Australia, Britain to strike treaty for joint production of submarines

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SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia and Britain said they would strike a bilateral treaty to produce a new class of nuclear-powered submarine, under the AUKUS partnership which also includes the United States.

Australia will buy U.S. Virginia class nuclear-powered submarines from the United States in the next decade, with Britain and Australia later building a new class of AUKUS submarine at Barrow-in-Furness in Britain, and in South Australia, under the AUKUS pact announced in 2023.

“We will be negotiating a treaty, a bilateral treaty, between Australia and the UK to enable our portion of AUKUS,” Australian Defence Minister Richard Marles told reporters after a meeting with his British and U.S. counterparts on Thursday in London.

“We will be operating the same class of submarine. So when you look at the industrial cooperation, the technology transfer, the way in which all of those mechanisms operate to do that, that is the subject of the treaty,” he added.

British Defence Secretary John Healey said the meeting of AUKUS defence ministers had also agreed to use British-made Stingray torpedoes in P-8A Maritime Patrol Aircraft which are used as submarine-hunting aircraft in the Indo Pacific region.

U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said the AUKUS partners had conducted significant experiments across the ground, undersea and electromagnetic spectrum to enhance warfighting capabilities as part of cooperation under the so-called AUKUS “Pillar Two”.

A joint statement said the AUKUS partners were increasing their ability to develop and deliver offensive and defensive hypersonic technologies, and will conduct a large scale drone exercise later this year.