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The latest arrangement of the AUKUS Alliance – a risky situation for Australia, unless…

Avatar Strategy&Future Strategy&Future
Darmowy! ·  0 · 21.03.2023
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(Source: Wikimedia)

Australia entered into this alliance despite living off China and Chinese imports of Australian raw materials. It was concluded despite the fact that China does not threaten Australia yet, neither militarily, economically, politically nor civilisationally. They threaten American world domination, but there is still a long way to Chinese domination over Australia and its choices or decisions. And as an island far from the mass of Eurasia, Australia has the strategic time and the appropriate resilience — as Australian strategist Hugh White has postulated over the years — to resist China’s pressure and build its own anti-access capabilities, which would prevent China’s dominance or even any military subjugation of Canberra to the will of Beijing. In other words, Australia had time, room for manoeuvre and a lot of arguments that could be converted into currency in relations with the US in order to get into a good negotiating position with Washington.

 

Without Australia and its territory, the Americans would not be able to win a war with China, neither in the Indian Ocean nor in the Western or even more so the South Pacific. This is a strong currency in the hands of Canberra. Yet the Australians formed the AUKUS alliance and joined the initially enigmatic nuclear submarine program for Australia, which, it should be added, overturned the deal with France on conventional submarines. This fact alone signalled clearly that Australia is planning nevertheless to engage in a naval war with China far from its home bases.

 

So where — this is not hard to guess: behind the “moat” of the Indonesian straits — in the Western Pacific, where new nuclear warships would perfectly complement the American fleet of the same ships. The Anglo-Saxons again in one family of ocean people… connected by one language and political culture…

On 13th March, at the US naval base in San Diego, the details of the contract for the acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines by Australia were announced. Firstly, Australia is to buy three Virginia-class ships from the United States, with an option to buy two more. These will be platforms used by older generations. The purchase will help to reduce the “gap” in Australian capabilities resulting from the need to withdraw six conventionally powered Collins-class ships from service. The purchase of the units is to take place “in the early 2030s.” It is hard not to accept this information with a sincere smile of irony. Australia will buy second-hand American ships with their own money, so that they will be directly subordinated to the American fleet in the event of war and with so-called interoperability. That’s not everything. Until then, it’s going to be a very long time…

Starting this year, the process of training Australian navy personnel at US and British submarine bases, including on board submarines, is to begin. “As early as 2027,” rotational stationing of British and US SSN submarines will begin in Australia; this is about accelerating “the development of the Australian naval personnel, workforce, infrastructure and regulatory system” for commissioning its own ships.

 

Ships will be stationed at the Stirling base on the west coast of Australia; in total, up to five units will be in service — four American and one British. A second important point: this means that the Americans are getting “free” access to a key spot on Australia’s west coast, on the Swan River, from where American submarines will be able to go out on patrols crossing Chinese communications in the Indian Ocean to Europe and Africa. The base is out of reach of China’s air and missile forces in an ideal location for this kind of task, similar to the bases for German U-boats in Norway, which were tasked with cutting Atlantic communications from the US to the British Isles during the last world war.

 

Again, the Americans get something that they care about very much: access to this base and “crediting” Australia to the anti-China coalition in the event of a war, and Australia agrees to this role as an automatic participant in the anti-China coalition now and therefore to participate in a possible war. Meanwhile, the Americans are not even helping Canberra economically in the face of potential economic retaliation from China, as we could observe and became convinced of back when AUKUS was first announced.

Ultimately, Australia and the UK are reportedly planning to jointly develop a new nuclear-powered submarine, called SSN-AUKUS. The first ship of this type is to be delivered “in the late 2030s”; it will be manufactured in the UK. In turn, “in the early 2040s” the first ship will be built in Australia. The fact that the first SSN-AUKUS will enter service in the early 2040s lends credence to the thesis that the Australians will decide to buy two additional Virginia-class ships from the Americans. Therefore, it is difficult to talk about acquiring capabilities for Australia that will do “the work here and now.”

 

According to Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, over the next 30 years, the total cost of Canberra’s program to acquire and operate eight SSN submarines will be up to $368 billion. As stated by the Australian Deputy Prime Minister, Richard Marles, this means that this program will consume about 0.15% of Australian GDP until the mid-2050s.

 

Part of this amount – three billion dollars – is to be used to strengthen the American and British shipbuilding industries; another 9 billion to create the foundations for its own capabilities in the construction of this type of units. Finally, a new naval base is to be built on Australia’s east coast; possible locations include Brisbane, Newcastle and Port Kembla.

 

This is interesting information, suggesting that Australians and the Americans are afraid that the presence of the Chinese navy will be more and more pronounced in the South Pacific, and that they expect the expansion of Chinese naval and air bases in this area to cut Australia’s communications with the US and Hawaii. Thus, the strategic attention and combat patrols of Australia’s new submarine fleet are to be directed to Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Guadalcanal, Samoa and Fiji.

 

According to the Australian media, the scale and cost of the program mean cuts to other branches of the armed forces will be inevitable; land forces in particular are to be the victims. This is clear. Australia is an island. Its defence takes place at sea and in the air, on the approach to the island, where it will be most difficult for the enemy to defeat the tyranny of distance, and therefore on the maritime approaches to Australia.  

Both Joe Biden and Anthony Albanese asserted that Australia had no intention of acquiring nuclear weapons. So much for official information. And here begins an interesting game. For the time being, the construction of the AUKUS alliance favours only the USA. Australia contributes to it and takes great economic and geopolitical risks, including the real risk of being drawn into a war with China.

 

Well, unless the result will be that Australia does obtain nuclear weapons. Then the game will be worth the candle. And this is what many analysts around the world suspect of the AUKUS alliance and Australia. According to them, the program of acquiring nuclear-powered submarines is to ultimately mean the status of Australia as a state with nuclear weapons. For now, it’s only nuclear powers that have nuclear submarines. We’ll see how it will be with Australia. But such a deal would make sense for Canberra. Possession of nuclear weapons is an effective antidote to a Chinese invasion, or to forceful attempts to enforce obedience, should Asia become China’s backyard with the Australian continent still located in its vicinity.

 

One suspects that even Hugh White would be pleased with such a cunning plan to acquire nuclear weapons. Because without the guarantee of obtaining such weapons, the conclusion of the AUKUS alliance by Australia on such terms as have been disclosed does not seem to be beneficial for Canberra. Having such a weapon turns this calculation 180 degrees. It also guarantees Australia’s independence from China for the future, without upsetting everyone already in the international community that Australia will join the nuclear club, and without potentially triggering the cascading effect of nuclear weapons proliferation around the world.   

 

Autor

Jacek Bartosiak

CEO and Founder of Strategy&Future, author of bestselling books.

 

Jacek Bartosiak Australia Pacyfik Rise of China S&F Hero USA World
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