Hi All,

Looking into buying an investment property. For ages I thought best advice was to avoid a city you're likely to be posted, as you risk losing DHA/RA entitlements. But apparently a property doesnt count as a suitable own home if its being rented out? Anyone got any experience with this and dealing with DHA while owning a property in their posting loc?

source in 7.2.9b
https://pay-conditions.defence.gov.au/pacman/chapter-7/part-2/div-1

Went for a run at Defence Berrimah and noticed a bunch of street lights/roads that were all unkempt. Curious as to what happened? Was this a construction project that never went ahead, contamination or?

https://preview.redd.it/q4udrmjiay3e1.png?width=986&format=png&auto=webp&s=3a87160c71f08e22d16fb767a55e362c1f351f0e

Especially when AB & LAC do at the same grade not to mention US Army PFC, USMC Lcpl.

Everyone talks about "senior digs" but the only way to figure out who they are is who has the oldest looking undershirt.

I saw an article here before looking at more ways to "recognise" people and if it existed would surely help give people the illusion that they are "progressing" faster?

-Edit, not complaining. Just curious.

What’s everyone’s experience with their employer granting them leave or top up pay for reserve work? I have a course I need to do and a bit unsure how to go about it with my employer :)

Just going through a common thread of having to fight to get paid for chocco work. Made me wonder what the worst example out there is of not getting paid.

Personally mine is having to fight for around 8 weeks to get paid for a 9 day Ex. Also had a mate who did a Ex Harri Hamituk and he was on Ex for about 8 weeks before they finally started paying him. Strangely is no longer a choc.

I mean, some of you know who I am.

The ADF certainly knows who I am after I did a dumb thing

But with the New Australian government requirement for Social Media Companies to ask users to prove they are over 16 to access services, it makes me wonder what path this is going to take.

I mean, a lot of us on here are clearly identifying ourselves as members or ex members of the military, same over in r/Military

Now, we may also use the same usernames across multiple platforms (bad OPSEC I know)

Now, if I am now going to have to link my "anonymous" online profile to my actual name, how is that link to my identity going to be protected?

What kind of target does this place on us if a threat actor can just hack Reddit and find out that u/Rumbuck_274 is actually P. Sherman at 42 Wallaby Way in Sydney, and now we know he's P. Sherman, well here's his Facebook, Insta, Threads, and hey look, he missed locking down a post about his kid winning an award 6 years ago in Primary School!

Oh look, that kid is probably likely to go to the high school around the corner, and they're an active member of the military (based on their Reddit posts)

Even if they are low hanging fruit (Some digger in a Q-Store), well now we know who your kid is, and where they go to school, now how about if you hear anything about say....a weapons or ammunition move, you let us know hey? Cos you know, we now know where your kid goes to school.

Or even the other way, bloke gets J5 discharged, gets his Class A Pension, but bills are too high, he makes a post on r/AusFinance about his he's been doing some gig work to help make ends meet cos his mortgage has gone up?

Well shit, now CSC knows you're making money, and we'll pull your pension and send you back to work.

Ok look, Rumbuck now has ads on his Podcast, well shit, we better investigate that! Cos we now know exactly who he is! Better can his CSC Pension.

I mean, I know we aren't posting anything overly serious here, but theres always S60 of the DFDS, and What powers are going to be given to investigators to find out who someone is?

Can someone make a post saying that they don't like the fact that they are away from their family, On yet another exercise, And that they just like some more time at home.... Boom! ADFIS/JIS or whatever they are this week sends a request to Reddit, now they take that to the unit and slap you with S60.

“The Reiwa 6 (year 2024) type escort ship (4,800 ton type), which is the capacity improvement type of the escort ship, was selected."

https://airpower.airforce.gov.au/blog/data-data-everywhere-nor-any-drop-drink-case-joint-integrator

The Australian government has made very clear that, to defend the nation, the Australian Defence Force (ADF) must be an integrated force. This article contends that such a goal remains an unrealised ambition. The 2023 Defence Strategic Review (DSR) (Houston & Smith, 2023), described as ‘one of the greatest shifts in Australia's military since WWII’, sets out integration as one of the most critical objectives for the ADF (Evans, 2023). The DSR states that deterrence, denial and response must be built on ‘…a genuine Integrated Force which harnesses effects across all five domains: maritime, land, air, space and cyber’ (Houston & Smith, 2023). In translating the DSR’s recommendations into action, the National Defence Strategy (NDS) elevated this goal into ‘national defence’, i.e. harnessing ‘all arms of Australia’s national power to establish a holistic, integrated and focused approach to protect our security and advance our interests (Australian Government, 2024)’.

This article analyses the significant challenges faced in integrating the force, most notably the question of who is actually doing the integration.

The Problem

Defence has become a prodigious creator of data in recent years, a trend which will only accelerate. On one hand, this is a positive development as it reflects the growth of high quality, highly connected sensors that Defence is investing. However, the profusion of sensing capability will challenge Defence’s existing sense-making capability through a deluge of data. Over the next few years, Defence will have added to its inventory Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) platforms such as the MC-55 Peregrine, Land 129 Phase 3’s Integrator platform, MQ-4C Triton, P8 Poseidon, multiple geospatial capabilities and completely new air and space domain awareness capabilities. This raises critical questions about joint data integration. For instance, can data from the P-8 Poseidon be shared with the Army? How is an Army amphibious task force sharing its Battle Management System data with the Navy’s Combat Management System? And can space domain awareness data be integrated with a Joint Task Force while underway? Under Defence’s matrixed approach, each program mentioned above has a designated capability manager. With different capability managers spread across an array of projects and programs, there needs to be someone ultimately responsible for data integration.

Defence has numerous policy – and paper – based organisations, but very few are dedicated to execution (those who actually operationalise the data and are hands-on with the 1’s and 0’s). The challenge is not only technical but organisational, and calls for establishing clear roles and responsibilities for data integration across different domains and branches of the military. Effective integration requires coordinated efforts and streamlined processes to ensure critical information flows seamlessly between platforms, enhancing situational awareness and operational effectiveness.

The current approach

Defence has a number of organisations with ‘integration’ in their title. However, it is not clear that any one of them is addressing the enterprise problem. At the strategic centre, there is the Force Integration Division (Australian Government, n.d.a). Force Integration Division is not a technical delivery group. It does not own or control networks as per Defence Digital Group, and their role stops largely at analysis and advice. At the other extreme sits Army’s Land Network Integration Centre, which has demonstrated a significant ability to integrate systems, but as an Army’s network ingestion organisation it does not control the networks for other services or Joint systems, bearers or standards to integrate Defence’s proliferating data systems (Robards, 2024; Australian Army, n.d.).

In August 2021, Defence announced the creation of the Chief Data Integration Officer (CDIO), whose role within Data Division reports directly to the Department of Defence Diarchy to provide advice and guidance (Hastie, 2021; Hendry, 2021). The Capability Acquisition and Sustainment Group (CASG) recently migrated its integration area, but again, it was a governance and policy-based group and not focused on execution.

Defence Digital Group, formerly known as Chief Information Officer Group, which owns the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Defence corporate networks has a role in Defence mission systems, but only when they want to connect to the corporate network (Australian Government, n.d.b). They also aren't necessarily the group responsible for data storage nor the data integrator. CASG’s Tactical Data Link Bureau manages some joint data links, but only some and not bulk ISR data.

Defence’s recent Digital Engineering Strategy 2024 is another weighty tome but light on guidance as to who is responsible for the actual conduct of joint integration of the digital engineering. The conceptual digital engineering capability lifecycle model presented in Appendix A of the strategy has the least amount of detail in the “in-service” column, where, in reality, it is where the rubber meets the road. (Department of Defence, 2024)

Put simply, in the Defence organisation, it is confusing where the boundaries lie and who is responsible for doing the work to create a “genuine Integrated Force”. It does appear that there is no data integration agency whose job it is to store bulk ISR data, convert data feeds, and connect it to capability elements. It also begs the question as to how many policy and governance organisations can provide robust advice without in-house expertise. Advice and guidance about data without real-world data experience is fraught with danger.

As an example, Air Force acquires a fleet of ISR aircraft, with each platform containing 40 systems. Each of these is an ICT system in its own right with proprietary software, firmware and its own data needs. The fleet is acquired off the shelf from the United States (US) as a foreign military sales (FMS) acquisition, meaning Australia has not built it, nor do we have the technical workforce to do so. Inevitably, this fleet will be part of a spiral upgrade program with its original manufacturer, during which most of the sensor systems will upgrade to newer versions. This creates an exponential integration problem as the first platform will be running new systems than the older platforms. Air Force will be responsible for ensuring integration in its own air domain – something that the report by the Australian National Audit Office into the unlamented Tiger helicopter notes is often incredibly difficult (Hehir, 2016). Who, then, is undertaking joint integration as this spiral of spirals continues?

Current project-based approaches can exacerbate silos by their very design of individual projects to solve their problems individually. Defence had at least three geospatial projects, one for the Navy, Army, and Air Force, where each service had “unique” needs respective to their service. They were each allocated funds in the Integrated Investment Program (IPP), but that spend was allocated in silos to each project. Each individual project would not risk affecting its own schedule by collaborating with another service doing very much the same thing with the same data. Defence needs to ensure its systems can interoperate not just with each other but also with all types of allies, domestic, foreign, sophisticated and unsophisticated, classified and unclassified.

The US Air Force have recently appreciated this problem and have pledged to stand up an Integrated Command Capabilities by the end of this year in an attempt to keep up with the modernisation efforts and tempo of modern warfare (Easley, 2024).

A better way

The NDS proposes that Defence capability needs to be conceived across three epochs (Australian Government, 2024, p. 28):  now to 2025: the Enhanced Force-in-Being will focus on immediate enhancements that can be made to the current force.  2026 to 2030: the Objective Integrated Force will see the accelerated acquisition of critical capabilities.  2031 and beyond: the Future Integrated Force will see the delivery of an ADF that is fit for purpose across all domains and enablers. Noting that “integration” initiatives appear to start in 2026, what then is to be done? To increase Defence’s integration—rather than drown in the data it is set to generate—structural governance and procedural reform are required.

Defence would benefit from an enterprise-wide approach akin to the Land Network Integration Centre, a Joint Network Integration Centre (JNIC). This hands-on group's remit would be to bring together disparate information feeds and create common repositories at all classifications. As well as ensuring Defence gains skills and knowledge to deliver integration, it would also ensure that policy and governance are grounded in evidence and knowledge. A JNIC would be responsible for implementing standards and policies from the CDIO in the Data Division and the architectural patterns of the Force Integration Division at the Integrated Force level via networks handled by the Defence Digital Group. Data must be handled and managed according to the Archives Act 1983 (Cth). That means data custodians must ensure end-to-end data providence, where data can be tracked and traced from generation to archival. A key aspect of this policy is boundary points, such as once data has been generated by a sensor platform, there is a transfer of custodianship from the collector to the point of aggregation.

Murphy’s Law tells us that battles are always fought at the edges of maps, a problem which can be overcome by extending with more maps using sticky tape. But when our future battles occur at the edges of our data, whose job is it to sticky tape more data?

Gday lads, here to ask a question about transferring from full time to army reserve, currently I’m a full time Arty gunner and coming close to my Rosso, I want to stay in defence (sadly) and was wondering what it is like to be in it day to day.

Also bases, as I will be travelling back to SA around Adelaide. Is there bases around/ in Adelaide I could possibly go to as a gunner or have to transfer to a different core due to it?

Looking to stay at Kuttabul during a few day transit through Sydney, can anyone advise what the accommodation is like and whether or not I’ll be able to park on base? Thanks!

Is there any good personal gear recommendations like packs, pouches for TBAS or pers IFAK gear etc.?

What's a good pack to buy. not really interested in crossfire cause you cant get them but some other good brands. want it to atleast hold 100L worth of capacity.

I’m in the army Reserves, I’m a bit older than most, being almost 50, I have a busy full time job with responsibility in the government, wife and two young kids. I’ve done Kapooka which i pretty much hated, LCM which was challenging, but rewarding, however I was glad when it was over. I’ve completed almost all of my IET’s, I’ve probably done just shy of three months of choc days since I started at the beginning of the year.

I’ve by and large enjoyed my time, I like the people and camaraderie, I enjoy aspects of the training, being outside, doing something different, I guess I could describe it as a ‘love / hate’ relationship. However, I also recognise that some of the things I don’t like, are part of the reason I joined, to take myself out of my comfort zone, and challenge myself. I also find my time in the army makes me appreciate my home life and regular job much more. However, I find whenever I turn up for a stint of training, I kind of feel like I’m handing myself into prison, and spend allot of my time on course looking forward to go home, to be with my family (I’m a big family guy).

I don’t know if I’m a but burned out from having done quite a bit of choc work this year, in addition to my other responsibilities, but I’m just not sure if this is for me. I see all the younger guys around me, who are so gung-ho about it all, whereas I have a much more ‘I could take it or leave it’ kind of attitude. I don’t know if maybe that’s just my age. That’s part of the reason I was hoping for some feedback here, as opposed to from choc mates, as I don’t want to be seen as ‘negative,’ and a burden on the team.

The main thing I have really struggled with is being away from family, I really take my hat off to you ARA members, I don’t know how you do it. Before I joined, I didn’t realise this aspect would be so hard for me, it’s almost like a kind of ‘homesickness.’ I guess the general ‘choc-life’ of a week or two’s course here and there is not an issue, my main concern, is if it all kicks off with some kind of conflict, or war, and we are forced to deploy. The thought of being separated from my family for months and months, and control of my life being handed over to the army, scares me. If I didn’t have a wife and kids this wouldn’t be an issue.

I guess if I were to sum it up, if I knew I would never be deployed and separated from my family, I would probably stick at it. But if I had a crystal ball and knew I was going to be deployed for months at some point in the future, I wouldn’t. But then part of my just wonders if I’m over thinking the whole thing (which I’m famous for), as I don’t see any of the other older blokes in the Reserves worrying about this kind of thing.

What is the process for separation from the Reserves if I decide to go down that route?

Any advice on what to do would be appreciated.

I've been looking everywhere for a good surplus store in Australia preferably online, but I haven't found anything

Hello folks, just wondering if the EF-88/F-90 stock is compatible with the original Steyr A3 upper?

Edit: Sorry, forgot to add context. So, I have one guy who was willing to sell me his F-90. Initially, I was reluctant but the stock has grown on me lately. I would like the quick change barrel of the original A3 though. Messaged the bloke but didn't hear back. So, thought of asking on here if its worth the squeeze.

Thank you.

I fucking love it.

(And this is the best version of her best song too).

If ya don't know, this is a Taylor Swift song, All Too Well, and the Sad Girl Autumn Version is an acoustic version of said song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIjvKnHFJr0&t=848s&ab_channel=PaulEvans