Guest essay by Eric Worrall
h/t JoNova; Australia’s politicians have finally buckled on their blanket nuclear ban, in the face of Australia’s glaring strategic need for submarines capable of cutting four thousand mile ocean supply lines, in case of a hypothetical Chinese or other large power invasion.
Australia to get nuclear-powered submarines, will scrap $90b program to build French-designed subs
By defence correspondent Andrew Greene, political editor Andrew Probyn and foreign affairs reporter Stephen Dziedzic
Australia’s next submarine fleet will be nuclear-powered under an audacious plan that will see a controversial $90 billion program to build up to 12 French-designed submarines scrapped.
Key points:
- Joe Biden is expected to make an announcement at 7:00am AEST
- The ABC understands the Prime Minister convened a National Security Committee of Cabinet yesterday
- It’s expected that there will be an increased presence of American nuclear subs in the region
The ABC understands Australia will use American and British technology to configure its next submarine fleet in a bid to replace its existing Collins class subs with a boat more suitable to the deteriorating strategic environment.
Australia, the United States and Britain are expected to jointly announce a new trilateral security partnership on Thursday, with a focus on aligning technology and regional challenges.
But Australia’s embrace of nuclear-powered submarines will have its political and technological challenges, given there is no domestic nuclear industry.
The new three-nation security pact – called AUKUS – will be seen by China as a bid to counter its regional influence, especially in the contested South China Sea.
The nuclear submarines would likely be based in WA.
…
A decent Australian nuclear submarine fleet would make an invasion of Australia an absolute nightmare for the aggressor. Australia’s current diesel electric fleet has limited underwater range, they could be crippled by a long range bombardment of major Australian ports, or destroyed by aircraft carrier based aerial spotters as they attempt to approach the enemy fleet on the surface, before diving for an attack run.
But a stealthy nuclear submarine fleet could fight on, even if our cities were reduced to smoking ruins, by remaining underwater, striking anywhere along the enemy maritime supply route, then making a fast underwater dash to San Diego or Hawaii for resupply.
In terms of the likely impact on broader Aussie adoption of nuclear power, perhaps I am reading too much into this decision. Obviously it would still be a big step, from buying a few nuclear submarines to a wholesale embrace of civilian nuclear power. The decision to buy nuclear could still be derailed if our timid politicians chicken out. But the fact it is even on the table as a plan is a tremendous advance on the previous irrational blanket ban on all things nuclear.
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Two Points;
First, Eric? You know I love you in a creepy and inappropriate way, but please never take up defence writing. Your heart is in the right place, but those paragraphs are pure Pirate Pete.
Second? Really did not see this coming. Up to Thursday morning I would have argued long and hard that there was no way we Australians were even mature enough to debate the suggestion of the idea that we one day might consider looking at a nuclear reactor.
Colour me surprised and wrong.
Third point – reading between the lines there has been a shift in our long term strategic goals. I feel this is a good thing because if you are not constantly checking your plans and showing a willingness to adapt when the situation demands it you end up with such pig headed plan as the Covid Roadmaps that our Experts refuse to update or modify.
SS and SSN type boats are different beasts. The main thing is that a SS is typically a lot smaller than a SSN which makes it more suited to coastal operations where you may or may not being doing things that are not directly related to messing with opponents shipping. If that was what you wanted to do of course.
And if you take a quick look at your atlas there are one or two islands to the north of us.
However if you look in other directions there are a lot of big wide oceans and if you are intending to operate in big wide oceans having a bigger SSN is a more practical choice.
So, like I said, reading between the lines there has been a change in Australian long term plans. Also note that the Collins boats are now to be extended in life. I am guessing of course but I would say we will be operating both SS and SSNs together for a while because a smaller SS can sometimes do things a larger SSN cannot.
Interest and pro-active I would say.
There was one mis-statement in this post by the author. Diesel electric submarines are not limited to making surface approaches, diving at the last instant for attack. Virtually all DE boats these days feature snorkels, as developed by the Germans in WW Two and used by the US Navy ever since, that allow the sub to remain submerged during long range cruises and approaches to attack. The sub’s cruising speed is limited with the snorkel up, and the snorkel itself can be picked up by a surface search radar a relatively short ranges (within 20 miles of the ship with the radar), or at longer ranges if deployed aircraft employ look down radars.
Clearly a nuke attack boat is far more capable than any DE boat. It can cruise forever at any speed clear up to flank speed, with no concerns about running out of battery juice or even fuel. A DE boat is very quiet on battery power, but the newer nukes are also very quiet and difficult to detect with sonar.
I hope you know what you are doing, Australia – the support infrastructure, build cost and ongoing support costs for these things will be enormous.
And you’ve annoyed the very people your coal mining industry relies on.
Annoying communists is a very bad thing to do. Why, the next thing you know, Australians will be insisting that Chinese communists start honoring human rights, stop prison slave labor and free Tibet.
Maybe Australia could be potential future customers for Chinese nuclear submarines?
No Griff the troll the one thing you can rely on is we will do nothing you want or approve of.
“they can’t protect our supply lines.”
Looking at the issue differently, list the navies of the world that can protect world supply lines.
The answer is none. The US navy operating with other navies, including China, keep the supply lines open.
Now list the countries that could use DE boats to sink commercial shipping and disappear. The list is long, I will start with North Korea. Suicidal warfare on the cheap!
This would be terrible. Australia could not ship coal to China. China would collapse. Without color TV from China, American children would have to go outside and play.
Just horrible!
Australia needs SSN to exercise with other SSN of the coast of North Korea. China and North Korea will know we are there. North Korea will test a missile. China will publicly denounce western imperialism. Privately the CCP will be happy to import coal and export TV.
The French are moaning about Australia joining the UK and US and ditching the AU$90billion submarine contract.
Regarding the faux anger being expressed by France since The Australian Government announced cancellation of the “contract” for supply of a still not completed plan to build a custom design conventional power diesel-electric submarine would be cancelled.
There was no contract signed for the being custom design based on a nuclear submarine design, there was a series of progressive contracts issued as each stage of development was reached by the designers in France. Australia had indicated concern about the length of time taken to this stage and about the delivery schedule indicated.
Also, the project commenced before China started to openly challenge Australia with orders cancelled for various goods China had been importing from Australia and tariffs applied contrary to the free trade agreement signed between the two nations.
In short the not yet ready for building submarine is no longer suitable to meet Australia’s future defence needs as a deterrent. And to buy nuclear submarines from our two closest allies makes sense.