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120 australian maritime issues 2009: spc-a annual
your army can do against your enemy’s territory and national life, or
else by the fear of what the fleet makes it possible for your army to do’.
Therefore, victory is usually achieved on land. 14
But unfortunately this conclusion is both overly simplistic and a non sequitur. In
preference the last sentence should read something like: Enabled by maritime
expeditionary forces, victory is usually achieved militarily, politically and economically
when the enemy population withdraws their support for their forces on land. 15 The
national failure to adequately recognise the importance of the sea in Australia’s defence
(sea-blindness) is not just reflected within the Australian community: it is confirmation
that the ADF fails to communicate the maritime message.
Expeditionary Operations
Since the end of the Cold War, expeditionary operations have once again come to the fore,
particularly amongst Western powers. 16 For example, the Royal Navy’s Future Maritime
Operating Concept is based upon ‘an integrated, expeditionary capability designed to
prevail in the most demanding circumstances and configured to support the decisive
achievement of political expectations and strategic objectives’. 17 There are many reasons
to send an expedition offshore and, despite some evolving terminology, the fundamentals
have not changed all that much over time. Indeed the application of military power
during the first part of the 21st century has many similarities with its application during
the later part of the Victorian period; only the British have been replaced by the United
States as the dominant maritime power. Towards the end of the 19th century, Colonel
George Furse of the British Army suggested that:
A state may resort to expeditions for a variety of purposes; the foremost amongst
these are:
• an invasion with the object of conquest and territorial aggrandisement
• as a means of transferring a war into the enemy’s country
• as a diversion, to ease the pressure brought on an allied power
• as a preliminary measure, to establish a base for ulterior offensive
operations
• to curb the arbitrary power of a state or ruler
• to destroy the enemy’s arsenals and dockyards and such, which
constitute a standing menace
• to deliver a country from foreign domination
• to obtain redress or to avenge an insult to the national flag
• to protect the commerce of the world. 18