Before a lively crowd at Glover Cottages on 17 May, I engaged Dr Andrew Davies, Director of ASPI’s Defence and Strategy Program, in a discussion on submarines. Why do we need them, why French, and why twelve? He said submarines remained an essential war-fighting asset. They tied up disproportionate naval assets of potential enemies, and made surface vessels vulnerable. If we delay their acquisition, we lose critical experience and crew numbers during what should be a transition time between the Collins boats and new ones. But, he added, what has just happened is not a tender process, but a ‘beauty contest’ for the best design. Theoretically the Australian government could walk away from the French and acquire other subs, but this would be expensive. What happens next will be about a million man hours of design work, the cutting of steel in about 2022/28, first delivery in 2027/8 for sea trials and first boat commissioned in 2030, by which time the last Collins class submarine will be gone. Why French? Because they are bigger, faster and longer-range than the Japanese and German competitors, and more silent because they are driven by pump-jets rather than propellers. Given competition from Korean, Japanese and Russian boats, I asked, not to say the nascent submarine fleets of our ASEAN neighbours, especially the Vietnamese who have ordered six Russian kilo-class subs, won’t our boats face stiff competition in the increasingly crowded South China Sea? Yes, Andrew replied, but ours will be as good as the best. And the eye-watering cost of $50 billion has to be seen through annual instalments. In 2040/50 monetary terms, it will be about $30 billion. But  since Direction des Construction Navales Services (DCNS) specialises in nuclear subs, I persisted, isn’t this a sneaky way of acquiring nuclear-propelled boats without stirring the Australian public too much? Not according to Andrew. Our boats will be shorter than their big French nuclear sisters , and not adaptable to nuclear power plants without enormous additional cost. But they will be big enough to be mother ships to smaller underwater mobile units, including drones.

Andrew agreed that the Japanese had been badly treated in the selection process. The front page of the Sydney Morning Herald the day the French Barracuda was announced coincided with the visiting Japanese boat Hakuryu sailing out through the heads after successful joint exercises with the RAN – a poignant sight. We agreed that the pain from Japan’s loss of face will not soon diminish. Our diplomats in Tokyo have a job in front of them.

Report written by Richard Broinowski