If people have doubts about the whole $368 billion AUKUS shebang, then its proponents — chiefly the defence department and the intelligence community — only have themselves to blame.
There is a particular arrogance that pervades the defence-security complex, one that says defence never needs to be held to account no matter how much money it splurges on hardware.
The public is expected to accept intelligence assessments at face value, even though this is the same intelligence community that produced the dodgy assessment justifying the US-led invasion of Iraq, with the UK and Australia as partners.
The defence industry, including former politicians and defence officials, has been salivating at the prospect of unlimited money from government coffers.
This week that was out in the open. Kathy J Warden, head of global defence corporation Northrop Grumman, hailed the multibillion-dollar opportunities that AUKUS held for investment between the US defence industrial base and Australia, as Australia became a “core partner” in America’s “deterrence” strategy against China.
“We are a leader in strategic deterrence … so we will be involved in pillar one of AUKUS,” Warden told The Australian during a visit to Australia where she met Defence Minister Richard Marles and other Albanese government ministers.
The financial side of the AUKUS agreement has been hailed in the UK for other reasons.
“The AUKUS deal is unusual in being a British defence project with virtually no downside,” wrote Professor Michael Clarke, former director of the Royal United Services Institute, in a letter to London’s The Times.
“It sustains and develops Britain’s successful submarine industries, creates the potent sort of partnership that Brexit was meant to stimulate, and best of all Australia is paying for most of it.”
Also writing in The Times, retired rear admiral Philip Mathias, a former UK director of nuclear policy, doubted the UK had “the capacity or effective leadership” to provide “the huge level of support” Australia would need to build its own nuclear submarine fleet.
“The performance of the Submarine Delivery Agency has been abysmal. Astute-class submarines are being delivered late by BAE Systems,” he wrote.
Yet supporters of AUKUS insist “the naysayers” — as styled by Peter Jennings, the former head of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) — are either misinformed about submarines and/or are stuck in the past when it comes to the China threat.
Jennings has been an influential voice in the framing of the China defence debate for several years. In the pages of The Australian, he has set out how and why AUKUS opponents need to be countered. He has warned that Australia’s commitment to AUKUS risks being undermined by the likes of Paul Keating, Bob Carr and others within the ALP ranks.
Jennings has set out a 12-point plan, which includes reconfiguring politics.
“Parliament needs to change,” he writes. “A special House of Representatives and Senate joint AUKUS implementation committee should be created. A key task is to turn some MPs into defence specialists, working with their US and British counterparts. This committee should still grill defence and the proposed submarine construction entity in a tough way, but it needs to be better informed than current parliamentary committees and understand its purpose is to deliver the best subs, not just aim for ‘gotcha’ media moments from hearings.”
Jennings has been criticised for being alarmist on China, but he is right to single out the Defence Department as needing to change.
“Defence [needs] to rethink its own approach to public engagement,” he says. “The Australian Defence Force hides behind a positive but dated image, tied more closely to World War I than future conflict. Defence needs to redefine its modern image. To do that it has to explain its business to the Australian public, not hide behind ministers and stay tight-lipped in parliamentary hearings.”
So how to restore trust when it comes to defence and security issues?
Here is a four-point plan for what needs to happen:
1) Defence needs to understand that it is not immune from accountability. Media contacts for the Defence Department should answer genuine public interest media inquiries instead of hiding behind an email wall.
2) There should be a permanent ban on former defence ministers taking corporate positions in the defence industry.
3) There should be a public register of former defence officials who go on to work in the defence industry. The register should spell out the conditions and the salary of their roles.
4) Defence media management needs to shift from giving drops to favoured journalists to engaging in frank public debate.
Please contact David Hardaker via his secure email dhardaker@protonmail.com if you wish to pass on information for Crikey’s AUKUS investigation.
The whole deal sucks, even the UK admits it; Australia is being used to prop up the US and UK defense industries at our expense
– they get money now, Australia has to wait up to 30 years to see anything for their money while being stood over by the US.
How is that any different to what they are accusing China of?
A Morrison’s secret deal, knowing he was on his way out, is the poisoned chalice it was meant to be. Albanese needs to grow a
spine and tell US we’re not as dumb as they think, or we shouldn’t be but it sure looks like we definitely are. Why are Ozzies
so enthralled by America, a country that is in it’s downward spiral because it has listened to its own big-noting. There are other
subs that we could have sooner and for less and, that run quieter than nuclear powered subs can.
Well, it’s not the first time Australia has lied to the international community. We really are as dumb as the rest of the world thinks we are. Dumb enough to ignore the beggars and homeless in our own country, while enriching the war industries of the UK and USA.
Scotty’s main motive was to wedge Labor. Like Howard and Abbott he has a “Western civilisation” imperial mindset. This should have give Labor food for thought and dropping it quickly.
I’d agree, LNP etc. left a ‘wedge’ for Labour (Biden & Sunak also inherited from previous regimes), but if neither public support nor any grounded long term defence strategy, behind AUKUS and purchases, then future wriggle room to change strategy?
The continuous blowouts in Defence spending under the (thankfully) departed government were awe-inspiring, in that they were not only of monstrous proportions, but also almost immediate……………
……………sign a contract one month, issue an amendment (if doubling the cost can truly be called an “amendment”) the next.
It seems that the core capability of the Defence Department is ineptitude (discounting for the moment the aroma of corruption).
Fortunately, their incompetence has not gone unobserved……
https://michaelwest.com.au/defence-spending-coronavirus/
Typical! The tax payer again foots the bill for something that will never be seen in my lifetime.
A exorbitant bill that will blow out over time and we will be used to pay salaries for overseas workers initially ( where are the U.S subs being built) the U.K is being lambasted even in the U.K .
It is sad that we are going diwn this path and excess wastage alobg with taxpayers money is beibg thrown at something that will tske years to complete ( at) greater costs along with us also losing more of Australia to the U.S once they build the base fir nuclear submsrines in W.A.
To me it is at to greater cost on all counts!
I don’t mind paying taxes for stuff I won’t see in my lifetime … like say if it were a green and prosperous nation where poverty is abolished etc – I do mind paying for stuff like subs that, at best, will be useless when they’re eventually launched, while making our kids poorer and less safe
Yes Roberto as I said in an earlier comments section look after pensioners and retiree’s the aged and infirm. Build more hospitals and find more nurses/ doctors, look after this country and stop kowtowering ( forelock tugging) to yanks and poms.
This country is going backwards at a great rate of knots when the main focus is on the voice, when trying to justify the purchase of subs .
In the meantime inflation skyrockets, ppl are living in cars, pensioners are finding it hard to survive, hospitals are over run.
Surprising we make an alliance with far away Anglocentric states who are mainly interested in their global hegemony when it would be more appropriate to have an alliance with our close neighbours like Indonesia, Malaysia and maybe Philippines instead. Or could they be considered as future potential enemies because they are Muslims and Asians?
How many US service personnel are currently embedded in Defence in Australia, including in its policy development and strategic thinking areas? How many in its procurement section? How many elsewhere? I’d like to see a list of which US personnel are working where, and for how long they have been, and will be, there.
The question of how many US military are in this country is easily answered – just ask DIMIA.
They don’t require visas as there is a special arrangement called Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) – the annual total could be ascertained with two keystrokes… if there is anyone with the gumption in the media to ask.