I'm not a foreign policy expert or historian but isn't there a rather recent change in foreign relations of Australia, meaning their strategic needs have changed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia%E2%80%93China_relati...
Or maybe it's just posturing.
It's by Hugh White the former deputy-secretary of the Australian Department of Defence.
Historically, that's turned out pretty well for them, as countries in that position can attract favorable terms from both major powers, who want to court them as allies.
Who knows if the government of Australia is thinking in these terms, but I'd be incredibly interested in what concessions and non-public promises Australia got behind the scenes for this.
And in terms of future international relationships, it does demonstrate to China that Australia isn't willing to make alliances solely on the basis of economic pressure. It will be curious if (in the medium to long term) China holds a grudge, or tries to reattract Australia with incentives.
Australia is weird.
Russia and China can’t deploy troops in their own country. The U.S. military can land 10’s of thousands of troops, with a support supply line any where in the world on less than 24 hours notice, along with all the firepower that comes with those troops.
To “win” in Afghanistan would require slaughtering about half the population of the country, something the U.S. military could easily do, but it would make the U.S. into an international pariah, and that would be bad for business.
If the U.S. sovereignty was actually threatened all but the nuclear weapons would be unleashed, including all the top secret weapons that have been developed since the Gulf War, it would probably seem like Star Wars.
Fast forward a few years and the Australian Government had announced one of the driving factors of this deal is nuclear power rather than diesel electric. We’re also building [reportedly] even less of the Submarine locally now. Not to mention the delivery delays this will cause & our lack of servicing capability.
Even as an Australian I can see how this would really annoy France.
Regardless I feel it's incredibly badly handled especially given trade situation with China. Australia is pivoting more towards other markets like EU (negotiations happening currently) and I can't imagine France is going to be too agreeable to this.
Contrary to what many people say, modern diesel submarines are actually stealthier than nuclear ones, because they are smaller (this would not apply to a modified nuclear attack sub, of course). In 2007 a Chinese diesel sub surfaced near the USS Kitty Hawk carrier, having apparently been undetected in the middle of a US exercise. They do have less endurance, but that is only an issue if Australia expects them to patrol far beyond its borders.
Apparently 6 months ago Biden started a secret dialogue with the Australians, offering nuclear propulsion tech to counter China. The US only ever did that with the UK, not even with Canada. The Australians' relationship with China has been deteriorating markedly, even though it is their largest market. Conversely the Chinese banned most Australian imports but not iron ore, because they don't have (yet) an alternative supply to feed their steel industry, although Guinea (in Africa) is a potential candidate. Keep in mind Australia is largely a resource extraction economy, despite being an advanced industrialized nation.
The Australians don't have any nuclear tech, not even a civilian nuclear power program, so any nuclear subs would need to be fueled and serviced by the US or the UK, which means Australia is effectively ceding part of its sovereignty (just as the British did, because their Trident nuclear missiles are 100% US-made). This is a significant development as up to now the Australians wanted to preserve their autonomy.
What are the French upset about?
1) The loss of a AU$ 90B contract, which means probably a €30B hole in France's naval R&D that will need to be plugged somehow. For a middling country like France, that is a lot of money.
2) France has a significant presence in the Pacific, unlike every other European nation, even the UK. 2M French citizen live there, and 7000 military personnel. France also has the largest maritime Exclusive Economic Zone in the world thanks to its possessions in the Pacific, but there are separatist movements in New Caledonia and Tahiti. The French-Australian deal was also part of a strategic cooperation deal with Australia, as the French are just as concerned about Chinese incursions in the Pacific as the Australians, and it has the benefit of being a deal with a peer, not as the junior partner of the US superpower (although of course Australia is the superpower of the Southern Pacific, but that means little compared to the US or China). This strategy is all in tatters now.
3) The French were blindsided, learning of the AU-UK-US deal from the press release, in the most humiliating way possible
4) They were not invited to participate in this AUKUS military alliance.
The consequences are severe and the US completely underestimated that. In 1966 the US commander of NATO refused to answer President de Gaulle's question of whether US nuclear weapons were stationed in France, and in retaliation France withdrew from NATO unified command (and NATO SHAPE headquarters in Paris and Rocquencourt near Versailles had to be moved to Belgium), and expelled US troops stationed in France.
France has recalled its ambassadors to the US and to Australia for consultations, which is just one step short of cutting diplomatic relations. To do so with the US is simply extraordinary, it's only happened once before, during the French revolution.
President Biden rightfully criticized Donald Trump for attempting to contain China while burning bridges with all its allies at the same time by waging sanctions against all of them, but this is a blunder of the same magnitude. France was the more China-skeptic of the major European powers, whereas Germany basically cares only about its exports and appeases China, and the UK was trying to have it both ways by becoming the chief Chinese investment partner in Europe. With this stunt, the US gets Australia to abandon its former policy of independence from the US, but basically sets back its efforts to mobilize Europe against the Chinese by at least 5 years,
I think the US is pretty reasonably concluding that France, and Europe overall, are not going to 'mobilize' against China regardless. We are not even two years from the EU & China signing their Comprehensive Agreement on Investment treaty in late 2020, which was heavily pushed by both France and Germany. It was a pretty stunning poke in the eye to America. The treaty is now apparently on ice, but I think the US clearly sees that Europe sans Britain is not going to be part of an anti-China alliance. So why bother appeasing the Europeans? What do we get out of it?
> French foreign minister says France didn't recall the British ambassador over the AUKUS row because France is familiar with the UK's "permanent opportunism" and said Boris Johnson was the "fifth wheel on the carriage".
* https://twitter.com/kimwillsher1/status/1439294035357749257
:)
> "Perfidious Albion" is a pejorative phrase used within the context of international relations diplomacy to refer to acts of diplomatic sleights, duplicity, treachery and hence infidelity (with respect to perceived promises made to or alliances formed with other nation states) by monarchs or governments of the United Kingdom in their pursuit of self-interest.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfidious_Albion
And as said in Ireland, "the Brits are at it again".
In all likelihood the Australians will pick US Virginia-class subs off the shelf, not made in Australia and not the (excellent) British Astute-class subs, because the US doesn't normally let junior partners get the spoils, only crumbs. For instance when the US organized the 1953 coup that overthrew the Mossadegh government in Iran at the British' request, the Anglo-Iranian oil company was replaced with a consortium of US and European oil companies, with the British getting less than the would have had if they had accepted Mossadegh's most maximalist plan).
The French are pissed? Je suis desolé.
If the Chinese start pushing Aus around and we need help, the French would point to the EU tying their hands while they pat their pocket full of our billions.
This decision is not just a embarrassment for France but it’s a vote of no confidence on the EU’s willingness to deter China.
This lets Australia out of a bad deal while people get distracted by Freedom Fries-type theatrics.
Basically it's treasonous behaviour that has become the norm for our political class of buck suckers.
Read the links in my post elsewhere in this thread https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28580035
The deal never should have been allowed to proceed in the first place. It was a travesty it dragged on for so long... but then again this is Australia that sells gas to overseas countries for half the price we sell to ourselves (even after liquefaction and transport taken into account).
It is so bad, because Australia is the largest gas EXPORTER in the world, but yet on the flipside the system is so corrupted by vested interests that several states of Australia (e.g. Victoria) are are seriously considering saving money by building several gas IMPORT terminals to buy the gas back from foreign countries, after the Australian gas cartel has already sold to those countries for half the price they sell to locals. It runs right to the top, and beyond. The country is run more by the mining powerbrokers and Murdoch than the politicians who are just muppets. Even our current PM famously said something like "the muppet show is over" when trying to placate the media hounding him after the last successful bloodless coup (changing of the countries leader decided only by vested interests)
In all of this talk of "betraying the French" or "siding with the US", there is not even a mention of the fact Australia is spending towards $100 billion on multiple nuclear submarines.
This for a country that only has 25 million people and a GDP of around $1.4 trillion USD.
Why on earth does Australia need nuclear submarines, and why isn't that money being spent to improve the lives of regular tax paying Australians?
A county of 25 million people that doesn't even have nuclear power (or nuclear weapons) has no need of nuclear submarines, it's an obscene waste of money.
Even the first 5 minutes of this mornings insiders was detailing these questions.
I lived in Ukraine where up until 2014 the threat of Russia taking Crimea and eastern provinces was “speculative”.
One big cause might perhaps be an 18 months travel ban preventing Europeans from visiting the US, a travel ban which separates families and has no justification anymore.
Just to be clear, Australia is also governed by a bunch of opportunistic jerks like the UK is at the moment. I would not be at all surprised is this was a feint to get the French to lower the price and the "investigation" will find various technical issues that preclude going with either the UK or US designs. Australia as a deep anti-nuke history, the government can probably use that as an excuse to fold on the new deal too.
The French have no care for the people of the South Pacific, their vain attempts at empire continue, while their toxic and deadly legacy in the region remains.
Careful complaining too hard about the behaviour of France though, they bombed us down here in New Zealand when we did.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/mar/09/france-has-und...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinking_of_the_Rainbow_Warri...
Also, an important factor has to be understood about the majority of people in France (Europe?): they hated Trump. When a Democrat was elected, they believed that they had a friend sharing their view on the world. Reality felt like a stab in the back.
Reality is that we have entered a new Cold War: China vs USA. Countries have to take a side.
For those interested about the *Thucydides Trap* (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thucydides_Trap) we are now seeing, I strongly advise this TED talk with Graham Allison: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XewnyUJgyA4
