Antinuclear

Shifting from the conventional power of the existing Collins class and the planned Attack class to nuclear propulsion would take the subs saga to a whole new depth.

Before reading the nuclear-powered musings of Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull (a rare meeting of minds), turn to the other part of the proposition: subs are vital.

A couple of episodes into this five–part series, I got a note from one of the smartest men I know—an economist with a long history in the Canberra policy jungle and an equally deep understanding of East Asia. He is a master at posing the simple Delphic question that forces lots of devilish detail through its paces.

And so my master posed this question:

Although I try to take an interest in these things, I really don’t know why Australia needs submarines. What—exactly—do we want them for? I really don’t know. We’re spending at least $100 billion (probably more) on something which somebody like me has no idea what it’s for. I’ve been keeping an eye on the literature. This matter—i.e., what we actually get from the submarines—doesn’t seem to be explained. I guess I’m slow, right? But my bet is that I’m not the only one.

A fine reminder of an enduring truth: the Canberra defence consensus isn’t always what the rest of Oz understands or believes.

Whenever military types berate me for the ignorance of journalists about defence, I respond they should be grateful to us: we’re merely showing them how much the rest of the population lives in a different place with a sky of a different colour.

On why subs are vital, turn to two politicians responsible for explaining defence to the voters…………..

There’d be no point in us having a nuclear navy if it wasn’t completely sovereign and able to be operated by, and at the direction of, the Australian government. That means the submarines and their nuclear power plants would have to be maintained in Australia.

With France, Australia is building Attack-class submarines that are cousin to the French Barracuda nuclear-powered boats. And that nuclear capability is one element in Australia’s decision to partner with France rather than Germany or Japan, as Turnbull states: ‘It wasn’t the reason for the choice, but accepting the French submarine bid, as opposed to the Japanese or German bids, at least gives us a potential option to move to a nuclear design in the years ahead.’

Reaching for that option would confront many dimensions of Australia’s nuclear taboo. The Labor and Liberal parties would have to agree. The people would have to be persuaded. There’s the small matter of building the nuclear industry. And we’d have to do a lot of talking and explaining to the neighbours—especially Indonesia.

All that could only happen in a darkening strategic environment. It’d be ‘a post-Covid world that is poorer, that is more dangerous, and that is more disorderly’. The quotation marks around that poorer, dangerous, disorderly quote are because that’s what Prime Minister Scott Morrison described in launching the 2020 strategic update.

Tough times will put more twists into Australia’s strange submarine saga. https://www.aspistrategist.org.au/the-strange-submarine-saga-nuclear-powered-poser/