As much as clothes, language has fashions. This month’s in-vogue expression is “walking back” – a metaphor for resiling from a position previously taken. And in these changing times, there is a lot of walking back about.
General/Justice Paul Brereton’s inquiry into war crimes in Afghanistan took four and a half years to produce a report. I was impressed by Chief of the Defence Force, General Angus Campbell’s initial stance when the report was released. Since then, there has been significant walking back, apparently due to pressure from our ever flexible political leaders. (Unlike ethics, popular opinion is constantly evolving, so a popular Prime Minister needs constantly to hold aloft a moistened index finger to gauge which way the wind is blowing – a style of leadership called leading from the back).
My previous article about Australian war crimes in Afghanistan opined that there was a great deal of bad conduct to be take responsibility for. That article focused on the responsibility of our political leaders over the duration of Australia’s involvement in the conflict (2001-2014). What responsibility does the top brass of the ADF have?
Brereton discusses responsibility within the Defence Force for the war crimes. Under the heading “Individual, command and collective responsibility” he says “commanders at troop, squadron and Special Operations Task Group level must bear some responsibility for the events that happened ‘on their watch’, the criminal behaviour of a few was commenced, committed, continued and concealed at the patrol commander level, that is, at corporal or sergeant level.”
However as to the responsibility of those higher still up the chain of command, Brereton says:
“The Inquiry has found no evidence that there was knowledge of, or reckless indifference to, the commission of war crimes, on the part of commanders at troop/platoon, squadron/company or Task Group Headquarters level, let alone at higher levels … or Australian Defence Headquarters. Nor is the Inquiry of the view that there was any failure at any of those levels to take reasonable and practical steps that would have prevented or detected the commission of war crimes.”
Brereton nods to the wisdom of hindsight, but says:
“It needs to be borne in mind that few would have imagined some of our elite soldiers would engage in the conduct that has been described.”
“Secondly, the detailed superintendence and control of subordinates is inconsistent with the theory of mission command espoused by the Australian Army, whereby subordinates are empowered and entrusted to implement, in their own way, their superior commander’s intent. That is all the more so in a Special Forces context where high levels of responsibility and independence are entrusted at relatively low levels, in particular to patrol commanders.”
He also refers to other cultural factors that contributed to knowledge of atrocities not flowing upwards, including by sanitising or embellishing reporting and by not challenging or interrogating accounts given by those on the ground; and to misconceived loyalty to their Regiment, or their mates.
Brereton says that commanders at:
“Australian Defence Force Headquarters appear to have responded appropriately and diligently when relevant information and allegations came to their attention, and to have made persistent and genuine endeavours to find the facts through quick assessments, following up with further queries, and inquiry officer inquiries. Their attempts were often frustrated by outright deceit by those who knew the truth, and, not infrequently, misguided resistance to inquiries and investigations by their superiors.
“The Australian Defence Force had in place a system of operational reporting and investigatory mechanisms including quick assessments, Australian Defence Force Investigative Service investigations, and inquiry officer inquiries, designed to provide command oversight and respond to allegations of unlawful conduct. However, these systems failed to detect breaches of Law of Armed Conflict that were identified during the course of the Inquiry. The failure of oversight mechanisms was contributed to by an accumulation of factors.
“First, commanders trusted their subordinates … Secondly, commanders were protective of their subordinates … Thirdly, there was a presumption, not founded in evidence, to discount local national complaints as insurgent propaganda or motivated by a desire for compensation. … Fourthly, the liberal interpretation of when a ‘squirter’ (a local national observed to run from a compound of interest) could be taken to be ‘directly participating in hostilities’, coupled with an understanding of how to describe an engagement to satisfy reporting expectations, combined to contribute to the creation of a sense of impunity among operators.
“Fifthly, consciously or unconsciously, quick assessment officers generally approached their task as being to collect evidence to refute a complaint, rather than to present a fair and balanced assessment of the evidence. … Sixthly, inquiry officers did not have the requisite index of suspicion, and lacked some of the forensic skills and experience to conduct a complex inquiry into what were, essentially, allegations of murder. … Seventhly, as a result, operational reporting, and the outcomes of quick assessments and inquiry officer inquiries, were accorded a level of confidence by higher command, which they did not in fact deserve.”
If those are the causes of the failure of the leaders of the ADF to identify much earlier that there were serious problems with war crimes being committed by their forces in Afghanistan, why won’t the failures recur?
Most of these factors are common to all sorts of big organisations. It is the obligation of their leaders to ensure that proper culture is all pervasive and that problems are detected and righted. In good organisations, the buck stops at the top. If the rumours did reach the upper echelons of the Defence Force, why were they only addressed many years later, when the leaders of the time were handsomely retired? If the rumours did not rise upwards, it points to a serious organisational failure.
Certainly, the Defence Force is a very particular type of organisation. Supposedly it is highly disciplined with command coming from the top. (By contrast, Brereton says that under “the theory of mission command espoused by the Australian Army … subordinates are empowered and entrusted to implement, in their own way, their superior commander’s intent.”) Nearly uniquely among Australian organisations, the ADF’s social licence includes the use of lethal force in the name of us all. A key condition of that licence is that the Defence Force leadership keeps an eagle eye. As an institution, it is simply not an adequate response for the Defence Force to say “we didn’t know”.
There needs to be an investigation of who knew what when. We need to learn from what has gone so seriously wrong.
The chiefs of the Defence Force over the period of the reported war crimes (2009-2013) were Angus Houston and David Hurley; while Ken Gillespie and David Morrison were the heads of Army. Hurley is Australia’s Governor-General. His appointment was announced shortly before the last federal election. Houston has held various senior public positions since his retirement from Defence in 2011.
China’s recent social media post was cruel. But our Defence Forces exposed us to its humiliating depiction.
Reverting to the “walk backs”: I predict that, contrary to the initial announcement, regimental honours and the like will be retained. No unit or regiment will be disbanded. The process, which has already taken so many years – the worst allegations go back seven and eight years – will take as long again. Few people will go trial and none will be convicted. Already the decision seems to have been taken that people who would be guilty as accessories to murder for making murders look like combat deaths – an offence carrying the same penalty as murder itself – will not be tried for murder. At worst, they will simply be dismissed from the Army.
Lawyer, formerly senior federal public servant (CEO Constitutional Commission, CEO Law Reform Commission, Department of PM&C, Protective Security Review and first Royal Commission on Intelligence and Security; High Court Associate (1971) ; partner of major law firms. Awarded Premier’s Award (2018) and Law Institute of Victoria’s President’s Award for pro bono work (2005).
Comments
15 responses to “What responsibility does ADF’s top brass have for war crimes in Afghanistan?”
Am I being banned ?
One more try.
Not for Prime Time: “US Kills 951 Civilians!”
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/51172.htm
I’m not sure why David McBride’s revelations about the rotten (my word) culture and possible war crimes in Afghanistan which he reported in 2014 are not acknowledged. He made complaints internally before he went public to the ABC and the Afghan Files program was broadcast in 2017. I understand he made his concerns known at the highest levels, including to General Hurley and Malcolm Turnbull.
Why he is still facing charges and years in jail when others are being lauded for coming forward at a later date, is unfathomable.
His trial proper has not started yet, although he was first arrested in 2018, and secrecy in the hearings is a hallmark, as in the trials of Bernard Collaery and Witness K. All under the guise of national security. What BS.
David McBride said publicly this year that he wants the cases against Collaery and K to
proceed because “… I know this is going to blow up in their face.”
The $500 million redevelopment of the War Memorial has been approved https://cutt.ly/ehYoCP1. The priorities remain unchanged.
We pick people for their unusual tendencies because they serve a particular purpose, we then get politicians who do not understand that purpose but know a marketing opportunity when they see one. We then put these people in a situation, where they apparently, are totally uncontrolled, are let loose on an unsuspecting local population and we allow a rotation schedule that is almost designed to send people insane and military top brass is incredulously surprised at the outcome.
The whole exercise was rotten from top to bottom and yet the only people who have been punished are those that have tried to bring this to public attention. How incompetent and corrupt do you have to get as both a General and a politician before the paying taxpayer finally says I have had enough. I am well aware that this has occurred and been encouraged by both the major parties and I despair.
We as a people need moral courage more than ever. Our institutions and elected leaders are failing all of us. It needs to stop and they need to be held to account. We as a people can no longer afford their hubris and incompetence.
Western soldiers are also victims of imperial policies. They are commanded by lunacy to commit lunacy and yet somehow, they are, expected to maintain their sanity and morality.
Keith Lamb
Invading armies have no rights they have responsibilities and that goes back to the initial bombings which were illegal!
The Inquiry system looks as if it is an exact copy of The Victorian Legal Services Commissioner`s method of investigating customers complaints against lawyers. Need to look deep into the culture of the nation then you can see how it happened. If the legislative structure of the nation will not incorporate quality standards, how can we expect soldiers in battle to do the right thing.
No doubt with the assistance of News, Morrison with continue his nothing to see here modus operandi and the stories of previous crimes will be put back on the shelf where he and his like would have them belong. At all costs, and especially since conscription is not likely in a future of professionally trained armed forces, a reliable supply of future cannon fodder/mentally damaged applicants must be at hand at all times in case we get (or anticipate) the call.
Why else are standing resources maintained somewhere in Defence to promote Anzac Day as the numbers of ex-servicemen fit to march are a tiny fraction of those who participated in previous decades?
Such a depressing conclusion. But if this proves to be the case there must be charges laid against the politicians who put us into Iraq and Afghanistan and the national rules for future engagement in US-generated conflicts/any other engagements certainly not left to people of the calibre of Howard, Abbott, Morrison and their ignorant ilk.
The fundamental character or spirit of an organization is set by the example of those at the top. In light of what happened, I agree with you Ian: it is not permissible for those in command to say “we didn’t know”.
It was the responsibility of all levels of command to see and understand that in such a difficult environment, the job being left to NCO’s was an almost impossible task.
Also, given the length of time over which allegations and rumors were said to have circulated and persisted it
was IMO wholly inappropriate for the ADF to investigate its own. That task should at the earliest have been given to a civilian authority with experience in criminal investigation – something that should be a standing requirement from now on.
I agree with your conclusion Ian, also it’s likely we won’t hear anything more from senior ADF staff.
As Morrison is now interposing himself to weaken General Campbell’s authority, is Morrison now one of “those at the top” to whom we should be looking for discipline in the ADF?
If this is all swept under the carpet as some fear, will it be up to the Chinese to remind us of our shortcomings as we fail to deal with them ourselves?
1. It stretches credulity to assert that higher echelons of the ADF were unaware of “problems” when rumours (and actual accounts) of wrongdoing were openly circulating, albeit not in mainstream media. Another instance of choosing what you don’t want to know.
2. Odd that what appears to be ongoing Australian complicity in war crimes involving our ally’s use of drones, with their ‘collateral damage’, coordinated through Pine Gap, has gained no further attention given the (rare) current attention on such evil. See e.g. https://newmatilda.com/2016/10/08/sanctioned-murder-australias-role-in-drone-strikes-on-innocent-civilians-is-growing/
“… few would have imagined some of our elite soldiers would engage in the conduct that has been described.”
Then it is the SAS commanders who should have joined those few.
Australian soldiers went to Iraq on the lie of WMDs. And we stayed long after the lie was exposed. We went to Afghanistan at the request of an ally. We rained naval bombardments on whole cities and counted all the dead as being terr’ists. Soldiers in the field speak knowledgeably all day long about the cynicism of their mission. They wrote home about it and discussed it on leave.
Any commander and any inquirer needs no wisdom of hindsight to predict what happened at the front. It happened at My Lai, it happened from gunships over Iraq and it was wholly to be expected.
Justice Brereton has done us a great service with his report. But it was General Brereton speaking when he denied its predictability.
The behaviour of the rank and file, the NCOs and the command was entirely predictable. What, after all is the actual mission in Afghanistan? Is it not (another) colonial conquest? And, given the abject failure of that objective, is it not one of area denial? That is, having failed in the primary mission of subjugation, the fall back position is to deny the territory to the perceived adversaries in the Great Game – most particularly to place a road block to the Belt and Road. Our troops were carrying out the actual mission, which is to stamp out in blood any resistance to the occupation. Spare us the mealy mouthed platitudes about the welfare of the people.
Look, the exposure of Brereton is better than nothing, and maybe ADF will be a bit less careless with their SAS units, but it is a given that shooters take the rap, not top military brass or key LibLab ministers.
If I observe that Gillard and Smith were staying the course with no dilution, when many or most of the murders happened, the response I usually get is “Why do you hate Julia?”.