How many retired US Navy officials does it take to advise Australia on its failed and expensive submarine building program — the one that is still a work in progress?
The number is 12, hired in consulting deals worth about US$10 million combined, according to The Washington Post.
The Post late last week published an investigation into the Australian government’s use of United States consultants in guiding the nation’s failed Attack Class submarine project which was cancelled last year by then-prime minister Scott Morrison as he announced a new alignment with the USA and the UK which hinged on nuclear-powered submarines.
It found that “to an extraordinary degree in recent years” Australia had relied on “high-priced American consultants” to decide which ships and submarines to buy and how to manage strategic acquisition projects.
“In addition to six retired US admirals, the government of Australia has hired three former civilian US Navy leaders and three US shipbuilding executives,” the Post reported.
It also reported that the Americans’ recommendations had influenced “a series of ill-fated decisions by Australian officials that could delay the arrival of any new submarines until 2040, almost a decade later than planned”.
The investigation painted a picture of ever-expanding American influence — and an absence of European influence — from 2014.
“The Australian government created additional naval advisory committees — and stocked them with Americans,” it reported.
When Australia announced its ill-fated contract with the French Naval Group in 2016, then-prime minister Malcolm Turnbull named a number of retired US Navy officials for their role in overseeing the “rigorous and independent” selection process: Rear Admiral Stephen Johnson, Vice Admiral Paul Sullivan, Rear Admiral Thomas Eccles and former US Navy secretary Professor Donald Winter.
The American influence reached its high water mark shortly after, in 2016, when the government announced a new Naval Shipbuilding Advisory Board. It coincided with Australia’s decision to unleash billions of dollars in funding for defence industries, a move sold as being “central to the government’s broader economic plan”.
The Naval Shipbuilding Advisory Board was chaired by Winter; its 10 members included Eccles and Sullivan as well as Vice Admiral William Hilarides (all retired). It included two others who had held senior roles with Huntington Ingalls, the company that builds nuclear powered submarines for the US Navy.
A little over two years later the government established the Naval Shipbuilding Institute, a joint venture between Huntington Ingalls Industries and US defence contractor Kellogg Brown & Root, headquartered at the Osborne Naval Shipyard in South Australia.
Winter remained a constant adviser in Australia’s moves to acquire a submarine fleet from 2015 onwards. When the Naval Shipbuilding Advisory Board was abolished in March 2021 he was appointed as a special adviser to Morrison.
Johnson was about to retire in 2015 when he was “targeted” by Australian recruiters.
“Even though Johnson was a foreign citizen, the Australian Defense Department offered him a senior government position as its general manager for submarines,” the Post reported. Johnson was later named Australia’s deputy secretary of defence, “a big promotion” and “an unusual job for a foreign citizen”.
American shipyards owned by Huntington Ingalls are now considered the leading contender to build Australia’s new fleet of nuclear-powered submarines. (Details are set to be released in March next year.)
The Post‘s investigation has gone into territory largely untouched by Australia’s political media. As such it shines a light on the tight network of defence relationships and revolving door appointments in which conflicts of interest are baked into the business model — all of it carried out in total secrecy.
It doesn’t seem to matter from which angle you approach our defence management, the impression is always the same: gormless, wasteful and wrong. To me, the over-arching problem here relates to the purpose of Australia’s submarines. Our government thinks it’s a good idea that they should lurk off China to bottle up their nuclear subs. The late Gary Johnston’s website presented convincing argument that the French subs were unsuitable for that, because they’d take so long to get there that their proportion of time on station would be small, and because being slow and having to regularly snort they’d be extremely vulnerable. But that purpose seems so far from being an appropriate way to look after Australan interests it borders on insanity, but it’s probably just a result of having been captured by great and powerful supposed friends. Rex Patrick has argued, I think, that our submarines should be capable of operating in the shallow waters to our immediate north, which the enormous nuclear boats are not. But that’s a lot of water for a small submarine fleet to traverse – you’d need to compare its effectiveness with the airborne alternatives, and we appear to be quite unable to address the strategic questions.
I’ve read the Auditor General’s report on our armoured personnel carrier acquisitions, also the story of Brendan Nelson’s role in the F18 purchase – and the ridiculous lead up to the French sub decision, with Abbott wanting Japanese etc. And now this awful story – magnificent work by WaPo – about the role of American consultants in the sub saga. Small wonder we can’t manage to shrug off the Monarchy – we have a serious identity problem.
Well described, truthful and more than a little worthy of our questioning a few key players. Mainland defense was always the logic for the diesel subs. Aggression towards China in a front-line false flag US fabricated war is madness. I always believed the thinking amiss with Defence in their believing the myth of Indonesian potential aggression towards us, in the days of Whitlam and Suharto. It seems, little has changed, with obedience to our US warmonger overlords unchanged.
Our previous government’s ability to hemorrhage money on pointless causes needs more than a tourniquet, it needs a complete brain replacement.
Depends where the tourniquet is tightened – around the necks of Defence Ministers & Mandarins would be favourite.
When one considers that Australia has been known as an “easy lay” in Washington for decades, why should anyone be surprised?
As well as a ‘cheap date‘ prior to that.
I wonder how much of our humungous defence budget is set aside for bribery. Seems to be a lot of it about.
Can’t we make them here out of recycled water bottles? Then they could just float around spying on everybody, and the enemy would think they’re just more plastic rubbish and ignore them. It’s a plan.