Trump’s amnesia might have briefly caused hearts to skip in Canberra, but it also won’t matter because in the end Trump is still likely to strongly support the nuclear submarine deal.
Why? Because AUKUS is a very Trumpian deal. Australia pumps an astonishing $US3bn into US submarine production with an expectation – which Trump will never have to honour because it will be beyond his term – that the US eventually sells us three Virginia-class submarines.
Why wouldn’t a transactionally minded American president like that sort of lopsided deal? Yet Trump’s inability to recognise the acronym AUKUS when asked about it in the Oval Office does tell us something about the different weight given to the importance of AUKUS in the US compared to Australia.
Yes, as Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton said, it is easy to trip over acronyms, and yes we shouldn’t read too much into it. But let’s be frank, any previous president would have done the basic preparation to understand the term AUKUS prior to meeting with British leader and AUKUS partner Keir Starmer. The fact that Trump didn’t even know the term suggests he has barely spent any time thinking about it or talking about it with his advisers.
That’s not great news for Australia. Yet that also will make no difference to whether or not Trump ultimately supports the deal. US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth says that Trump is fully aware of AUKUS and fully supportive of it, while Secretary of State and China hawk Marco Rubio has said AUKUS is “almost a blueprint’’ for how allied nations can work together to confront security challenges.
The Americans will almost certainly love AUKUS during Trump’s four-year term because they don’t need to make any hard decisions in relation to it. Until the end of this decade they just have to accept pots of money from Australia, which last month handed over a cheque for $800m as the first instalment of the eventual $US3bn to speed up the production of the Virginia-class submarines.
It is the president who succeeds Trump who will have to make the hard decisions on AUKUS and this is where the issue becomes murky for Australia. At that point the then-US president will have the power to halt the planned sale of Virginia-class submarines to Australia from 2032 if it is judged that the loss of those submarines from the US fleet will undermine the fighting capabilities of the US military.
Given that the production of Virginia-class submarines is currently way behind schedule and unlikely to catch up by the 2030s when the sale to Australia is supposed to take place, it would be an easy argument for a president – backed by a hawkish congress – to make. That is when the going gets tough for AUKUS and for Australia. But not for Trump, who just has to kick back in the Oval Office and watch Australian taxpayers pour a small fortune into the US shipbuilding industry. Given that, why wouldn’t he support AUKUS, or whatever it’s called?
Dutton is no ‘Bulldog’ on Port of Darwin call
So far, the opposition has been entirely reactive in this campaign. At the last election, they left their one good policy until the last minute, making it entirely ineffective politically. Will they this time do the same on defence?
Marles coy on taking over Wong’s portfolio
Richard Marles has refused to commit to serving a full term as Defence Minister if Labor wins the election amid speculation Penny Wong is planning to retire.
Donald Trump’s failure to recognise the term “AUKUS” was an embarrassment which tells us a few home truths about where this deal - which is central to Australia’s defence planning - ranks in the president’s head.