Under the original 2021 AUKUS plan, Australia was expected to receive at least two used Virginia-class submarines and one newly built submarine. The United States, United Kingdom and Australia have now announced a streamlined approach under which Australia will acquire three used submarines from the same production block.
Marles told reporters at the IISS Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore that AUKUS was an “incredibly complicated” undertaking. He said Australia needed to “place a premium on simplicity”.
“We had the prospect … of almost having four classes of submarines operating at the same time — the last of the Collins Class, two in-service Virginias, a brand new Virginia, and a brand new SSN-AUKUS — that gets pretty complicated,” Marles said.
“What we will have here is a simpler pathway. The Virginias we are acquiring will all be of the same type and I can’t overstate the significance of that,” he said.
Marles said the revised acquisition would generate “significant” savings for Australia. However, he said the change would not make a major difference to the total cost of the ambitious submarine program.
“It doesn’t fundamentally change the equation, but it will help,” he said.
Shadow Defence Minister James Paterson said the change required a fuller explanation from the government. He said the shift should not be addressed only through limited language in a joint statement.
The joint U.S.-UK-Australia statement described the change as a mutual streamlining of the acquisition. It said the approach would simplify supply chain management, operational and maintenance requirements, and maximise cost efficiencies.
Dr Malcolm Davis from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute said Marles was “correct” that acquiring three submarines of the same type would have advantages. However, he said there was still no guarantee that the United States would agree to sell the submarines, as U.S. shipyards continue to face pressure to increase production rates.
“The Americans still have to have sufficient numbers of boats in order to sell them to us,” Davis said.
Davis said the third used Virginia-class submarine would have a shorter service life than a newly built submarine. However, he said that would not necessarily create a major problem for Australia.
“We were going to face the same problem in the end … and we’ll still get an awful lot of use from these Virginias,” he said.
Dr Euan Graham, an analyst specialising in Indo-Pacific defence and security, said Marles’ argument for simplicity made sense. However, he said it should be viewed with a “grain of salt” because Australia’s options may have been limited by what the United States was willing to provide.
“The glass half empty version is that we are dealing with a curtailment of Australia’s ambitions for Virginia-class submarines because this is all the Americans are willing to give us,” Graham said.
“But the glass half full [version] is: this is still going ahead, despite the hand-wringing over the AUKUS review,” he said.
Davis said the government also needed to clarify whether the United States remained open to selling Australia up to five Virginia-class submarines, as previously flagged. He said it was important to know whether the revised plan now set a ceiling of three submarines.
“If it’s the latter then we’ll have to make do with three second-hand boats,” Davis said.
Military analyst Michael Shoebridge said the U.S. Navy was keeping the “newest and most capable submarines” for itself. He said used Virginia-class submarines would offer less capability than newly built boats.
“These second-hand Virginia-class submarines are less capable than the new ones,” Shoebridge said.
“Plus a new submarine is easier to maintain than an old submarine — just like a new car is easier to maintain than an old car,” he said.
Shoebridge also criticised Marles’ argument that the revised plan would simplify maintenance requirements. He said Australia was already expected to maintain different Virginia-class variants rotating through HMAS Stirling in Perth.
“If we’re maintaining all the different Virginia-class variants that the US rotates through Stirling, then how does it make a difference what flag is on the boat?” Shoebridge asked.
Source: ABC News.
