Q+A: Defence Minister Gerry Brownlee
Q+A: Defence Minister Gerry Brownlee interviewed by Corin Dann
Defence Minister Gerry Brownlee
– North Korean regime has ‘evil intent’
Defence
Minister Gerry Brownlee told Corin Dann on TVNZ 1’s Q+A
programme, ‘that it will be sanctions and continued
diplomacy that should be first called upon to try and
resolve the situation there.’
‘The difficulty is here
you’ve got a leader that people know very little about his
regime, but you would assume that underneath him, there is a
very big machinery of people who have equally evil intent,
and so you’ve got to make sure that you think about the
millions of North Koreans who are suffering under that
regime at the present time.’
When asked about Australia
being singled out by the North Koreans overnight and whether
North Korea is to blame, Mr Brownlee said, ‘Well, it’s
North Korea that’s sending the missiles into the Sea of
Japan and making the various outrageous threats, including
the threats overnight to Australia.’
When asked whether
NZ could take part in any US led action against North Korea
Mr Brownlee said, ‘that would be something that would have
to be decided at a time when you reach that point..’
Mr Brownlee also told the programme as Minister for
Civil Defence that ‘there is a need to look at that chain
of command’ and that, ‘Cabinet has approved a technical
advisory group to sit down and look at the legislation. That
group comprises people from police, from Defence, from Civil
Defence and from the Fire Service, and they will consult
with other services that are required to act in
circumstances of civil emergency and also look at that
structure to see how it works and how it might be
improved.’
Please find the transcript attached and you
can view the interview here.
Q+A, 9-10am
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Q + A
Episode
07
GERRY
BROWNLEE
Interviewed by Corin
Dann
CORIN Joining me now from
Christchurch is Gerry Brownlee, Minister for Defence and
Civil Defence. Good morning to you,
Minister.
GERRY Good
morning.
CORIN I
wonder if I could start first with the developments in North
Korea over the last few weeks. We’ve seen an escalation in
tension there. A lot of troops being moved around by a
number of countries. How worried are you about the
escalations in the Korean
Peninsula?
GERRY Well,
I wouldn’t say particularly worried, other than it’s a
situation that is under constant monitor. This is a country
that is economically very depressed but spending a huge sum
of money sending some of those missiles into the Japan Sea
and constantly threatening all those around with what they
are trying to protect is some degree of military might. I
think the precautions that countries particularly on their
borders are taking are
realistic.
CORIN So
is it a concern or not that the US seems to have changed its
stance here a little bit and says it wants China to deal
with this situation, and it’s made it very clear that if
it is unable to deal with North Korea, then the United
States and its allies will. Does that include
us?
GERRY Well,
that would be something that would have to be decided at a
time when you reach that point, but I think the detente
that’s currently between President Xi and President Trump
is pretty good, and what you’re seeing there is two
countries who have an interest in the area, looking at a
rogue state that is making all sorts of threats that,
frankly, would be probably more concerning to China, given
that they share the border with them and have a big, big
population in such close
proximity.
CORIN Do
we share the view that this is up to China to solve, that
they need to take actions? For example, cutting oil supplies
into North
Korea?
GERRY We
don’t take any particular view about some other
country’s foreign policy. What we do say is that it will
be sanctions and continued diplomacy that should be first
called upon to try and resolve the situation there. The
difficulty is here you’ve got a leader that people know
very little about his regime, but you would assume that
underneath him, there is a very big machinery of people who
have equally evil intent, and so you’ve got to make sure
that you think about the millions of North Koreans who are
suffering under that regime at the present
time.
CORIN So you
are very clear that this is an evil regime. We’ve seen
Australia, in fact, singled out by the North Koreans
overnight, according to reports pointing out that they could
be effectively caught up by Korean missiles. You’re not
afraid to put your cards on the table here and say it’s
North Korea that is to blame for all of
this?
GERRY Well,
it’s North Korea that’s sending the missiles into the
Sea of Japan and making the various outrageous threats,
including the threats overnight to
Australia.
CORIN And
can we trust Donald Trump? He went into the election
campaign with a very clear strategy that is was America
first. Since then, we’ve seen him launch missile attacks
in Syria and ramp up the rhetoric on North Korea. Is it no
longer America first, and how does a country like New
Zealand deal with
that?
GERRY Well,
that’s a question that you’d have to put to US
representatives, not
me.
CORIN Well,
with respect, Mr Brownlee, we do need to know from
you-
GERRY Well, I
was just coming to that. But what I would say is that the
situations in North Korea and Syria have been ongoing, and
what President Trump has said, much as President Obama was
saying before, is that there is an expectation that the rest
of the world will assist in coming to a party trying to get
rid of these regimes that are oppressive. But worse than
that, also pose a threat to any nation, because the nature
of that type of warfare now with rampant terrorism, random
terrorism, means that no country is particularly safe from
that sort of
activity.
CORIN It’s
interesting that we’re talking about North Korea because
if we look at the Defence White Paper that was put out last
year by the New Zealand Government, much of its focus really
is on economic exclusion zone, the waters around New
Zealand, Antarctica, and it was criticised by some
Australians for not really wanting to deal with issues such
as the South China Sea. Were we kind of a bit off the ball
there?
GERRY No, I
don’t think so. I mean, put it in perspective. The US have
a military of about 1.5 million personnel. China is reducing
its military to about two million personnel. So they are
very, very big players. We will never ever match the
capability that they have, but we can be complementary to
our Five Eyes partners, and that’s the intention of the
White Paper. It sets out an acquisition programme that
you’d ideally execute over the next 15 or so years and
maintains that we do have the interest in Antarctica. It’s
the first time we’ve stated that and also boosts cyber
intelligence, which is also very important in this sort of
range of threats that come to us
now.
CORIN But the
criticism, Mr Brownlee, is that we’ve pulled our punches
on criticising China, that we don’t want to criticise
China, whereas Australia has gone much further.
GERRY Well,
that’s for the Australians. What we’ve said is that the
issues in the South China Sea are for the countries that are
most affected to determine. But we have been very clear that
we think that the UNCLOS decision should stand. We think
that freedom of navigation is important, but we do note that
there have been bilateral arrangements, for example, with
Brunei, and it looks as though there will be some sort of
bilateral arrangement with the Philippines as well, and it
is their claim over territorial sea that is most
affected.
CORIN Yes,
but half of our trade goes through that piece of ocean, so
surely we should be having a greater focus
there.
GERRY More
than that. A very large percentage of the world’s trade
goes through those oceans because China is equally in need
of them. So what we’re saying is we want freedom of
navigation, freedom of passage through those areas
maintained, and that’s a position that we haven’t shaken
from.
CORIN But the
nub of it is we’re trying to have it both ways, aren’t
we? It’s that same old problem. We’ve got our Five Eyes
partners here meeting this weekend. You’re welcome to
confirm that for me if you like this morning, but I think
that’s pretty clear, yet at the same time, we’ve got an
economic relationship with China that we don’t want to
upset. So are we sort of not willing to take a risk
here?
GERRY No,
let’s be clear. First point is that the economic
relationship that China has with the rest of the world is
very, very big, and the imperative for China to lift the
stakes of some of the least well-off in that country are
very high. When it comes to the South China Sea, we don’t
take a position on whose sovereignty is preeminent over
another. We simply say we support the UNCLOS decision, and
we think that the bilateral discussions that are going on at
the moment will lead to there being the freedom of
passage-
CORIN But
what if China, Mr Brownlee, is building up military
installations on disputed islands and upsetting the balance
in that
region?
GERRY Well,
that’s for the region to look at. It’s certainly
something that we do monitor and we do discuss it. I’ve
never backed away from discussing those things with Chinese
military people when I’ve had the opportunity and made
clear our position that we think the freedom of navigation
through those areas is important, the recognition of
territorial sea is important and the arrangements between
countries who have those claims need to be settled on a
one-to-one
basis.
CORIN Sure.
For the record, are the Five Eyes heads
here?
GERRY I
thought it was the Bollywood actor who’s down there this
weekend. I thought that would be the reason for the
excitement.
CORIN I
mean, I think we’ve seen the planes. I mean, that does
show, though, that at a time of heightened tension in the
North Korean Peninsula, you’ve got bosses of the Five Eyes
agencies here. What does that say about New Zealand’s
relationship with those
countries?
GERRY Well,
I was a little surprised that you were able to go to Google
and work out who owned the planes.
CORIN Well, it
wasn’t me personally, but fair enough. Look, I wonder if
we could move on to Syria and Iraq, the Isis fight. I’m
sure that will be discussed by those Five Eyes bosses over
the weekend. You have mentioned in your recent visit there
that we would have some role post-Isis. Can you expand a bit
more on
that?
GERRY Well,
look, I think the context here is Iraq is a country of 80
million people, and the vast majority of those people want
to go about their lives in a peaceful fashion. You only need
a city or a city area like Baghdad, where there’s about
nine million people, a few thousand who are in the ratbag
category who will hold the whole place to ransom. That’s
the evil of terrorism. So as Iraq gets cleared of Isis, and
I think it’s worth noting that it is the Iraqi security
forces and the Iraqi government who’ve done that by and
large, with the assistance of
others-
CORIN What
can we do, though, in that
reconstruction?
GERRY Well,
in the reconstruction, that’s something that we would look
at at the time. There is nothing proposed at the present
moment. But it’s also, I think, very important that as
Isis operatives flee the Middle East that we have a very
good intelligence flow to know where they’re moving to,
because we don’t want them
here.
CORIN Are you
worried that there will be some coming back to New
Zealand?
GERRY Well,
it’s not one of those worries that you spend all night
awake over, but it’s something you should be alert to.
CORIN Is there a
problem with some of our defence equipment. I mean, for
example, if you wanted to send some of those NH90s over to
help with the reconstruction in Iraq, you wouldn’t be able
to do it, would you? They’re not
equipped.
GERRY Well,
it depends what you’re suggesting. I think they’re a
very capable machine. There’s no doubt about that. They
certainly couldn’t fly there. No helicopter
could.
CORIN No,
no, I accept that, but isn’t one of the issues that
they’re not fit for purpose? The helicopter is too big to
ship around to take to the Pacific and do
jobs.
GERRY Well,
we’ve got the Canterbury, of course, and you can take them
on the Canterbury. It’s only the air transport that
we’re lacking in that regard, and that’s part of a
future plan. And also as they become more operational, there
is the possibility of island hopping in the
Pacific.
CORIN Are
you committed to them? Will you upgrade
them?
GERRY Sorry,
we did have one in Fiji. It was very useful at the time of
Hurricane
Winston.
CORIN But
it’s pretty embarrassing, isn’t it, that we’ve got
them effectively half-grounded, our fleet of $700 million
helicopters that you can’t fly around the country at the
moment?
GERRY Well,
hang on. They are flying, it’s just that they have decided
that on a safety basis, it wouldn’t be very smart until
they isolate the problem that occurred about a week ago to
fly over water. So they’re still flying over
land.
CORIN Okay.
Just very quickly, are you committed to keeping them,
though? Upgrading them, doing what you have to do? Because
you’ve said in the past you thought they were an
‘interesting’
purchase.
GERRY Yes,
I think they were at the time, and the government of the day
made that decision. They are what they are. We’ve got
them. They are a very functional aircraft. They carry 19
people, up to 19 people. They’re very, very useful
aircraft and getting a lot of work, I might say. So, yes, of
course we’ll be keeping
them.
CORIN I guess
the bigger issue here is can we have confidence that when
you’re about to embark on a $20 billion defence spending
programme that we’re going to not have more, or what
confidence is there that we’re going to get these
purchases right, because there seems to be a string of them
where there are problems that
emerge.
GERRY I
think the fact these days is that you know more about them,
so the Defence Force doesn’t sort of hide any of its
problems. They’re all out there. We don’t ask commercial
operators to tell us how often their planes are out of
action for various engineering faults and otherwise, and
that’s not a criticism of anyone. It’s just reality. But
the Defence White Paper with its procurement plan alongside
sets out a better process for procurement so that we do
have, firstly, interoperability among our own services, but
then with those with those who we are closely associated
with outside of New Zealand as
well.
CORIN Sure.
It’s been a few weeks now since the Hit And Run
allegations from Nicky Hager and Jon Stephenson. Looking
back, are you comfortable with the way the Defence Force
handled those criticisms and
allegations?
GERRY Yes,
I
am.
CORIN Why?
GERRY Because
I think they fronted them very, very well.
CORIN It took five
days.
GERRY No, no,
well, five days – when you’ve got some outrageous
allegations being made and they come to you as a bit of a
surprise, then I think it’s not unreasonable that you take
some time to go through those checks. I think that’s why
people can be confident that the position taken by General
Keating, supported by me, I must immediately say, is the
right one, and I think the response has been
appropriate.
CORIN And
are you comfortable with the perception that it gives that
it was the Defence Force investigating itself here? There
was not an independent
inquiry.
GERRY I
don’t think that’s the
perception-
CORIN What
other perception could there
be?
GERRY Well,
it’s a perception you might have, but I talk to a lot of
people out on the street, and it’s not something that’s
coming through to
me.
CORIN So the
Defence Chief investigating an issue in the Defence Force
– that’s independent in your
mind?
GERRY I
didn’t address that particular question. What I said was
that I think it was appropriate that General Keating and his
senior officers went back over all of the records and
considered the allegations and then made a decision about
whether further investigation was required. I think that’s
the appropriate way to do it, and I am certainly persuaded
that there was no need for further
investigation.
CORIN Okay.
If we move on to another issue that you are responsible for
– civil defence. You’ve been very critical particularly
around the Christchurch fires of some of the handling of the
lines of communication around these types of problems and
disasters that come up. What are you going to do about
it?
GERRY First
point I’d make is I want to make it clear that all those
people who commit themselves to either rural fire or civil
defence activities have my admiration. We do need them, and
we want them to keep that commitment up. But it’s
important that the backup structure that enables Civil
Defence to do its work is fit for the time. Now, we’re
working on a system that was first designed in the 1950s. It
was ratified again in 2002 with some changes, further
changes in 2015, actually, and I think that there is a need
to look at that chain of command particularly. If you think
back to the ‘50s, communication was not as easy as it is
today, and it sometimes strikes me a little odd that
you’re getting better news of an immediate situation from
media outlets than you’re getting in situation reports. I
think the key to it, though, is the whole structure of how a
civil emergency is declared and then what are the
authorities that anybody who has responsibility in that
carries.
CORIN Could
you see there ever being a day where that essential
government that makes that call on a local
hazard?
GERRY Well,
I don’t think that’s something that politicians should
decide, and for that reason I’ve appointed and Cabinet has
approved a technical advisory group to sit down and look at
the legislation. That group comprises people from police,
from Defence, from Civil Defence and from the Fire Service,
and they will consult with other services that are required
to act in circumstances of civil emergency and also look at
that structure to see how it works and how it might be
improved.
CORIN Well,
Minister Brownlee, one last question. A cabinet reshuffle
due tomorrow. Are you expecting to be Foreign Minister
tomorrow?
GERRY Look,
I expect tomorrow Mr English will announce his arrangements
for not only the next few months but hopefully for the years
to
come.
CORIN Would
you like to be Foreign Minister? I mean, you’ve obviously
done a lot of those issues under
Defence.
GERRY Well,
look, I think in the end what I want is for National to be
the party that has the greatest vote after the 23rd of
September and able to form a government to continue the work
that we’ve done over the last few years, and how I fit
into that will be something that is determined by the Prime
Minister.
CORIN Defence
Minister Gerry Brownlee, thanks very much for your time this
morning.
GERRY Thank
you.