Down Under On Nuclear Power - AUKUS and its impact on the Royal Navy
The Royal Australian Navy will operate nuclear submarines provided initially by the United States and then in a joint design with the Royal Navy. This extremely positive and very exciting news was the upshot of the meeting between leaders from all three nations in San Diego this week, confirming that the AUKUS security arrangement is one of the most forward leaning and exciting developments of recent years. Much will be written on this topic for many years to come, but the overall plan seems to boil down into three core phases. Joint presence and operations in Australia by US and British SSN’s from the mid 2020s, followed by Australia taking nuclear submarines to sea for the first time in the early 2030s, using US VIRGINIA class hulls. At some point in the late 2030s to early 2040s the RAN will roll out their own indigenous SSN capability jointly designed with the UK. The aspiration on display here is, frankly, stunning. In a relatively short timescale the RAN will go from bein...