 James, what are your thoughts on the role of private contractors in military conflict zones? Sure, look, the term private military contractors is a really divisive term and it conjures up different images in people's heads. So some people will hear that term and think mercenaries, people who will be guilty of war crimes, other people will think of more professional military organisations and there's everything in between. I think the first thing to appreciate is that when we're talking about private military security contractors, there are both good ones and bad ones. There are cowboys and professionals and quality control is really important. What are the ways that governments can regulate the use of contractors? Sure, look, there's a couple of ways that governments can shape the way these contractors operate and try and ensure that they are of a higher quality. The first is international regulation and there's a number of different regimes underway being run by diplomats but also within the industries themselves trying to establish code of conducts that will guide the actions of contractors and whom they hire and how they operate. The second way is through the contract mechanism itself, making sure that they conduct good due diligence and that they set good terms for the contractors to operate on with set conditions for the performance of their tasks. And the third way is to generate transparency in the industry and that's the biggest challenge. Trying to find out who is operating where is quite difficult at the moment. It's quite clear that regulating private military companies and the way you regulate other companies in the economy is not sufficient enough. There needs to be more transparency as to what those companies are doing and there needs to be more information available for people in the military, government, media and NGOs to get information on these companies and how they operate. What sort of roles are appropriate for private contractors? Well this is a debate that's well underway in the US and UK at the moment. Some of the roles that contractors perform, most of the roles they provide are static security or mobile security for diplomats or for embassies or for VIPs that are moving through battle zones. PMSC is the most active in Iraq and Afghanistan, that's where most of the work is at the moment. But they're also involved in providing advice, providing risk assessments. In specialist areas of the military, we have weapon systems that are incredibly complex and require a specialist contractor to either maintain or operate them. And increasingly we're seeing the contractors pop up in more controversial areas of military operations. So in intelligence work, either conducting intelligence work on the ground or providing intelligence analysis to governments. From your personal experience in conflict zones, what do you think has worked well and what hasn't worked? Sure, well I've had experience with good contractors and bad. My first tour in Iraq, I saw some absolute cowboy contractors rolling down roads, trying to push locals off roads and trying to push the military off roads sometimes as well. And those kind of contractors aren't helpful. But then in my most recent tour in Afghanistan, I worked with some highly professional military contractors. And in fact, there are a lot of Australians who have gone into the contracting business for Australian companies and for overseas companies as well. What do you think the future holds? Maybe we've learned a lot of lessons from what's happened in the last few years. Where do you think we're going with the role of contractors in military conflict zones? I think the use of private military contractors will grow over the next couple of years. That will be driven by the drawdown of US military forces in both Iraq and Afghanistan. There are projections that the use of security contractors in both of those countries purely for the US government will grow by up to 9% in the next five years. Those are big numbers when you consider that there are 40,000 contractors in Iraq that we know about and up to 100,000 contractors in Afghanistan. So there's money to be made in this industry and that means the companies will keep employing people and keep seeking business. Also, contractors are starting to be used in new areas. So particularly in counter-piracy operations in the Indian Ocean, off the coast of Somalia, governments have been a little reluctant to step in there and guarantee security for cargo ships. That space is starting to be filled by private military contractors and the demand for that kind of service has gone through the roof this year. I guess a private contractor can really specialise in a certain skill set as well. Yeah, that's entirely right. Often these are retired military personnel, in fact almost exclusively retired military personnel. With the drawdown in military budgets that's happening at the moment, there will be more of those military personnel around. Special forces, soldiers from Australia, America and the UK are highly in demand. Those kind of soldiers are very highly trained, very professional. When they're tasked to do a security, they generally do a good job. What are the legal implications for governments that use contractors? Sure, and look with the caveat that I'm not an international lawyer, so I don't use my words as carefully as a lawyer would. But there's been a lot of scholarship on this issue over the last five or six years, particularly since the invasion of Iraq. Governments can be held accountable if they employ contractors who don't behave appropriately in war zones. There are international legal principles, there are also legal principles in the host countries. So if that's Afghanistan, they have their own legal principles as well. So governments do need to exercise a degree of caution. There is some risk if they choose companies that don't have good quality employees and that don't operate in an ethical manner. James Brown, thank you very much for your time today. No problem at all.