Australia will buy up to 5 nuclear-powered submarines from the US

Washington:

Australia will buy at least five US nuclear-powered submarines and later a new model with US and British technology as part of an ambitious plan to bolster Western power in the Asia-Pacific region in the face of a rising China, a US official said on Monday. Will prepare ,

President Joe Biden was hosting his Australian and British counterparts, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, at the US naval base in San Diego, California, to announce the plan.

Australia, which joined the newly formed AUKUS grouping along with Washington and London 18 months ago, will not get nuclear weapons. However, with nuclear propulsion, the new submarine fleet would give a substantial new force to the Western coalition trying to push back against China’s own military expansion.

Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, told reporters flying to California on Air Force One that the submarine plan illustrated Washington’s long-term commitment to protecting “peace and stability” in the Asia-Pacific region.

The partnership with Australia, which includes sharing secret nuclear technology previously given only to Britain, is “a decades-long, maybe a century-long commitment,” Sullivan said.

Three conventionally armed, nuclear-powered Virginia-class ships will be sold “during the 2030s,” Sullivan said, “with the possibility of going up to five if necessary.”

He said the new model, nuclear powered and carrying conventional warheads, is a long-term project and will be dubbed SSN-AUKUS. It would be built on the basis of a British design, with American technology, and “significant investment in all three industrial bases,” Sullivan said.

– Increase in defense spending –

While Australia has ruled out deploying nuclear weapons, its submarine plans represent a significant new phase in a US-led effort to counter growing Chinese military power, including by Beijing building a sophisticated naval fleet and turning artificial islands into offshore bases. marks the

Sunak’s office said on Monday that Britain is also moving to increase its military capabilities in the face of China’s challenge and pro-Russian invasion of western Ukraine.

Downing Street said “more than $6 billion of additional funding over the next two years” will replenish vital ammunition stockpiles and modernize Britain’s nuclear enterprise and fund the next phase of the AUKUS submarine programme.

Australia was previously on track to replace its aging fleet of diesel-powered submarines with a $66 billion package of French ships, also conventionally powered.

The sudden announcement by Canberra that it was withdrawing from that deal and entering the AUKUS project sparked a brief but unusually fierce dispute between the three countries and their close ally France.

Compared to the Collins-class submarines due to be retired by Australia, the Virginia-class are nearly twice as long and carry a crew of 132, not 48.

China warned that AUKUS risked starting an arms race and accused the three countries of setting back non-proliferation efforts.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning told reporters, “We call on the US, Britain and Australia to abandon the Cold War mentality and zero-sum game, honor international obligations in good faith, and do things conducive to regional peace and stability.” urges to do.” in Beijing.

Xi Jinping, the communist country’s leader, made a fiery statement last week accusing the United States of leading the Western effort to “all-out control, encircle and suppress China”.

But Washington says Beijing is alerting countries in the Asia-Pacific to highlight its threats to invade Taiwan’s self-governing democracy, as well as the threat from nuclear-armed North Korea.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)