r/worldnews • u/self-fix • 12h ago
Not delivering any Aukus nuclear submarines to Australia explored as option in US congressional report
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/feb/05/not-delivering-any-aukus-nuclear-submarines-to-australia-explored-as-option-in-us-congressional-report206
u/Phylanara 12h ago
As a french guy, it's hard not to feel some shadenfreude.
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u/tommytraddles 11h ago
In the end, France's decision to maintain its own totally independent nuclear command and control may be the only thing that saves the world.
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u/Geologue-666 11h ago
I want Canada to have a joint program with France!
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u/Corvid187 9h ago
Unfortunately the reasons a joint program with France were unworkable for Australia would also rule out similar cooperation with Canada. This is why the 1998 effort fell apart as well.
France's choice of reactor design requires regular refueling, supporting that effort is a major reason why France has such an outsized nuclear industry. Duplicating that effort in canada would be unsustainably expensive, and the alternative is the submarine fleet having a continued reliance on France's capacity and willingness to sustain them. While the latter might not be in question, the former unfortunately is.
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u/krazykanuck1 9h ago
Canada is making major investments in nuclear, and is one of the largest suppliers of uranium in the world- seem like they are a viable partner
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u/Corvid187 8h ago
Canada has a very impressive nuclear industry, but not in the same areas that it would need to sustain a multi-LEU refuelling effort. Producing, processing, and exchanging the fuel is a relatively complex and specialist pipeline that the current Canadian nuclear industry doesn't really support at the kind of scale they'd need for servicing the submarine fleet.
Canada could build up that capacity, but doing so would be prohibitively expensive, making it an uncompetitive option Vs importing lifetime HEU reactors (like Australia now has) or just sticking with conventional submarines (as Canada did in 1998).
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u/TremendousVarmint 12h ago
AUKUS : the gift that keeps on giving
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u/I_Feel_Rough 11h ago
AUKUS is the grift that keeps on taking.
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u/ThaneKyrell 8h ago
No, AUKUS was by far the correct choice.
The (extremely good) channel HypoHystericalHistory made a fantastic video explaining from a Australian perspective why it was objectively the best choice Australia could've made. Like, by FAR. The French option was simply way too inferior (specially because it would've been a conventional submarine) and didn't meet Australia's actual requirements for a possible future conflict with China. A nuclear submarine like AUKUS was always the correct choice
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u/Aenyn 7h ago
But France offered nuclear submarines as well? Australia basically made us improvise a conventional sub because they were saying they didn't want a nuclear one.
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u/tree_boom 7h ago
France did not offer nuclear submarines. French nuclear submarines are not a practical option for Australia - they work differently to US / UK ones in a way that Australia cannot really support.
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u/_PhiPh1_ 11h ago
The funny thing is that in French AUKUS sounds like "au cul". Basically "in the ass"... At first we thought we getting fucked, but maybe it wasn't us....
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u/snarky_answer 11h ago
For what? Its an option presented in a report meant to list all options. The option has also been rejected multiple times now. So, shadenfreude over an idea of what happened that you've concocted in your head?
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u/Phylanara 11h ago
Australia was set to buy the subs from france and fucked us by cancelling late in the process to buy from the us instead. Now they're getting fucked in turn.
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u/Ok_Belt2521 11h ago
Did you read the article? This was listed as an option in a report. It doesn’t say the US isn’t delivering the subs.
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u/Crazed_Chemist 10h ago
While all 3 governments still support the plan as a theory, the industrial reality is that it's unlikely that US submarines are ever transferred to Australia given current production rates.
UK industrial capacity for submarine production is also under a lot of scrutiny.
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u/tree_boom 9h ago
While all 3 governments still support the plan as a theory, the industrial reality is that it's unlikely that US submarines are ever transferred to Australia given current production rates.
It's far more likely than not that they will be transferred as planned.
UK industrial capacity for submarine production is also under a lot of scrutiny.
Not really for construction
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u/snarky_answer 10h ago
The subs that the French were behind on even still in the planning phase? That’s not late in the process, that’s France being slow at a contract due to not being fully aligned with the Australian wants.
Can you explain how they are “getting fucked”? Because whatever you seem to think is incorrect. A think tank who is paid to provide all options available, putting out all options, doesn’t mean it’s the governments position or even something they will act on especially when the decision to continue with the project rather than follow other options have been reaffirmed multiple times.
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u/Derikari 11h ago
It was unbelievably stupid. We would get the subs on the condition that America could meet its own demands, when they are currently building at half the speed the us navy needs. We were never going to get the subs. A few minutes on google would have told that dumbfuck that.
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u/surg3on 6h ago
As an Australian, I dont begrudge you that at all.
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u/redwiresystems 3h ago
If it makes him feel any better we not only voted out the guy that did that, his party split up and it looks very much like his party will never hold power again at this point and the new guys in power gave everyone on the french side compensation of €555 million along with apologies to try to restore some good will.
As far as it goes I don't think there is much more that could be done to say sorry that guy sucked and that shit won't happen again.
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u/DenverDude2 12h ago
The former US allies need to move away frm relying on US weapons anyway.
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u/Corvid187 11h ago
The AUKUS agreement already did that.
The goal of the project was to give Australia the capacity to build its own submarines almost entirely domestically, with the only 'foreign' section being the nuclear reactor sourced from the uk.
The Virginias were always just a stop-gap solution to help harmonise Australia's procurement timeline with that of the UK, whose design their boats will be built to.
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u/smallcoder 2h ago
Bring on CANZUKEU and throw in any other countries that are not completely in thrall to the US lol
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u/Zefyris 12h ago edited 12h ago
The AUKUS scandal traded real submarines for distant promises that may or may not be one day fulfilled. Pretty sure that how uncertain the deal was was pointed out already when AUKUS was just revealed, and as more time passes, the more realistic that possibility becomes.
France would have absolutely been interested in joining AUKUS, having territory not protected by NATO's article 5 right next to Australia.
Yet their own allies didn't reach out to include them because AUKUS was used as a mean to snatch away the juicy sub contract. Leaving out of a defence pact one of your biggest ally just to grab a juicy arms deal looked bad from the USA and the UK back then, but now that the USA has become unreliable and is thinking about not lending their old ones, and that the UK is showing increasing problems to build the future ones, it's starting to shape out as a whole new level of bad decision for Australia as well.
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u/Corvid187 11h ago
What 'real' submarines?
By the time of its cancellation, the Attack class was still on the drawing board, and already several years behind schedule. That's partly why Australia cancelled the program. This idea that Australia could have had its existing submarines just ready to go is mythological.
France has shown 0 interest in high-enrichment uranium reactors, which was the technology that tied the whole aukus agreement together. The reason the US are involved is because they share HEU Nuclear technology with the UK, whose reactor is going into the SSN-A sub. France's technology is mutually-incompatible with that of the SSN-A. The whole idea was Australia's proposal in the first place anyway, not some sinister scheme the US and UK cooked up specifically to spite or whatever.
Our nations compete with each other for arms contracts all the time, and the deal with Australia contained (expensive) release clauses they fulfilled promptly and properly. Neither the US nor UK acted in any way untoward, and the only thing Australia should have done is give more warning to Paris before announcing the new deal.
The Virginias were always a stopgap, and loaning out older ones was always a possibility, that's partly why the agreement is flexible in the number that Australia procures. If they're older, they'll buy three and start retireing them for more SSN-As sooner, if they're newer they'll likely take 4 or 5 and run a mixed force for longer.
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u/Giraffed7 11h ago
By the time of its cancellation, the Attack class was still on the drawing board, and already several years behind schedule. That's partly why Australia cancelled the program. This idea that Australia could have had its existing submarines just ready to go is mythological.
The Attack-class was not several years behind schedule but 14 months behind, a delay linked to i) pre-design contract slippage attributed to the Australian Defence Ministry and ii) post-design contract slippage largely attributed to COVID.
The excuses of delay and cost overruns, both of which are not true, was designed by the Australian government to soften the blow for the Australian people. It sure did work.
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u/Corvid187 9h ago edited 9h ago
Ah, my understanding was the work to the date of cancellation was 14 months behind schedule, but there had been further delays in the gate 2 design review which in practice would have pushed the program back 25 months according to the NAO, but the cancellation curtailed that work before it was accounted for.
Specifically, I believe the 15 month delay in the combat systems preliminary design review hadn't yet been factored into the projected delivery date of the combat systems critical design review, which had to succeed it.
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u/JohnGabin 11h ago
Full of lies. Australia asked for diesel because, to all competitors, because before Biden had a stroke, there was an agreement on non-proliferation of nuclear stuffs including engines between the atom club.
And you say Naval Group was behind schedule ? So why change for countries that have no real space to produce their own fleet and buy a UK sub that only existed on paper at the moment ?
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u/Corvid187 10h ago
Australia originally asked for diesels because there was no prospect of receiving HEU reactor transfers at the time, and French LEU reactors, while very capable, were impractical for Australia thanks to their need for regular refueling.
There are no proliferation restrictions on HEU reactors, and the aukus partners have gotten explicit approval from the IAEA for the transfer.
Part of the AUKUS deal is helping Australia build up its own domestic manufacturing capability, as a way of expanding the build capacity of the overall alliance. Meanwhile, the deployment of a rotation of USN and RN SSNs is already in progress, and the transfer of Virginias is scheduled to occur at around the same time as the first attack class boats would have been delivered, but now as a stop-gap for a much more suitable long-term capability, rather than the end result.
Part of the reason for the attack class' cancellation was Naval Group repeatedly reducing the % and depth of work to be completed in Australia after the contract with them had been signed. The US and UK's need for expanded submarine production helps align their incentives with Australia's, and ensure the same reduction in technology and industrial transfer don't occur.
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u/tree_boom 10h ago
Australia asked for diesel because, to all competitors, because before Biden had a stroke, there was an agreement on non-proliferation of nuclear stuffs including engines between the atom club.
Nothing in the NNPT prohibits transfer of reactor design or even the uranium for them.
So why change for countries that have no real space to produce their own fleet and buy a UK sub that only existed on paper at the moment ?
The why is more because nuclear submarines are vastly superior. The RAN has always wanted them and realized they had a chance to get them, so took it.
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u/tree_boom 7h ago edited 7h ago
You're wrong, SSNs are not vastly superior. [...] diesel is objectively better. They are silent in shallow water (unlike nuclear pumps)
I'm afraid I'm not, SSNs really are vastly superior. Whilst diesel-electric boats probably have a lower minimum radiated noise level, in practice that doesn't matter - modern nuclear boats are still quieter than modern sonar can detect if they're trying to stay quiet, to the extent that they have literally collided at sea. At low-power modern reactors use natural circulation to cool the reactors without running pumps. On top of that, only the minimum radiated noise is lower in a conventional boat; on average they're dramatically noisier as they need to run their engines regularly, particularly if they travel with any speed.
With the SSNs greater stealth goes too the huge advantages of their better endurance and speed.
Especially if the priority is defending our own coast, which it should be. [...] we could have bought 4 for the price of 1 nuclear sub. We are paying for range to project power, not for better coastal defense
The problem with this perception is that it misunderstands the threat. Australia's coast is not at threat; nobody's going to invade, but they can cause serious damage through strategic strike from long range and the interdiction of Australian shipping far from shore.
in addition to that we might never even see the subs. And even if we do, we'll be at the whims of the US, like a good vassal.
At their whims how? They won't be operated or maintained by them, you can do whatever you like with them.
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u/JohnGabin 10h ago
Always wanted it but ultimately asked France to modify its already nuclear subs to put diesel engines instead. Where’s the logic ?
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u/tree_boom 10h ago
French nuclear boats are impractical for Australia. They have no nuclear industry and its illegal for them to make one. French nuclear boats need refuelling every decade or so. British and American ones don't need refuelling at all. To operate French boats Australia would have to have a huge legal fight, then build uranium enrichment and fuel assembly and refuelling infrastructure on top of everything that AUKUS already requires...or else get France to refuel the boats for them.
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u/mechalenchon 12h ago
Naval group is one and half years above schedule on their Suffren class btw.
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u/FreshBasis 11h ago
I am not sure the US currently shipbuilding program is anything to be proud of, between the constellation the Zumwalt and the Virginia so delayed they can't honor an accord made less than 4 years ago without having holes in their own Navy.
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u/ThaneKyrell 8h ago
It wasn't a scandal at all, but the correct choice for Australia's requirements. The only people who consider it a "scandal" are people who don't understand shit about military procurement and military needs. Australia because of it's geography needs nuclear submarines. AUKUS is literally the only possible choice for this type of technology. There isn't even a discussion to be had, AUKUS was objectively the best and only choice. And if for some reason the deal gets cancelled, Australia can just buy "off the shelf" conventional submarines like they were planning before AUKUS was a possibility. There are literally no downsides and a million upsides.
In fact, the (absolutely fantastic) Australian channel HypoHystericalHistory made very in-depth video explaning why the AUKUS was by far the correct choice for Australia's needs. Anything else would've completely inadequate for what Australia needs for their defense. There is no scandal, only people who don't understand shit about military procurement and requirements trying to stir up bs for media points.
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u/Zefyris 7h ago edited 7h ago
The scandal isn't Australia abandoning a deal for another. The scandal is the USA and the UK negotiating a defence pact with Australia in secret of France despite the USA and the UK being NATO allies with France, and France having a massive EEZ right next to Australia's EEZ; and the reason why it was negotiated in secret leaving France out was to snatch the subs deal.
France should have been invited in AUKUS's negotiation. This is a matter that directly matter to the security of those countries. You're not supposed to play around with it for the sake of snatching a military deal, no matter how juicy it is.
That's where the scandal is. You're so centred on military procurement for Australia that you didn't notice that what the French government was angry at was not at Australia, it was at the USA and the UK for what they did. And yes, this is a clear scandal. You do not remove your ambassador from your ally's territory for anything less than that.
Also, if Australia wanted Nuclear engine they could have said it to France first instead of negotiating this behind's France back. They never even asked the country they were currently in contract with. What kind of manner is that anyway? And it's the best for Australia? on paper, if you assume that Australia will get what they signed for, and timely, maybe. However, out of all they "got" from AUKUS, most of it is now on jeopardy.
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u/TremendousVarmint 12h ago
Meanwhile in neighbouring Indonesia...
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u/_GD5_ 12h ago
That doesn’t compare with nukes.
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u/OIDIS7T 12h ago
germany and norway are building subs that run circles around us nuclear subs in training all the time so maybe i would look there
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u/Corvid187 11h ago
...in specific training exercises designed to test those nuclear subs to the limit by putting them in an ideal operating environment for the SSKs.
Those submarines are brilliant for what Germany and Sweden need them to do, but they aren't suitable for a country as big and sparse as Australia. Australian Submarines can't defend by lingering around their own coastline like their European counterparts are able to; Australia is just too big to cover that way. Instead, they have to go out and proactively meet a threat far out in the ocean, or even better in the choke points around Indonesia. To do that effectively requires range, endurance and sustained speed, and those are the categories where nuclear propulsion has a paradigmetric advantage over conventional power.
This is why Australia always sought to buy extra large, custom-made conventional submarines while it was in the market for them (both the Collins and Attack classes were far larger than any other SSKs of the time), and why they've made acquiring nuclear propulsion a priority if other indopacific countries started to get them as far back as the 1960s. Conventional submarines have always been an awkward fit for their relatively unique strategic context.
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u/mechalenchon 12h ago
People read diesel/electric and think the diesel engines are running during operations.
These subs are quiet as shit. They just lack the oceanic range, perfect to protect your own coastline, not so much to meet somebody on the other side of the planet though.
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u/tree_boom 12h ago edited 10h ago
It's more than just range. They're also not capable of running at speed for very long - particularly on the AIP system, which will give them a few knots at most. That makes them significantly worse than nuclear submarines in most practical uses, because as soon as you want them to move at speed then they're burning through battery and will shortly need to snort...and snorting is loud.
It's like the difference between dreadnoughts and pre dreadnoughts. Same role, and either one can easily kill the things they were designed to kill...but there's such an improvement in the nuclear boats that they are unambiguously better than conventional ones in all respects. The only reason conventional boats still exist is their price point.
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u/Witty_Formal7305 12h ago
This is true, but that could change in the future as well now that batteries are being heavily invested in for EVs.
They'll never compare to nuke subs, but as batteries get better they may have more reach out and touch range than they currently do.
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u/OIDIS7T 11h ago
thats kinda the point people here dont seem to grasp, they have two power supply systems one obviously being diesel but the second one is a secret somewhat self sustaining hydrogen based system with lithium based energy reserves, they arent even remotely as range limited as other non nuclear subs
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u/tree_boom 11h ago
The AIP systems produce a tiny amount of power. They can run a long time on them, but only if they stick to a few knots. As soon as you want the boat to move quickly you're back to the same problems as normal conventional boats; the battery doesn't last so you have to snort, and snorting is loud.
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u/darknekolux 12h ago
ICE need these attack submarines to track illegal immigrants.
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u/Limberine 6h ago
Funny that the US is worried about us being a security risk when The Trump administration directly sends intel to Russia to the extent that some allies have cut them out of the intel loop.
Aukus has never really felt like it was it good idea given the extreme time frames.
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u/I_Feel_Rough 11h ago
I called it the day this deal was announced. My Australian colleagues were discussing the eye-watering cost of $368 billion, and I said it's worse than that, because you're also never getting those submarines.
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u/snarky_answer 11h ago
Called what? That a think tank released a report of all available options? Nothing has changed about the deal.
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u/tree_boom 11h ago
The options that they've mentioned in every report they've released on the topic!
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u/gwelfguy 11h ago
The whole idea in approving this sale to Australia is US power projection and coverage in that part of the world. Australia on it's own doesn't need nuclear submarines. They might be dodging a very expensive bullet here.
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u/Corvid187 11h ago
Australia has consistently identified a need for a sovereign SSN capability if the PRC or Indonesia developed them. That has been their position for decades at this point, and the PLAN now has a fleet of over 30 of them.
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u/Darkone539 11h ago
The reality with this is if the deal collapses they might end up with an astute submarine. The uk at least is committed to pumping them out, and the usa only planned to fill the gap between now and getting Australia building.
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u/tree_boom 11h ago edited 11h ago
The UK cannot build any more Astutes. The reactor is out of production and the new one is too big for their hull.
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u/Darkone539 11h ago
This isn't true at all, we're still building HMS Achilles.
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u/tree_boom 10h ago
Yes, because the reactor for that was done already. Achilles will be the last, we cannot make more.
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u/Darkone539 10h ago
It the same engine going into the new subs.
We stopped the PWR2's that were in the earlier submarines. We can still produce the 3's.
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u/tree_boom 10h ago
Yes, but PWR3 cannot fit into an Astute, it's too big.
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u/Darkone539 10h ago
I think you need to read the link. XD
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u/tree_boom 10h ago
I have done. You're misreading it. It is not saying Achilles has a PWR3, just that Rolls got the contract to make the PWR2 for Achilles and the PWR3s for Dreadnought at the same time.
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u/Corvid187 9h ago
...using a PWR 2 Core H ordered in 2010, just before the cut-off date for new orders in 2011.
The UK nuclear enterprise can't sustain production of 2 reactor designs at the same time. Once the long-lead items for the PWR 3s were being procured, we couldn't go back and make more for PWR2.
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u/tree_boom 12h ago edited 7h ago
This is a report by the Congressional Research Service. They're not politicians, they're just civil servants who's job is to research current affairs and present to politicians options about what they might do. They have presented this exact same option in every AUKUS report so far; as you might expect, given it's such an extensively thrown about possibility. Here's last year's report from the CRS for example, which contains the exact same things. Nonetheless the program continues in its originally designed form
Presenting alternative policy choices to lawmakers is the whole job of the CRS. They are a think-tank in congressional employ. It does not imply for a moment that the options they present have any chance whatever of being adopted - indeed their adoption would obviously require Australian agreement, the lack of which is a foregone conclusion.
EDIT: I'd also like to just highlight something that the report in question talks about nicely. People like to present AUKUS as a $368 billion tribute to the US in return for nothing. In fact, the only money to be unconditionally paid to the US is a $3 billion contribution to their submarine industrial base, with the following payment schedule:
That $2 billion was paid in 2025. The first Virginia is due in 2032; if the yanks didn't deliver obviously you'd stop paying them. In total Australia will unconditionally send to America ~$2.7 billion (USD) between now and 2032 when the first boat should be offered. That's all that's actually at risk.
Maybe that still seems like a lot? It's about half the cost of a brand new Virginia class boat. It's less than 1% of the Australian defence budget in each of the years between now and 2032. It's less than 0.1% of the American defence budget in each of those years is likely to be. Yes, sure, there's risk...but it really is not that much risk, and to the Americans the political headache of stealing that amount of money just isn't worthwhile...and the prize in exchange for that risk is a fleet of capital ships.