The Anzac tradition. (Letters).

SIR: The article by Dr Michael Evans on "Towards an Australian Way of Warfare" (July-August 2002) starts with a review of the manner in which the concept of a "way in warfare" has been developed, and the dependence of such ways of warfare on the political and strategic culture of individual nations. However, Dr Evans then defines a way of warfare as essentially the set of attitudes and beliefs of the military establishment, which is not necessarily the same thing.

On reading the first three-quarters of the article, the almost inexorable conclusion emerges that the Australian way of warfare is continentally oriented, and based on the Anzac tradition, with its culture of the volunteer citizen force. This is broadly as argued by Sol Encel in 1966 and more recently by Carl Bridge, Glyn Harper and Iain Spence, all quoted in the article.

However, Dr Evans attempts to dismiss this concept, using four arguments. First, he describes the Anzac tradition as also being a metaphor for nationhood, which it probably is. However, this surely links it closely (through the concepts of the political and strategic culture of individual nations) to the national image of its way of warfare. And one of the most important elements of the Anzac tradition is the rejection of militarism, and thus rejection of reliance on the attitudes and beliefs of the military establishment.

Dr Evans' second argument relies on the requirement for staff work, logistics, training, leadership and the formulation of strategy, implicitly in his view unable to be provided by citizen forces. However, he ignores that these requirements have always existed, and have been met in the past by the Regular forces that have always existed alongside the citizen military tradition in Australia. The Anzac tradition was founded on this co-operation and thrived through two world wars on it.

Indeed, David Homer (in his book Crisis of Command) suggested that one way to effectively combine the two elements is to have the citizen soldiers command the fighting organisations, while the Regulars lead the operations and administrative staffs. Given the apparently inexorable trend towards a higher proportion of officers and officer cadets in the Regular Services (from 18 per cent in 1991 to 23 per cent in 2001), the personnel to enable staff work, logistics, training, leadership and the formulation of strategy should be readily available!

The third argument used to reject the Anzac/citizen force tradition relies on claims that the Digger legend means little to the contemporary navy and air force, and is therefore irrelevant to modern Australian military practice. Putting aside the question of whether that tradition might still be relevant to the army, perhaps Dr Evans and those he quotes should bear in ...