Technology unravels strategy and the weakness of AUKUS |
Developments in technology, their consequences for strategic policy and challenges in sustaining Australia’s submarine warfare capability are the ultimate challenges to AUKUS.
We argue elsewhere that advances in submarine battery technologies will have changed the prospects for regional undersea warfare at about the time that Australia’s first AUKUS nuclear powered submarines (SSN) become operational. The consequences should influence Australia’s national security policy and the ultimate usefulness of AUKUS.
The demise of submarines has been predicted regularly. Yet in the face of modern military systems they remain less vulnerable than surface warships. Nonetheless, traditional anti-submarine warfare (ASW) sensors are being enhanced by increasingly powerful digital analysis. More nations are deploying fixed submerged sensor systems and surveillance is being extended by autonomous underwater gliders, autonomous surface craft like BlueBottle and uncrewed underwater vessels (UUV). Together with intelligent mines, high performance light metal battery (LMB) powered small submarines and, before long, killer UUVs, submarine missions will become more difficult.
Just how, and to what degree, broadly depends on who’s searching, why they’re searching and what they can do about it. And the latter need not be overtly hostile.
When Indonesia eventually deploys its submarine detection system, covert passage between the Indian and Pacific Oceans will become problematic. Submerged transit is possible at only two points in the Indonesian archipelago, with Lombok Strait preferred for the large 10,000 tonne future Australian SSNs. Disseminating the data on such transits could compromise covert deployment and complicate RAN missions. Were Indonesia ever prompted........