By ABC's Michael Brissenden

Posted Thu Jul 25, 2013 6:47pm AEST

Photo: Retired army general Jim Molan (left) talks with Tony Abbott and Scott Morrison at the launch of the Coalition's asylum seekers policy in Brisbane on July 25, 2013. (AAP: Dan Peled)

With the PNG solution and now Operation Sovereign Borders, the domestic politics of the asylum seeker crisis is driving policy more than ever before, writes Michael Brissenden. And despite all that’s been said over the past week, the boats keep coming.

Is it a political statement or is it a policy? That’s a legitimate question to ask about the Coalition’s new Operation Sovereign Borders.

With an election looming and political tensions surrounding the issue even more fractious than usual, the question of who has the right policy is now lost in a political Dutch auction.

At this stage it’s easy to read the Coalition’s announcement as catch-up politics by an Opposition Leader left flat-footed by the sheer audacity and unexpected political chicanery of Kevin Rudd’s PNG solution.

To be fair, the PNG solution left more than a few people gasping open-mouthed at the return of that familiar brand of chaos politics. After all there’s a lot of ground to make up. The “folk” in the seats that matter need reassuring. “Gotta zip.”

With Kevin Rudd sucking up the political oxygen, just getting noticed has been difficult for an Opposition Leader used to having a fairly easy run.

So he needed a “National Emergency” to be tackled - by no less than a three-star general who would oversee the 12 agencies that now have direct involvement in border security and would coordinate asylum seeker detention and offshore processing. The military leadership would report directly to the Immigration Minister, rather than the current arrangement which has a two-star admiral at the head of what’s called the “Border Protection Command”, who is only responsible for the intercept and detection of boats and who answers to the Minister for Home Affairs.

If you were going to give a department overall responsibility for such a difficult policy area, based on their track record, you wouldn’t think the Department of Immigration would be your first pick.

This is not a Defence problem. These people are not attacking Australia.

The Opposition’s new policy was informed by the retired major General Jim Molan, who says it will allow the Coalition, should it win government, to “give more refined direction the agencies and the agencies’ plans”.

Asked on ABC Radio about what he thought of the Rudd PNG solution, Jim Molan declared he was suspicious of the timing, given the Rudd announcement was made just a month or so from an election - although he admitted he was sounding much too “partisan” even for his own liking.

But now both sides are deliberately trying to inject the partisan into this issue.

Former Chief of Defence Force Admiral Chris Barrie is one who thinks it’s all a bit of political overkill.

“The job that I think we’re trying to resolve here is one of surveillance, patrol and response.” That’s not going to change because we’ve changed the bureaucratic arrangements in Canberra, he says.

Many of those like Barrie who’ve been around this policy argument for a long time are questioning the need to change the emphasis of how we approach it. Call it a “National Emergency” if you like, they say, but it’s not a military problem.

Alan Behm, a former senior Defence official, who has worked closely with both Coalition and Labor governments, says, “This is not a Defence problem. These people are not attacking Australia.”

The domestic politics of the asylum seeker crisis is now driving policy more than ever before.

But it seems nothing will stop desperate people looking to find a better life for themselves and their families. Despite all that’s been said over the past week, the boats keep coming. Manus Island won’t be able to hold them all and turning the boats back isn’t going to work without an agreement with the Indonesians.

Surely the only way to deal with this is not to look for quick-fix solutions but to work on regional agreements that will actually stand the test of time.

No doubt we’ll have to wait at least until the election is out of the way.

Michael Brissenden is the ABC's national defence correspondent. View his full profile here.

Quick fix solutions make poor asylum seeker policy - The Drum (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)