Keynote Address by Minister for Defence Dr Ng Eng Hen at the Defence Technology Prize Award Ceremony on 26 November 2024

IFriends and Colleagues,

Senior Officials,

Distinguished Guests,

Defence Technology Prize Winners,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Introduction

This is a happy and satisfying day for many of you, I know you have been working very hard to be recognised, as least today. This makes it a very special day, so thank you for asking me to join. As Chief Defence Scientist Tan Peng Yam said, we are gathered to recognise the outstanding achievements of our Defence Technology Community (DTC). I do not think I need to convince any of you here that the impact of technological innovations on security is huge and it is manifestly obvious to all of us. If you look back, even within this past decade, new technologies have become mainstream threats to militaries everywhere. Whether it is unmanned warfare, cyber intrusions, disinformation campaigns, and with more to come, any military that is not prepared for new and emerging threats will suffer the consequences. It is now no longer a question of “if” anymore, but “when”, and “how” disabling the impact will be. The sum of it is that the unprepared military for these new and emerging threats will lose the battle, if not the war.

It is not just the expanded range of these new threats, but the pace and proliferation. As we witnessed in the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war, technological cycles have become compressed in time. Even militaries that considered themselves nimble find it hard to keep up with these cycles. To compound the problem, conventional structures within most militaries do not lend themselves to this rapid pace of change.

These moments in history where incumbent militaries were caught unable or unwilling to adapt to technological advancements have occurred before. For example, in the term of the last century, in the late 1900s, prior to the widespread use of telegraph and radio, communications were mechanical, so either the horse, the car, or the train. People got used to that pace of communication. They got used to the pace of communication even in warfare. A simple example was that if I am communicating in the front line from the capital, it takes two weeks by horse or car to reach, for a message to reach, and for a message to come back. So it gives me about four weeks to plan, to relax and to wait for my message. In 1914, one decision to the next, the inability to appreciate that new technology has changed the pace of communication, precipitated a war. The annals of history will tell you that both Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia never wanted war – that is what we are told. They actually sought peace, but delayed telegrams and conflicting messages left them uncertain of each other's intentions, and the rest is history. By the time the Kaiser’s response reached St. Petersburg, Germany had already declared war on Russia, and the chance for resolution was lost. Their intentions, no matter how good, were overtaken by technological change and their inability to operate in the new norm.

Radical changes in the assumptions of modern-day warfare were indeed one of the recurring messages that I get on my defence trips overseas. We travel a bit and meet other defence leaders both in the military and Ministry of Defence, and this is a recurring message – that modern warfare is now changed. The ongoing Russia-Ukraine War is probably an archetype, if not a forerunner of wars to be fought subsequently. It is forcing militaries all over to relook their assumptions so that we are not caught in that paradigm which I talked about for the First World War where things changed but your assumptions did not. Now, you saw in the V15 video, the Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR), I think that was a great capability, but modern militaries are no longer talking about it – that is the old paradigm. We have been talking about the ISR for about twenty years now. What is the new operating paradigm that militaries are positioned for?  It is called the “God’s eye view” – persistent ISR that updates not every few hours, not every few minutes, but every few seconds. Just imagine how mind-blowing it is if you can see instantaneously what happens fifty, hundred, two hundred, four hundred kilometres away – the “God’s eye view”. Not just updated intel episodically, but real-time. In Ukraine, in fact, this is what happens, and this is what they shared with us. Starlink or mass swarms of drones enabled some of that, at least over the prescribed areas of operations. Movements of men and armaments were fed real-time by telecommunications, supplemented by information from civilians and the paramilitary. They knew where the Russian tanks were, they knew where the Russian men were, in real-time. This is no longer science fiction but reality. With pervasive strike platforms and AI-enabled systems, you can just imagine the pace of warfare. The OODA (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) loop is reduced from minutes to seconds. Just imagine if somebody could see into Singapore real-time, all movements within Singapore, instantly or close to that, they would essentially know when our H-hour is and plan accordingly.

Importance of Enhancing our Defence Technology Strategy

The central question that must occupy all militaries therefore, and all leaders, security and military leaders, is how do we prepare for this type of war? You make two assumptions: that it will never happen – this type of war is science fiction, and you do not plan accordingly and live with the consequences; or you say this is already happening, this will happen, we will not fight the previous war, we will fight the next war, and you plan accordingly. Therefore, you ask yourself, are we prepared? To get ahead of the curve, or even to keep up with it, requires militaries to evolve new innovative structures. I think we will still need to meet the needs of conventional platforms and tactics – that will never go away. And there, MINDEF, the SAF, DSTA, DSO, and Singapore Technologies have done well. So to name a few, we have achieved full operational capability for the Republic of Singapore Air Force’s H225M medium-lift helicopters and the CH-47F heavy-lift helicopters, and we have integrated advanced communications systems. We have also commissioned the Republic of Singapore Navy’s (RSN) first two operational Invincible-class submarines, Invincible and Impeccable, and that was made possible by our strong partnership with German shipbuilder Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems. For the Army, we have replaced the former Section Automatic Weapon with the Light Machine Gun, which is more lethal and for our soldiers to be more effective.

There in the conventional space, I think we have done very well, but to meet faster cycles of technological change, our current systems are not optimised. Why are we not optimised? You cannot operate in a start-up environment like a large traditional organisation. I am just stating the truism, which others have found in the business sectors, and I think that applies to militaries and organisations at large. If you want to operate like a start-up as a conventional organization, it ends up being ineffective and frustrated. In real life, you have the example of Walmart, all of us know – deep pockets, huge organisation, enormous resources. It tried to do it, tried to convert itself from being a leading brick-and-mortar organisation to become a digital platform. Despite its heft and spending billions of dollars, Walmart's transition to a digital-first strategy has been far slower and more difficult than anticipated, and it continues to face stiff competition from more tech platforms. If you ask yourself, what is a simple truth that all of us have realised? Some of you have worked in different organisations – cultures of organisations make a difference, a huge difference. One of the things that SAF officers who join civilian organisations say when you meet them is that things are different – the SAF is a different animal compared to where I am now. Mixing the two, like a brick-and-mortar versus an online organisation, is trying to force fit one to the other – this is hard and counter-productive. 

So what do we do? You need a hybrid structure and allow start-up autonomy from the parent organisation. MINDEF and the SAF will need to have start-up like teams within the larger organisation, with closer ops-tech integration. And ops-tech integration for start-ups may even have tech leading it – ops may have to be subservient to tech. That is a radical change. We are a traditional organisation, but our SAF officers are progressive, and I believe they can lead tech as ops. In that set-up, a higher risk of failure or obsolescence may have to be accepted. In other words, in a brick-and-motar, if you fail 10% of the time, you will. As a start-up, if you fail 80% of the time, you will say, “Great, I succeeded one out of five times.” Because doing nothing or maintaining status quo will also fail or lead to irrelevance. A compelling example would be Ukraine’s recent creation of the world’s first Unmanned Systems Force, focused on deploying novel, low-cost UAVs to outpace the enemy. If the SAF is a start-up culture, I look forward to them suggesting to build an unmanned air, naval or army service.

Drawing Lessons from Global Conflicts

This wave of change already includes mass unmanned platforms, for both ISR and Strike. The concepts are now well-proven. Ukraine has effectively employed low-cost unmanned surface vessels. You would have read about the Magura drone boat, which has claimed at least 18 successful strikes against naval vessels in the Black Sea since the summer of 2023. That is why Ukraine has maintained control of the western Black Sea. The grain transports of Ukraine have reached pre-war levels, and they are able to do that against a much larger Russian Navy. They were outsized, but they were able to claim and not lose sovereignty of the western Black Sea because of the drone strikes. In my recent trip, I was informed that one of the modus operandi for both sides was to pack jet skis with explosives. Just imagine hundreds of them being let loose. Each costing just a few thousand dollars and packed with explosives, it changes entirely our concept of operations – how do you protect against it, how do you make sure that they do not end up changing tactically or strategically the course of the war?

I am glad that the SAF and DTC have already started to meet this new challenging environment, and we have had rapid innovation and partnerships with new industrial players. The DTC collaborates with local start-ups like BeeX, a spin-off company that develops autonomous underwater technologies for the RSN. Other key partnerships include Transcelestial, which is working on laser communications technology with DSTA and ST Engineering for high-speed connectivity, and Bifrost, which develops data generation engines for AI and robotics.

People at the Core of Our Technology Edge

For all these initiatives to succeed, we need one essential ingredient – bold, talented, and committed people, like yourselves. When these people succeed, we need to recognise the efforts so that others will emulate their examples. This year, the award of the Defence Technology Prize goes to two individuals and four outstanding teams.

the individual award winners, Dr Yee Jiong Sang from DSO National Laboratories, worked on the guided systems development since 1992. Another recipient is Mr Ong Khoon Kiat from DSTA, who pioneered capabilities to detect and counter online threats of misinformation and extremist propaganda.

This year, we are proud to recognise two team award winners from the DSO and the Digital and Intelligence Service. The advance information security team has developed homegrown information security capabilities that enhance our situational awareness and provide early warning for the SAF. The advanced language processing team has created algorithms to enable efficient and timely analysis of critical information.

You saw the V15 team from DSO, who developed mini-UAVs for the Army. They developed these new designs for the fixed-wing hybrid V15 UAV, to deliver a solution that meets the Army’s rigorous operational requirements. The advanced energetic systems team has developed and successfully qualified insensitive munitions designs. Because there are limited testing ranges, they used extensive simulations and innovative testing methods to improve the safety of our munitions.

As we have done in the past decades, I do not need to convince you about the battle grounds – it is happening before your eyes. We do not want this situation, but I was always taught – If you learn a lesson vicariously from somebody else’s battle, you are paying very little, and we have to learn those lessons. As we have done in the past six decades, we just need to stay abreast, and we do it through our determination, effort, and ingenuity, so that we can position Singapore with the best possible defence against today’s threats and tomorrow’s challenges. I think we have built up enough resources, manpower and ingenuity in our system so that we can achieve these mission goals. We need to continue to be bold and imaginative so that we can surmount every problem that comes our way.

Conclusion

Congratulations to all award recipients once again. Thank you.

Defence Engineers and Scientists Honoured for Excellence and Innovation in Defence Technology

Fact Sheet: Defence Engineers and Scientists Honoured for Excellence and Innovation in Defence Technology