires a continual, sharpening process. It also removes those who might be tempted to attack the rich…

    The confluence of these things is inevitable and the country that has, per capita, the greatest ratio of medals per head from the Olympics hints at why Australians are involved.

    Own it!

  4. Patrick M P Donnelly Avatar
    Patrick M P Donnelly

    Does not the surgeon require a sharp scalpel?

  5. David Macilwain Avatar
    David Macilwain

    The partner to the “heroes” who kill in battle and sometimes unwillingly die, are those we call “terrorists” and “insurgents” and to whom we ascribe no legitimacy, leave alone heroism. In reality, as in Afghanistan, those brave men who dare to resist the invaders – and we are invaders – are heroes in front of their families, brothers and mothers. To them too, the enemy appears cowardly beneath his battle gear and high-tech equipment, and worthy of no respect; justifying a resort to trickery and “soft targets” which stand a chance of success. Yet even there, our supposed morality vanishes, in the double-dealing and treachery that saw the creation of Al Qaeda and ISIS as a pretext for further aggression and occupation, yet still all couched in terms of “Defence” and “National Security”.

    1. Patrick M P Donnelly Avatar
      Patrick M P Donnelly

      Weakness invites attack.

    2. Michael McKinley Avatar
      Michael McKinley

      David, there is nothing I can disagree with in what you say. The problem that I see in so many decisions to go to war is that an understanding of the type the you are accurate in outlining is impossible for the great majority of people. And for reasons good and lamentably awful. Politicians, and other leaders, and those they would use to endorse their decisions seem capable of focusing only on the last atrocity – inevitably someone else’s fault – and the most garbled of understandings as to how the present emerged. In such terms it’s a world of ignorance.

  6. Allan Behm Avatar
    Allan Behm

    This is another penetrating and characteristically confronting essay by Michael McKinley. War crimes as an artefact of a secular faith that constructs a kind of national identity and conformity around the myth of heroic personal sacrifice in war may well constitute the myth’s Achilles heel (which rather overloads the metaphor, but there we are). Mike may be right: the suspension of reason demanded by all faith-based systems, whether secular or religious, may precipitate all sorts of outcomes that are irrational, even criminal ones. Child sexual abuse in so many religious institutions bears witness to that. A romantic and sentimental attachment to the ANZAC myth as the still-point of the turning world of a fabricated national identity may explain the war crimes. It does not excuse them. Whether our peculiar form of cultural dysmorphia has anything to do with the war crimes identified by Justice Brereton is beside the point: they are illegal. The entire panoply of legal remedies, up to and including a Royal Commission to identify and extirpate the systemic causes of criminality in armed conflict, has to be activated here. Yes, we do need to do as Mike suggests, and examine both our cultural consciences and the political carpet-baggers who seek to manipulate them. And we have to chase down the criminals in the courts, the military command system that inexplicably failed to know about them, and the political decision-makers who created the preconditions for them to commit these crimes in the first place.

    1. Michael McKinley Avatar
      Michael McKinley

      Allan, many thanks for your comment; to say that I am grateful for it is an understatement in the light of your own extremely insightful essay on this site. I am in total agreement that what is required is a comprehensive search for the perpetrators at all levels, not least those with decision-making power, and that means the military, bureaucratic and political leadership. My worry is that this won’t happen and that, as with the child sexual abuse crimes, the institutional imperatives to protect, obfuscate, and delay the thoroughgoing investigations, trials, verdicts and eventual sentences will win out in the long run. Indeed, I believe that process of defence and deflection has already begun. This reflects on citizens in a way that is corrosive of ethics, morality, law, and politics, now and into the future. Ultimately, we need to take seriously the words of the great and learned Rabbi, Abraham Joshua Herschel: In a democracy it might be that all are not guilty, but all are responsible. Again, many thanks, Allan.

  7. bill burke Avatar
    bill burke

    Michael McKinley’s advances a five point thesis that sees violence as an unshakable essence of what purports to be civilization and finds “Hamlet” as an apt illustration of his observations. Tarrying a little longer with the Shakespearean corpus could lead to different conclusions when considering Macbeth’s lessons. Here, enacting violence is seen as a deviant development – not as an ever present concomitant of civilization. Indeed, when Birnam wood remove to Dunisane” signals its imminent demise and a return to the good.

    1. Michael McKinley Avatar
      Michael McKinley

      Bill, thanks for your comment – it is much appreciated. My concern with foundational violence was to force a focus on the nation state mainly, less so on civilisation, even though both have the same legacy of violence-guilt. I need to think more about your suggestion relating to Macbeth – and I am interested in the point you make. My references to Macbeth have you usually been to the reactions which my papers and articles have provoked from the strategic studies mainstream – which I sum as per: “It is a tale
      Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.” My response is that those who seek to dismiss the critique are that all their :yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death.” I’m grateful for your redirection, Bill.

  8. Jerry Roberts Avatar
    Jerry Roberts

    Thanks Michael. Hamlet’s concerns were political corruption and justice. The great play begins with something rotten in the State of Denmark and ends with Hamlet’s plea to his true-blue mate, Horatio, to live on and tell the story.

    At the practical policy level, our people are doing too many tours of duty in places where they should not have been sent in the first place. A primary school geography student looking at a basic relief map of Afghanistan could draw out the mountain ranges.

    1. Michael McKinley Avatar
      Michael McKinley

      Thank you, Jerry – for both the elaboration of the Glass and your very accurate observation about the perils of repeated deployments to a land that historians and strategic analysts know as “the place empires go to die.” The question we need to ask, I suppose, is why and how the decision-makes who dreamed up this sojourn nearly two decades ago didn’t pay attention to geography and history. Perhaps they think they are superior to the facts and the record?