An excerpt from Admiral David Johnston’s keynote conversation at the ASPI Defence Conference 2026. Reflecting on 48 years of service, Australia’s Chief of the Defence Force identified the pace of technological change, vulnerable lines of communication, and the shrinking value of warning time as the most significant shifts he has witnessed.
I think what’s intensified would be a couple of items. The pace of change of technology — I started in a navy that was a carrier navy, and that technology changed over time as it adapted to the missile age and our own requirements. If we look at the implications of technology change and how quickly it’s accelerating, that’s an adaptation we’ve had to contend with.
I think the other change is lines of communication. Ninety-nine percent by volume of our trade moves by sea. Ninety-nine percent of our internet traffic moves through undersea cables. We’ve reorganized our industry base such that much of what we used to produce in Australia now comes from overseas, and we have a scheme built around just-in-time logistics, which has changed the way we look at lines of communication in and out of our country. Of course, we partly saw during COVID, and are seeing again now in an environment where fuel prices are increasing, what the consequences of those lines of communication being interrupted or less available can look like.
A few things have intensified. Time is one of them — the value we now have to place on time, in a way that was a luxury in the past. Those of you who are experts on defense policy would know we had a judgment that warning time was at least ten years. That gives you a great security blanket: when you think you’ve got ten years to resolve a problem, you don’t have to address it in the medium term. When that judgment changed, and we had to adapt to warning time no longer being ten years, the consequences inside defense — the way we think about our relationship with industry partners, what we might need in stockpiles, our readiness and preparedness settings — represented a really fundamental reset in how we make sure we’re ready for the now.