For this episode of the podcast Sub Rosa, Andrew interviewed former GCHQ employee David Wells about counter-terrorism. GCHQ is the UK government’s signals intelligence agency, similar to the United States National Security Agency (NSA) or the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD). The interview discusses the nature of signals intelligence and its current role in counter-terrorism. We...

Criminal intelligence (CrimInt) is so useful in serious criminal investigations that it’s difficult to envisage a situation where it shouldn’t be sought and used if it’s available. This special report argues that Australia’s current arrangements for gathering and disseminating CrimInt overseas are suboptimal. While additional resources are needed to address this condition, there’s also a...

In this Executive Summary, the Inquiry sets out its conclusions on a number of issues that have been central to the controversies surrounding Iraq. In addition to the factors that shaped the decision to take military action in March 2003 without support for an authorising resolution in the UN Security Council, they are: the assessments...

Australian participation in the operation of Pine Gap is effectively complete, with access to all areas of the base except the US National Cryptographic Room. The senior Australian Defence officials who negotiated the original implementing agreement with the CIA sought and obtained access to all ‘product’ from the facility. After initial discriminatory restrictions on Australians...

Paul Dibb AM has had an extraordinary career. He enjoys an international scholarly reputation of the highest order, while at the same time he has done much distinguished public service. He was a pioneer in moving back and forth between posts in government departments, notably the Department of Defence, and academia.