https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/16/us/politics/france-us-biden-australia-submarine.html France cancels celebrations with US: "Sale of submarines to Australia - knife in the back" Paris is furious after being left out of an alliance between the US, Britain and Australia, which cost them the loss of a prestigious deal. In response, an event to mark the 240th anniversary of the start of their partnership was canceled. The United States acknowledged on Thursday that it only gave France a few hours’ notice of its deal to provide Australia with nuclear-powered submarines, a move that French officials have denounced as a major betrayal by one of its closest allies. ------------------- Anglophone alliance USA, UK, Australia - former British colonies. WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden announced Wednesday that the United States is forming a new Indo-Pacific security alliance with Britain and Australia that will allow for greater sharing of defense capabilities — including helping equip Australia with nuclear-powered submarines. It’s a move that could deepen a growing chasm in U.S.-China relations. https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-business-china-australia-united-states-1b2e597918bc1c8dd1aab26ab32c9621
Lerner, state your opinion: is it good or is it bad that President Biden is making this new alliance that can stand up to China? Good or bad?
I think its good. I do have questions trying to understand why only these 3? China, Russia, and Iran have their alliance. Besides the loss of the sale deal, why France feels betrayed. Was there a better way to handle this?
Strictly French noses out of joint. Perfidious Albion and all that. True, it's the Colonies but it's all the same.
No doubt the loss of $55b in revenue to a major state enterprise and all of the jobs, prestige, and power projection is a significant loss to France. Pretty clear though that the new deal is far more beneficial to all involved outside of France.
I don't have a lot of patience for the French. I didn't mind when they denied the use of their airspace when Reagan went after Gaddafi. And I didn't mind when they didn't want to go after Hussein. (Remember "freedom fries"? Childish.) But.... They're not a member of NATO, which I find repugnant. And I think they don't appreciate the threat China poses--which is what this submarine issue is really all about. This isn't about selling subs--nuclear or diesel/electric. This is about projecting power in the region.
I don't have ANY patience for the French or at least none at all for what passes for the French government.
China is not happy as we can see and hear. Be it French or US nuke powered submarines, China appears threatening Australia.
Yeah. My theory is that a "better way" of handling this would involve looping in France, and they would have various interests in torpedoing anything that might offend China too much. Or Russia. So Biden admin seemingly decided to proceed in a most direct way to get the desired result. And good for them. In immortal words of Victoria Nuland, "f##k the EU". P. S. It would be interesting to see Trumpublican party criticize Bidenn for 1) standing up to China and 2) making deals to sell weapons to other countries. Both things the 2020 election loser crowed about constantly, but failed to achieve.
There's also the matter that we have no idea what conversations took place behind the scenes here, and that's probably where all the interesting things took place.
Looks like a lot of good jobs will be generated in the US. Australia possibly sensing that China is a becoming a bigger danger so its time to get stronger. This is good.
Part of the deal involved US/UK technical transfer to allow Ausi industry build them. Still a number of US jobs, but a game changer for Australia’s shipbuilding industry. Granted, while the jobs are huge, the power projection of this may be immense.
Being ex-Navy, I've spent a little time thinking about what war over Taiwan would look like. There’s been just one essentially Naval conflict since WWII, the Falkland Islands. Taiwan would be much bigger but the shape would be similar unless one side or the other wanted to risk going nuclear. The key to limited involvement will be submarines. Conventional submarines are seriously inferior to nuke boats for projecting power at a distance from home base. Australia and the U.S. are preparing but it might be too late. It takes a long time to build a submarine and an even longer time to create the infrastructure needed. What concerns me now is that Xi may decide that his window of opportunity is limited and that he should strike now.
I suppose another factor is the state of China's hypersonic missile technology. If they build a missile that can potentially take out a carrier at a distance, that's a big advantage over the noisy subs they currently field.
China allied with Russia who has such missiles. In 2019 Russia announced the deployment of its first Avangard hyper-sonic missiles, which it said could travel at more than 20 times the speed of sound. Recently the Russian military tested a new Zircon hyper-sonic cruise missile
That raises the question how willing Putin would be to allow Russian-made missiles to be used to try to sink U.S. Navy warships. I would think in any conflict between China and the Allies that Putin would rather sit back and let his rivals weaken each other.
Good analysis, I think you are right. Yet I don't want to think about a scenario where Russians will use such weapon or even worse in a more global conflict. Blessed are the peacemakers.
As Steve indicates, the Russians do not see the Chinese kindred spirits. Instead, they see a rivalry that has existed since the Sino-Soviet split in 1960. Even the breakup of the USSR failed to change that. I think the Russians are scared of the Chinese. They should be.
Maybe for them its enemy of their enemy is their allie. Indeed China can walk to Russia. Chinese in the Russian Far East: a geopolitical time bomb?
