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as support to PNGDF operations, training and logistics. 25 It also has involved periodic joint
exercises, such as Exercise OLGETA WARRIOR, as well as PNGDF personnel visiting Australia
for individual and collective training. 26
The individual training has included initial officer training at the Royal Military College
Duntroon, through to attendance at the Australian Command and Staff College and Centre for
Defence and Strategic Studies at the Australian Defence College. The collective training has
included Exercise WANTOK WARRIOR, whereby a PNGDF infantry company (±100 personnel)
has been attached to Army’s 3 rd Brigade in Townsville for a period of around one month
each year, providing an opportunity to improve its level of training by having access to the
operational experience resident within Army’s 3 rd Brigade, as well as exposure to facilities and
equipment not available in PNG.
From the ADF’s perspective, this reasonably extended period of training allows it to enhance
its interoperability with the PNGDF, build inter-personal relations and facilitate two-way skills
transfers, including what PNGDF soldiers are able to impart about operating in some of the
most difficult terrain in our region. The fruits of these exercises can be seen in Operation
ANODE, the ‘Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands’ (RAMSI), where a platoon
of PNGDF soldiers has been deployed as part of an ADF-led multinational company over a
number of years. 27
Given the level of joint ADF-PNGDF interoperability already established and fostered over a
number of years, particularly in training, peace-keeping and nation-building constructs, an
option might be to consider a more permanent concept, such as a standing joint ADF-PNGDF
unit with a primary role of responding to regional humanitarian assistance and disaster relief
contingencies in the Southwest Pacific. 28
Such a ‘Pacific Battalion’ could provide an enhanced ‘successor’ to RAMSI once Operation
ANODE concludes. Without speculating too far on what it might look like, an obvious option
would be to have a PNGDF infantry company attached to one of the ADF’s Townsville-based
infantry battalions to assist in the provision of a bilateral, regional response to any future
Southwest Pacific humanitarian assistance/ disaster relief events, perhaps for six months each
year (coinciding with the cyclone season). Clearly, the use of this joint force would need to
be agreed by both governments on a case-by-case basis but feasibly could be done under
the umbrella of the Pacific Islands Forum, not least to assuage any regional concerns as to
Australia’s motives. 29
Aid funding
Australia cannot, and probably should not, attempt to compete with the amount of aid funding
being spread across the Pacific by China and some other nations, particularly in countries
such as Fiji, whose current government is already predisposed to look to nations other than
Australia for assistance. 30
Indeed, matching these soft loans and opaque, untied aid that collectively total hundreds
of millions of dollars would be implausible in Australia’s current, constrained budgetary
environment—which has included Australia deferring its commitment to meet the UN’s
‘millennium goal’ of 0.5 per cent of gross national income being allocated to foreign aid. 31
Hence, innovative engagement strategies, such as those proposed in this article, are needed
to meet this challenge.