A separate pact between Australia and Britain doesn’t risk angering the US as it weighs up torpedoing AUKUS, Trade Minister Don Farrell insists.
The US was conspicuously absent as Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles and UK Secretary of State John Healey inked a bilateral agreement to strengthen ties around the AUKUS nuclear submarine agreement in Geelong on Saturday.
AUKUS, formed with the UK and US in 2021 to address concerns about China’s rising military ambition, is designed to enable Australia to acquire nuclear-powered attack submarines in the 2040s.
But the future of the $560 billion deal has become murky after the Trump administration initiated a 30-day review to examine if it meets its “America-first” criteria.
Mr Farrell denied the Geelong treaty risked annoying the US as Australia seeks a lower tariff on exports.
“It does the opposite,” he told Sky on Sunday.
“The message that the Americans will get out of this is that the other two parties to AUKUS are very, very supportive of the continuation of the project.”
The coalition has backed the bilateral agreement but opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Michaelia Cash said it raised a series of questions.
“Was the US brought in on this? Did they know about it? What was their response to it,” she asked.
Mr Marles said the signing built on “the strong foundation of trilateral co-operation between Australia, the UK and the United States” and advanced the shared objectives of AUKUS.
He remained confident about the ongoing involvement of the US in the partnership, as did Mr Healey and David Lammy, the UK Foreign Secretary.
Australia will pay $5 billion to support British industry in designing and producing nuclear reactors to power the future AUKUS-class subs.
It is slated to acquire at least three Virginia-class nuclear-powered submarines from the US in the early 2030s.
With signing formalities done and dusted, Mr Marles, Mr Lammy and Mr Healey are expected to attend the Talisman Sabre exercise in Darwin on Sunday.
Australia’s largest and most sophisticated war-fighting exercise started on July 13 and involves more than 35,000 personnel from 19 militaries across three weeks.
In addition to the US and UK, forces from Canada, Fiji, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, Thailand and Tonga have joined as partners.
Malaysia and Vietnam are also attending as observers.
The 2025 war games involve the UK’s Carrier Strike Group, led by the Royal Navy flagship HMS Prince of Wales – the first UK carrier strike group to visit Australia since 1997.
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