Why Australia wants nuclear submarines

Sam Hawley: Hi, I’m Sam Hawley, coming to you from Gadigal Land. This is ABC News Daily. There is long as a rugby pitch and can cruise through the water in almost complete silence. But the cost is mind blowing in as little as four years. Us nuclear powered attack submarines will be deployed to Australia. The government says to keep us safe. Today the ABC’s political editor Andrew Probyn on how fear of China has driven us to the biggest defence investment in our history.

Andrew I think it’s pretty fair to say we’ve had a messy lead up to this submarine decision. It’s pretty hard to forget that moment in 2021 when the French leader, Emmanuel Macron, well, he was rather unhappy with Scott Morrison.

Andrew Probyn: Unhappy? He was furious. Sam. Emmanuel Macron was absolutely furious with Australia because he learned that Scott Morrison’s government was backing out of this 2016 contract to buy French subs.

Reporter: Macron said Mr. Morrison misled him before the contract was ditched in September. The two leaders have crossed paths at the G20 summit in Rome.

Andrew Probyn: We were heading off to Europe When we got to Rome, I remember seeing Emmanuel Macron in one of the side conference rooms of G20 and I stepped right in front of him and off it went.

Andrew Probyn: … How do you heal the relationship with with Australia?

Emmanuel Macron, French President: Look, I do respect sovereign choices, but you have to respect our allies and partners. And it was not the case with this deal and I think this is detrimental to the reputation of your country and your prime.

Andrew Probyn: Bevan Shields from the SMH asked that question right at the end. You know, has he lied to you? And I don’t think I know.

Bevan Shields, SMH Reporter: He lied to you.

Emmanuel Macron, French President: I don’t think I know.

Andrew Probyn: I mean extraordinary times and an extraordinary moment in Franco-australian relations.

Sam Hawley: Sure, was.

Andrew Probyn: …said that you might have lied. Is that true?

Scott Morrison: No.

Reporter: He said that what happened was detrimental to your reputation. What do you say to that?

Scott Morrison: I will always stand up for Australia’s interests.

Sam Hawley: So the French president, as you said, he was furious because Australia had pulled out of a huge submarine deal with France and there was all these secret negotiations going on behind the scenes between the UK, Australia and the US. So let’s leave that behind now. But it was quite a moment in history. So take me now to the US, to San Diego, where the US President has been hosting Anthony Albanese and the British leader Rishi Sunak to announce this new deal and probes. It’s a huge deal. It’s a big deal.

Andrew Probyn: It’s a massive deal.

Joe Biden, US President: The next critical step in advancing the Australia US UK partnership AUKUS. It’s an unusual name, AUKUS.

Andrew Probyn: Early estimates is it’s going to cost at least $268 billion, could be $368 billion. So there’s a lot of wriggle room there, even even for those with the rubber rest of mathematics. But we have got a strategic situation in our region in particular that is drastically changed. It’s one of the reasons why Scott Morrison decided that the conventionally powered French submarine was not going to be good enough because when you have a diesel electric submarine, it has to actually get to the surface and do something called ‘snorting’, not the version that happens at the Logies, but but with diesel electric, it has to surface. That’s a strategic risk if you’ve got a much more potent potential adversary. Under Xi Jinping, China has become a lot more assertive. So this capacity, this extraordinary decision to go for nuclear propulsion was one that was pursued by Scott Morrison. He might have been surprised to learn that the Americans were willing to share it. And we have a Prime Minister from Labour’s left faction who’s now fully embraced nuclear propulsion.

Anthony Albanese, Prime Minister: In the next decade, Australia will take delivery of three US Virginia class nuclear powered submarines.

Sam Hawley: Yeah, sure. And it’s being trumpeted as the single largest increase in defence spending in Australian peacetime.

Anthony Albanese, Prime Minister: The AUKUS agreement we confirm here in San Diego represents the biggest single investment in Australia’s defence capability in all of our history.

Sam Hawley: And it’s significant for the Americans too. They’ve sort of described it or analysts at least have said it’s the most aggressive step it’s taken to counter China’s military expansion in the seas around Taiwan.

Joe Biden, US President: AUKUS has one overriding objective to enhance the stability of Indo-Pacific amid rapidly shifting global dynamics.

Sam Hawley: You mentioned there the type of submarine. It’s a nuclear submarine and they can stay under water for a really long time. They’re a bit more secretive. They can move around without being noticed.

Andrew Probyn: Well, apparently they can stay under water for three months. Imagine how smelly it is with 100 submariners. They’re stuck in the one space for for three months. But yes, look, they are far stealthier, they’re faster, and they are among the world’s best, if not the world’s best. So this project, this agreement between three nations is in various phases. The second phase at least, will see Australia by Virginia class subs from the United States at least three up to up to five That would give us nuclear propelled submarines in the early 2030. Now Richard Marles has done a press conference. He claims that that option was actually not there until after the election.

Richard Marles, Defence Minister: Australia will now be just the seventh country to operate a nuclear powered submarine and this represents the biggest leap in our military capability.

Andrew Probyn: It’s interesting that in a political sense there’s grand bipartisanship when it comes to the nuclear subs issue, perhaps surprisingly so, given that nuclear has always been such a hot button, pardon the pun issue when it comes to internal politics. We will probably have a merged US slash UK slash Australian navy running these ships at first. We won’t get our own Australian built nuclear powered submarine until the early 2040s, which will be a bit later, about half a decade after the Brits build their version. And…

Sam Hawley: We’ll all be a bit older by then.

Andrew Probyn: We’ll all be a bit older. 2040, that’s a long way away. That means that some submariners who are going to be on our first our first boat out of nuclear powered boat are either toddlers or not even born. It’s amazing to think that that’s how long, how long this this project has to be delivered. Is going to require a whole lot of training. It’s going to require a whole lot of investment in education, infrastructure. It’s also going to require a very big decision to be made about nuclear waste, because one of the things that we’ve learned that we didn’t know in all of those myriad leaks over the last fortnight is that part of the deal is that while the nuclear reactor is going to be provided in a so-called locked box to Australia. Australia will have to take ownership and carriage of it once it’s beyond its life. That means digging a very deep hole, we’re told, somewhere on defence land and burying it for what? Upwards of 64,000 years. Isn’t that the Sting song?

Sam Hawley: Okay. So, yes, this is not an easy deal to actually put into place. There’s a lot of complexity that goes with this. President Biden, He’s noted it’s the first time in 65 years that the United States will be sharing the technology at the heart of the nuclear submarine. So that’s in itself, I suppose, is significant. And it shows us, I guess, how worried the US is about China. So what’s China saying about all of this?

Andrew Probyn: Well, China is not happy. We have Xi Jinping about a week and a bit ago was saying that the US tactics, its behaviour is one of containment and encirclement of China. But at the same time, Xi Jinping is overseeing a grand expansion in his own military, including nuclear weapons and submarines. Remember, these are ones that Australia is getting don’t have nuclear weapons. They’re nuclear powered. Very, very big distinction there. We’re in the middle of one of the most fascinating and potentially dangerous periods of history where two great powers are in the middle of a tussle, a tussle that’s only going to get more, more and more intense given the rapid militarisation and the expansion of the Chinese military and its its clear intention to pursue its interests as it sees them with Taiwan and as a as a very important flashpoint.

Sam Hawley: Hmm. So this is a tussle between these two big superpowers, America and China. And it seems like we’re sort of like in the middle of it. So we’re going to spend a lot of money, a huge amount of taxpayers money on this. But I guess the question you’d ask, is it actually going to make us safer?

Andrew Probyn: I don’t think we’ve necessarily been immune from any activity. If there is some, let’s pray that there isn’t. In a sense, Australia is always going to be a target in some form, be it cyber or some other attack. It is considered by defence, by strategic experts and by Labour and Liberal to be a necessary attempt at deterrence. Let’s hope it works.

Sam Hawley: Andrew Probyn is the ABC’s political editor. It’s predicted building the nuclear powered submarine fleet will support 8500 direct jobs in Australia at the peak of construction. The delivery of the Virginia class submarines from the US will require congressional approval. This episode was produced by Flint Duxfield and Chris Dengate, who also did the mix. Our supervising producer is Stephen Smiley. To get in touch with the team, email us on [email protected]. I’m Sam Hawley. Thanks for listening.