Howard never had any personal passion that drove his interest in security. His intervention in East Timor was driven by genuine concern for the plight of individual Timorese, in the same way that his later, and equally significant, assistance to Indonesia after the tsunami also seemed motivated by concern for individuals. Howard also came to believe personally in supporting George Bush in his ''war on terror''; nevertheless, none of these events appeared to result in a greater desire to shape Australia's strategic direction or place in the world. Today, things are different.

Kevin Rudd is very aware that cabinet's National Security Committee has become obsessed with the tactical to the extent that it risks ignoring the vital strategic settings that will determine the eventual outcome of any future crisis. Under Howard there had been attempts to extend the committee's horizons, although these petered out as the Government became more focused on its immediate political survival.

Professor Ross Babbage, of the Kokoda Foundation, is scathing about the result of these efforts to stretch the focus of the NSC to long-term issues. ''Most ministers had difficulty focusing on more distant horizons. Issues such as ''China's relationship with Japan in 2015'' may seem weighty, but in practice the imponderables of the long term make any decision-making difficult and easy to defer. After an hour or so most people just want to move on.''

In practice the NSC soon became occupied with the detail on the agenda. Issues such as ''Should we buy an American air fighter, or the Spanish one?'' soon overtook broader considerations such as ''What will we need a navy to do in the next decade?''