The big question that is not being addressed:   why go to the extra expense of a nuclear-powered submarine?

What exactly can a nuclear-powered submarine accomplish that is either impossible or more difficult for a conventional submarine?

last first dog on the moon

 haresfur wrote:

i listened to the economist radio/podcast earlier ("the intelligence" portion)
i learned a bit about a more complete picture
ask your smart speaker to play it
because devilish details

enjoy and stay safe 

 westslope wrote:
The common practice in Australia is for the government (state or federal) to write a huge cancellation fee into the contract along with payments heavily weighted up front as a poison pill to keep the next government from changing things. Then the next government says, "Screw you" and cancels anyway. Win-win.

France is right pissed, they are...

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote:
Classical Liberal recipe for peace:  more trade, more economic integration, not less.   

Classical recipe for dealing with the Chinese:  Avoid humiliating them.   Layout/summarize all parties' interests in a clear, non-judgemental manner.

 westslope wrote:
Breakup fee is what I had in mind.  

Mind you this was a procurement contract.  Not sure what the common practice is.

another take on the complexities of it all

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote:

Agreed.  

I do not blame the French for being furious.  Was there a cancellation fee like there usually is in the private sector world of Mergers and Acquisitions?  In this case, the cancellation fee would have been in the billion or two Euro range.

It would be interesting to see the EU create its own armed forces.  Though the Europeans (as a group) seem still very capable of making huge strategic blunders such as deposing Qaddafi, the former authoritarian leader of Libya.   On a bad day, it would seem that some Europeans have just as much difficulty as the Americans in understanding the political sociology of authoritarian regimes.  Or that foreign policy predicated on Dark Ages morality and righteousness often leads to poor outcomes (see the current security situation in the Sahelian countries).

I would have liked to see and still would like to see a more forceful western response to Chinese thuggery in the Gulf of China.  Human Rights abuses inside China or in Hong Kong should be addressed with rhetoric and occasionally backroom diplomacy.  

China has now applied to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership formerly known as the TransPacific Partnership (TPP), the same one that President Trump withdrew from shortly after winning office.   This is an opportunity IMO.   But would bet that the USA or some other country, perhaps Australia, will deliberately sabotage the process.

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote:

I don't understand all the ins and outs but it seems the original deal with France was pretty screwed up. But maybe not. Then again, I don't know why Australia needs any submarines. France shouldn't have trusted Peter Dutton or Scott Morrison - no one else does.

 westslope wrote: 
Well the French are pretty pissed.

Which might also nudge the EU closer to setting up its own military capacity (as opposed to many national forces) which it is already moving towards as it realises US hegemony is on the wane and no longer to be trusted. 

I'm no great fan of the Chinese, but the fact of the matter is that they are now a world power and seem mostly keen on becoming the center of global trade, which they seem to be pretty successful at doing for the time being.  

US Democrats picked up on the Trump lies and Chinese bashing.    Canadian political parties have done the same.   

Former colleagues of mine in the 1980s peace and disarmament movement are also proliferating lies about China.  Then many prominent 'peace activists' supported and still support the anti-Semitic Israeli nation building process.

Sure, there are lots of Chinese policies that grate.   Then the question is will the current western response spearheaded by President Biden actually be effective or is this all one big exercise in vacuous virtue signalling with a significant risk of blowback?  

The first outcome that folks should consider in this campaign of lies is the impact on Chinese energy policy and anthropogenic climate change.   Expect China to put more weight on 'national energy security' going forward.  That means more not less coal in the mix.   It would be great for the world to sell China more LNG but that will not work if parts of world stand poised to use that fuel as a political weapon to manage the behaviour of the evil and mean Chinese.  

Australia has to be careful.  For one, the hegemonic decline of the USA means that one day the USA will reduce its global military footprint and abandon its allies similar to how Great Britain abandoned the former Palestinian Mandate or similar to how the USA just abandoned Afghanistan.    

A cold war will please Australian anti-Chinese racists but will likely hurt Australia's economy.   When it comes to 'us versus them' and 'dealing with the culturally inferior', Canadians seem quite content to take an economic hit (e.g., fishing resources confiscated from First Nations and then managed in a way that would make the great Latin American Neo-Marxist leaders proud).   

 haresfur wrote:
One war almost concluded, so more time to start another...

 haresfur wrote:
i'm not sure there is a benefit for china if they declared war on (or attacked) australia

 R_P wrote:

Yeah the stupidest thing our government did was to go all Stockholm syndrome with trump and piss off China unnecessarily. Just continuing with Biden. We just should have kept our heads down. The Chinese government are smart. They know they can't take on the US directly, politically speaking. So they are working to contain US power by chipping off around the edges and taking on the US allies. So we cop the rhetoric and sanctions. Example, they have limited imports from Australia (limited, they still will buy what they want). So where do they go to replace the food and other stuff they aren't buying from us? Yep, the US. 

And if it ever came to war? Well being cannon fodder is part of our national identity.

With its move to acquire heavy weaponry and top-secret technology, Australia has thrown in its lot with the United States for generations to come — a “forever partnership,” in Mr. Morrison’s words. The agreement will open the way to deeper military ties and higher expectations that Australia would join any military conflict with Beijing.

It’s a big strategic bet that America will prevail in its great-power competition with China and continue to be a dominant and stabilizing force in the Pacific even as the costs increase. (...)

Clearly, the United States also made a choice: that the need for a firm alliance to counter Beijing is so urgent that it would set aside longstanding reservations about sharing sensitive nuclear technology. Australia will become only the second country — after Britain in 1958 — to be given access to the American submarine technology, which allows for stealthier movement over longer distances.

Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said during a regular news briefing in Beijing that the submarine agreement would “seriously damage regional peace and stability, exacerbate an arms race and harm international nuclear nonproliferation efforts,” according to a transcript issued by the ministry.

 R_P wrote:
There has been shocking behaviour in treating women Polies and staff.

My trouble with Gillard was her knifing her party leader in the back when he really didn't deserve it from a policy perspective, although he was a terrible manager by all accounts. That and her lack of courage by opposing legalising gay marriage* and other progressive issues. The overall trouble with the Labor Party is that they feel a need to bend to the conservative instincts of union members on social issues and vote in favour of traditional union jobs in mining rather than supporting a reduction in carbon emissions.

*The non-binding plebiscite to approve gay marriage passed overwhelmingly in most electorates including the rural, conservative ones where people realised it didn't make any difference to them who other people were rooting.

 haresfur wrote:
You got something with chickens (or birds)...