UK Clarifying Carriage of Australian SSN Program

On September 5, 2022 Anonymous made some interesting and well-balanced comments, as follows:

LEX's comments made me pause to go back over recent ministerial statements to see if I had missed anything. I had.

The biggest hints on AUKUS were not from Australian Minister for Defence Marles' comments in the UK last week, but from the UK Secretary for Defence Ben Wallace when standing next to [Marles] at their joint press conference in the UK. 

Wallace was much more confident of a joint UK/AUS SSNR [aka SSN(R)] build. Marles, though standing next to him, did not contradict Wallace.

First Wallace said:

"As if buying an American one off-the-shelf, or one of these ones [ie. SSNs] off-the-shelf – it’s not that. AUKUS is a collaborative program between three nations and the question is how do we all get to 2035-2040 in our deliveries, which we all need for our cycles, and how collaborative can we be."

Then Wallace said:

"I think there’s a confusion as to somehow this is me trying to sell that submarine and the Minister [Marles] will go off to the United States and buy that, but actually the ultimate is to get all of us to get through the 2030s where we produce a submarine that is in my view, truly collaborative, might have a bit of all three on it."

The USN SSN program chief [Rear Admiral Scott Pappano] virtually dealt themselves [the US] out of an AUKUS sub build last week with Adm Pappano saying it [the US providing SSNs to Australia] would be "detrimental" (to the USN SSN program).

[Anonymouses Comment]

So if everyone is telling the truth I think AUKUS will see a joint UK/RAN SSNR design followed by a joint build between BAE Barrow and ASC, with some US technology included.

Pete Comment

1.  Yes it is almost certain that the US technology on Australia's future SSNs, will, include the US AN/BYG-1 (or its successor) Combat System. This already permits Australian submarines to fully interoperate with the USN. That Combat System (including US weapons, sensors, communications and huge networked databases) is already on Australia's Collins submarines. 

2.  Regarding the oft brought up belief that a US reactor could go into a UK SSNR hull. This is not so, because apparently the UK PWR3 reactor, very likely to go into the UK Dreadnought SSBNs and UK SSN(R)s is/will actually draw on US S9G reactor technology. 

The authors of Wiki explain: the "PWR3 [is and will be] a new system "based on a US design but using UK reactor technology".[18][19] The [UK] Royal Institution of Naval Architects reported that it was likely that the UK was given access to the US Navy S9G reactor design used in their Virginia-class submarines..."

3.  In terms of UK Secretary for Defence Wallace's comment: "...2035-2040 in our deliveries..." I am of the conservative belief that the first UK designed SSNR aka SSN(R) must follow completion of the UK Dreadnought SSBN Program. That timing reality might see the first SSNR launched in the UK in about 2039. Then post-launch completion and trials then may see it commissioned in 2044.

The first Australian SSNR/SSN(R) might be launched in Osborne, Adelaide, in 2041, with post-launch completion and trials perhaps seeing it commissioned in 2046.