Dartman and
junior.VH-LFA,
I'm not certain that Dick is putting the situation in such black-and-white terms.
Hence his "New Zealand" solution: that is, have military people working as controllers in a civvy system that controls both civil and military. That would alleviate any of the concerns you raised.
Having said that,
contractors are unlikely willing to deploy with extremely minimal notice into warzones where they can be shot at. Not only would they likely be unwilling, but it would be impractical for a lot of reasons. Security Clearances, use of weapons, intergration with other assets, force protection.. the list goes on and on.
there are workable solutions to all the above concerns.
IMHO:
A tour of duty is made a lot more attractive once the incumbent realises "Tax free, plus $180.00(ish) per day danger money, also tax-free, and all the other perks while over there".
"Immediate deployment" could be a legitimate concern. However, there are ways around this, such as being written into the contract.
Security Clearances are squared away well before any deployment.
I'm not sure what weapons you'd expect an ATCO to use, but weapons training, etc, can all be done as part of pre-deployment. (Probably a 9mm, which has proven time and again to be the most dangerous weapon (to the user) of any Australian service weapon).
I'll agree that it is POSSIBLE that an ATCO could be "shot at" in a war-zone. But can anyone tell me when the last Australian Military ATCO was shot at in either Iraq or Afghanistan?
The biggest hurdle to any of the above, IMHO, is the Australian military. The U.S. are much better at integrating military and civilian assets in conflict zones. I can only speak of Iraq (my deployment) and not Afghanistan, but the Australians are petrified of doing so.
DIVOSH!