New Zealand Defence White Paper 2016 Released

[Dave Homewood]

www.beehive.govt.nz/release/defence-white-paper-signals-20b-investment-plan

[Dave Homewood]

$20 billion investment sounds good but then you note it is over 15 years, so that averages to $1.33 Billion per year. Is this on top of the day to day running costs? Or is that the Defence total budget? Surely not the latter?

No mention of air transport, I guess we're sticking with the Hercules fleet for the next 15 years.

[ErrolC]

The "release" doesn't link to the White Paper itself, only an infographic and Q&A.

When will more detail be available about the Defence capabilities signalled in the
White Paper?
More detail about the planned mix of Defence Force capabilities will be provided
when the next Defence Capability Plan is published later this year.

Why isn’t the White Paper more specific about the costs attached to individual
capabilities?

• This White Paper is costed and funded, meaning that costs have been modelled as
  part of the Defence White Paper process to provide Government with confidence
  about the overall cost of Defence capability out to 2030.
  
• Specific costs will be refined as part of the development of individual capability
  business cases. It would be premature to release these now, especially before
  Government has made firm decisions about capability purchases as part of the
  formal business case process.

[shorty]

Dave, from Stuff
It will also continue with programmes to replace New Zealand's aging fleet of Boeing 757s, C-130 Hercules and surveillance aircraft, the Orions.

[Dave Homewood]

Spoil sport, I was having a bit of fun with the transport theorists.

[skyhawkdon]

I suspect the dollars being talked about are the "whole of life" cost of the new equipment, not just their purchase price.

[Dave Homewood]

I hope they don't waste it all on more useless boats.

[beagle]

20 billion, now lets see, 2 x C17's, 4 x C27's, 4 x CH53k's, .....evening Dave

[macnz]

Thanks Dave.

Here's the budget estimate: www.budget.govt.nz/budget/pdfs/estimates/v4/est16-v4-deffor.pdf

Its pretty ludicrous that a White paper due in Dec 2015 is still not here in June 2016 ...but then again should we be surprised when we look at how Gerry has managed the CHCH Earthquake rebuild?

In the Budget estimate;
Pgs 9 (55), 11 (57), & 13 (59) outlines what each service expects "to achieve" with their appropriation which is quite funny when we are talking about a defense budget for 2016/17 of $2.2billion - that includes $501 million for the "purchase of assets" and $1.36billion OPEX on 3 services:
New Zealand Army >> $543 million
Royal New Zealand Air Force >> $517 million and
Royal New Zealand Navy >> $308 million.

$501m split 3 ways on assets doesn't purchase much of anything these days. If RNZAF got the whole amount maybe they could lease but certainly not purchase any aircraft during the year. Probably be lucky if we got 2 drones and a console for that amount.

$20 billion over 15 years? Please. If we believe that and indeed that averages $1.33 billion p/year - then what happen to the other $832 million for FY2016/17?


Defense news covered our spend last week:
www.defensenews.com/story/defense/international/asia-pacific/2016/06/03/new-zealand-defense-budget/85286358/

[suthg]

Find a copy of last night's news and find we are losing 30 aircraft, 757's, Orions, Hercs, ... what else is going? Is this man mad?

Oh and two Frigates as well...

Orions are to be upgraded more sensors and probably an engine upgrade as well.

[pepe]

Jun 8, 2016 20:45:06 GMT 12 Dave Homewood said:

I hope they don't waste it all on more useless boats.

You don't want to read this then.......

www.shephardmedia.com/news/imps-news/ice-patrol-littoral-support-nzdf/

The "Senior Service" hasn't been forgotten...

[Dave Homewood]

If they buy boats that are not a waste of money and can give good service, fine. But buying boats that sit in dock all their life because they haven't got what it takes seems to be the RNZN way these days.

[madmac]

The white paper is here
www.defence.govt.nz/reports-publications/dwp-2016/defence-white-paper-2016.html

It is all a bit wishy washy, with little to no facts, and standard repetition of NZDF / government propaganda. Nor is there an out breaks of brilliance. OK so standard government document produced under National.

The Cyber warfare capability is good, but it doesn't cover how they plan to get it right (only took 70 year to get the best use of automatic weapons).

looking at the threat assessments, if it was 1941, i think it wouldn't have had a negative thing to say about the Japs and the Germans. The rise of isolationist policies / erratic politics from the USA (and the fact that these are only going to increase) and the PRC's on going destabilisation of the south china sea both have serous impact on long term defense planning, but neither get a look in.


All in all, its more of the same.

[shorty]

If Auntie Helen gets to be the boss of the UN there will be lots of "clapped out" aircraft coming on the market as she decides that all the member countries will have no need of defence assets! We should be able to pick up some real bargains, all we then need to do is to get some service infrastructure re-instated

[madmac]

Can any one enlighten me as to why they term China was used in the white paper, China denotes a region and race, not a country, to use China instead of People republic of China (PRC), or was it one of the terms of the free trade agreement.

[Dave Homewood]

Maybe for the same reason it uses the term "United Kingdom" rather than United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, of "United States" rather than "United States of America", because the whole world knows what the terms mean and there's no need to bother writing the full title?

I had never realised that the NZ Govt considers China "an important strategic partner for New Zealand". Do we have a close defence relationship in terms of exercises and exchanges and defence deals, like we do with the USA and Australia?

[saratoga]

It was about the teacups.
The major threat to NZ is of course cutlery,hence the use of China in the paper.Especially that extra threatening type,Fine Bone China.

[kiwithrottlejockey]

Considering how much New Zealand (and most countries around the world) relies on China for manufactured goods and clothing and computers and mobile phones, I guess we'd be screwed if we fell-out with China.

Then, there is the USA which is in hock to the tune of trillions of dollars to China.

No wonder many people claim the 21st century will turn out to be the Chinese Century, just as the 20th century became the American century, superceeding the British Century, which was the 19th century.

[madmac]

falling out with PRC would be much the same as the USA or the EU, painful for some but not fatal.

The population demographics of the PRC, means its unlikely to have a long run on top, the work force is shrinking by 3 million a year and this is going to accurate rapidly in the next 10 or so years. Think more along the lines of rise and stagnation of Japan, except that PRC leadership is terrified of its people (spending on internal security is greater than that of the military) what they will do to keep the people sympathetic to the leadership is problem.

[ErrolC]

New Zealand’s Defence White Paper: look south
Peter Jennings
The Strategist — The Australian Strategic Policy Institute Blog

www.aspistrategist.org.au/new-zealands-defence-white-paper-look-south/