SYDNEY: Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he was confident a deal for the US to sell nuclear powered submarines to Australia was on track, ahead of talks between defense and foreign ministers of the two countries on Friday.
Twenty-five US Republican lawmakers told President Joe Biden on Thursday the plan to sell three attack submarines to Australia under the so-called AUKUS partnership would “unacceptably weaken” the US fleet without a clear plan to replace them.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin are in Queensland state for the annual AUSMIN dialogue, where progress on the nuclear-powered submarine deal, regional security and clean energy will be the focus.
“I am very confident,” Albanese told reporters on Friday, when asked about the Republican letter, which noted the AUKUS agreement was “vitally important” but shouldn’t weaken the US fleet.
The United States, Britain and Australia announced the three-way AUKUS defense agreement in 2021 under which Australia is to obtain nuclear submarine technology from the United States.
Albanese said he had met Republicans and Democrats on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Lithuania this month and was struck by “their unanimous support for AUKUS.”
The US is Australia’s major security ally and announced with Britain in March that the United States would sell Australia three US Virginia class nuclear powered submarines in the early 2030s, before Britain and Australia produce a new submarine class — SSN-AUKUS — the following decade.
Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles said in a Sky television interview that Australia, which has agreed to invest $3 billion in US submarine facilities, understood there was “pressure on the American industrial base” but AUKUS was “on track.”
“Why this arrangement is going to be so advantageous for all three countries is because we will develop an industrial base in this country which will contribute to the net capability of Australia, the UK and the US,” he added.
China’s security ambitions in the Indo-Pacific will also be under discussion by the security allies over two days of talks.
“We’ve seen troubling (Chinese) coercion from the East China Sea to the South China Sea to right here in the Southwest Pacific, and will continue to support our allies and partners as they defend themselves from bullying behavior,” Austin said before meeting Marles on Friday.
Australia is reshaping its defense force in response to China’s military buildup, and plans to boost its long-range strike capability, domestic missile production, and interoperability with the US and other regional militaries.
Austin said deepening defense ties, including efforts to integrate Japan into joint force posture initiatives, would be discussed.
“Now’s the time to be working closely with friends, and Australia has no better friend than the United States of America,” Marles said at the start of a meeting with his US counterpart.
Australia hosts an annual rotation of US Marines in the northern city of Darwin. War games involving more than 30,000 troops from the US, Japan and 10 other countries are being held in Queensland this week.
Australia says it is ‘confident’ on US nuclear submarines as ministers meet
https://arab.news/mm8fs
Australia says it is ‘confident’ on US nuclear submarines as ministers meet
- The US, Britain and Australia announced three-way AUKUS defense agreement in 2021
- Australia will obtain nuclear submarine technology from the United States
UK’s Starmer calls Trump’s remarks on allies in Afghanistan ‘frankly appalling’
- Britain lost 457 service personnel killed in Afghanistan, its deadliest overseas war since the 1950s
LONDON: British Prime Minister Keir Starmer called US President Donald Trump’s comments about European troops staying off the front lines in Afghanistan insulting and appalling, joining a chorus of criticism from other European officials and veterans.
“I consider President Trump’s remarks to be insulting and frankly appalling, and I’m not surprised they’ve caused such hurt for the loved ones of those who were killed or injured,” Starmer told reporters.
When asked whether he would demand an apology from the US leader, Starmer said: “If I had misspoken in that way or said those words, I would certainly apologize.”
Britain lost 457 service personnel killed in Afghanistan, its deadliest overseas war since the 1950s. For several of the war’s most intense years it led the allied campaign in Helmand, Afghanistan’s biggest and most violent province, while also fighting as the main US battlefield ally in Iraq.
Starmer’s remarks were notably strong coming from a leader who has tended to avoid direct criticism of Trump in public.
Trump told Fox Business Network’s “Mornings with Maria” on Thursday the United States had “never needed” the transatlantic alliance and accused allies of staying “a little off the front lines” in Afghanistan.
His remarks added to already strained relations with European allies after he used the World Economic Forum in the Swiss ski resort of Davos to again signal his interest in acquiring Greenland.
Dutch Foreign Minister David van Weel condemned Trump’s remarks on Afghanistan, calling them untrue and disrespectful.
Britain’s Prince Harry, who served in Afghanistan, also weighed in. “Those sacrifices deserve to be spoken about truthfully and with respect,” he said in a statement.
’WE PAID IN BLOOD FOR THIS ALLIANCE’
“We expect an apology for this statement,” Roman Polko, a retired Polish general and former special forces commander who also served in Afghanistan and Iraq, told Reuters in an interview.
Trump has “crossed a red line,” he added. “We paid with blood for this alliance. We truly sacrificed our own lives.”
Britain’s veterans minister, Alistair Carns, whose own military service included five tours including alongside American troops in Afghanistan, called Trump’s claims “utterly ridiculous.”
“We shed blood, sweat and tears together. Not everybody came home,” he said in a video posted on X.
Richard Moore, the former head of Britain’s MI6 intelligence service, said he, like many MI6 officers, had operated in dangerous environments with “brave and highly esteemed” CIA counterparts and had been proud to do so with Britain’s closest ally.
Under NATO’s founding treaty, members are bound by a collective-defense clause, Article 5, which treats an attack on one member as an attack on all.
It has been invoked only once — after the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington, when allies pledged to support the United States. For most of the war in Afghanistan, the US-led force there was under NATO command.
POLISH SACRIFICE ‘MUST NOT BE DIMINISHED’
Some politicians noted that Trump had avoided the draft for the Vietnam War, citing bone spurs in his feet.
“Trump avoided military service 5 times,” Ed Davey, leader of Britain’s centrist Liberal Democrats, wrote on X. “How dare he question their sacrifice.”
Poland’s sacrifice “will never be forgotten and must not be diminished,” Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said.
Trump’s comments were “ignorant,” said Rasmus Jarlov, an opposition Conservative Party member of Denmark’s parliament. In addition to the British deaths, more than 150 Canadians were killed in Afghanistan, along with 90 French service personnel and scores from Germany, Italy and other countries. Denmark — now under heavy pressure from Trump to transfer its semi-autonomous region of Greenland to the US — lost 44 troops, one of NATO’s highest per-capita death rates.
The United States lost about 2,460 troops in Afghanistan, according to the US Department of Defense, a figure on par per capita with those of Britain and Denmark. (Reporting by Sam Tabahriti and Elizabeth Evans in London, Stine Jacobsen in Copenhagen and Terje Solsvik in Oslo, Malgorzata Wojtunik in Gdansk, additional reporting by Andrew MacAskill, Muvija M and James Davey in London and Bart Meijer in Amsterdam; Writing by Sam Tabahriti; editing by Gareth Jones, Andrew Heavens, Ros Russell and Diane Craft)
