Missile firing
The Integration of Joint and Single-ServiceDoctrine – Ensuring Maritime, Land andAir Concepts are Understood and AppliedBy Captain P.D. Leschen, RAN5Australia’s single Services have a long history of joint operations, dating back to the expeditionto capture German New Guinea in 1914. During World War II, joint <strong>Australian</strong> operationalactivity involving units from all three Services reached its peak during the final operations in theNew Guinea-Bougainville-Borneo areas. Notwithstanding this evidence of interoperability there hasbeen a parallel tendency towards independent operations, albeit often as part of a larger alliedforce.In the aftermath of the Vietnam War, it became clear that the level of independent planningwas inconsistent with the future needs of <strong>Australian</strong> security. Although each Service argued that itsplanning assumptions were the product of endorsed strategic guidance, each was also working fromdifferent doctrinal foundations. The push for a more coherent defence organisation in the 1970s,combined with the move towards greater defence self-reliance, has resulted in a greater focus onjoint operations.Over the past 20 years, the ADF has madegreat strides in its capability to plan andconduct joint operations. This joint approachis reflected in strategic guidance, in the ADFcommand structure and, increasingly, in theway we structure the force. The effectivenessof these arrangements has been tested in anongoing program of major exercises andoperations, which indicate that, while thereare always improvements to be made, thebasic approach is both sound and successful.The operations in East Timor provide the mostrecent and prominent example.ADF and single-Service doctrine giveprimacy to a joint approach while recognisingthat the professional mastery of the singleServices is the key to the creation of aneffective joint capability. At the strategic andoperational levels, the various doctrinalpublications are in close alignment in theircoverage of the nature of conflict, strategicpolicy, the operational art, and the variousaspects of campaign planning andimplementation. Indeed, there is considerablerepetition of these themes in the joint<strong>Australian</strong> <strong>Defence</strong> Doctrine Publication(ADDP) series and the strategic level maritime,land and aerospace doctrine publications. 1The maritime, land and aerospace doctrinepublications, however, also include strategicconcepts from the Maritime, Continental andAir Schools of Strategic Thought, such as seaand air control. These concepts are importantin understanding how to employ militarycapabilities as part of a coordinated jointcampaign, yet they are not covered in jointdoctrine or the <strong>Australian</strong> Military Strategy(AMS), 2 either individually or in an integratedway. The concepts are covered in the<strong>Australian</strong> Command and Staff Course, butagain not in a particularly integrated way.Doctrinally, the ADF has a situation wherejoint, maritime, land and aerospace conceptsare expressed in four different languages,which are not necessarily well understoodacross the ADF. Moreover, the structure ofour doctrine could be taken to imply that themaritime, land and aerospace concepts are