AUKUS submarine deal exposed as monumental folly

Nautical metaphors are irresistible, I’m afraid, when talking about Australia’s seemingly endless submarine saga. But as investigative journalist Andrew Fowler makes clear in “Nuked: The Submarine Fiasco that Sank Australia’s Sovereignty“, his excellent and excoriating analysis of the genesis of the AUKUS pact, there isn’t much room for levity otherwise.

Anyone who doubts the accuracy of former Labor luminaries Paul Keating and Gareth Evans, who have argued that AUKUS is, as Keating put it, “the worst deal in all history,” really ought to read this book.

The plan for Australia to acquire eight nuclear-powered submarines, built locally in partnership with the United States and the United Kingdom, is projected to cost up to A$368 billion (US$249.4 billion). But it is not just the cost of the AUKUS project that is astounding.

While many people should hang their heads in shame, the principal architect of this monumental folly is Scott Morrison, whose reputation will be deservedly further diminished by the revelations contained in Fowler’s carefully researched volume.

One question the book does not address in detail is the abysmal quality of political leadership in this country – especially, though not exclusively, on the conservative side of politics.

Whatever the reasons for this, the end result was that

The shift in question was the decision to abandon an agreement to buy much cheaper, arguably far more suitable and deliverable submarines from France, with the aim of “welding Australia’s military to the United States.” In retrospect, it is hard to believe how badly the French were misled, or how shortsighted the rationale for the switch actually was.

In Fowler’s view, buying the French submarines would have been a