concerened anyone???
NZ Confident White Paper Will Provide Adequate Capabilities
By Nick Lee-Frampton
Published: 1 Apr 2010 10:50 PRINT | EMAIL
Wellington - New Zealand's delayed defense white paper "will cover a capability mix that … will allow us to meet our security obligations and deliver value for money," Defence Minister Wayne Mapp told delegates at the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia-Pacific 2nd Study Group on Naval Enhancement in the Asia-Pacific.
Mapp said that some defense observers have pointed with concern to modernization plans, in particular naval modernization efforts, by regional defense forces, but that he is optimistic that change in the Asia-Pacific region can be "managed peacefully."
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"It is inevitable that naval capability will grow along with economic capability," Mapp said March 26.
New Zealand's next defense white paper (DWP) had been expected at the end of March but has been delayed six months while officials find about 50 million New Zealand dollars ($35.5 million) a year for the next few years.
As Mapp explained March 7 when he announced the DWP would not appear as scheduled: "There are some challenges, largely due to the recession and things of that nature, that we have to deal with over the next five years, so we're doing a value-for-money exercise, a deep look into the defense system to see if we can get resources essentially from the back office to the front. We've got to sort that out because when the report's published, people have got to have confidence that it's affordable actually over the entire 25 years.
"It's not a cost-cutting exercise; what's occurring over the next three years or so, we're receiving nearly 2 billion dollars of new equipment - helicopters, upgraded aircraft, of course the Project Protector fleet. That pushes up operational costs in particular, and right at a time when the economy is, you know, recovering. So we do have to be able to shift a bit of resources out from the back to the front," he said.
There is no possibility that New Zealand will increase its traditional funding of 1 percent of GDP spent for defense. Indeed, Roderick Deane, erstwhile head of (NZ) Telecom and the State Services Commission, and known nationally for imposing ruthless economic efficiency, has recently been appointed to lead a so-called "value-for-money review." It may be that defense spending will go down, if not simply sideways as Mapp said is required.
Defense News understands that the defense force was not forewarned of Deane's appointment.
Mapp is blunt about what has to be done: "New Zealand faces tight fiscal realities, and so we must be more deliberate on where our defense dollars are spent. The DWP will therefore outline a realistic and affordable defense plan."
Ron Smith, co-director of International Relations and Security Studies at the University of Waikato in Hamilton, told Defense News he expects the white paper will be "driven by financial considerations, by what we want to spend rather than by an assessment of contingencies and what we might need."
Smith cautioned that "a policy that doesn't anticipate capability requirements in a broad way is a policy that is going to fail you."
Lance Beath of the Centre for Strategic Studies at Victoria University of Wellington expressed dismay at the financial focus that has delayed publication of the white paper.
"It seems to me a credible, if disappointing, line for those of us where there was hope held out that this defense review might attempt to tackle additional resources."
Beath said that "over the last 20 years or so there has been a marked divergence" between Australian and New Zealand white papers, the former arguing they have to be prepared to fight a conventional war.
"We tend to say the prospects for … war appear to be … vanishingly small, therefore it is a waste of time and resources to prepare for the improbable, so instead lets focus on peace-related operations."
Phil Goff, defense minister with the previous (Labour) government and now Labor Party leader, said he was puzzled at the explanation for delaying the DWP.
"Given the white paper is at a strategic level, I can't see any good reason why that should have to rely on a short-term focus on a cost-cutting exercise. It doesn't really make sense to me that that is the reason for the deferral.
"I don't think the explanation is adequate and the consequences of the deferral [include] an absence of policy and an absence in any area of moving forward with defense. I just find it extraordinary that [the government] will have had no defense policy of their own for [so long]; they are simply maintaining the status quo."
From
www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=4562392&c=ASI&s=ALLanyone now feel a bit unsure about the DWP?
Funding the capabilities recommended by the review should be an outcome of the review, not the other way round! So long as funding is kept at 1% of GDP (or less) then NZDF war fighting capability will continue to shrink.
great one there Labour!! 
