Why The Age will always stick to its code

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“It’s real simple. I stick to the f—ing code mate, 100 per cent.”

When Ben Roberts-Smith said this to a fellow SAS veteran of the war in Afghanistan, he was talking about a code of silence he and many of his comrades-in-arms believed was an intrinsic part of what bound them together as Australia’s elite fighting men.

Of all the places where a crime might be committed, in the midst of war is among the most difficult to investigate. Afghanistan compounded this difficulty by being as remote and alien a land as many Australians could imagine. Since Roberts-Smith began his defamation action against this masthead in August 2018, Afghanistan has returned to Taliban rule, making it even more inaccessible.

Our case that we did not defame Roberts-Smith but rather had uncovered the truth of his war crimes faced further obstacles. One was time – the allegations involved incidents that took place between 2009 and 2012. Another was Australian officials’ aversion to media scrutiny.

But not everyone was silent. First to speak out were Afghans who alleged their family members had been murdered by Australian troops, and NGOs who recorded and analysed their testimony. Shamefully, these voices struggled for a hearing within our military and other media. But then Australian troops, interviewed by military sociologist Samantha Crompvoets for a study into culture and trust commissioned by the Department of Defence, began to reveal that they had witnessed acts that did not sit with their own ethical code.

As Crompvoets told our reporter Nick McKenzie, her research found different people from different vantage points revealing what seemed to be a pattern of behaviour. The then chief of army, Lieutenant-General Angus Campbell, saw enough merit in her findings to ask the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force to conduct a secret inquiry, led by Major-General Paul Brereton, into allegations of unlawful conduct.

It was not until 2020, years after this masthead’s reporting, that results of this inquiry entered the public domain. The heavily redacted report found credible information that at least 39 Afghans were unlawfully killed by Australian soldiers. It stated: “We embarked on this inquiry with the hope that we would be able to report that the rumours of war crimes were without substance. None of us desired the outcome to which we have come. We are all diminished by it.”

For The Age to have known about these events years earlier and dismissed them as not worth examining would have been to shirk our duty as journalists. To assume that the Inspector-General’s inquiry would tell Australians everything they needed to know about the conduct of our forces would also have been an abdication of the role we are meant to play in a free society. To examine those allegations with the seriousness they deserved, we interviewed those involved, gathering evidence and trying to report the truth of what occurred.

This masthead you support has prevailed in defending itself against the charge of defamation, and the court has found that the man who brought those accusations, funded by a rival media company, in fact committed war crimes and murders. That Australian, who received the highest military decoration our country can bestow, whose words and actions became part of the fabric of the Australian War Memorial, has been shown to have committed those acts in a war waged on our behalf. And we should not forget that in a distant land, fathers and sons were cut down unjustly by foreign forces – our forces.

To those who wonder why we pursued this story in the first place, or who question holding our troops to higher moral standards than those of the people they are fighting, it is worth quoting the words of “Soldier Y” of the SAS, who told McKenzie that “we are not above the law, we’re not above the rules of engagement. If anything, the expectation for us to adhere to the laws around conflict should be higher than anyone in the entire ADF.”

When we send soldiers abroad to fight, it matters that they are fighting for the right reasons and that they fight in a way that faithfully represents our values. This poses questions for our leaders – our journalism has explored whether a few highly trained soldiers were used as a political tool in Iraq and Afghanistan to bolster our standing in Washington – and questions for soldiers like Ben Roberts-Smith.

In seeking answers, The Age has adhered to its own code, which is not to remain silent but to go where the evidence takes us and ask hard questions. Thursday’s verdict shows why that commitment is vital.

Patrick Elligett sends an exclusive newsletter to subscribers each week. Sign up to receive his Note from the Editor.

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