Recently the Albanese government knocked back a request by the United States to deploy a naval ship to the Red Sea to counter Houthie attacks on shipping relating to Israel. Pundits and opposition criticised this response. About 12% of global trade goes through the Red Sea and the Suez canal. Most of Australia’s trade is with Asia and so it is largely unaffected. Here is a report about another arrangement that we have with the United States and the UK. This has caused a lot of concern by trading partners with Australia in the Pacific including Malaysia and China. Such reports makes you wonder whether AUKUS will ever get off the ground? – Ian Curr, Ed., 2023.
AUKUS, a US, UK and Australia security partnership, is accelerating its nuclear submarine program to address gaps in infrastructure, human resources and technology-sharing protocols.
Defense News reported in late December that the US Navy plans to conduct its first nuclear submarine maintenance work in Australia this summer using the submarine tender Emory S Land to train 30 Australian sailors on how to repair its Virginia-class vessels.
The report says the training will help to establish a nuclear-powered attack submarine maintenance capability at the HMAS Stirling naval base in Western Australia.
The AUKUS nuclear submarine program consists of three phases that will first see the US and UK operate submarines out of Stirling, Australia, then Australia’s purchase and operation of new and used Virginia-class submarines from the US, and finally Australia’s building and operating of its own nuclear attack submarines (SSNs).
Australian officers, sailors and government civilians involved in AUKUS are already training in nuclear submarine-related matters with the US Navy and are learning attack submarine maintenance procedures at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and Barrow-in-Furness, England.
The report also mentions that a first group of Australian sailors will be assigned to serve on US submarines in 2024 and that they will begin performing maintenance at the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard as part of their training.
The AUKUS nuclear submarine deal is making ripples across the Indo-Pacific. Image: US Embassy in China
In October 2023, the UK Ministry of Defense (MOD) reported that personnel from the US and Australia joined Royal Navy members in Faslane for training on maintaining nuclear-powered submarines.
The UK MOD announcement said that the US and Australian Submarine Support groups collaborated to form an Advance Verification Team (AVT) to enhance their knowledge of the maintenance and industrial skills needed to manage and maintain nuclear-powered submarines.
The UK MOD also said that an additional 4 billion pounds (US$5.1 billion) will be committed to AUKUS, with funds earmarked for designing, prototyping and purchasing main long-lead components for the first UK submarines dedicated to the partnership.
Despite these cooperative moves, AUKUS still has a long journey ahead in terms of physical and human infrastructure.
For one, the issue of whether any of the AUKUS submarines will be constructed in Adelaide, Australia, has yet to be extensively discussed, according to an article written by John Bruni and Pat Tyrell for the Australian Institute for International Affairs (AIIA) in August 2022.
However, the Australian government has announced its intention to produce the initial SSN-AUKUS submarine in Australia by the end of the decade, with two locally built vessels to be provided to the Royal Australian Navy in the early 2040s. The Australian government also said that in 2023 it began enabling works for the future Submarine Construction Yard at Osborne, South Australia.
However, Bruni and Tyrell point out that to get the SSN-AUKUS program up to speed, Australia must develop considerable nuclear engineering skills, extensive support and maintenance teams, nuclear regulatory authorities and specialized emergency teams.
They also say that Australia’s universities will need to establish nuclear engineering centers and create a nuclear engineering hub in the country to provide the highly skilled capabilities needed for nuclear submarine repair. The Australian government must also develop means for nuclear materials to travel safely within Australia.
World Nuclear News reported in March 2023 that South Australia’s Flinders University had signed agreements with US and UK universities to develop specialist skills for the future construction of AUKUS nuclear submarines.
World Nuclear News says the agreements will enable Flinders to offer undergraduate and postgraduate studies to South Australian students. It notes that the University of Manchester, the UK’s Nuclear Technology Education Consortium lead university, will partner with Flinders University for its nuclear masters’ programs and doctoral-level research training.
Naval shipbuilding capacity gaps and technology-sharing issues may also hinder AUKUS’ progress in nuclear submarine development and other sensitive military fields.
In a March 2023 Politico article, Paul McCleary and Cristina Gallardo note that getting AUKUS up and running for the long term will be challenging due to the complex changes needed in export control rules and growing concerns that overstretched US and UK shipyards can handle the workload.
McCleary and Gallardo note that even the combined US and UK naval shipbuilding programs cannot match China’s output.
China is likewise cranking up its submarine-building program. Image: Twitter Screengrab
They say that keeping AUKUS up and running over the coming decades is based on a big assumption of unity, political commitment and sustained funding until the first steel for the SSN-AUKUS is cut in about a decade from now.
McCleary and Gallardo point out that Cold War-era US military export controls may be outdated, as they were initially designed to prevent sensitive military technology from falling into Soviet hands.
They say the US needs to rethink its export controls to authorize the transfer of sensitive nuclear propulsion technology within a reasonable timeframe, as the SSN-AUKUS will undoubtedly heavily rely on US-made components.
They mention that US military export controls apply to AUKUS Pillar Two technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), electronic warfare and hypersonic and quantum technologies.
At the same time, AUKUS has raised concerns from several Southeast Asian states about the defense bloc’s implications for regional security and strategic stability.
In a March 2023 ISEAS Yusof Ishak Institute paper, Ian Storey and William Choong mention that Southeast Asian countries have expressed concerns about external interference, arms races, aggressive actions by major powers and submarine intrusions in archipelagic sea lanes.
Storey and Choong note that while AUKUS officials have gone to considerable lengths to explain the rationale for the defense bloc and assuage concerns from regional states, major players such as Malaysia and Indonesia will likely continue to voice reservations.