Speech by Minister for Defence, Dr Ng Eng Hen, at Goh Keng Swee Command and Staff College Command and Staff Course 2014 Graduation Ceremony

Chief of Defence Force,
Service Chiefs,
Senior Commanders,
Graduands of this 45th Command and Staff Course,

As well as the 15th Command and Staff Course (National Service), and 3rd Command and Staff Course (Executive), First let me say how delighted my wife and I are to join you this evening for your graduation. It is always a pleasure to meet your better halves, your significant others, your spouses, some parents and close friends, to hear about your families. I like doing that, my wife likes doing that. Not because we are kay poh, but because your life stories are important. They reflect what you go through and you are reflective of the entire Singapore society - the aspirations they hold, your achievements and the difficulties, as well as our foreign guests, very interesting stories. I know one of you with his wife, who came down by a cruise and they are going back the other way, also by a cruise. So I wanted to say to the wife, "Oh, I'm sure you had a lot of time when your husband was doing the course." But before I could say that, she said, "I have five children." As they say in Singapore, quickly diam diam, better don't say anymore. I think they're going back by the cruise with five children. I have always believed that we should keep a close watch on our own people - and when I say own people here of course I refer to our foreign attendees as well - our military people, because their own lives reflect what the nation is going through, and at the end of the day, you ask yourselves what the military does, our core business is defending our way of life. What is it that is defending that is worthwhile? So we ought to know about it, and at the core of it, whoever I speak to, I think one of the essential elements of what we are protecting is our families, our family life.

All of you have your own rituals, I call them, or what makes the family comes together. For me and my wife, we have four children. We like to spend as much time as we can on dinner.

When the children were growing up, we would ask them "What did you do today?" I'm sure you do that too. It's not that we are spying on our children; we just want to know what is going on in their life. When they grew up, my children wised up to this and before I could ask them, they would turn around and ask, "What did you do today, Dad?" When I was a surgeon, it was easier - I could tell them what I did. Then when I went into the Government it was more difficult. So some days would be difficult so I'd say, "Well, I had meetings." Then they looked at me, not very happy. So I had to think of more creative ideas. After which, I ran out of ideas and I said, "I can tell you, but I would have to kill you after that."I'm sure that many of you feel very proud, and you should be, after this intensive 10-month long programme. And from your stories and what you share, as well as your personal sacrifices. I was particularly moved by an NSman whose wife passed away. He said that his wife encouraged him to complete the course. All your difficulties, your effort, and your sacrifices. I am sure that it is for a greater cause of preparing yourself for bigger roles and higher responsibilities in your respective organisations.

Developing Leaders of Tomorrow

For Singapore, next year, we celebrate our 50th Anniversary. It's a Golden Jubilee. It will be special, it is special, and I think at every Golden Jubilee, every nation, every organisation will celebrate how far we have come and I think Singapore has come very far. We remember our early and difficult beginnings. It will be a time of thanksgiving, for the peace and prosperity we enjoy today and also a thanksgiving for the pioneers who made it possible. I think it will also be a time to look forward, to affirm what we must never give up and reflect on what we should change and adapt, for a better future.

I think one of the hallmarks of the SAF's achievement, which we must hold on tenaciously, is the ability to produce good leaders, year after year. My concern is this danger: that because we do it well and we do it sometimes as if smoothly, without interruption - we do it year after year, this dinner is not the first and there will be many to come and I'm sure and you know, it's efficient. The danger is that we believe that this - producing good leaders from the military - is the natural order of things. It is not. 好男不当兵 (good men do not become soldiers). That's a saying steep in Chinese tradition. My Chinese is not so good but I know that there are epigrams that put the soldier at the bottom. You know it, there are many Chinese scholars here. The moment we believe that what we have for the SAF, producing good leaders is the natural order of things, I believe this is the day that we begin to slide downwards. It is not natural order in Singapore or in any other country for the military to attract those who are capable as the first choice of their life career. I am being honest. It is a wonderful career and the values that I see our soldiers are uplifting and I will vouch for your character, your determination and your values. But it is true that there are opportunities and on a general and national level, it is not a natural order. Neither is it the natural order of things to ask busy professionals and mid-career Singaporeans, our NSmen, to set aside precious time to attend a 10 month course.

But for 45 years, this College has succeeded in developing exemplary military leaders who care for the country and the men they lead. And I think These are leaders who have ingrained in themselves strong and virtuous military values, a strong fighting spirit and a continuous drive for excellence, as our valedictorian has said. As a result, graduands of this College before you have gone on to hold high leadership positions in the SAF and made a significant impact. I see them often, I meet them often. Recently, Colonel John Morrice passed away. If you look at his life, he has done so much, high standards of leadership.

Together with these aspirations, the College itself has also improved its offerings to participants. It collaborates with Nanyang Technological University and the Singapore Institute of Management and over 80 officers have obtained their Masters degrees in the last few years. A pioneer batch of 21 SAF officers received the Graduate Diploma in Military Leadership in April this year.

And for the first time too, we have senior warrant officers - very glad to meet you and your wives - they are participating in the CSC (Executive) course. We recognise their abilities and are going to put them into places with larger responsibilities that they will have to shoulder, and we put them through this course to prepare them for it. We've also one officer from the Singapore Police Force and 15 international officers from 11 countries. For Myanmar it's the first time. I think it's a very rich texture, diversity, you add perspectives to your discussions with diverse views and experiences, and I think, most importantly, the friendships that you will forge with one another, and I hope that friendship continues.

Changing Context for Military Leadership

The College and CSC must keep up with the demands placed on military commanders today. Why? Because the security challenges that confront countries are increasingly transnational and complex. Mission outcomes today are hard to define, let alone achieve. It's true. It's not so clear cut, it's not just 'defend the nation', question is who is the enemy? What is the outcome? Very hard to define. And it calls for leaders who have excellent domain knowledge in their fields of expertise, and yet at the same time factor in inputs from others to make good decisions on the spot in complex scenarios.

That's a bit theoretical; let me cite one example from a threat that we are facing now - terrorism - to drive home a point. The violence and extremism occurring now in the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) should be viewed as a continuum of the terrorist threat since 9/11 in 2001 mounted by Al-Qaeda. Many of you remember how ISD (Internal Security Department) disrupted that Al-Qaeda plan to bomb installations in Singapore through the JI, the local network here. And because of that Singapore joined with other forces against this terror network in Iraq and Afghanistan. Just imagine that 6000, 5000 of kilometers away, we are a small country here, yet we are there. Why? We did this because no country or its citizens are safe if terrorists are allowed to grow in strength. It could be any one of us that they want to behead. You remember our Singaporeans, our poor Singaporean who was in Mumbai, happened to be there. No one is safe. The Jemaah Islamiyah cell that was uncovered in 2001 showed that they had made plans to bomb targets in Singapore. Our combined efforts there have disrupted Al-Qaeda, but as then-Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew said during an interview, this was with Fareed Zakaria of Newsweek in 2003 regarding Al-Qaeda and Islamic extremism in Iraq, let me quote what Mr Lee said, "In killing the terrorists, you will only kill the worker bees. The queen bees are the preachers, who teach a deviant form of Islam in schools and Islamic centres, who capture and twist the minds of the young." He further warned, "You must use force. But force will only deal with the tip of the problem." Many of you, all of us here, would agree with Mr Lee.

So for ISIS, new "queen bees" have formed. You kill one "queen bee", you make it weak, Al-Qaeda, JI is there. You attack the "queen bee" in JI, another "queen bee" comes along. You have to address ISIS, but I think there will be other "queen bees". This is a protracted fact. But this "queen bee" ISIS is producing radicals. An estimated ten to twenty thousand foreigners are reported to be in Iraq and Syria, many of whom have joined the radical group, they are providing logistic support, they are being trained militant techniques - how to bomb, how to avoid detection, how to do harm to innocent civilians. And many countries, including us, are worried if these return jihadists, as they are called, when they come back, what ideology they have, what training they have. We train in Singapore, these return jihadists from Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, train there. Will they come back and form a militant group? They already have. Some of them announced that they come back, and this is their region, they've coalesced to form a militant group to pose a real threat to our security.

As Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has said, Singapore is seriously considering how we can be a helpful partner in the fight against ISIS. Recently the SAF hosted the Special Forces commanders. It was an international conference two weeks ago. So I had lunch with them, having lunch with Special commanders is quite an experience - all Special Forces, quite interesting. They are all quite big, big size. Anyhow, I asked them, there were about 17 of them, 17 to 19, I asked them, "how many of you and countries have citizens in your countries who have gone to Iraq and Syria, and nearly every hand went up. Seventeen countries all put up their hands. I'm not talking about this new world you know, I'm talking about your citizens who are in Iraq and Syria, it's a multi-national problem, So when we talked about the threat is, it coalesced all the groups, and these countries were those with ASEAN, from Europe, Arab countries, Russia. I asked a Russian, "do you have? Yes I have". They opened them up. We discussed how we have to train respond to these threats, and came to the conclusion that there are no quick fixes or easy answers. We have to exchange information and cooperate to counter the scourge of international terrorism. But yet, more importantly, at the same time, we must remain united and cohesive, and come together to guard against extremism and self-radicalisation. Because these terrorists attack all people regardless of what you believe, regardless of your faith. They will attack Muslims, they will attack Buddhists, Christians, or even when you have no faith.

As leaders within MINDEF and the SAF, we must help defend our people against this clear and present threat. At the same time, we must pursue peace - there are other challenges in the East and South China Seas, working with other countries to build strategic trust and confidence, and maintaining communication channels.

Indeed, the SAF is working with its partners in the region in many ways: Malacca Straits patrols with Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, to deter piracy. Together with 17 other countries from the ADMM-Plus, we have conducted multilateral exercises. And we are now gearing up for humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. We have established the new Changi Regional HADR Coordination Centre. These are efforts that we continually cultivate, put expenses into, put resources into, and we know that we need to collaborate with others to deal with transnational issues because the challenges are complex.

Military Leadership for the 21st Century

So as military leaders today, we must have knowledge not only to be able to exercise wisdom and discernment but to be alert to shifts in the security landscape and appreciate the implications for Singapore, and your countries as you go back. Understand our national interests and objectives, so that you can lead the men and women under your charge confidently when called upon to serve our nation. We have to work closely with militaries, national security agencies and civil society organisations around the world in tackling challenges that affect us all.

Let me take this opportunity to acknowledge the commitment and steadfast efforts of our 49 NS Commanders graduating alongside our Regulars tonight. We appreciate the difficulty that you've had in balancing work and family commitments, on top of their in-camp training.

Conclusion

In closing, I would like to thank the spouses, the family members and employers of the graduating officers. Your support is really important to help our graduands complete their course. I want to congratulate each graduand, and I know that the fact that you're here, and the fact that you've completed this course, is something that you can be really proud of. It shows the mettle in your, what you're made of, and it is a promising start to future success in your own responsibilities in the SAF and in your careers.Thank you very much.