AUKUS Pillar 1
Sub-standard Strategy?
Origins
September 2021 saw a new security pact between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States (AUKUS). The substance of the agreement amounted to two ‘pillars’ covering, respectively, submarines (Pillar 1) and advanced capabilities (Pillar 2). Pillar 1would see Australia cancel a troubled €56 billion contract to procure twelve Attack class diesel-electric submarines from France in favour of eight or more nuclear powered ‘hunter-killer’ submarines in a joint venture with the US and the UK. Although nuclear-propelled, the AUKUS submarines would, importantly, be conventionally armed and would not, therefore, carry nuclear warheads. Pillar 2 amounted to a trilateral collaboration covering various ‘advanced capabilities’: undersea; quantum; AI and autonomy; cyber; hypersonic and counter-hypersonic; electronic warfare; innovation; and arrangements for the sharing of information. Pillar 2 seemed at first to be supplementary to Pillar 1 and it has not been as much in the public eye as its counterpart. Yet various Pillar 2 working groups have been at work since 2021 and, given uncertainty surrounding China’s strategic intentions, there is mounting pressure to extend the collaboration to include Canada and Asian countries, particularly Japan and the Republic of Korea.[1]
Ironically Pillar 1, having attracted the bulk of political, media and public interest as the raison d’être of AUKUS, has come under increasing scrutiny; often very unfavourably. This is in part explained by its unorthodox and undiplomatic origins. Pillar 1 caused what is known in diplomatic circles as a stink. French politicians, furious at having been squeezed out of an immensely lucrative deal – ‘the contract of the century’ – spoke of a ‘stab in the back’ and even of ‘treason’. A good deal of France’s anger was directed at the UK, described by France’s Europe minister as having returned to ‘the American fold and accepting a form of vassal status’ and at Prime Minister Boris Johnson in person, dismissing him as the ‘fifth wheel on the carriage’. France recalled its ambassadors from Washington and Canberra but in a contemptuous gesture allowed its ambassador to la perfide Albion to remain in London.
The future of Pillar 1 is the focus of this essay. With mounting uncertainty as to whether this project is either strategically wise or financially sustainable (particularly in the light of reports that the UK’s own submarine fleet is critically underfunded), it is unlikely that the forthcoming UK Strategic Defence Review (SDR 2025) will ignore the matter and continue unquestioningly with the project. I will discuss various questions that the 2025 Defence Review Team might address to ensure that Pillar 1 will be consistent with the UK’s new strategic outlook. But the first question on their minds should be “how and why do we find ourselves in this position?” To answer this question, I will turn briefly to the documents that SDR 2025 will soon replace: the March 2021 Integrated Review of Security, Defence, Development and Foreign Policy (IR 2021) and the March 2023 Integrated Review Refresh (IR 2023).
For some, the significance of the Pillar 1 project was that it would validate the UK’s recently revealed ‘Global Britain’ stance. This slogan made its first appearance on the cover of IR 2021, in which the UK was presented as ‘a European country with global interests, as an open economy and a maritime trading nation with a large diaspora’. ‘Our future prosperity’, its authors argued, ‘will be enhanced by deepening our economic connections with dynamic parts of the world such as the Indo-Pacific, Africa and the Gulf, as well as trade with Europe.’ A central feature of the UK’s global outlook would be a ‘tilt’ to the Indo-Pacific region: ‘In the decade ahead the UK will deepen our engagement in the Indo-Pacific, establishing a greater and more persistent presence than any other European country.’ In a way these slogans and assertions were little more than the usual rhetoric found in policy documents. But for certain commentators they were a promise that was about to be delivered. Thus, AUKUS was welcomed variously as a ‘boost for the UK’s post-Brexit “Global Britain” agenda’; an arrangement that ‘puts substance into the Indo-Pacific tilt’; a ‘genuine tactical victory for the “global Britain” claim’; and ‘the moment Global Britain came alive’. Liz Truss, then the UK’s trade negotiator, saw AUKUS as an example of ‘Global Britain in action.’ To my mind the ‘Global Britain’ slogan was a shining example of political rhetoric that manages, simultaneously, to sound both arrogant and needy. It was unceremoniously dropped by former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in IR 2023 and should probably not be brought back to life. But what of Global Britain’s first (and possibly signature) manoeuvre – the much-vaunted ‘Indo-Pacific tilt’ that IR 2023 argued was being ‘delivered’? Should it retain its prominence in the UK strategic outlook and, by extension, does it provide an adequate rationale for UK involvement in AUKUS Pillar 1?
Indo-Pacific tilt
IR 2021 offered a ‘framework’ for the Indo-Pacific tilt, covering such matters as trade, investment, socio-economic development and the promotion of open societies. The review was open-eyed as to various risks to regional stability which could adversely affect UK interests – climate change, terrorism, organised crime, cyber security – but was especially concerned with freedom of navigation: ‘Much of the UK’s trade with Asia depends on shipping that goes through a range of Indo-Pacific choke points. Preserving freedom of navigation is therefore essential to the UK’s national interests. We already work closely with regional partners and will do more through persistent engagement by our armed forces and our wider security capacity- building.’ IR 2021 came close to a military commitment to the stability of the region when it spoke of ‘strengthening defence and security cooperation, including in maritime security, building on our overseas military bases and existing contribution in the Indo-Pacific’.
It is inconceivable that the AUKUS arrangement could have been announced without considerable time having been spent in preparation. But there is little or no hint in the language of the ‘tilt’ that a security arrangement of the geostrategic significance of AUKUS could have been in gestation. Was it actually believed that Australian nuclear-powered submarines would be deployed to secure freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific? Curiously, while IR 2021 was certainly aware of security risks in the region, it also adopted a rather emollient tone: ‘In the Indo-Pacific ... we will adapt to the regional balance of power and respect the interests of others’ and will recognise ‘the importance of powers in the region such as China, India and Japan...’ One obvious question now arises for the SDR 2025 panel: is AUKUS Pillar 1 what was meant by the ‘Indo-Pacific tilt’, or did the UK simply move quickly, guided neither by strategy nor principle, to exploit a commercial opportunity?
Nuclear non-proliferation
Does Pillar 1 represent a nuclear proliferation risk? Both the US and the UK are nuclear weapon states (NWS) and both are parties to the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), as is Australia, as a non-nuclear weapon state (NNWS). IR 2021 confirmed the UK’s support for the NPT and was confident of the UK’s reputation in nuclear non-proliferation: ‘We are strongly committed to full implementation of the NPT in all its aspects, including nuclear disarmament, non-proliferation, and the peaceful uses of nuclear energy; there is no credible alternative to nuclear disarmament. The UK has taken a consistent and leading approach to nuclear disarmament.’ IR 2021 was also alert to the risks of nuclear proliferation in the Indo-Pacific, placing the region at ‘the centre of intensifying geopolitical competition with multiple potential flashpoints: from unresolved territorial disputes; to nuclear proliferation and miscalculation...’
Article III of the NPT is clear: ‘Each State Party to the Treaty undertakes not to provide: (a) source or special fissionable material, or (b) equipment or material especially designed or prepared for the processing, use or production of special fissionable material, to any non-nuclear-weapon State for peaceful purposes, unless the source or special fissionable material shall be subject to the safeguards required by this Article.’ Although the propulsion of a hunter-killer submarine could not reasonably qualify as a ‘peaceful use’ of nuclear energy, it is important to note that nuclear propulsion and nuclear armament are categorised differently by the NPT. Nuclear propulsion of warships and submarines is generally exempted from the nuclear weapon non-proliferation regime, although the transfer of nuclear materials and technology, as required for submarine reactors, would in all circumstances be governed by rigorous export controls and safeguards regimes.
Happily, for the participants in Pillar 1, the director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA – the guardian of the NPT), has accepted that the nuclear safety and security provisions of AUKUS will be consistent with the founding statute of the IAEA. Nevertheless, there are dissenting voices. Under Pillar 1 the US and the UK – NWS, long-standing parties to the NPT and permanent members of the UN Security Council – will be assisting Australia to become the first NPT NNWS to acquire nuclear propulsion capability. Furthermore, it is probable that any submarines produced under Pillar 1 will take the US-UK approach of fuelling the submarine reactors with long-lasting, weapons-grade Uranium-235 (U-235), sealed for the c.30-year life of the submarine. U-235 is, unequivocally, a ‘special fissionable material’ and might reasonably be described as a nuclear proliferation risk. Although the supply of nuclear-powered submarines to Australia would not directly contradict the UK’s position regarding nuclear proliferation, as stated in IR 2021, it certainly asks questions of it – questions that SDR 2025 would do well to address.
China
IR 2021 offered a mature and balanced approach to relations with China. In important respects (i.e., trade and investment), China was seen as a huge opportunity for the UK, but in other respects (i.e., security and human rights) a huge problem. The UK’s approach could be described as classic, dual-track diplomacy which sees dialogue as broadly more productive than sanctions or containment: ‘Open, trading economies like the UK will need to engage with China and remain open to Chinese trade and investment, but they must also protect themselves against practices that have an adverse effect on prosperity and security. Cooperation with China will also be vital in tackling transnational challenges, particularly climate change and biodiversity loss.’ IR 2021 set out the UK’s approach to co-operation with China: ‘We will require a robust diplomatic framework that allows us to manage disagreements, defend our values and preserve space for cooperation where our interests align.’ Will SDR 2025 adopt a similar approach?
Some sense of the harm Pillar 1 might have done to this fine diplomatic balance can be seen in China’s reaction, with the foreign ministry in Beijing accusing AUKUS partners of ‘severely damaging regional peace and stability, intensifying an arms race and damaging international non-proliferation efforts’ and furthermore of persisting in an ‘outdated cold war zero-sum mentality.’ The UK’s response to China’s accusations was at first confused: UK Prime Minister Johnson insisted that AUKUS ‘is not intended to be adversarial towards any other power’ while others were less equivocal, describing the purpose of AUKUS as being to ‘counter’, ‘contain’ or even ‘deter’ China. Certainly, an argument could be made that to have equipped Australia with inferior diesel-electric submarines would have meant that China would remain the unrivalled regional champion in hunter-killer submarines. In that regard, a nuclear- powered hunter-killer fleet could be a more effective way to balance China’s capability, modify China’s behaviour and stabilise the region. But if deterrence was or is the rationale then the rationale is confused, in that the AUKUS submarines might not be operational until the 2040s. Deterrence without capability is not deterrence – it is at best risible and at worst hollow provocation and, in this case, it seems just as likely to accelerate perceived Chinese adventurism as to contain it. Whatever the strategic rationale might be claimed to be, the decision to telegraph the intention to counter, contain or deter China so far in advance of having the capability to do so could mean, despite the position set out in IR 2021, that the UK’s trade and investment relationships with China will suffer, even if only temporarily.
Will tensions between the language of IR 2021 and the UK’s participation in Pillar 1 be resolved in SDR 2025? Was the risk of deteriorating relations – diplomatically, economically and strategically – foreseen in the planning of Pillar 1? Was the risk assessed to be acceptable in the light of the expected benefits of Pillar 1? Was any such risk assessment done at all?
European security and defence
What does Pillar 1 say about the UK’s approach to European security and defence? IR 2021 had expressed the UK’s long-standing ‘NATO first’ approach: ‘NATO is the foundation of collective security in the Euro-Atlantic area, where our commitment to Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty remains our most powerful deterrent... Russia is the most acute threat in the region and we will work with NATO Allies to ensure a united Western response, combining military, intelligence and diplomatic efforts.’ SDR 2025 must be expected to use very similar language, particularly considering the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Yet there was concern in Europe that Pillar 1 might distract from European security and stability and might even undermine NATO. Did the initiative imply that US was moving away from Europe towards the Pacific, with the UK at its side? Might the UK find itself unconvincingly involved in efforts to deter China and in a weaker position, as a result, to contribute to the deterrence of Russia? Might Russia – ‘the most acute threat in the region’ – welcome this episode as another crack in the greying transatlantic security architecture?
The grim irony of Putin’s assault on Ukraine is that it has re-emphasised NATO’s founding mission (the defence of Europe) and softened decades of tension between the Alliance and the European Union. Accordingly, post-Brexit UK governments[2] became gradually (albeit often grudgingly) more accepting of the case for closer European defence and security collaboration; outside the NATO framework but, importantly, not in competition with it. Nevertheless, within EU member governments and institutions, the AUKUS agreement prompted a revival of interest in the development of a specifically EU capability in security and defence. The UK government might well have considered this possibility and judged, not without reason, that rhetoric about a discrete EU security and defence capability will amount to as much as it has for three decades or more – i.e., next to nothing. But what if AUKUS does, finally, encourage European governments to achieve more ‘strategic autonomy’? Might the UK’s participation in AUKUS have prompted the very outcome the UK has spoken against for decades – the inefficient ‘duplication’ of European military capability through parallel commitments to NATO and some EU equivalent?
UK national strategy
As with the outcome of any similar review, IR 2021 had a split personality. It was, first, a policy document of record, expected to set out the government’s view of the world and the UK’s position within it. But it was also a strategy document, and strategy must be dynamic and adaptable if it is to be worth its salt. Whatever the balance between these two imperatives, national strategy loses some of its authority and respectability if it is seen to say one thing while its authors set about doing another. This is particularly so in the field of strategic deterrence, where the presentation of a strategy is an absolutely core part of that strategy. This is because deterrence strategy is, in the first place, concerned with influencing the assessment, made by strangers and adversaries, of a government’s capabilities and intentions. Yet it was, and is, not clear how IR 2021 could have led in the direction of Pillar 1: was this a demonstration of general policy or of strategic adaptability?
This uncertainty raises the possibility that the UK’s participation in Pillar 1 was strategically sub-standard; a reactive, spontaneous, ad hoc spasm of a decision that purports to be valid for decades but that does not appear to have come from a place of careful strategic calculation. Or perhaps France’s reaction was a misreading, assuming of the UK a very high level of strategic perfidy when what was really going on was a reaction to the UK’s increasingly populist politics; an ex post facto attempt to find something – the ‘tilt’ would do – that could fit the Global Britain branding, in all its excess of style over substance. Whatever the case, if participation in Pillar 1 could have undermined the UK’s reputation as a reliable, trustworthy and consistent strategic actor, then an urgent task for SDR 2025 must be to produce a more convincing economic and geostrategic rationale for the decision, ensuring that any doubts about the UK’s strategic seriousness and credibility are allayed.
Last words
AUKUS Pillar 1 might in time be shown to be very much more than ‘an arms deal with benefits’. Any concerns about nuclear proliferation might prove to be exaggerated. Diplomatic and trading relations with China might soon be restored. China might be deterred for 20 or so years from what the West sees as further military adventurism in what China considers its vital sphere of control. Collaborative successes achieved in Pillar 2 might not be contaminated by the perception that Pillar 1 failed in its mission to deter. The UK’s security and defence relations with the EU and with European governments might result in effective and efficient collaboration, complementing NATO rather than competing with it. AUKUS might live up to one description of it as a ‘brilliant move’ and the UK might be applauded for the wisdom and pragmatism of its national strategy.
But these outcomes and rewards are unlikely to come about by accident and without lucid explanation. The content of a national strategy is either serious or it is not; it either matters or it does not. If it is serious, and if it does matter, then it also matters that policy decisions and actions should be broadly consistent with what is declared and should be seen as such. Otherwise, as the French might say, a UK national strategy could be dismissed as une étude intégrée qui ne vaut même pas le papier sur lequel elle est écrite.
[1] With the addition of Canada and certain Asian countries the grouping’s name could simply be extended from AUKUS to CAUKUSA (although what the Caucasian nations of Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan would make of this is anyone’s guess).
[2] There have been no fewer than seven post-Brexit UK governments, if each of Theresa May’s and Boris Johnson’s two ministries are counted separately. This rate of churn might not have reinforced the image of the UK as a credible and dependable strategic actor in times of great uncertainty.