Thread: An opinion piece on Australia and the Afghanistan War

Andrew Hastie, MP, SAS, tells it as it is.


"First, we have forgotten basic truths about human nature that previous generations of Australians better understood.

Second, we ignored the true nature of war and sanitised it

Third, parliamentary scrutiny of Defence is broken and needs fixing.

Fourth, the Brereton Report rightly condemns a warrior culture that fused ‘military excellence with ego, entitlement and exceptionalism’

Fifth, in the hierarchy of virtues, moral courage remains paramount to physical courage

So before people cry for a repudiation of all warrior culture, they should first understand what you need in an elite special operations unit. You need people who run to the sound of the guns. Who are prepared to fight and destroy Australia’s enemies. Who will die doing so, if necessary. Those men exist. They are serving at present. They have done nothing wrong. We need to uphold them and their vital mission. They will not be helped by soulless modern cultural theory, derived from the academic ivory tower. It may well diminish our effectiveness if shoe-horned and institutionalised.


OPINION: Andrew Hastie MP/ex-SAS – on Brereton Inquiry - CONTACT magazine (contactairlandandsea.com)

Senator Lambie , re Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran suicide.


17 December 2020To the Veteran community,Re: Royal Commission into defence and veteran suicide

It’s the end of the political year and I want to update you on where things stand with respect to the campaign for a Royal Commission into defence and veteran suicide. I’ve noticed there’s a bit of confusion floating around about what’s happening right now, as well as what comes next. The Government and Pauline Hanson’s One Nation have 38 votes in the Senate, of 76. You need an absolute majority (39 votes, under normal circumstances) to pass legislation; a tied vote counts as a fail. With only One Nation and the Coalition supporting the legislation for a National Commissioner for Defence and Veteran Suicide Prevention, the legislation cannot pass the Senate. The Government has indicated it intends to spend the summer Christmas break trying to switch the votes of members of the Senate crossbench, with a view to putting the legislation to a vote only once it has the numbers to pass. During the last sitting fortnight of 2020, the Government twice joined with Pauline Hanson’s One Nation to oppose procedural moves to require the National Commissioner’s enabling legislation to be dealt with before Christmas of 2020. The preference of the two was that the legislation not be debated, amended or passed before that time. In both instances, Jacqui Lambie, Senator Rex Patrick, Centre Alliance, the Greens and the Australian Labor Party supported the move to bring the bill on for debate.

The interim National Commissioner, Bernadette Boss CSC, continues her work on a desktop review of known suicides from 2001-2018. It’s been confirmed that the legislation is not required for this initial work to proceed. The fact that this legislation has not gone to a vote means that it remains on the Senate’s Notice Paper until it is resolved. Until it is no longer on the Notice Paper, it is not defeated. With little notice, the Government can bring anything that sits on the Notice Paper up for debate. With little notice, debate can be brought to an abrupt end, and a final vote be taken. The Government will not do that (as it would amount to rushing into a loss), preferring instead to keep open the chance to persuade one Senator presently opposed to the National Commissioner to either change their mind or abstain from the vote. (With a Senator abstaining from the final vote, the total available number of votes is 75, not 76. Considering that passage requires an absolute majority, which in the event of an abstention is 38, the Government would achieve the same outcome from a Senator abstaining as it would from a Senator voting with them.)In short, the battle continues. The Government does not have the numbers to pass their legislation; we do not have the numbers to have it discarded.

Without a change to the numbers in the Senate, the legislation will come to a vote at a moment of the Government’s choosing (if ever).I’m firmly of the view that victory isn’t simply depriving one’s opponent of victory. Until this is won, it’s not. But we are winning. That much is clear. Between now and the new year, my focus will be on campaigning as if nothing has changed :

telling the public what the difference is between the Government’s National Commissioner and a Royal Commission and where the Government’s model falls short. Defeating the National Commissioner is a critical step in the campaign for a Royal Commission.

It remains an important obstacle to overcome. Defeating it requires more than blocking from it coming to a vote. We seek a vote, which we will win. Then, having won, we just keep going.



Yours Sincerely, Senator Jacqui Lambie Senator for Tasmania