Praise for Donald Trump’s review of AUKUS
Australia has been given a copy of the Trump administration’s AUKUS review, with Defence Minister Richard Marles declaring the US is ‘100 per cent supportive’ of the submarine program.
Australia has been given a copy of the Trump administration’s “America First” AUKUS review, with Defence Minister Richard Marles declaring the US is “100 per cent supportive” of the nuclear submarine program.
Mr Marles revealed the government was examining the review ahead of high-level bilateral talks in Washington next week.
He did not elaborate on its findings but quoted Donald Trump’s declaration in October that the $368bn program was “full steam ahead”.
“We are in receipt of the AUKUS review now. We are working through the AUKUS review, and we very much thank the United States for providing it to us,” Mr Marles said on Thursday.
“What’s really important here is the United States is completely supportive of AUKUS, as the President of the United States made clear.”
He said Australia was meeting all of its milestones on the “fundamentally important” deal to buy at least three Virginia-class submarines from the US and build a fleet of new AUKUS-class boats with the United Kingdom.
The AUKUS review was led by the Pentagon’s defence policy chief Elbridge Colby – a noted AUKUS sceptic who had warned the deal could leave the US short of submarines in the event of a war with China over Taiwan.
Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said that “the Department of War has concluded its review of AUKUS” and provided an assurance that it was aligned with Mr Trump’s commitment that Washington was “full steam ahead” with the program.
Mr Parnell said that the review had identified ways to put the security partnership on a stronger footing but he did not spell out what the recommended changes were.
“The purpose of the review was to identify opportunities to strengthen AUKUS and ensure its long-term success, in alignment with President Trump’s America First agenda,” he said. “During the review, the Department consulted extensively with the US interagency as well as Australia and the United Kingdom.” Mr Parnell said that, “consistent with President Trump’s guidance that AUKUS should move “full steam ahead,” the review identified opportunities to put AUKUS on the strongest possible footing.”
“The Department will work in close consultation with its partners to develop options for implementing the review’s recommendations.”
The Pentagon has not said yet whether the review or parts of it will be made public.
Mr Marles and Foreign Minister Penny Wong will meet with their US counterparts Pete Hegseth and Marco Rubio in Washington next week for the nations’ annual AUSMIN talks, with the AUKUS pact expected to take centre stage.
A statement on the outcome of the AUKUS review is likely to be issued during their visit.
Australia is also due to pay the second of three $US1bn instalments to the US at the end of the year to help bolster the country’s submarine production, but it is unclear whether the payment will be made during the coming AUSMIN talks.
Co-chair of the Friends of Australia Caucus and ranking member of the House Seapower Subcommittee, Joe Courtney, said that the Pentagon’s five month review had “endorsed the AUKUS agreement and correctly determined that its framework is aligned with our country’s national security interest.”
“With its completion, it is important to note that the 2021 AUKUS agreement has now survived three changes of government in all three nations and still stands strong,” he said.
Providing more details on the review, Mr Courtney said that the statutory authority enacted by Congress in 2023 would “remain intact, including the sale of three Virginia-class submarines starting in 2032.”
“The report correctly determined that there are critical deadlines that all three countries have to meet. Therefore, maintaining disciplined adherence to schedule is paramount,” Mr Courtney said. “To that point, Congress is poised in the next two weeks to deliver another major boost to the US submarine industrial base, which is in included in the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, which will build on the over $10bn investment from Congress since 2018 and Australia’s $3bn committed investment under AUKUS.”
Mr Courtney said that the investment meant that US submarine shipyards were now “delivering tonnage output near all-time highs.”
“The AUKUS report reaffirms that Congress and our Australian allies must continue that effort to achieve the goals of AUKUS. Expanding the submarine workforce, supply chain, and facilities to even greater capacity is the clear pathway to meet the demands of US submarine fleet requirements and those of our ally Australia.”
Australian officials breathed a sigh of relief in October when the US President personally endorsed the submarine deal during his long-awaited sit-down meeting with Anthony Albanese.
Mr Trump welcomed Australia’s “big orders” of military equipment and pushed back on suggestions the US had insufficient Virginia-class boats to sell to Australia.
“We do actually have a lot of submarines. We have the best submarines in the world, anywhere in the world, and we’re building a few more, currently under construction,” he said.
But US Secretary of the Navy John Phelan, who sat in on the leaders’ meeting, sounded a note of caution, saying Washington wanted to “improve” the submarine agreement and “clarify some of the ambiguity”.
“We’re looking at the AUKUS relationship and making it better for all three,” he said, in an apparent reference to the review.
Mr Trump said these were “just minor details”, and asked Secretary Phelan: “You’re going to get that taken care of, right?”
The President also gave Mr Albanese a pass on defence funding, which sits at about 2 per cent of GDP, despite his own longstanding push for US allies to get their military budgets to 3.5 per cent of national output.
“I’d always like more, but they have to do what they have to do. You can only do so much,” he said.
His enthusiasm for the program came despite Virginia-class submarine production running at just 1.2 boats a year compared to the 2.33 the US needs to produce to provide Australia’s subs without undermining its own force.
Mr Marles has long insisted AUKUS “is happening”, but the US review cast a shroud of uncertainty over the agreement.
Mr Colby warned in 2024 against providing Virginia-class boats to Australia, saying the US could not delude itself over its submarine shortage.
Meanwhile, Australia’s Defence Department conceded this week that US Virginia-class submarines operating from Western Australia may be armed in the future with nuclear weapons.
The admission came after Greens senator David Shoebridge quizzed the department in a Senate committee hearing over the US’s development of a sea-launched nuclear cruise missile for the Virginia boats, up to four of which will operate from HMAS Stirling near Perth from 2027.
Defence officials said the US understood Australia’s position that stationing such weapons in Australia was prohibited under the Treaty of Rarotonga, but the Australian government did not press the US on whether its vessels and aircraft carried such weapons.
“We respect the United States position of neither confirming nor denying,” Defence Secretary Greg Moriarty told Senate estimates.
The Australian government maintains a similar policy in relation to nuclear-capable US bombers that operate from the Northern Territory.
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