Ibid - Australian Army

Land Warfare Studies Centre 54
Theatre Response Force and was to produce an updated Musorian
Armed Forces pamphlet to provide Exercise Enemy doctrine. 223
Only in June 1998 did the Army seek to make the RTA trials more
compatible with changes in defence policy. In a revised RTA Trials
Master Plan, it was stated that ‘trials will be conducted within
operational scenarios drawn from analysis of the 1997 strategic
review, “Australia’s Strategic Policy” (ASP 97)’. 224 Phase 2 of the
RTA Trials was to ‘assess the adaptability and versatility of the
Phase 1 TF to the off-shore DAA, DRI and DGI tasks identified in
ASP 97 in order to identify additional capabilities that may be
required in the ECF [Enhanced Combat Force]’. 225 By December
1998, the current of strategic change had effectively rendered
MLW One 1.3, Operations in Defence of Australia 1996, and
MLW One 2.1, Task Force Operations in Defence of Operations
1996—both fundamental to the A21 scheme—obsolete only two
years after their publication. Both documents were to be superseded
by new Army Trials Doctrine. 226
Maritime Strategy and the Modernisation of Australian Army
Doctrine, 1998–99
223
224
225
226
Ibid.; Australian Army, The Musorian Armed Forces, Army Trials
Doctrine 4.3, 1st edn, Version 1, Land Operations, Tactics,
Techniques and Procedures, Parts 1 and 2, Headquarters Training
Command, Sydney, January 1998.
Australian Army, Office of the Chief of Army, ‘Restructuring of the
Army Trials Master Plan’, 6 June 1998, p. 1. Minute signed by
Lieutenant General John Sanderson. Copy in author’s possession.
Ibid.
Australian Army, Doctrine Status and Development 1999,
Headquarters Training Command, Sydney, December 1998, p. 18,
para. 46. The aim of Army Trials Doctrine was to provide a separate
mechanism for developments to be assessed, thus creating a process
whereby relevant material could eventually be integrated into
mainstream Army doctrine.