The US Navy this week proposed removing an attack submarine from its 2025 spending plan, but top officials rushed to promise Australia would still get three nuclear submarines.
from its 2025 spending plan, in a tacit recognition that American shipbuilding yards are struggling with the pace of producing and maintaining the national fleet.The proposed budget cut prompted fears about the viability of AUKUS, which was designed by the US, Australia and the UK to safeguard the Indo-Pacific from the growing threat of China, but requires the US maintain a production rate of 2.33 submarines a year to sell any subs to Australia.
Australia will buy up to five Virginia class attack submarines from the US under the AUKUS agreement.“I can tell you that AUKUS is one of the transformative agreements,” Richard Verma, the administration’s deputy secretary of state for management and resources, told this masthead. “We are very proud to be strongly supporting it and moving forward with it.”
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, US President Joe Biden and UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak at an AUKUS announcement in March 2023.Part of the agreement also involves Australia spending $3 billion to boost US shipyards so Virginia-class submarines can arrive in the early 2030s – an investment that Courtney described as “pretty amazing”.
He noted that unless the US doubles its rate of production of Virginia class submarines, it won’t have capacity to supply Australia with the subs promised, let alone maintain the numbers needed for its own navy.
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