AUKUS News, Views, Analysis.

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
Australia aiming for regional superiority, American deployment of ships and aircraft, logistical and sustainment support for the USN and potentially even hosting intermediate range missiles:

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It simply won't be possible for Australia to have regional supremacy.

Indonesia is going to be far larger in 10 year's time and spending far more on the military than Australia.

Remember it is Australia which is chopping off parts of Indonesian territory as we see in Timor and Papua.
 

Overbom

Brigadier
Registered Member
So far, we've seen

1. Iran admitted as a full member of the SCO security organisation
2. China applying to join the CPTPP

Let's see if anything else happens.

AUKUS doesn't actually change the situation much.
SCO was already in the cards before this new "alliance". I see that as a win for China in Eurasia.

CPTPP is a reaction to AUKUS. I am still a but confused though what is China's true objective with that one though. Is it joining or is it getting denied and then being able to criticize Aus + Japan for prioritizing conflict?

I think that China is happy with both outcomes. A cant-lose move
 

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
SCO was already in the cards before this new "alliance". I see that as a win for China in Eurasia.

CPTPP is a reaction to AUKUS. I am still a but confused though what is China's true objective with that one though. Is it joining or is it getting denied and then being able to criticize Aus + Japan for prioritizing conflict?

I think that China is happy with both outcomes. A cant-lose move

Yes.

If China joins CPTPP, then it will be on terms acceptable to China. China is so much bigger than the CPTPP countries.
If China doesn't join CPTPP, it's their loss from an economic perspective.

Around 2030, I reckon the Chinese economy will be around $50 Trillion in PPP terms.
And the actual exchange rate should converge to the PPP rate.
 

Bellum_Romanum

Brigadier
Registered Member
I'm not saying they're going to get it. I only put the vision from Europe of what NATO did in the 90s.

Read, learn and don't make past mistakes.

Chechnya, Kosovo, solidarity union in Poland, fall of Ceaușescu, Perestroika ... Check out the story of how NATO defeated the Warsaw Pact.

I finish with this that is not the topic
Lol that's all am going to say man. Good luck.
 

FireyCross

New Member
Registered Member
As a Brit with an Aussie partner, I find this whole sordid affair pretty depressing. I think it's a poor decision on the part of Australia and is against her best interests and ignores her fairly important and critical security needs.

Here's my 2c worth...

I suspect that the RAN isn't thrilled with this, as it compromises their autonomy to conduct operations, and even ensure availability of their own vessels. It also fails to address fairly obvious security priorities (see below). I suspect they'll be some very angry words in private between politicians and navy personnel who feel they've been compromised by politicians who either desperately want to grandstand, or caved into US pressure, or - more likely - a combination of both. Scomo has consistently shown his vulnerability to ego massaging and flattery.

The main problem is that American (in particular) and UK (to a lesser degree) SSNs are designed for use out in the big blue, with lots of depth and nothing in the way. Australia's main maritime security headaches are almost all along her northern coast, which couldn't be less suited to SSNs. Scomo probably ins't terribly familiar with anything outside the eastern suburbs and northern beaches of Sydney, but if he ever cares to take note, he might notice that pretty much the entirety of the northern coast is extremely shallow, very VERY tidal, and littered with estuaries, islands, reefs, shoals and shifting mud and sand banks. It's *much* better suited to a small, agile diesel-electric sub. The German/Italian Type 212 can operate in 17m of water and would be infinitely more appropriate to Australian needs, which really boil down to stopping a potential landing or blockading force.

The other thing is that for all Scomo wants to be America's jack russell, he's more like the cop at China's shopping mall. Australia is the biggest buyer *by far* of Australian exports.... Iron ore is Australia's #1 export, and 70% of it goes to China. In pretty much every major commodity Australia sells, China is invariably the #1 buyer, and in several major sectors is the overall majority buyer, with the rest of the planet making up the remainder. Many sectors like agricultural development and real-estate also rely heavily on Chinese investment. Gambling the entire economy on how amicable towards China some random American foreign policy hawks are going to be doesn't seem like a genius move.

Finally, the existing Collins submarines, though not the world's best, are the only submarine solution Australia currently has, and given this AUKUS thing doesn't actually provide submarines, just some vague commitments to share certain tech, Australia seems incredibly unlikely to be able to get a replacement in the water in time. To be blunt, the chances of Australia being able to domestically produce an SSN is low to none. There will be a decade of mill of umm-ign and ahhh-ing, harrumphing and finally some bodged last minute deal to either go back to diesel-electric, or, worse buy some used or poorly adapted off the peg SSNs that massively compromise Australia's legitimate maritime interests while pissing off France (as in New Caledonia) and New Zealand - Australia's closest allies in the region.
 

davidau

Senior Member
Registered Member
If there is a true NATO-like alliance to China's borders, China will go to war to break that alliance.

We've seen that happen with Vietnam and Korea previously.
China should issue a stern warning to the n-triad. They have the cunning, warmongering mentality of a salami slicing machine!
 

solarz

Brigadier
As a Brit with an Aussie partner, I find this whole sordid affair pretty depressing. I think it's a poor decision on the part of Australia and is against her best interests and ignores her fairly important and critical security needs.

Here's my 2c worth...

I suspect that the RAN isn't thrilled with this, as it compromises their autonomy to conduct operations, and even ensure availability of their own vessels. It also fails to address fairly obvious security priorities (see below). I suspect they'll be some very angry words in private between politicians and navy personnel who feel they've been compromised by politicians who either desperately want to grandstand, or caved into US pressure, or - more likely - a combination of both. Scomo has consistently shown his vulnerability to ego massaging and flattery.

The main problem is that American (in particular) and UK (to a lesser degree) SSNs are designed for use out in the big blue, with lots of depth and nothing in the way. Australia's main maritime security headaches are almost all along her northern coast, which couldn't be less suited to SSNs. Scomo probably ins't terribly familiar with anything outside the eastern suburbs and northern beaches of Sydney, but if he ever cares to take note, he might notice that pretty much the entirety of the northern coast is extremely shallow, very VERY tidal, and littered with estuaries, islands, reefs, shoals and shifting mud and sand banks. It's *much* better suited to a small, agile diesel-electric sub. The German/Italian Type 212 can operate in 17m of water and would be infinitely more appropriate to Australian needs, which really boil down to stopping a potential landing or blockading force.

The other thing is that for all Scomo wants to be America's jack russell, he's more like the cop at China's shopping mall. Australia is the biggest buyer *by far* of Australian exports.... Iron ore is Australia's #1 export, and 70% of it goes to China. In pretty much every major commodity Australia sells, China is invariably the #1 buyer, and in several major sectors is the overall majority buyer, with the rest of the planet making up the remainder. Many sectors like agricultural development and real-estate also rely heavily on Chinese investment. Gambling the entire economy on how amicable towards China some random American foreign policy hawks are going to be doesn't seem like a genius move.

Finally, the existing Collins submarines, though not the world's best, are the only submarine solution Australia currently has, and given this AUKUS thing doesn't actually provide submarines, just some vague commitments to share certain tech, Australia seems incredibly unlikely to be able to get a replacement in the water in time. To be blunt, the chances of Australia being able to domestically produce an SSN is low to none. There will be a decade of mill of umm-ign and ahhh-ing, harrumphing and finally some bodged last minute deal to either go back to diesel-electric, or, worse buy some used or poorly adapted off the peg SSNs that massively compromise Australia's legitimate maritime interests while pissing off France (as in New Caledonia) and New Zealand - Australia's closest allies in the region.

Despite their rhetoric, is obvious that Australia isn't getting those nuclear subs with their northern coast in mind.

On the economic front, I think it's pretty clear that ScoMo is trying decouple Australian economy from China.
 

Blitzo

Lieutenant General
Staff member
Super Moderator
Registered Member
In fact, I would go several steps further to suggest that China and Russia should probably strike a deal for China to purchase a dozen of Russia SSN Yassen-M to counter the AUKUS submarine deals. This will NOT involve technology transfer and it is large enough to incentivize Russia. This would send a strong signal of China-Russia de-facto alliance and deter the adversarial block. I'll probably post my thoughts to the AUKUS thread as it is off-topic here.

Oh, I'm sure China would be interested in some of them to bolster their own SSN fleet (that is likely to expand significantly in the next decade and a half given what we see at Bohai).... but I would be very surprised if Russia was willing to sell Yasen-Ms, and the amount of infrastructure needed to support even a small fleet of those would be significant.

If this Ka-52 deal is true, one reason I think China would be willing to go with it is because the negotiations prior to the deal would have been fairly simple and quick to do, and the delivery of the aircraft themselves would be relatively fast as well.
SSNs are a whole, whole different ball game both in terms of time from negotiations to delivery, but also in terms of sophistication and complexity... relative to some attack helicopters.
 
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