Phil Arms, Executive Director ArmsOA
With more than 30 years of service, Phil possesses a robust background in test and evaluation, joint force experimentation, and operations analysis. For the past ten years he has led multi-disciplinary teams analysing national security issues across all domains, informing senior ADF and allied leadership on the capability requirements to address security challenges within the Indo-Pacific.
Phil specialises in operations analysis, drawing from decades of operational flying, more than seven years living in the United States employed in flight testing and capability development roles, and operational experience in Afghanistan. In late 2025, he established Arms Operations Analysis Pty Ltd to deliver a sovereign analytic capability that merges operational art with proven scientific methodologies.
Brent Hughes, Expert Advisor
Brent is a retired Australian Army officer with over 20 years of service, culminating as Commanding Officer of the 1st Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment. He brings deep expertise in combat leadership, operational planning and real-world amphibious operations, forged through multiple deployments to Afghanistan, East Timor and Papua New Guinea.
Brent is an experienced wargamer with secondments to the US Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory, followed by leadership of the Army’s Operational Analysis team. He holds a Master’s in Foresight from the University of Houston and is an expert in wargaming, wargame design, analytics and futures-based planning.
Dr Mike Brennan, Expert Advisor
Mike Brennan is a National Security operations and technologies analyst.
Mike has had a distinguished career in operations analysis, military experimentation and science management as an Australian public servant, including appointments as Director General Capability Materiel Sciences, Director General Simulation, and Scientific Advisor-Army.
Through Brennan Advisory Pty Ltd he has consulted for more than a decade to government, industry & academia on defence capability development & analysis of complex “high consequence” socio-technical systems.
Duncan Briggs, Expert Advisor
Duncan is an accomplished Systems Engineer and Project Manager with an extensive career dedicated to capability management, systems integration, and ICT operations within Defence environments. Following a period of service in the Australian Army, Duncan worked extensively within industry delivering these services at operational and tactical levels in support of Special Forces operations, Defence Intelligence Group, and Headquarters Joint Operational Command.
Duncan recently led the development of the ADF’s Joint Operational Understanding and Scrutiny Tool (JOUST) revolutionising the digital wargaming and experimentation space. As Defence’s Project Manager for this capability, Duncan spearheaded the development, documentation, and delivery of the JOUST digital wargaming solution.