The Navy plans to conduct its first submarine maintenance work in Australia using a U.S. submarine tender next year, with dozens of Australian sailors aboard learning how to repair U.S. nuclear-powered submarines.
Under Secretary of the Navy Erik Raven recently said the trilateral AUKUS partners of Australia, U.K. and the U.S. have already moved significantly toward helping Australia prepare to field a future nuclear-powered attack submarine (SSN) force in a short amount of time.
In March, the three countries announced the optimal pathway to help Australia field SSNs. The plan starts by increasing deployments, basing a rotational force of U.S. and U.K. submarines in Australia, the U.S. selling three to five used and new Virginia-class submarines in the 2030s, then Australia building and fielding its own SSN-AUKUS boats starting in the early 2040s.
“Since the announcement of the optimal pathway in March, we’ve come a long way in a short time. Australian officers, sailors and government civilians are in our nuclear training pipeline. They are routinely observing and learning maintenance procedures in Pearl Harbor and in [Barrow-in-Furness]. Together, we’ve stood up program offices in all three countries, started upgrades at facilities at HMAS Sterling submarine base in Western Australia, and are planning for our first submarine maintenance period in Australia for next summer,” Raven said on Nov. 30 during a Congressional Shipbuilding Breakfast event.
Raven said the maintenance period will use the USS Emory S. Land and “will include 30 Australian exchange sailors that will deploy with the tender for qualifications to participate in the maintenance.”
He said in 2024 Australian sailors will be assigned to U.S. submarines and Australian maintenance workers will start training and performing maintenance at the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard.
The U.S. also plans to start buying long-lead elements of submarine training, hardware simulators and support systems in 2024 to “form the core of the Australian submarine training center for Southwest and the eventual sovereign Australian submarine fleet.”
Raven told the audience that included some lawmakers that in order to move forward on these and other AUKUS efforts, “we must have legislative relief,” along the lines of four legislative proposals DoD submitted this year to enable elements like Australia buying submarines and providing the U.S. with funds to bolster the submarine industrial base.
“Current law limits our ability to undertake the next steps of this program. Specifically, absent relief, we cannot receive the funds that Australia is committed to invest in the U.S. submarine industrial base, train Australian workers in connection in construction and maintenance for the nuclear submarine industry, sell a Virginia-class submarine to Australia or modernize our export control systems to execute this ambitious program. Advancing these four asks and legislative proposals submitted for the 2024 NDAA consideration would enable us to stay on track for this aggressive schedule set forth to achieve the optimal pathway to Australians acquisition Australia’s acquisition of the submarines and it demonstrates a whole of government commitment to our trilateral partners.”