Since the late 1980s , the Australian government had increasingly called upon the ADF to contribute forces to peacekeeping missions around the world . While most of these deployments involved only small numbers of specialists , several led to the deployment of hundreds of personnel . Large peacekeeping deployments were made to Namibia in early 1989 , Cambodia between 1992 and 1993 , Somalia in 1993 , Rwanda between 1994 and 1995 and Bougainville in 1994 and from 1997 onwards . The 1996 election of the Howard Liberal government resulted in significant reforms to the ADF 's force structure and role , with the new government 's defence strategy placed less singular emphasis on defending Australia from direct attack and greater emphasis on working in co @-@ operation with regional states and Australia 's allies to manage potential security threats in recognition of Australia 's global security interests . In line with this new focus , the ADF 's force structure changed in an attempt to increase the proportion of combat units to support units and to improve the ADF 's combat effectiveness .