Australia will be left with no submarines if it abandons Aukus, senior defence official warns | Aukus
A senior defense official has warned Australia will be left without submarines if it abandons the Aukus deal with the US and UK, and has refused to publicly endorse an alternative plan if Australia’s promised nuclear power fleet does not come under Australian command.
“Defence has been directed to pursue Aukus and we are pursuing Aukus and that is our plan. I’m not going to get into the area of ’Plan B’ or ‘Plan C’,” defense department deputy assistant secretary Hugh Jeffrey told the Sovereignty and Security Forum in Canberra on Friday.
Australia’s decades-old $368 billion deal to buy eight nuclear-powered submarines has faced intense scrutiny over the deal’s transparency and lagging shipbuilding rates in both countries Australia relies on.
Australia has already given more than $2 billion (out of $9 billion promised) to the US and UK to increase their industrial capacity to build more submarines, without any guarantee that the submarines will be delivered.
At the Security and Sovereignty Forum at the National Press Club, event host Malcolm Turnbull asked Jeffrey what Australia would do if the promised US Virginia-class submarines, followed by the UK-designed Aukus submarines, did not come under Australian command.
“What is the government’s Plan B if we don’t get any results from Virginia? [class submarines] Is it because Americans don’t produce enough for their own needs? Turnbull asked. “If we don’t have a new submarine and we’re left with the creaking hull of the Collins, what’s our Plan B?”
The Collins class is Australia’s current class of aging conventionally powered submarines whose operating lives have far exceeded predictions.
Prime Minister Turnbull, whose conventional motor submarine deal with French giant Naval was canceled by the Morrison government in favor of Aukus, has been a consistent and harsh critic of the Aukus deal. He noted steadily slowing shipbuilding rates in the US and restrictive legislation that would prevent America from selling any submarines to Australia.Weakening the United States’ submarine capabilities”.
Retired Rear Admiral Peter Briggs told the forum that the US and UK would not be able to provide Australia with the promised submarines on time, and said Australia should abandon Aukus and “go back”.
Jeffrey, assistant secretary for strategy, policy and industryHe said Australia had previously tried and failed to acquire a submarine fleet to replace the aging Collins class.
“This effort under Aukus is, by my count, the fourth attempt to change a submarine program we started in the 1980s. Since then, every effort to change it has run counter to domestic policy. Do we really think this should be the fourth?”
“If you really want to be in a position where we don’t have submarines, ‘turn around.’ Speaking as an apolitical public servant, I think we need to get away from this relentless politicization of defense capabilities.”
“Forgive me if I’m being cynical about these questions. I think we should get on with our work.”
Jeffrey declined to comment on possible alternatives to the Aukus plan.
“As a public servant it is not my job to talk about ‘Plan B’, that is the prerogative of the government. The defense has been directed to follow Aukus and we are following Aukus and this is our plan. I do not go into the area of ’Plan B’ or ‘Plan C’.”
