Antinuclear

Submission to AUKUS Inquiry -AUKUS deal is a catastrophic misjudgment – Leo Kerr

Leo Kerr n.103

Subject: Opposition to AUKUS Pillar I (Nuclear Submarines) on Grounds of Cost,
Sovereignty, Nuclear Waste, and Strategic Miscalculation

1. Executive Summary

The AUKUS agreement, particularly Pillar I concerning nuclear-powered submarines,
is fundamentally not in Australia’s national interest. While framed as a necessary
response to strategic challenges, the deal imposes crippling financial costs, creates
an unresolved nuclear waste legacy, severely compromises national sovereignty,
rests on unrealistic delivery timelines, and damages Australia’s regional relationships.
This submission argues that AUKUS represents a profound misalignment of strategic
priorities that will leave Australia less secure, financially weaker, and more dependent
on foreign powers for generations.

2. Prohibitive and Unsustainable Financial Cost

The AUKUS submarine program is the most expensive defence project in Australian
history, with estimated total costs of $368 billion over several decades. This figure
does not include the substantial additional costs of base upgrades, workforce
training, and nuclear safety regulation.

Opportunity Cost: $368 billion represents an extraordinary concentration of defence
spending that will inevitably crowd out investment in more agile, relevant capabilities.
Cyber defence, long-range strike missiles, unmanned aerial and maritime systems,
and enhanced intelligence capabilities would deliver more immediate and flexible
security benefits for Australia’s unique geographical circumstances.

Distortion of Defence Budget: The submarine program will consume approximately
40% of the defence capital investment budget for decades, starving other services
and capabilities. The Royal Australian Air Force and Army face significant
modernisation needs that will be compromised.

Subsidising Foreign Industries: A significant portion of Australian spending will
directly support US and UK shipyards, supply chains, and workforce development.
Australia is effectively paying to solve the industrial capacity problems of allied
nations while receiving no firm guarantees on delivery timelines. This represents an
unequal arrangement where Australian taxpayers bear enormous risk while allied
defence contractors secure long-term revenue.

No Exit Clause Without Penalty: Australia has committed to this path with limited
ability to withdraw without incurring substantial sunk costs and diplomatic damage.
The deal’s structure locks Australia into decades of expenditure regardless of
changing strategic circumstances.

3. Catastrophic and Unresolved Nuclear Waste Liability

The AUKUS deal will transform Australia into a permanent repository for high-level
nuclear waste—a burden the nation is entirely unprepared to manage.

Sovereign Responsibility for High-Level Waste: Under the agreement, Australia
accepts sole and permanent responsibility for all nuclear waste generated by its
submarine fleet, including highly radioactive spent fuel that remains dangerous for
hundreds of thousands of years. There is no existing permanent high-level nuclear
waste storage facility anywhere in the world. The United States and United Kingdom,
which have operated nuclear submarines for over 60 years, have still failed to
develop permanent storage solutions.

Accepting Foreign Waste: Most alarmingly, the deal permits the US and UK to
dispose of low- and intermediate-level nuclear waste from their own submarines in Australia. This provision makes Australia a designated dumping ground for other
nations’ toxic military legacies with no reciprocal benefit.

No Domestic Waste Management Plan: Australia currently has no permanent,
community-agreed solution for even its existing low-level medical and research
waste. Successive governments have failed for nearly three decades to site a single
waste facility in the face of sustained opposition from communities and Traditional
Owners. Recent legislative attempts to compel facility construction have been widely
criticised for granting government the power to unilaterally designate sites without
proper consultation or consent.

Intergenerational Inequity: The nuclear waste problem will remain dangerous for millennia, far beyond the lifespan of any government or institution. Current decision-
makers are imposing a permanent environmental and security burden on all future generations of Australians without their consent and without any credible plan formanagement.

4. Severe Erosion of National Sovereignty

AUKUS fundamentally subordinates Australian defence and foreign policy to United
States strategic interests, compromising hard-won independence in national
decision-making.

Lack of Independent Operational Control: Australian commanders will not have
independent control over these submarines. The vessels, their nuclear reactors, their
weapons systems, and their support infrastructure are so deeply integrated with US
military systems that the concept of independent Australian operation is illusory.
Critical maintenance, refuelling, and weapons replenishment can only occur at US
facilities, meaning Australia cannot sustain these submarines without continuous US
approval and support.

Enmeshment in US Conflict Decisions: The agreement’s emphasis on
“interchangeability” and “integrated deterrence” strongly implies that AustraliaEnmeshment in US Conflict Decisions: The agreement’s emphasis on
“interchangeability” and “integrated deterrence” strongly implies that Australia would be compelled to support the United States in any future conflict involving
China—including over Taiwan. The AUKUS framework does not preserve Australia’s
right to make independent decisions about war and peace. Rather, it assumes
Australian participation as a condition of the alliance.

Ceding Control of Australian Territory: AUKUS requires significant expansion of
Australian military facilities, including HMAS Stirling in Western Australia for
submarine basing and RAAF Tindal in the Northern Territory for nuclear-capable B-52
bomber rotations. These expanded facilities will host US military personnel,
equipment, and potentially nuclear weapons. Australia has a longstanding policy of
not confirming or denying the presence of nuclear weapons on its territory, meaning
the public and Parliament will have no assurance about what is being hosted on
Australian soil.

Vulnerability to US Domestic Politics: The entire AUKUS project is vulnerable to the
whims of US electoral politics. In 2025, the Pentagon initiated a review of the
agreement to ensure compliance with the “America First” policy agenda. This
demonstrates that US interests will always take precedence. If a future US
administration decides the agreement no longer serves American interests—or
demands Australian participation in a conflict Australians do not support—Australia
will have no meaningful recourse. Our strategic future is held hostage to US political
volatility.

Explicit Opt-Out Rights for Allies: Both the United States and the United Kingdom
have explicit opt-out rights under the agreement, allowing them to withdraw if their
own national requirements are not met. Australia has no equivalent protection. A
senior Australian Defence official has conceded that if the US or UK walked away,
Australia’s “Plan B” is non-existent.

5. Unrealistic Delivery and Capability Gaps

The timeline and technical assumptions underlying AUKUS are deeply unrealistic,
leaving Australia with a dangerous capability gap.

Decades-Long Delivery Timeline: Even under the most optimistic projections, the
first Virginia-class submarines will not be delivered until the early 2030s, and the final
Australian-built SSN-AUKUS submarine will not enter service until the 2050s—
approximately 40 years from the agreement’s announcement. This timeline exceeds
the planning horizons of any government or military strategy.

Ailing Allied Industrial Bases: Both the US and UK submarine industrial bases are in
poor condition. The UK has experienced periods where it could not deploy a single
operational submarine due to maintenance backlogs. Its skilled workforce and supply
chains have atrophied. The US Navy faces its own pressures to maintain fleet
numbers and has warned that diverting submarines to Australia could degrade
American undersea capabilities. US law prohibits the sale of nuclear submarines if it
would “degrade the United States’ undersea capabilities,” giving Congress a
permanent veto over deliveries to Australia.

Collins Class Capability Gap: Australia’s existing Collins-class submarines are
scheduled to begin retirement from the 2030s. Even optimistic AUKUS timelines leave
a gap of 5–10 years with no submarine capability. The government has no credible
interim solution. Plans to extend Collins-class service life face significant technical
challenges and workforce constraints. The gap leaves Australia without a
fundamental strategic capability at precisely the time proponents claim the strategic
environment is most dangerous.

Unproven Technology: The SSN-AUKUS submarine design does not yet exist. No
nuclear-powered submarine has ever been designed and built in Australia. The fusion
of British design and American propulsion technology has no precedent and faces
immense technical, regulatory, and safety hurdles. Every nuclear submarine program
in history has experienced significant cost overruns and delays.

6. Damaging Impact on Regional Relations and Economic
   Security

AUKUS has damaged Australia’s standing in Southeast Asia and the Pacific while undermining our most important economic relationship.

Provocative and Exclusionary: Regional neighbours, including Indonesia, Malaysia,
and Pacific Island nations, have expressed serious concerns about AUKUS. It is widely
perceived as a provocative, exclusionary military pact designed for great power
confrontation. This undermines ASEAN-centred regional architecture, which has been
built on principles of inclusivity, consultation, and non-confrontation. AUKUS risks
triggering a regional nuclear arms race, which would make Australia less safe, not
more.

Damage to Relations with China: AUKUS has been explicitly framed as a response
to China’s rise. While prudent deterrence is legitimate, the manner in which AUKUS
was announced—without prior consultation with regional partners and in a manner
designed to exclude and confront—has poisoned the strategic atmosphere. The
agreement has reduced mutual trust in the bilateral relationship with Australia’s
largest trading partner. China accounts for approximately 25% of Australian exports,
and a stable, functional relationship is essential for Australian prosperity. A growing
number of Australians question the logic of sacrificing economic well-being for
uncertain strategic guarantees from an ally with divergent interests.

Strategic Contradiction: Australia is simultaneously pursuing the most expensive
military buildup in its history while relying on China for export income that funds
government services, infrastructure, and social programs. This contradiction is
unsustainable. If Australia genuinely believes China poses a direct military threat
requiring nuclear submarines, then continued deep economic integration is
strategically incoherent. If China does not pose such a threat, then AUKUS represents
a catastrophic misallocation of resources.

Marginalising Pacific Concerns: Pacific Island nations have consistently identified
climate change as their primary security threat. AUKUS diverts attention, diplomatic
energy, and financial resources away from climate action and towards military
competition. This damages Australia’s reputation as a responsible regional partner
and cedes influence to other powers that are more responsive to Pacific priorities.

7. A More Prudent Path Forward

It is not too late to change course. A growing number of former defence officials,
diplomats, and strategic analysts have called for Australia to fundamentally revisit the
AUKUS decision.

Immediate Recommendations:

1. Commission an independent cost-benefit analysis of AUKUS against alternative
   defence investments, including an updated conventionally-powered submarine
   program, long-range strike capabilities, and enhanced cyber and space assets.
2. Reject the nuclear waste provisions and maintain Australia’s longstanding policy of
   not accepting foreign nuclear waste on its territory.
3. Reassert parliamentary sovereignty over war and peace decisions, clarifying that
   no alliance commitment overrides the Australian Parliament’s exclusive authority to
   authorise military action.
4. Redirect defence investment toward capabilities more suited to Australia’s
   geography, including long-range maritime patrol aircraft, unmanned underwater
   vehicles, distributed sensor networks, and precision-strike missiles.
5. Pursue genuine strategic independence by diversifying defence partnerships and
   avoiding exclusive reliance on any single ally for critical capabilities.

8. Conclusion

The AUKUS submarine deal represents a catastrophic misjudgment. It imposes an
unprecedented financial burden, creates a permanent and unresolved nuclear waste
liability, erodes Australian sovereignty, rests on unrealistic delivery assumptions, and damages our most important regional relationships. The justification for AUKUS
relies on an exaggerated threat perception and blind faith in allies who have placed
their own interests first—explicitly, in writing, in the agreement’s opt-out clauses.

Australia does not need nuclear submarines to be secure. We need a defence
strategy appropriate to our geography, our budget, and our democratic values—not
one designed by foreign industrial lobbies and imposed under the guise of alliance
solidarity. For these reasons, I urge this Committee to recommend that the Australian
Government withdraw from the AUKUS Pillar I submarine agreement and pursue a
more independent, proportionate, and responsible defence posture.

September 23, 2026 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized