Lieutenant-General Peter Francis Leahy was Chief of Army from 2002-2008. After a 37-year career, he retired to become director of the National Security Institute and a professor at the University of Canberra.
Fitz: You are the longest-serving Chief of Army since General Harry Chauvel in the 1920s. Do you keep the honorific of “general” in retirement, and insist upon it, or are you busted down to “Mr” on the day of retirement?
PL: (Laughs). No, you’re allowed to keep the honorific there as long as you put (Rtd.) in brackets after your name. When people don’t know what to call me, I invite them to call me “Peter”.
Fitz: General, what have we learned from the war in Ukraine?
PL: So many things, starting with the way a nation might be threatened beyond just military action, like cyber warfare, economic warfare, grey zone warfare . . .
Fitz: “Grey zone” warfare?
PL: It’s a relatively new theory, which says that, rather than actually go to war, you can challenge a state in the lead up to war. So what we saw in Crimea, and what was seen leading up to Ukraine, was the use of “little green men”, in military parlance: people who come in as mercenaries and try and disrupt things. We’re talking Special Forces, foreign intelligence, all running disruption operations so that hopefully the state collapses before the military arrives. And I think that’s where Mr Putin has got it so wrong. He didn’t play his strongest cards on grey zone warfare – attacking Ukraine’s railways, electricity systems, banking systems or anything like that – and he didn’t appreciate that the Ukrainians would fight the way they have.
Fitz: The lesson being?
PL: A reminder of the power of the people with a great leader. Putin thought Zelensky was just a comedian, but he has shone, brought his country together by showing such bravery, staying there, reaching out to the world, and his people have responded to him magnificently.
Fitz: What have we learnt about state-of-the-art warfare, in terms of military hardware?
PL: That numbers don’t necessarily bring you victory. The Russians have got more tanks than the Ukrainians and much more firepower. But they don’t appear to have morale, that sense of cohesion in the force that makes them want to fight. The Ukrainians do, and it makes all the difference.
Fitz: There’s a line going round the internet to the effect that “The great mistake made by Putin is sending slaves to liberate an already free people.” Is that the heart of it?
PL: Yes! The other thing is General Valery Gerasimov, the Russian Chief of the General Staff had been tasked with reforming the Russian Army for the last 10 years, and clearly, he hasn’t done it. He must have been lying to Putin because surely if Putin had known the poor state of his army he wouldn’t have invaded. And it has changed everyone’s perception. A few people were proposing the Ukraine was just the start, and the next Russian target would be Latvia, Estonia, Finland, and even Sweden.
PF: Can we hope for Russia’s complete defeat?
PL: I think we can. Putin has miscalculated on the operational front, and I’m not sure he’s got the Russian people behind him. It’s possible the General Staff might have a go at Putin. I think he’s out on the ledge right now.
PF: It has been announced that Australia will send Ukraine some of our armoured troop carriers. Is this wise?
PL: I don’t think so. It is a long way away, and why is little old Australia sending them hardware like that when you’ve got 22 countries of NATO with their own hardware so nearby? We can support them in other ways with medical supplies, providing humanitarian aid and through economic sanctions. If we are supporting democracy, there are countries in Africa we’ll be flying over to get there, that need our help much more on the democratic front. And we should be focusing on defensive measures in our region, rather than so far away.
Fitz: Speaking of which . . . After Prime Minister Harold Wilson announced in 1968 that Britain was going to withdraw its forces “East of Suez”, President Nixon the following year unleashed his Guam Doctrine which said, broadly, “and don’t expect America, either”. Despite that, in the 70s we had Australia’s own defence minister Jim Killen saying that “the Australian Army couldn’t defend Botany Bay on a sunny Sunday afternoon”. Would we do much better now?
PL: Our major threats right now are from a terrorism event, foreign interference, espionage. I don’t think there’s an immediate threat of an invasion of Australia. But back in Killen’s time we were saying we’ve got 10 or 12 years warning time. I don’t think we’ve got that amount of warning time now. And given the small size of our defence force and its capabilities, I think we need to concentrate in this region. And you mentioned Jim Killen. When he was around we were running the Armoured Personnel Carrier the M-113. Well, we’re still running the bloody thing! In many ways, we haven’t brought about those big scale capability changes that we need. I joined the Army in 1971 and we were 34,000 strong. When we went into Afghanistan and Iraq, the army was around 24,000. It’s now back around 30,000. It needs to be larger. We have really limited capabilities to do more.
Fitz: Bob Katter has called for conscription and teaching schoolchildren how to fire rifles. Is he barking mad?
PL: I don’t think we should look at conscription. But we could reintroduce the Ready Reserve model. And that is kids coming out of school and instead of going on a gap year – who’s travelling to Asia or Europe these days? – they could get into the army for one year full-time, and then sign up for four years in the reserve. And we should have our version of the GI Bill, so that if you join the army, after a period of service, you get funded for a university degree or some other form of tertiary training. I think this could also build a sense of national belonging. My wife Lee who you know, has this terrific saying at the moment: “We seem to be trying to find ways that we can divide ourselves rather than things that will unite us.”
PF: Is it wise to have put so many eggs in the submarine basket? People talk about underwater drones being so advanced, by the time our submarines are online, submarines will be obsolete?
PL: I think it is wise, we’re going to need them. Submarines have a terrific deterrent effect.
Fitz: What about all the tanks we’ve just bought? If we are concentrating on defending Australia, it is inconceivable we’ll have tanks going down the main street of Grafton to defend against a nearby landing, surely?
PL: No, but we do need them to be able to operate at higher levels of conventional war. I don’t know if your journalistic mates with Greg Sheridan – “Fitz: – not particularly!” – but he has been critical of the tanks saying they can’t move around. Well, if you look in Asia, there are plenty of highways. They can move alright! And if we are going to put our troops in forward situations in the future, they have to have hardware like tanks to survive. They shouldn’t go without the equipment they need because some commentators don’t think it’s a good idea. I’m pleased that Peter Dutton is not taking their advice.
Fitz: I guess at least with our tanks, we won’t have enough to have a line 60 kilometres long, like the Russians. Would we get to 500 metres if we lined them up all end to end or not?
PL: At 120 tanks, it would be respectable!
I didn’t post the whole article because they veered off the topic. But, aside the way this Australian sees the war in Ukraine, it made it clear to me now that the country can’t be as generous with military gear for Ukraine, seeing their tiny sized force. That surprised me that Australia’s military is so tiny.
The population of Australia is only about 30 million.