Latest news with #Pezzullo
Sky News AU
08-05-2025
- Business
- Sky News AU
Former home affairs boss says risk of regional conflict ‘very concerning' as he outlines major security risks facing Albanese government
Former home affairs boss Michael Pezzullo has outlined a series of major national security challenges facing the Albanese government, including the 'very concerning' risk of a conflict in the Indo-Pacific region. For over nine years, Mr Pezzullo was one of Australia's most powerful and influential national security bureaucrats, serving as head of the Department of Immigration and Border Protection before becoming the inaugural secretary of the Department of Home Affairs. Speaking to Sky News Australia on Thursday, the former public servant said that while the Albanese government would be keen to deliver on its election promises, they were also 'very alert to how messy, lonely and hard the outside world is'. 'So I think those issues will demand a greater proportion of the PM's personal time and the time of the National Security Committee than perhaps people outside of the system might anticipate,' Mr Pezzullo said. The former home affairs boss said there were a number of 'key defence decisions' that needed to be resolved in this term of government. 'Particularly what we do to ensure that we don't have a submarine capability gap, extending the Collins class and making sure that the Virginia acquisition and the AUKUS design are all on track,' he said. 'And there are a whole lot of other defence issues… I think defence funding will be a concern… So that'll be a challenge.' But Mr Pezzullo also said there would be 'dramatic developments' when it came to Australia's alliance with the United States over the next three years. 'Setting aside the trade tariff issues, just strictly on the defence side, we'll start to see the arrival of the four US combat submarines in 2027,' he said. 'If you actually look at the available submarine force the Americans have, allowing for boats that are in maintenance… it's about four out of 32 combat submarines (that will be based out of Perth)… a very significant deployment. 'That will play Australia into a whole lot of geopolitical issues that we're really, frankly, unused to - being directly involved in supporting US combat forces operating from Australia.' Mr Pezzullo, who was fired as Home Affairs boss in 2023 after it was revealed he had been using back channels to weigh in on cabinet appointments. According to an independent inquiry, he had breached public service code of conduct at least 14 times, including by failing to remain apolitical, failing to disclose a conflict of interest, and using 'his duty, power, status or authority to seek to gain a benefit or advantage for himself'. However the former bureaucrat has continued to be viewed as an experienced national security professional, with the Opposition openly discussing bringing him back into government prior to the election. Mr Pezzullo said that Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong had 'got the right balance' in her approach to Asia, ensuring there an equilibrium in the region and Australia does not get 'sucked into great power conflict'. But he said that the introduction of defence and security protection discussions into the bilateral relationship with Korea, Japan and the Philippines presented a new challenge on this front. The former home affairs boss also said there was a lot of work to be done to 'bring different parts of the community along' in terms of the geopolitical challenges Australia faces, adding that he was 'very distressed and concerned' some Chinese Australians thought they were being accused of being disloyal. 'I think there's a lot of work to be done in the social cohesion space as it relates to defence and security,' he said. 'There's a lot of data and a lot of outreach that the (home affairs) department has, and its Minister has, with a lot of the community groups. A lot of work was done in collecting data on attitudes, for instance. I think it's very important that that work be revisited.' Mr Pezzullo clarified that it was important for Australia to have discussion about 'how brutal and how authoritarian' the regime of the Chinese Communist Party is, but the politicians needed to take much more care in making it clear they were not talking about Chinese people. 'We just have to have a very nuanced, layered, very differentiated discussion. But we must always, always not make it about race, about culture or ethnicity. 'We must always split it off from any sense that we've got any kind of antagonism or difference on racial or civilizational or cultural grounds with the wonderful Chinese people, it's just so important. 'You've got to overcorrect… you've got to constantly be talking about the loyalty of the wonderful Chinese Australian community here in Australia 'It's geopolitics, and we've really got to be quite explicit in our language and hone in on the geopolitical concerns that we have about Communist China." Mr Pezzullo also discussed the risk of escalation from India's strike on targets in Pakistan overnight, warning there was a risk it could get 'very dangerous'. 'It's very concerning if…we're in a process that's now known as escalation management, where you escalate the controlled application of violence. 'The Indians have attacked into Punjab and other parts, as well… Pakistan administered or controlled Kashmir as well, saying that they're striking at terrorist infrastructure. 'The Pakistanis have now said, from their Prime Minister down, we reserve the right to strike back. They've made the point, mercifully, that they will focus on military targets. 'The problem is a lot of the targets, whether they're air bases, or fuel dumps, or command and control centres, are in close to civilian populations.' Mr Pezzullo said Pakistan couldn't let the Indian strike go unanswered, and hopefully the conflict would end there, but there was a risk it could lead to a series of strikes and the outbreak of a larger war between the two nuclear-powered nations. 'If it's sort of a draw and they can all back off, and questions of prestige and honour and sort of the blood lust of retribution are all kind of dissipated, then I think we'll get through without a significant conflict emerging. 'If, however, the escalation just keeps going strike, followed by strike, followed by strike, it might be that one side then decides to launch a massive attack to pre-emptively start to degrade the other side's military capability. 'That gets very dangerous…I don't think it's going to get to that level. I think common sense and humanity will prevail, but it is a risk."
Sky News AU
08-05-2025
- Politics
- Sky News AU
‘We all hold our breath': Pakistan will not let Indian strike ‘go unanswered'
Former home affairs secretary Mike Pezzullo discusses the conflict between India and Pakistan and its effect on Australia. 'The Pakistanis have now said … we reserve the right to strike back,' Mr Pezzullo told Sky News Australia. 'We all hold our breath now to see what the Pakistani strike is likely to be. 'I think they are likely to strike; they can't, in a sense, let the Indian strike go unanswered.'
Sky News AU
25-04-2025
- Politics
- Sky News AU
Mike Pezzullo claims ADF budget is ‘underfunded' for Gen Z recruiters
Foreign home affairs secretary Mike Pezzullo spoke on the 'zoomer generation' or Gen Z fighting for Australia if need be. 'I think if there was an imminent threat to Australia … Aussies would turn up,' Mr Pezzullo told Sky News Australia. 'The problem is, if you turn up unprepared … if the defence capability hasn't been built up in the lead up to the potential conflict, then you're going to take more losses on the day of battle than you otherwise would need to.'
Sky News AU
25-04-2025
- Politics
- Sky News AU
‘Drums are beating even louder': Mike Pezzullo warns war could still be in Australia's future
As Australians pay their respects to veterans past and present on Anzac Day, former home affairs secretary Mike Pezzullo has warned of the potential of future military conflict the country may have to face. Mr Pezzullo revisited a warning he gave in 2021, claiming free nations, like Australia, must prepare for war, which made headlines worldwide. 'I felt that Anzac Day had become backward-looking, and I mean that in a positive sense, a historical looking view of Australia's military past, where we honour the sacrifice … that those men and women made for our future freedom,' Mr Pezzullo told Sky News Australia. 'I felt that Anzac Day was losing some potency in terms of alerting us or being alert to the risk of it might also be a feature of our future. 'War is a problem in the current world … it is regrettably a feature of our present and regrettably it might be a feature of our future.'
Sky News AU
25-04-2025
- Politics
- Sky News AU
'Drums are beating even louder': Former Home Affairs Secretary warns war could still be in Australia's future
As Australians gather to commemorate Anzac Day on the 110th anniversary of the Gallipoli landing, former home affairs secretary Mike Pezzullo fears the country may not be far away from another war. While speaking to Sky News' Laura Jayes on Anzac Day, Mr Pezzullo reflected on the prosperous way of living Australians have been able to lead as a result of the sacrifices others have made defending the country. He recalled a "controversial" Anzac Day message he penned to staff four years ago where he warned of growing military tensions in other parts of the world, saying the "drums" of war were "beating" and said this message remained prevalent today. He cited the war between Russia and Ukraine, which kicked off about 10 months after his message, as an example of how major conflicts continued to emerge globally. On Friday he said the "drums of war" were still beating in an article for The Strategist. The former deputy secretary of defence told Jayes the threat of war remains even more heightened than in 2021. "No one doubts now that war is a problem in the current world. And in fact this morning, as I speak to you, there is potential mobilisation going on the border between India and Pakistan and the potential for military conflict to break out just there," he said. "And of course, there's war in the Middle East. China's rehearsing for an invasion of Taiwan. They haven't made a decision about whether to do that. "So it is regrettably a feature of our present and regrettably it might be a feature of our future. Those drums are beating even louder than what I warned about four years ago." Mr Pezzullo also expressed concern about Australia's preparedness in the future, if the time comes where the country's military has to be ready to fight. He said while he still believed Australia's youth would turn up and fight, showing the same valour of soldiers 110 years ago, he feared they may not have the tools available. "The problem is, if you turn up unprepared, if you haven't had that military training, if you don't have the right equipment, if the defence capability hasn't been built up in the lead-up to the potential for conflict... then you're going to take more losses on the day of battle than you otherwise would need to and you won't potentially be successful on that first day," he said. "Democracies tend to be slow to the fight, tyrannies tend to more mobilised, democracies tend to be slower to the fight, you saw that in World War One and World War Two, then they mobilise their population and they basically out-produce the aggressor. "We might not have that luxury next time, if God forbid, it does come to it." Mr Pezzullo's comments come after the Coalition pledged earlier this week to deliver a significant boost to military spending. The Coalition plans to lift defence spending by $21 billion over the next five years, taking the nation's total outlay to 2.5 per cent of GDP, which will rise to 3 per cent within the next decade. The former home affairs boss praised the Labor government's national defence strategy, but that it needed the funding the Coalition was pledging. "I'd congratulate the government on its national defence strategy of 2024 but it's underfunded," he said. "I think you'd almost have the optimal defence strategy for Australia if you could combine the money and the strategy from the two sides of politics."
