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n his interviews for my book, The Twilight of Exceptionalism – the Liberal and Conservative Era 2013-2022, Mr Abbott said the first task facing his government was stopping asylum-seeker boats, but some senior officials were “completely defeatist” and alarmed that Australia would risk conflict with Indonesia.
Mr Abbott said: “At numerous stages, Operation Sovereign Borders could have floundered. The message was, you know, this risks conflict with Indonesia. And I said: ‘Well, so what? That is just the risk we have to run.’ But if that’s your concern, avoiding conflict, you can’t do anything.
“I mean, this is the problem, you know. Most government policy fails because there are red lines that different people put around it that means it cannot succeed. The red line the officials put around this operation – around this whole desire to stop the boats – meant that you couldn’t actually do it.”
Mr Abbott didn’t want war with Indonesia but he wanted the official mindset to shift in order to commit to his radical military-orientated policy, devised by Scott Morrison as shadow minister. Mr Abbott’s national security adviser, Andrew Shearer, said: “I think there was widespread scepticism whether the policy would work. In parts of the bureaucracy there was a more active level of resistance particularly among some of the government lawyers. For Abbott, this was an existential policy problem, nationally and politically.”
Mr Abbott said: “I thought to myself, what would Indonesia do if the boats were coming from Australia to Indonesia illegally? They would just sink them. We just turned them around. But, by hook or by crook, we were going to stop this damn thing. If you don’t have a border, you don’t have a country.”
As PM, Mr Abbott saw OSB as a test of his government’s viability. He wanted all organs of government – civilian, military and intelligence – active participants to achieve the goal. This is what Mr Morrison delivered as minister for immigration and border protection. It was an unorthodox policy with a military commander in charge – Lieutenant-General Angus Campbell – reporting direct to Mr Morrison with strict operational secrecy about events on the water and the boat turnarounds.
Mr Morrison said: “Operation Sovereign Borders was arguably the most compelling aspect of the change of government in 2013.”
In Mr Abbott’s view, he was faced with varying advice from senior officials. The chief of the Defence Force, General David Hurley, later governor-general, felt obliged to tell Mr Abbott the operation must be consistent with international law, provide for safety at sea and ensure that asylum-seeker boats could be safely turned on the water, as well as warning about ties with Indonesia.
“PM, we can do this, but it is not cost-free,” Mr Hurley said. “I cannot guarantee this can be done in a risk-free way.” That was responsible and prudent advice but frustrating for a PM determined to reverse the existing order. But the official who made the greatest positive impact on Mr Abbott was then Customs and Border Protection Force head Mike Pezzullo, who told Mr Abbott the policy could work, saying “sometimes you’ve got to be a bit Mossad”.
Mr Abbott said: “At one stage we were advised by some sections of the bureaucracy that something we were doing was illegal. I just said to (attorney-general) Brandis, ‘Well, go and get better advice, simple as that’.”
Recalling his visit to Indonesia and meeting with president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Mr Abbott said: “I said to him ‘you know, we are going to turn boats around’, and he didn’t respond one way or the other. He just gave me a benign look, as if to say ‘Well, you do what you must’.” Obviously, Indonesia’s president did not give Australia the green light.
Referring to the boat turnbacks, Mr Morrison said: “Angus Campbell’s advice had been, ‘Once you start this, you can’t stop and you need to get it right; if the first test doesn’t work, it’s over.”
Insiders told the author the covert operations by the Australian Secret Intelligence Service, headed by Nick Warner, involving the disruption of the people-smugglers in Indonesia were as effective as the boat turnarounds in halting the trade. In June 2013, before the change of government, Mr Abbott met Mr Warner and raised the issue of what he called “the black arts” – with Mr Warner explaining ASIS did not do assassinations since such activity was outside its defined scope. ASIS was not Mossad. As PM, Mr Abbott raised with officials the capability for final resort action to “take out” the people-smugglers if policy on the water had failed and this was the only means left. Such discussion became academic once the boats were stopped, but Mr Abbott had been interested in a power that ASIS did not possess.
Our intelligence agencies monitored the Indonesian military closely. An official said: “We watched the Indonesian military. At no stage did Indonesia take any military action to counter what we were doing. They never came near the drop-offs for boat turnbacks.”
By February 2014 the asylum-seeker boat trade had ended.https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/sometimes-youve-got-to-be-a-bit...
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