Australia’s AUKUS Tributes

At this time of rising living costs, economic uncertainty, and impending climate disaster, subsidising the US and UK submarine construction industrial bases is the obvious priority for the Australian government. With massive taxpayer funds flowing through the government’s hands on the basis of media releases, are there yet to be revealed details that will explain to the taxpayer how these contributions aren’t just tributes?

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The new Pericles: Marles, master of the Seas

Australia’s future maritime warfare capability is now to include the ‘Enhanced Lethality Surface Combatant Fleet’. Requiring, like the AUKUS submarines, ambitious naval acquisition and construction programs with long lead-times before delivery, serious questions are raised about how the ELSCF responds to assessments of Australia’s strategic circumstances – and of the extent to which it would be just another contribution by Australian taxpayers to US military forces.

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Mr Marles tugs the forelock in Washington

Submission to US strategic objectives is often on display as new Australian Defence Ministers ritually wend their way to Washington to offer up jaded homilies, full of hagiographic accounts of ANZUS and strained assertions of shared values. The new Minister’s recent visit, however, foreshadows a more dangerous abandonment of fundamental elements of national sovereignty.

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