Committee of Supply – Head J (Ministry of Defence)

Debate resumed.

The Chairman: Minister for Defence.

7.45 pm

The Minister for Defence (Dr Ng Eng Hen): Much obliged, Mr Speaker. Colleagues, Mr Speaker, this Committee of Supply (COS), we sit together with the rest of the world coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic.

We have learned to live with the disease and are returning to normalcy. But it is also clear to all of us that the world has changed, and some things will never revert to the status quo ante. Among them, hybrid work patterns, greater digitalisation, increased vulnerability of supply chains, rising protectionism.

Many of you have spoken about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and in parallel, that and rising US-China tensions, which many of you touched upon, are seminal forces that will impede, if not unravel, globalisation.

For Singapore, whose external trade is three and a half times our GDP, the proverbial “shop in the MRT station”, the “canary in the mine of globalisation”, so dependent on free flow of goods and services, capital and people, these changes are bound to affect us, and our country will feel the effects strongly.

There is also the potential of physical disruption to key sea lines of communication. Mr Vikram Nair spoke on this. Mr Dennis Tan alluded to it. The South China Sea and the Straits of Malacca and Singapore are indeed vital waterways. A third of global shipping goes through the South China Sea and the Straits of Malacca and Singapore and carries 80% of the oil transported to Northeast Asia.

Coupled with these external forces, internally, many countries see their citizens pushing against globalisation and immigrants. The rise in extreme right parties is a vivid sign of this inward-looking mood.

In sum, the post-World War II constructs of increasing free trade and open borders are under severe stress. President of the World Economic Forum Børge Brende recently described our world as one which is gradually sliding from a period of cooperation to a period of intensifying global competition.

China’s ascension into the World Trade Organization (WTO), if we cast our minds back, was in 2001, so some 22 years ago, where US President Bill Clinton at that time spent political capital to get his Congress to support it. Why did the US do it? They wanted to speed up China’s transition to a market-based economy for it to be more globally integrated. As the thinking went, if China was more like the rest of the world, trading with it and co-dependent, then surely Communism as a form of government would be weakened.

More than 20 years later, I suspect that some within the US and their Western allies, in retrospect, might think that was a mistake. Because China has indeed risen economically and is now one of the largest trading nations. So, for the very reasons you push for China to be included in the WTO, it has succeeded. But just recently, Czech President-elect Petr Pavel asserted that China was “not compatible with Western democracies in their strategic goals and principles”.

Think about this. The world’s second-largest global trading partner is not compatible with you. So, it is not what you do; it is what you are.

These forces run deep and will alter the very foundational pillars of countries and their relationships with others. It is inevitable, even for large and middle powers, let alone tiny Singapore. And many of you asked what these structural forces, what these tectonic plates will do to us. Mr Alex Yam, Mr Don Wee, Mr Dennis Tan, Mr Vikram Nair.

Let us first look at Europe. For Germany, that long believed and worked for the integration of Europe and Russia, those hopes have all but evaporated. Germany downsized its Bundeswehr, its military, in the 1990s to reap the so-called “peace dividends” after the Berlin Wall fell. Today, it has to reverse that policy. Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Zeitenwende speech in 2022 marked, as the word means, the end of an era and a turning point.

European Union (EU) countries have now pledged to spend more on defence in the face of Russia’s war on Ukraine. Some, like Latvia, are also reintroducing conscription while others like Germany, Sweden, Poland and France continue to mull over the reinstatement of some form of national service.

Closer to home, Asian countries too are upsizing their militaries, especially in Northeast Asia. With your permission, Mr Chairman, I have asked the Clerks to distribute charts on military spending as many Members asked about it. [Please refer to Annex 7.]

The Chairman: Please do. [Handouts were distributed to hon Members.]

Dr Ng Eng Hen: Members can refer to them and also access the handouts through your MP@SGParl mobile app.

China is estimated to spend in excess of US$270 billion and announced a 7.1% increase last year. Japan has announced plans to double its defence spending to 2% of GDP by 2027 and to develop counter-strike capabilities. For the past decade, Japan’s military spending, albeit as a self-defence force, has been on the same level as France and Germany’s, around US$50 billion every year. Two percent of Japan’s GDP would be around US$85 billion today. That is more than what India spends.

South Korea wants to increase defence spending by an annual average of 6.8% over the next five years, with a focus on securing capabilities to counter North Korea. If that happens, South Korea will spend as much as Japan today. Similarly, Australia will reach these levels of defence spending by 2030.

I put in comparison ASEAN’s military spending. ASEAN is not a military pact, but in comparison, spends in aggregate about what one of the ASEAN+8 countries spends – South Korea. Taken together, and if these facts bring to your minds that Asia is spending a lot militarily, you are quite right. Taken together, Asia’s military spending on the whole had already surpassed Europe in 2009.

The gap has since widened even further. Between 1999 and 2021, the defence spending by EU increased only by 20%, compared to the US that went up by 70%, Russia by 300% and China by 600%. EU countries will now be spending more because of the Ukraine invasion, but Asia’s military spending will be still larger for some time to come. The charts show the trends clearly.

All of us of course are asking, as some of your questions alluded to – what will all this lead to? I doubt anyone can really be sure. But without a robust framework to maintain peace, this upsizing of Asian militaries can spell trouble ahead.

Some of you know that there is a metaphorical Doomsday Clock that has been ticking away. Well, this Doomsday Clock has moved 90 seconds closer to midnight this year, the closest to global catastrophe since 1947, post-World War II. It is no wonder that some of us sleep less soundly at night.

Here, it would be remiss of me as Minister for Defence if I did not thank Members of this House for their constant and strong support through the years for my Ministry’s budget. The record shows that Members of Parliament of all political parties and Nominated Members of Parliament in successive Parliaments have shown this collective support. None of them were beguiled or rendered complacent by peace to push for less defence spending. Yes, questions were asked about how MINDEF and the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) put our defence dollars to use and if it was effective, accountability, so on and so forth. Questions that needed to be asked and were asked by Members here. But not reduced spending.

Outside this Parliament, some political personalities did push for reduction, saying our defence spending is "excessive”, or that external threats for us "don't exist”. I wish that was true. To them, I say, do not sacrifice a strong defence for Singapore at the altar of political expediency. It may win some support, but it risks losing Singapore in that self-interest. As Mr Lee Kuan Yew reminded us even in his later years, “Without a strong SAF, there is no economic future, there is no security”. That is a hard truth that remains constant.

We must never forget that defence is a long-term business. For the SAF, major systems and platforms take 10 to 15 years to conceptualise, build and integrate into our fighting force. That is assuming everything runs smoothly, without chop and change. If a military loses a capability and wants to build it back, it may take twice as long.

We need to remind ourselves constantly that investing steadily in defence is the more prudent and cost-effective strategy, especially during good times and peace. Because it is not just the dollars spent, but the know-how, the human capital, the culture and most important of all, the psychology and mental build-up of commanders and soldiers, crucial for the SAF, which is made up of NSmen in the majority.

Some of you have asked what have we learned from the war in Ukraine? We have learnt many lessons. We are watching it very, very closely. Because it is the only war in which modern state-on-state warfare has been fought in recent years. Mr Vikram Nair asked about this. There are indeed military lessons to be learnt. But more important than military lessons, examples of how people, ordinary citizens make the crucial difference, not only in civilian affairs but military too.

Ukrainian civilians have played significant roles in the conflict from the very beginning. Let me just share some examples briefly. Workers cut up old train tracks and welded them together to create obstacles. These were known as “steel hedgehogs” – nobody taught them how to do it – and they put them up to block Russian military trucks. Volunteers produced, repurposed and operated drones for the Ukrainian Armed Forces. And in particular, when Ukraine’s imports were disrupted and prices of lithium batteries went up and soldiers needed to communicate, volunteers started donation drives to collect and recycle batteries to power drone operations.

More recently, we saw footage of improvised grenades reportedly made by the Ukrainian Army in partnership with civilian engineers.

Basically, it shows a fragmentation grenade fitted with a shuttlecock that is attached for stabilisation. The grenades could then be lifted by commercial drones and dropped onto targets from above. A cheap and creative solution, perfect for recycling used shuttlecocks.

Ukraine’s Armed Forces relied heavily on civilians to gather military intelligence through crowdsourcing. When the invasion began, the government added new features to the Diia app, it is the equivalent of our Singpass. And through a chatbot, citizens could help the military locate Russian troops and vehicles by providing photos and videos together with live locations. As footage flooded in, there were multiple reports of Ukrainian troops successfully destroying Russian convoys, thanks to the tip-offs from the public. There was another crowdsourcing app followed, it is called ePPO, and this was for citizens to report sightings of cruise missiles and kamikaze drones. That is how sophisticated their system had become.

Passion, grit, bravery, innovation, even pure genius in the face of overwhelming adversity. Ukrainians had no electricity or running water, endured freezing temperatures, constantly under the threat of incoming missiles, but the resolve of the Ukrainian people to protect their country, to defend their freedom shone through, through all the misery that war brings.

If the war has taught us anything, it must be that weaponry and fighting platforms are important, but ultimately, it is the fighting spirit of the people that will decide if they end up subjugated or sovereign. We Singaporeans must build and have that same spirit and resolve. Our lives and our country will depend on it.

Let me now turn to the actual figures for MINDEF’s Budget. I think Don Wee asked specifically. In the coming financial year, my Ministry projects an expenditure of just under $18 billion. This translates to an increase of 5.6% from FY2022 due to mainly three reasons.

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First, inflation. MAS has estimated that core inflation should come in at 3.5% to 4.5% in 2023.

Second, we are catching up of projects deferred or disrupted – for example, SAFTI City, NS Square, the delivery of our submarines.

Third, we are spending more on digital and other non-kinetic capabilities. I will elaborate on them in the response to your questions on the Digital and Intelligence Service (DIS).

I had informed Members previously that MINDEF will strive to keep the growth of our Defence Budget to be in line with inflation and we have achieved this target for the past decade at about 4.3% each year. We expect this to continue for the next decade too, to stabilise at a 3% to 4% year-on-year growth.

By design, as Members have noted, MINDEF does not give detailed information in the Budget Book. Members know the reason. It is not in our security interest to do so, just as we do not give the detailed cost figures for acquisition of planes, submarines and Army platforms because they provide an indication of our capabilities.

Similarly, we do not want to provide an aggregated amount for the acquisitions – because you can guess – if your capability development is this budget and it is collected over years, what are you spending it for?

But the key question, I think, that the Member Gerald Giam is asking is how then do you assure prudence and accountability of your spending?

Like all public agencies, we are held to account for the management of funds. We are subject to independent audits by the Auditor-General's Office (AGO), where deep dives are taken into processes. In other words, you do not get to see the aggregated picture but you can see any of the individual processes.

For example, AGO had discovered payment errors of flexible benefit allowances in FY2021 and these were promptly recovered. MINDEF does not have any say to what the AGO wants to look at. If it wants to look at platforms, we have to show the detailed processes.

As Mr Giam said, the Public Accounts Committee can also request for additional information after examining AGO's audits, as it did in this case.

We have strong internal controls to ensure that expenditure is within stipulated ranges of reference costs. In other words, when we pay for something, we take reference from other known quoted figures.

Our procurement processes adhere to rigorous standards. When there are large-scale projects, we have senior management committees to ensure oversight and compliance.

But I take the point – there is a necessary trade-off between accountability and full transparency. There has to be. But I think overall, Singaporeans – with an NS Army – can see what our dollars go into and, as I said, the detailed processes are subject to audit.

Overall, MINDEF's spending has stabilised at between 3% and 4% of our GDP. Barring increasing tensions or persistently high inflation where military spending may have to go up, MINDEF expects this to be the steady state spending.

I will repeat that because my officials are very nervous about this. We have stabilised between 3% and 4% of the GDP. That is saying a lot. And barring increasing tensions or persistent high inflation, we expect this to be steady state spending.

In fact, this means that over the past few decades, because we have matured, as a percentage of GDP, we have been spending less.

What has we achieved? The final accountability – what have we done with all these defence dollars? I think Mr Henry Kwek and Mr Chong Kee Hiong asked about this.

With your permission, Mr Chairman, I have asked the Clerks to distribute a handout on SAF's transformation, which Members may refer to.

The Chairman: Yes, please. [Please refer to Annex 8.]

Dr Ng Eng Hen: We can have a quiet satisfaction that the SAF today is recognised as one of the most advanced in Asia.

I think Mr Dennis Tan asked – what are you preparing to make sure that your sea lines of communication, your airways, towards 2040, how are you preparing?

Some perspective: the SAF is not large relatively. There was a reason I gave that the military spending for all the countries around us. But for our size – all our Services, we are the most advanced in Asia. We operate modern state-of-the-art platforms. Together, these Services can prosecute campaigns across a spectrum of security challenges. This modernisation is saying a lot. It has taken two decades but has been completed successfully. Very few militaries have achieved that.

As a result, the Army now uses digitalised fighting and support platforms – the Hunter Armoured Fighting Vehicles, HIMARS and Leopard Tanks. The Air Force's Smart Multi-Role Tanker Transport aircraft and Aster-30 Missile Systems are new additions, together with the F-15s. The Navy has brought on a full fleet of Frigates and new Littoral Mission Vessels. In the next decade, more platforms and capabilities will be added.

I previously informed this House in 2019 that our Air Force would purchase four F-35 Joint Strike Fighters because we wanted to evaluate it. It allowed us access to information and facilities for a full evaluation. Our pilots have flown in F-35 mission simulators. The F-35 is a single-pilot cockpit. So, you cannot share with anyone. They have flown in simulators and learnt from operational F-35 pilots. They have evaluated the electronic systems on board and made trips to F-35 bases to study how other users maintain their fleets.

We have also flown with other F-35 operators, in particular, very recently, in Exercise Pitch Black in Darwin, Australia.

All of these have given us valuable insights. MINDEF and the SAF have concluded that the F-35 is the best choice to meet our defence needs now and in the future.

MINDEF will therefore proceed to exercise the option to acquire a second tranche of F-35Bs – eight of them – and they will be added to our fleet by the end of the decade. This acquisition will support the progressive drawdown of our ageing F-16s, which will retire from mid-2030s, which means that at steady state, our RSAF will operate F-35 and F-15 fighter planes – the most advanced in the region.

For the Navy, we have launched our second and third Invincible-class submarines a few months ago in Kiel, Germany. Later this year, you can expect the first submarine to return home base. You will only have a fleeting glance. It is, most of the time, underwater, unless you are at Changi Naval Base, where you can see some of it. By the end of this decade, all four submarines will be operational around Singapore waters.

These custom-fitted submarines will be stealthier, more agile and will remain submerged for a longer period. This significantly enhances naval capabilities to protect our interests at sea. And people notice. At the recent Munich Security Conference, they said, "You have got new Type-218SG submarines." I said, "Yes" – quietly.

For the Army, the next-generation Howitzer and Armoured Tracked Carrier will be introduced as well as more unmanned aerial and ground vehicles in our combat units.

Some of you ask about future threats – Mr Alex Yam, Mr Henry Kwek. Indeed, this was the reason we started the DIS. It has allowed us to consolidate military intelligence and digital and cyber capabilities.

Most of you ask for updates, including most Members of Parliament. I have talked about an SAF digital range. It has made good progress. It will contain virtual replicas of networks and systems that we have nationally so that we can simulate a wider range of cyber-attacks.

It will be completed in 2026. It will be used to train our DIS forces and conduct exercises with other military and commercial partners and we will organise joint training with other national agencies – I think Mr Alex Yam talked about that – to defend our critical infrastructure.

Some of you ask what our cyber agency DIS' mission is. Digital threats in the cyber arena are pervasive daily – literally tens, if not hundreds of thousands. What our cyber agencies are more concerned with are external and orchestrated attacks by non-state and state actors, for example, terrorist organisations.

The DIS has picked up some entities and is monitoring them for their activities. That is as much as I can say.

The DIS will also set up the Digital Ops-Tech Centre, run by software engineers and data scientists, to provide in-house software development. This Centre will be operational in 2024. I am giving you discrete dates and these are our targets.

Recruitment – some of you have asked this – including Miss Rachel Ong. In 2018, we launched a Cyber Work-learn programme and last year, a new Digital Work-Learn Scheme. Since the launch of both schemes, more than 350 NSFs have signed on. We also saw a 40% increase in applications. A significant number of applications are for non-uniformed roles. So, I think it is doing quite well.

This transformed quadri-Service SAF will provide Singapore with a strong core against foreseeable threats. But even so, I agree with many Members here that we must prepare for new disruptive technologies as well as scenarios that we have not seen.

The future is still evolving but the overall shape is discernible. In the not so distant future like many Members talked about, militaries will use a new generation of hypersonic missiles, lethal autonomous platforms and directed energy weapons. These are just a few examples.

Unmanned platforms are now commonly used in both civilian and military settings. What will be a game-changer is when these unmanned platforms from air, land and sea are scaled to large numbers and weaponised.

We have already seen it in the Ukraine war. How do you respond to those?

A few years back, drone strikes from Azerbaijan took out Armenian air defences, artillery and armoured vehicles from above. Recently, in Sevastopol, Ukraine launched a coordinated drone attack against the Russian Navy – nine from the air, seven from the sea. These drones were able to break through multi-layered defences around the port and damaged at least two Russian ships.

These concrete examples that Members of Parliament have shared are rewriting the doctrine and practice of modern warfare as we speak. So, how does MINDEF and SAF deal with this, I was asked.

Well, we set up organically and organisationally the Future Systems and Technology Directorate (FSTD). It is literally called that – the Future Systems and Technology Directorate. In it are SAF planners, DSTA engineers and DSO scientists. Their job is to ignore vested interests in the present SAF but instead to be insurgents, to render obsolete if they can current platforms, forces and even organisations by producing improved ways for Singapore to defend itself in the future.

They do not have that many friends because they are trying to steal somebody's lunch literally. And if they can show they can do that, then they have succeeded. Our future literally depends on them performing their tasks well.

As an example, FSTD spearheaded the research and investments in unmanned platforms and this was a decade ago – even before what we talked about today. Today, autonomous technologies will be built into the Navy's new Multi-Role Combat Vessels to function as a "mothership", with unmanned platforms that can work together across a range of missions. This was a decade ago because that is how long it takes to conceptualise and build.

So, while older RSN ships typically operate one unmanned system, these vessels are able to operate multiple systems simultaneously. The Navy will shift towards a future force structure where about half of its vessels will be unmanned. Fifty percent of our future Navy will be unmanned.

There is one more last vital ingredient for the SAF – our people. We can have the best platforms and systems in the world, but as the Ukrainian spirit showed, it is the spirit and the know-how that will determine if the SAF can defend Singapore and its interests successfully.

There is an infographic on how we are training. [Please refer to Annex 9.]

In order to have well-trained soldiers, we have to invest and we have invested heavily in our training infrastructure. SAFTI City – we have announced it in 2017 – is making good progress. The completed training circuits will include battlefield effects simulators that can replicate smoke and blast effects and interactive targets that can fire back – a far cry from our days when it is "bang, bang, bang, bang, I shoot you, you shoot me". Who confirms? We just assume that both did not get shot or both got shot. This one, cannot "play play", no bluffing, because you wear electronic sensors. If you are dead, you are dead. If your platform is hit, that is it.

Phase 1 will be completed next year and will consist of over 60 new buildings – a mix of high-rise interconnected buildings, low-rise residences, a bus interchange and even an underground MRT station. Buildings and roads can be configured so that the soldiers can encounter a different layout each time they train at SAFTI City, so that they can train in a complex urban environment.

Surrounding SAFTI City, we will build three new Instrumented Battle Circuits (iBACs). The first – Murai Urban Battle Circuit – will be ready by this year, and the other two will be ready by early 2024. These circuits will simulate energy fires such as artillery bombardment and air strikes, and they will help our soldiers hone their operational instincts and tactical fundamentals.

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When these iBACs start, up to 22,000 active and NS soldiers will use them every year. Realistic, efficient training.

This will excite you. The new training facilities will have sensors and video cameras to capture data and provide instant replays. So, you say you shot him, he says he shot you. Video replay. Like football matches. Let us see what happened. Professional sports teams know the value of this. Soldiers and units will receive real-time feedback on their performance and this will help them stay alive, or remain alive.

We have also invested large sums into overseas training facilities. I visited our soldiers in Australia last year in the Shoalwater Bay, and some of the facilities like the Urban Operations Live Firing Facility and the Combined Arms Air-Land Range will be ready for use from next year. This will allow our NSmen and NSFs to participate in Brigade, even Division-level exercises.

We have also increased the use of advanced training simulators, up to 20% additional live training will be replaced by them. You can combine simulators now for different platforms.

But even with all this, we will have to conduct some training locally. Because if COVID-19 taught us something, it is that our overseas training facilities can be terminated instantly and we do not want to be dependent. I know that Members of Parliament, especially living in the housing estates do get feedback and complaints from residents about noise. And we try to mitigate the impact of this noise. The Air Force reduces flying tempo during critical exam periods, but there is a limit to that. Help explain to your residents that just like NS, this local SAF training is the price we pay to ensure a credible force to protect our freedom and independence.

I visited Luke Air Force Base, where our F-16 squadrons were training. We do to those communities as we do here, we have open house, we treat them to makan, and I was talking to the mayor. I said to the mayor, "Please tell your residents that we appreciate them tolerating all that noise." It is not as if Luke Air Force Base does not have housing estates. They have, just like us. And we fly together with the US planes. And he says, "Don't worry, I tell them this is the sound of freedom." The mayor in Arizona, in Luke Air Force Base, telling his residents, that this is the sound of freedom. But whose freedom? Not US freedom, but Singapore's freedom. They are willing to invest in our freedom. So, explain to your residents. Yes, we will do as much as we can overseas, but there is a limit and we must never be so dependent on others that if we have another pandemic, we find that we cannot train and we are operationally less ready.

Mr Chairman, the defence of Singapore is a long-term commitment. The success of it is not for the faint-hearted and can only be achieved if we as one people have that staying power, never flagging in spirit or effort; never lulled or deceived that Singapore does not need a strong SAF because the world is safe or that others will protect us.

We have come far as a multiracial and multi-religious nation to build an SAF that will fight with one heart and aim – to protect our Singapore. We will go even further as long as we commit each year to stay the course.

I want to thank Mr Chairman and Members for this indulgence for staying on a Friday night. Thank you very much. [Applause.]

The Chairman: Deputy Leader.