When Foreign Affairs Minister Marise Payne and Defence Minister Peter Dutton held 2+2 consultations with their French counterparts three weeks ago it was business as usual on the submarines front.
“Both sides committed to deepen defence industry cooperation and enhance their capability edge in the region. Ministers underlined the importance of the Future Submarine program,” a statement released says.
All the gushing talk of deepening cooperation, a historically close strategic partnership, shared values and principles, gave no indication that for the past 18 months the Morrison government had been working towards screwing over the French.
On Thursday morning Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced the $90 billion submarine contract with French manufacturer Naval Group had been scrapped. French President Emmanuel Macron found out just hours earlier over the phone. Shared values and close strategic ties be damned.
“They had every reason to know we had deep and grave concerns,” Morrison said of the project.
The French are pretty pissed off, and it’s clearly news to them. On Friday France recalled ambassador Jean-Pierre Thébault, leaving Australia in a diplomatic row with a country it has historically counted as an ally.
So far the government appears blindsided by the depth of France’s rage, and unprepared for the geopolitical consequences to come out of yet another unforced error in the foreign policy space.
The communication
According to Morrison and Dutton, Australia had been raising concerns with France over the submarines for some time.
The government, Dutton said, had always been “upfront, open and honest”, noting that he’d raised concerns with French counterpart Florence Parly at last month’s consultations.
Dutton and Morrison have a point: the problems with the Naval Group contract — spiralling costs, delays, a tetchy relationship with Defence — have been well documented for many years. So much so that at Senate estimates in June, Defence secretary Greg Moriarty confirmed he was considering alternative submarine options.
When Morrison and Macron met at the Élysée Palace in Paris that month, Macron reaffirmed France’s “full and complete commitment” to the submarine project. By then, Naval Group had engaged lobbyists in Canberra.
Still, the government’s pivot clearly took Paris by surprise. Yesterday Morrison confirmed he’d called Macron at 8.30 on the night before the announcement. His government had been quietly talking about problems with the Future Submarine Project for 18 months, without alerting the French. Judging by their reaction, Morrison’s call was clearly unexpected.
Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs Jean-Yves Le Drian, who sat down with Payne and Dutton just months ago, has at various points called the decision a “stab in the back” and “duplicity”.
“We thought we were mates,” Thébault told reporters on en route to Sydney airport.
How France could respond
The French response might seem like a bit of overheated Gallic histrionics. Actually there are many ways France can screw us. Paris’ anger could scupper the government’s hopes for a free trade agreement with the European Union. The French are already calling on other countries in the bloc to reconsider the deal. France was meant to play a key role in those negotiations. Now it will not.
One sticking point for FTA negotiations is the EU’s proposed carbon border adjustment mechanism, where tariffs will be placed on imports based on emissions. Tensions with France could make it harder for Australia to overcome a growing gulf with the EU on climate, particularly ahead of the COP26 summit in Glasgow in November.
And the falling out seriously undermines Australia’s strategic cooperation with France. Work done to maintain closer military ties has come undone. The submarine deal was just the tip of the iceberg for heightened cooperation in the Indo-Pacific, including vital maritime surveillance work. In June, Macron offered Australia support as it faced the “front lines of tensions” in the region. That easy support can’t be taken for granted any more.
It’ll be 18 months before we get to know much more about the nuclear submarines. They might not be protecting Australia until 2040, in a geopolitical environment that will be dramatically different from today’s. In the short term, however, Australia must live with the consequences of angering the French.
So far our great leaders have unnecessarily antogonised the Japanese over the submarines after Abbott promised them the contract, now they’ve forfeited on a contract with the French, without letting them know we were reconsidering, we’ve single handedly taken out the distinction of permanently damaging our relationship with the Chinese by playing Trumps ‘lapdog’. Most of this is purely out of a desire to make an announcement. Has any govt. in our history ever done so much damage to our economy through sheer incompetence?
Well, we are only playing to our strengths and being consistent – in our take on being an ally. What was Superman’s oft expressed moral code “Truth, Justice and the American Way”? Or, are we just playing Robin to the U.S.A.’s Batman – perhaps the Jester and King analogy might be more accurate.
I’ll go with the Penguin, though hard to choose between classic Steve Bell’s Prince Philip or Tomorrow’s Sparky.
Both cool dudes, even away from their beloved Antarctic.
It started as “Truth and Justice” the rest came later. Anyway we are irrelevant, sdo they should call it USUK.
That’s right. This whole thing is largely being reported in isolation, just something that’s come up. The government’s egregious history, screwing over in turn the electors of South Australia, the Japanese Government & now the French, isn’t being widely examined. As is always the case with this government, today’s scandal is just that, one of an ongoing series.
Yes very well stated Brett. The French have now received an in your face example of the moral bankruptcy that is Morrison and Dutton. Morrison in particular has shown time and time again that he will sell out, knife in the back anybody so long as it suits his political agenda. That agenda is rusted on to as many TV announcements as possible to further his political ambition to retain power at all costs.
Morrison is the ultimate example of ‘doing whatever it takes to stay in power’. using persons as a means to an end causes no mill-second .of moral regret by Morrison just as lying (as so well proven by Crikey) is Morrison’s default position. Morrison cares not a jot for the welfare of all Australians only for those who bring ‘something to the table’. He has now shown as he has done previously that he cares even less for his professed allies the French by showing not the least of basic moral values of respectful treatment to them
Morrison is turning Australia’s values into a mirror of his own. It is time Australians woke up to this miserable excuse of a human being and tossed him and his kind out with the garbage.
It would have been a simple matter to change ftom having France change their nuclear subs to diesel to having their nuclear subs as they were originally built for. But no, motor mouth has to cause a diplomatic stoush simply because he thinks we can play with the big boys and do whatever floats into his numb nut for a brain.
And there it is in plain English. We are, and will forever remain, a Vassal state.
We certainly are a vassal state, Harry, but that does not mean we shall always have to remain so. But so long as we enthrone stupidity in our leadership we will remain as vassals to be used by others for their ends.
A forever ally, for those forever wars. I found Morrison’s choice of that particular word, with all its connotations, injudicious.
I’ve got a great idea how we might smooth things over with the French: perhaps we could cancel our participation in the Flying Heap of Crap project and ask the French if they might be able to supply a plane that actually flies and shoots. All square!
Now there’s a thought. Anyone putting their hands up yet to get into a steel tube with an onboard nuclear reactor, possibly for months or years at a time? (except of course when they spend 2 to 3 years in dry dock getting refueled and the expended nuclear waste is removed and buried, with all radioactive surfaces and components then replaced…in Adelaide perchance?) Perhaps the US will give us some of their mothballed and contaminated Los Angeles class.
Nah. I understand, that in response to an Australian Government call for expressions of interest in providing a 5th Generation fighter for the RAAF, a European consortium had already come to Australia for the called for contest of ideas only to be told at the last minute that, without any presentations on any of the aircraft contenders, the Australian Government had signed up to the aspirational Lockheed Martin F35 Lightning, still on the drawing board. As a tragicomedy aside, I still recall the cancellation of a flag waving F35 demonstration flight to Brisbane from Melbourne some years ago. The reason for the cancellation? Our desired all-weather interceptor, the “Lightning”, was dangerous to fly in stormy conditions where a lightning strike would have a catastrophic effect on the aircraft’s digital flight control and navigation systems.
The F35 and submarine projects are not the only current Defence procurements in trouble. The Army’s LAND 400 Phase 2 project with Rheinmetall for new light armoured vehicles is also in a bit of strife – you guessed it, we decided to alter the vehicle design. The favoured replacement turret/gun combination is too heavy for the vehicle and renders the vehicle prone to turning over in uneven landscapes. Additionally, the vehicle has tyres which are manufactured in only one plant worldwide, and that plant is located in Germany. For its part, the F35 still has 835 issues of various levels of severity, seven of which remain “critical” and may not be addressed by Lockheed Martin for another 3 years or more.
There would appear to be an opening here for Australian Universities to offer project management courses with in-course internships on how not to do it in co-operation with Australian Government agencies.
We continue to punch above our weight, as our P.M. is fond of saying. No mention of striking below the belt however.
“Lightning”? Now that’s an ironic name given that it doesn’t perform well in electrical storms!
Perfidious Albion? SORRY, Perfidious Australie.