Lance Collins criticises army cover up culture
The World Today - Monday, 25 July , 2005 12:38:00
Reporter: Paula Kruger
TANYA NOLAN: One of the Army's top intelligence analysts has spoken out about what he says is a culture of cover-up and intimidation within the Australian Defence Force.
Lieutenant Colonel Lance Collins was a Senior Intelligence Advisor to the then Major General Peter Cosgrove when he was Commander of the INTERFET forces in East Timor in 1999.
Lieutenant Colonel Collins came to public attention last year when a leaked report backed his claims that he'd been victimised by a 'pro-Jakarta lobby' in the intelligence community.
The report's author, Navy Captain Martin Toohey wrote that intelligence was distorted and driven by Government policy, but those claims were publicly rejected.Colonel Collins has spoken to ABC TV's Australian Story saying he's concerned about the effect the controversy has had on Captain Toohey.
PAULA KRUGER: Despite being recognised as one of the military's top intelligence officers, Lieutenant Colonel Lance Collins says he can no longer stand being in the Army.
LANCE COLLINS: The system is very heavily weighted to produce a certain answer that is acceptable to a certain political party and its agenda rather than the nation and its well-being.
PAULA KRUGER: Colonel Collins has told ABC TV's Australian Story of his concerns in 1998 over increasing instability and violence in East Timor and the Indonesian Army's links with local militias.
But he says his concerns were not well received when he put them in a formal intelligence estimate and pointed out that Australian foreign policy was being driven by a pro-Jakarta lobby.
LANCE COLLINS:I thought the intelligence reporting was too equivocal and quite vague and so I and others tended to draw their attention to areas of fact, which wasn't appreciated.
That resulted in my Headquarters getting a letter telling me to keep quiet within the system of DIO's reporting and that typifies what they were looking for – compliance and silence.
PAULA KRUGER: When Australian troops were deployed in East Timor, Colonel Collins worked with the then Major General Peter Cosgrove as his Senior Intelligence Advisor.
During that time, his access to a vital database in Canberra was shut down.
He initially believed it was caused by a technical hitch but then suspected it had deliberately been turned off to punish him.
LANCE COLLINS: I returned to Australia on the last day of February in 2000 and a couple of intelligence corps colleagues of main warned me that the knives were out for me in Canberra and one of them advised me I should stop saying there needed to be a Royal Commission into the whole thing.
PAULA KRUGER: Colonel Collins was transferred from Army intelligence and given a training position.He says he wrote to the then Defence Minister about his concerns over intelligence analysis, undue sympathy towards another power and the investigation into Merv Jenkins, the Defence Intelligence Organisation's former Chief Liaison Officer in Washington.Mr Jenkins was accused of handing the Americans documents on East Timor, documents he believed he had the authority to pass on.
DIO and the Department of Foreign Affairs launched an investigation and soon afterwards Mr Jenkins committed suicide.
LANCE COLLINS: It certainly registers as something very wrong in a system when you have people who've been inside the military and intelligence systems for all their working lives and they suddenly commit suicide, then that's a sky rocket that something's badly wrong.
PAULA KRUGER: Colonel Collins had his wish for an independent investigation fulfilled. It was led by the Navy's Captain Martin Toohey, who found that the substance of the Colonel's complaints were well founded, that a pro-Jakarta lobby exists in DIO and it tells the Government what it wants to hear.
But Captain Toohey's findings were rejected and he was subjected to a Defence Security Investigation.
LANCE COLLINS: By having been harassed within Defence, he is very much a changed man
.PAULA KRUGER: Another investigation has been conducted this time by the Inspector
General of Intelligence and Security, Ian Carnell, and he has backed Colonel Collins' claims the link between East Timor and an intelligence database in Canberra had been deliberately cut. But his completed report has been with the Defence Minister Robert Hill since late last year.
Senator Hill says he has not yet released it because he is pursuing legal and administrative issues arising from the report.
TANYA NOLAN: Paula Kruger. And the story will be broadcast in full tonight on ABC TV's Australian Story program tonight.
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2005/s1421892.htm
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Reporter: Paula Kruger
TANYA NOLAN: One of the Army's top intelligence analysts has spoken out about what he says is a culture of cover-up and intimidation within the Australian Defence Force.
Lieutenant Colonel Lance Collins was a Senior Intelligence Advisor to the then Major General Peter Cosgrove when he was Commander of the INTERFET forces in East Timor in 1999.
Lieutenant Colonel Collins came to public attention last year when a leaked report backed his claims that he'd been victimised by a 'pro-Jakarta lobby' in the intelligence community.
The report's author, Navy Captain Martin Toohey wrote that intelligence was distorted and driven by Government policy, but those claims were publicly rejected.Colonel Collins has spoken to ABC TV's Australian Story saying he's concerned about the effect the controversy has had on Captain Toohey.
PAULA KRUGER: Despite being recognised as one of the military's top intelligence officers, Lieutenant Colonel Lance Collins says he can no longer stand being in the Army.
LANCE COLLINS: The system is very heavily weighted to produce a certain answer that is acceptable to a certain political party and its agenda rather than the nation and its well-being.
PAULA KRUGER: Colonel Collins has told ABC TV's Australian Story of his concerns in 1998 over increasing instability and violence in East Timor and the Indonesian Army's links with local militias.
But he says his concerns were not well received when he put them in a formal intelligence estimate and pointed out that Australian foreign policy was being driven by a pro-Jakarta lobby.
LANCE COLLINS:I thought the intelligence reporting was too equivocal and quite vague and so I and others tended to draw their attention to areas of fact, which wasn't appreciated.
That resulted in my Headquarters getting a letter telling me to keep quiet within the system of DIO's reporting and that typifies what they were looking for – compliance and silence.
PAULA KRUGER: When Australian troops were deployed in East Timor, Colonel Collins worked with the then Major General Peter Cosgrove as his Senior Intelligence Advisor.
During that time, his access to a vital database in Canberra was shut down.
He initially believed it was caused by a technical hitch but then suspected it had deliberately been turned off to punish him.
LANCE COLLINS: I returned to Australia on the last day of February in 2000 and a couple of intelligence corps colleagues of main warned me that the knives were out for me in Canberra and one of them advised me I should stop saying there needed to be a Royal Commission into the whole thing.
PAULA KRUGER: Colonel Collins was transferred from Army intelligence and given a training position.He says he wrote to the then Defence Minister about his concerns over intelligence analysis, undue sympathy towards another power and the investigation into Merv Jenkins, the Defence Intelligence Organisation's former Chief Liaison Officer in Washington.Mr Jenkins was accused of handing the Americans documents on East Timor, documents he believed he had the authority to pass on.
DIO and the Department of Foreign Affairs launched an investigation and soon afterwards Mr Jenkins committed suicide.
LANCE COLLINS: It certainly registers as something very wrong in a system when you have people who've been inside the military and intelligence systems for all their working lives and they suddenly commit suicide, then that's a sky rocket that something's badly wrong.
PAULA KRUGER: Colonel Collins had his wish for an independent investigation fulfilled. It was led by the Navy's Captain Martin Toohey, who found that the substance of the Colonel's complaints were well founded, that a pro-Jakarta lobby exists in DIO and it tells the Government what it wants to hear.
But Captain Toohey's findings were rejected and he was subjected to a Defence Security Investigation.
LANCE COLLINS: By having been harassed within Defence, he is very much a changed man
.PAULA KRUGER: Another investigation has been conducted this time by the Inspector
General of Intelligence and Security, Ian Carnell, and he has backed Colonel Collins' claims the link between East Timor and an intelligence database in Canberra had been deliberately cut. But his completed report has been with the Defence Minister Robert Hill since late last year.
Senator Hill says he has not yet released it because he is pursuing legal and administrative issues arising from the report.
TANYA NOLAN: Paula Kruger. And the story will be broadcast in full tonight on ABC TV's Australian Story program tonight.
http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2005/s1421892.htm
*** DISCLAIMER ***
This message was sent to you using the "Send to a friend" facility on ABC Online (http://www.abc.net.au). To make a comment about this email, contact us: http://www.abc.net.au/contact/
Be sure to also include this entire email message. The ABC is not responsible for the content of this email, and anything said in this email does not necessarily reflect the ABC's views
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