About this resource

6 July 2007

Australia in Afghanistan is the first in a series of web resources on Australian Forces Abroad being produced by Nautilus Institute at RMIT on the policies, activities and consequences of Australian military and police and intelligence forces abroad. As of May 2007 more than 3,850 Australian Defence Force (ADF) personnel were deployed overseas in eight operations. In March 2007 there were 375 Australian Federal Police (AFP) members serving overseas in International Deployment Group operations, including more than 200 in East Timor, and another 86 officers in liaison roles in 26 countries.

There are remarkably few organised and accessible public collections of information about Australian military activities in Afghanistan or any other other current theatre of military or police operations. There are no collections of contending policy analyses or even of basic documents. This lack of information inhibits informed community discussion, and encourages the incorrect belief that there is no reliable information available to the public.

We offer this resource to enrich debate and to rectify the deficiencies in public knowledge. We invite your comments and suggestions and appreciate your support.

The elements of Australia in Afghanistan will be updated as more information becomes available about existing ADF and AFP activities, and as government policy develops.  Moreover Nautilus expects that over time errors and omissions in existing material will come to light and be rectified, and new versions of existing pages will be mounted. In that respect materials offered in both the Australia in Afghanistan and the wider Australian Forces Abroad projects are provisional, and always subject to revision.

Note that this resource focuses on the Australian involvement in Afghanistan. It is not intended to provide comprehensive materials on all aspects of the current conflict in that country, and touches on wider issues only insofar as they are immediately relevant to the Australian military involvement.

Project coordinator: Richard Tanter