Duncan Lewis' appointment as ASIO head casts the spotlight on Defence

By Nicholas Stuart
Updated October 1 2014 - 10:13am, first published September 20 2014 - 12:00am
Then Australian Army Brigadier Duncan Duncan Lewis, right, in 2000, as United Nations Commander Sector West in East Timor, meeting his Indonesian counterpart Colonel Indra Hidayat.
Then Australian Army Brigadier Duncan Duncan Lewis, right, in 2000, as United Nations Commander Sector West in East Timor, meeting his Indonesian counterpart Colonel Indra Hidayat.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott speaks with ASIO Director-General Duncan Lewis via a secure tele-conference from Arnhem Land.  Photo: Alex Ellinghausen
Prime Minister Tony Abbott speaks with ASIO Director-General Duncan Lewis via a secure tele-conference from Arnhem Land. Photo: Alex Ellinghausen

Duncan Lewis will bringa broad range of skills to his job as the new head of ASIO. He'll need to. The raids on Thursday conclusively demonstrated that some of the most dangerous threats we face are not the old, simple conventional enemies of the past. This means we, as a society, have to keep up.  We have to find people who can combat these new threats and there is a way to do it - but this requires breaking down our old institutional model to become agile and move as fast as our new enemies.

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