The more keen eyed of you may have spotted something a little different on the editorial page this month: a cartoon.

When Australia departs Afghanistan, security forces made up of a number of police and army forces will take over their responsibilities in Uruzgan Province. It’s a mixed bag of capabilities and personalities.

It is always tempting in the December/January edition to look at the year that was and the year ahead. And it is a temptation I will give into. It has been a year of ups and downs in many ways.

What exactly do industry groups do on a day to day basis to get the bigger picture across? ADM Editor Katherine Ziesing spoke to Defence Teaming Centre CEO Chris Burns to find out what makes the DTC tick and how the new government will affect Defence industry amongst other things.

By the end of the year, there will be no Australian troops left in Uruzgan Province and most of those in Afghanistan will have come home.

One of the things that I love most about working at ADM is that there is always something new to report on, be it a new technology, a new company, a new program or a new policy.

Navy has always struck me as the service most guided and shaped by its history. A sense of ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ seems the preferred modus operandi.

Presumably BAE Systems execs had a word in the PM’s ear about the Valley of Death but his only public utterance came in response to a worker who bailed him up in full view of the TV cameras asked him to sign a union petition calling for future naval vessels to be designed and constructed in Australia.

As many of you may have noticed, I have an ongoing passion with the Domestic Munitions Manufacturing Arrangements (DMMA) program, which I’ve continued on P28 this month.

The Afghanistan conflict has produced some quality literature and more is sure to appear. For this correspondent a standout remains Dead Men Risen by Toby Harnden which recounts the tour of the Welsh Guards in Helmand in 2009.

Whatever you call them UAVs, UASs, RPAs, HALEs, MALEs or drones, unmanned systems don’t have the best reputation. But what is on the horizon for this technology?

By the time ADM readers pick up this edition, the federal election should be well and truly done. Whoever has formed government will be picking their front bench and hopefully bedding down into the work of running the country. Whichever party, forms government, a new defence minister will be in place as Defence Minister Stephen Smith is stepping down at this election.

The new more open and consultative Australian Defence Force has confessed that it really wasn’t properly outfitting the diggers for much of the time they were fighting in Afghanistan.

What is it about simulation that makes for a great conversation about outcomes but lacks application? The business case for using simulation, modelling and experimentation early on in the planning and development of requirements is a relatively easy one to make. As Major General John Caligari, Head of Capability Systems, has pointed out previously, in simulation you can fail early, fast and cheaply with test points that can be repeated over and over again. This message is seeping through the organisation but it’s a slow burn.

Bringing together this edition of ADM has once again turned my focus onto weapons and Force Protection. Our features this month take a closer look at two weapons programs in particular: light weight automatic grenade launchers under Land 40 and 81mm mortars under Land 136. And I have concerns about both of them for similar reasons. Both are ostensibly off-the-shelf solutions but the process has been carefully questioned as the program offices conduct market research and examine various contracting models.

By the end of the year most troops will be out of Afghanistan and longrunning missions in East Timor and the Solomons will have been long over, taking Australia back to an era when Australia’s only foreign adventures were small, worthy and not very risky peacekeeping operations of which most people had never heard.