One of US president Donald Trump’s top picks for the Pentagon says selling submarines to Australia under the Aukus agreement poses a “very difficult problem” for the US and could endanger its own sailors.
Elbridge Colby, Trump’s nominee for under secretary of defense for policy – the number three post at the US Department of Defense – has previously admitted he is “skeptical” about Aukus and said this week he is worried selling submarines to Australian could leave US sailors “vulnerable” because the vessels won’t be “in the right place in the right time”.
In written and verbal testimony to the Senate armed service committee nomination hearings, Colby affirmed Australia was a “core ally” of the US – “with us even in our less-advisable wars” – and that he supported “the idea of empowering our Australian allies”.
“It is a great idea for them to have attack submarines.”
But, Colby argued, there remained “a very real threat of a conflict in the coming years”, particularly along the so-called first island chain – the first arc of islands out from the east Asian continental mainland coast – including Taiwan, Japan, the Philippines and Borneo.
“And our attack submarines … are absolutely essential for making the defence of Taiwan or otherwise a viable and practical option,” Colby told the committee.
“So if we can produce the attack submarines in sufficient number and sufficient speed, then great. But if we can’t, [supplying Australia] becomes a very difficult problem because we don’t want our servicemen and women to be in a weaker position and more vulnerable and, God forbid, worse because they are not in the right place in the right time.”
In August he tweeted: “Aukus, in principle, it is a great idea, but I have been very skeptical in practice. I remain skeptical, agnostic, as I put it, but more inclined based on new information I have gleaned. It would be crazy to have fewer SSNs Virginia-class [attack submarines] in the right place and time.”
According to the Aukus agreement, signed in 2021 by the then Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, the US will sell Australia between three and five Virginia-class conventionally armed nuclear-powered attack submarines (known as SSNs), with the first to be delivered in 2032. These will replace Australia’s ageing Collins class diesel-electric submarines before Australia’s own Aukus submarines can be built.
However, the agreement also mandates that before any boat can be sold to Australia, the US commander-in-chief – the president of the day – must certify that America relinquishing a submarine will not diminish the US navy’s undersea capability.
The US’s submarine fleet numbers are currently a quarter below their target and the country is producing boats at half the rate it needs to service its own needs, US figures show. Experts have argued the chance of that condition being met is “vanishingly small”.
On 8 February, Australia paid $US500m ($AUD790m) to the US, the first instalment in a total of $US3bn pledged in order to support America’s shipbuilding industry as part of the Aukus agreement.
But on 11 February, the Congressional Research Service issued a paper highlighting the stubbornly sclerotic pace of submarine-building in the US. The US navy has a “force-level goal” of 66 attack submarines; it currently has 49.
The report says the US needs to build new submarines at a rate of 2.3 each year to meet its own needs, as well as provide submarines to Australia. Since 2022, it has built boats at about half that rate: 1.2 boats a year.
Under an alternative proposed in the paper, the US would not sell any submarines to Australia; instead, it would sail its own submarines, under US command, out of Australian bases.
“Up to eight additional Virginia-class SSNs would be built and, instead of three to five of them being sold to Australia, these additional boats would instead be retained in US navy service and operated out of Australia along with the five US and UK submarines that are already planned to be operated out of Australia.”
The paper argued that Australia, rather than spending money to buy, build and sail its own nuclear-powered submarines, would instead invest that money in other military capabilities – long-range missiles, drones, or bombers – “so as to create an Australian capacity for performing non-SSN military missions for both Australia and the United States”.
Colby is the author of The Strategy of Denial: American Defense in an Age of Great Power Conflict, and has pushed the US to prioritise the Indo-Pacific over other parts of the world. He has been strongly supported by key members of Trump’s inner circle, including the vice-president, JD Vance.
In written comments to the Senate committee, Colby urged Australia to lift its defence spending to 3% of GDP.
“The main concern the United States should press with Australia, consistent with the president’s approach, is higher defence spending,” Colby said.
“Australia is currently well below the 3% level advocated for Nato by Nato secretary general [Mark] Rutte, and Canberra faces a far more powerful challenge in China.”
Australia is not a member of Nato. Australia’s defence minister, Richard Marles, responded: “The budget papers show the Albanese government is increasing defence spending to record levels.”
Australian defence spending is budgeted to reach $56bn this year, equivalent to 2.02% of GDP. The Albanese government has committed to exceeding $100bn by the 2033-34 financial year, representing 2.4% of GDP.
In written comments to the Senate committee, Colby said he “had expressed concerns” regarding the US attack submarine fleet and the production rates of new boats.
“I believe we must increase US attack submarine production to meet US military requirements in the Indo-Pacific region – to ensure our servicemen and women are as well-armed as possible in the event of war – as well as to meet our obligations under Aukus Pillar One.”
Trump told Congress in an address this week he would “resurrect the American shipbuilding industry” by establishing a new “office of shipbuilding” inside the White House.
“We’re going to make them very fast, very soon.”
