00:02Militaries around the world have been paying a lot of attention to drone technology for
00:06a very long time now, but two conflicts in particular, two recent conflicts, have really
00:11highlighted their place in modern warfare. That's the war in Ukraine and, of course,
00:16the conflict in Iran as well, where cheap, mass-produced drones have had a massive impact
00:22on the battlefield. Iran's use of $30,000 drones that can fly very long distances, 2,000
00:29kilometres or so, and deliver an impact, a 50 kilo or so explosive over that sort of
00:34terrain, or force those countries on the receiving end to spend millions of dollars firing interceptors
00:40to take them down. It has demonstrated, I suppose, what military analysts would call a massive
00:45asymmetrical advantage there. Australia, it says, is taking note as well. The federal government
00:51announcing overnight it's going to increase funding for drone technology as part of the
00:57national defence strategy that's going to be released later on this week. At least $2 billion
01:01in extra funding over the next decade or so, on top of the $10 billion or so that was already
01:08expected. In the Australian context, we're talking about some different kinds of drones here. There
01:13are large, expensive platforms like the Ghost Shark and Ghost Bat that are already under development in
01:20Australia. These are highly capable but expensive platforms, both undersea, in the case of the Ghost Shark,
01:27or in the air, in the case of the Ghost Bat. But the government says there's also money going into
01:31billions of dollars going into these sort of cheap mass-produced drones we have seen used on
01:37battlefields in places like Ukraine and Iran as well. Here's the Defence Industry Minister, Pat Conroy,
01:43speaking on those lessons that have been learned from abroad. We've learned the lessons from conflicts
01:49going on in Ukraine and the Middle East right now and we've already introduced the first armed drone
01:53into the Australian Defence Force and we'll keep investing in this capability to keep Australians
01:59safe, to equip the Australian Defence Force and drive more jobs in Australia. We've got a very
02:04significant and skilled Australian defence industry. We've got a very well-skilled Australian drone
02:11industry and we'll be supporting that further. This announcement is part of the National Defence
02:15Strategy that will be released on Thursday alongside the Integrated Investment Program, which really maps
02:21out how Defence sees, I suppose, the landscape at present and where it's going in the next few years
02:26and what sort of hardware it needs to equip itself with to meet some of those challenges. So we'll see
02:32that released on Thursday. We knew drones would be a big part of that, of course, with counter-drone
02:38measures and how to keep Australian assets and Australian military bases safe from drone attack.
02:43Also, missiles are expected to feature quite heavily as well. One big unanswered question
02:48that comes around funding. This drone funding is not entirely new. Some of it is redirected funding
02:55or reprioritised funding. So we may have to wait until Thursday to see what projects are being taken
03:01taken from to put this funding towards.
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