AUKUS trilateral security partnership is now a thing
Australia, United Kingdom and the United States announces on 15 September 2021 at the White House, that the 3 countries will now form a new trilateral security partnership called AUKUS.
The partnership will allow scientists, industries and defense forces from the 3 countries to work together. The cooperation will include cyber technologies, artificial intelligence, quantum technologies and undersea domains related technologies. Although the extent of this information / technological sharing is uncertain, given United States tends to be keep a lot to themselves, while Australia may not be the most “secured” country given how badly it was infiltrated by Chinese espionage.
DPA reckons that most of the key technologies and researches will not be provided to Australia by UK or the USA, making this alliance simply a good excuse to sell expensive submarines to Australia and reassuring Australia that UK and USA had their back, while Australia stands at the frontlines facing off China as one of the first line of defense.
In Australia’s perspective, AUKUS will be complimenting the various partnership arrangements Australia has already had, including ANZUS, the Quad, Five Eyes and their various other partnership with ASEAN countries and the Pacific.
The first “move” AUKUS will be delivering, will be a nuclear powered submarine fleet for Australia. It will be decided over 18 months on how this will be achieved. The end result would be submarines built in Adelaide, Australia, with the support and assistance of United Kingdom and United States. However Australia will not be acquiring nuclear weapons despite this next step into the nuclear armament.
According the statement by UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, parts of the submarines is likely to be built in the United Kingdom before shipping over to Australia. Which means, the technological transfer may not be “complete”.
This is shown from Boris Johnson’s exclamation that opportunities from AUKUS will be creating highly skilled jobs across the United Kingdom (including Scotland, northern England and the Midlands). The claim that this is an opportunity for Britain to reinforce it’s place at the leading edge of science and technology, is another sign that, most of the cutting edge technology in the subs is likely to be retained in the United Kingdom, and not be given away to Australia.
This would probably still suits the geopolitical needs for Australia to put to sea, a powerful fleet of submarines that can keep China at bay, while satisfy the political needs to show the Australian public that the government is able to create jobs within Australia with this partnership and priding themselves that the sub is locally made (or rather, more accurately, assembled).
US President Joe Biden didnt add further substance in his speech from what is already mentioned by the other two leaders, dwelling mainly on how the deal will not mean a proliferation of nuclear weapons as well as trying to placate France, which USA had basically scuttered Australian submarine deal from, by name dropping them and assuring France is definitely still a friend and partner of the United States.
Biden also reinforce that the AUKUS will not eclipse other United States commitments, like with ASEAN, the Quad, and other alliances.
In DPA’s opinion, the main gist of AUKUS is to tell China and the world that, UK and US will be backing Australia as the main force to counter the growing aggression of China that is unsetting the balance of power in the Asia Pacific. And that the USA and UK will be willing to sell and provide Australia with cutting edge technologies and weapons to make sure that Australia will be sufficiently armed and prepared against the increasingly technologically advanced Chinese military.