Aukus deal: Australia has ‘a lot to do’ in Southeast Asia to calm concerns over submarines, analysts say

Canberra has its work cut out explaining purchase of US submarines to governments like Indonesia and Malaysia, who worry about provoking China, say experts

Region is ‘increasingly divided over US-China; all Asean member states need economic ties with China but rely on US for stability and security’

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A US submarine. Australia is buying up to five nuclear-powered US submarines, as part of efforts to counter China. File photo: Reuters

Published: 6:09pm, 14 Mar 2023Updated: 10:55am, 17 Mar 2023

Corrected [10:53am, 17 Mar, 2023]

[10:53am, 17 Mar, 2023]
This story was amended to reflect that the first iteration of the Quad grouping became dormant as a result of waning interest from all four participating countries.

The anglophone nations that make up the Aukus pact will need to undertake a fresh round of diplomacy in Southeast Asia to allay concerns that Australia’s submarine acquisition will further fuel US-China tensions and trigger a regional arms race, analysts say.

The leaders of the United States, United Kingdom and Australia announced on Monday that Canberra will purchase up to five conventionally-armed, nuclear-powered US submarines, starting early in the 2030s, as part of efforts to thwart Beijing in the Pacific.

This will be followed a decade later by the production of a new class of “SSN Aukus” nuclear-powered submarines, developed with the US and UK, to counter China’s growing regional footprint, said Joe Biden, Rishi Sunak and Anthony Albanese during their San Diego meeting.

The submarines – nuclear-powered but not nuclear-armed – will allow patrols closer to the Asian mainland without a port call.

While Biden said he was not worried that Beijing would see Aukus as aggressive, the Chinese mission to the United Nations said on Tuesday that the “blatant” submarine plan “constitutes serious nuclear proliferation risks, undermines [the] international non-proliferation system, fuels arms races, and hurts peace and stability in the region”.

Two nuclear-weapon states – the US and UK – claiming to uphold nuclear non-proliferation standards while transferring weapons-grade enriched uranium to a non-nuclear-weapon state was “a textbook case of double standard” that would damage the international non-proliferation system, the mission said.

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