The United States, Australia and the United Kingdom formed a pact in 2021 to boost the three nations’ collective deterrence in the Indo-Pacific. That Aukus agreement is vital but there is more work to do: The U.S. should double its submarine production.
Under the first pillar of the Aukus agreement, the U.S. would sell our attack submarines to Australia. In exchange, Australia would expand basing for U.S. submarines. In the second pillar, all three nations would share advanced technology.
Attack submarines are among our most effective weapons and the crown jewels of U.S. military power. Undersea warfare is one of the few areas in which we retain a competitive advantage over the Chinese military.
Aukus has bipartisan support because of its potential to improve the national security of all three nations. Implementing this deal will require a historic amount of cooperation and trust among the three countries and, here at home, between the executive and legislative branches.
As it stands, the Aukus plan would transfer U.S. Virginia-class submarines to a partner nation even before we have met our own Navy’s requirements. The U.S. Navy’s military requirement is 66 nuclear attack submarines. Today, there are only 49 in the fleet. And the Navy projects its inventory will decline to 46 by 2030 as older nuclear submarines retire faster than they are replaced.
Worse still, demands on our submarine maintenance capabilities have also stretched our military’s readiness. Nearly 40% of U.S. attack submarines cannot be deployed because of maintenance delays. For example, the USS Connecticut had an accident in the South China Sea in 2021 and likely won’t be operational until 2026.
The U.S. submarine industrial base is producing an average of 1.2 Virginia-class attack submarines a year, short of the two our Navy needs. There are many reasons for this underperformance. For years, the U.S. government purchased only one submarine annually—hardly enough to maintain a strong industrial base.
By comparison, during the 1980s we bought four times as many. The effort to ramp up production to a rate of two attack submarines a year has been plagued with workforce and supply-chain challenges.
To keep the commitment made under Aukus, and not reduce our own fleet, the U.S. would have to produce between 2.3 and 2.5 attack submarines a year.
Improvements in submarine maintenance and more forward basing of submarines will help increase deployment of the submarine fleet, making the deterrence effect of these weapons even stronger. Australian investment in U.S. shipyards will also help. But we can’t afford to shrink the overworked U.S. submarine fleet at a dangerous moment.
China’s President Xi Jinping has instructed the People’s Liberation Army to be ready for a Taiwan invasion by 2027. Time is of the essence.
Fortunately, there is a solution. President Biden should immediately send Congress a request for supplemental appropriations and authorities—including a detailed implementation plan—that increases U.S. submarine production to 2.5 Virginia-class attack submarines a year. It is time to make generational investments in U.S. submarine production capacity that include supplier and workforce development initiatives.
There is precedent for such a bold investment. Men, women and industries answered the call at the outset of World War II to produce weapons and materiel. During the Cold War, the U.S. rapidly built a nuclear Navy that was second to none. To fulfill the promise and benefit of the Aukus agreement, we need such clarity of purpose once again.
Mr. Wicker, a Republican, is a U.S. senator from Mississippi and ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
39 comments:
Hey Wicker, plenty of more important things going on at home that need attention than attack subs
Roger "Draft Dodger" Wicker has been pushing for more money to Ukraine, too.
GTFO.
Maybe we'd have more money for "attack submarines" if we didn't give hundreds of billions to one of the most corrupt nations on earth, led by a literal actor who films himself dancing in high heels and a corset.
Roger Dodger- you represent one of the poorest states in the country. How about actually helping the people here instead of your corrupt crony kleptocrats thousands of miles away?
How much more $$$ can we hand out to defense contractors?
To my knowledge, Wicker has never had a job that required WORK or SWEAT.
Lmao this dude doesn’t even try to hide the fact that he is owned by AIPAC and the Military Industrial Complex.
Who is going to “man” the subs?
The military standards for fitness and hygiene have eroded to the point that it’s almost entire big booty baby mama’s and transgender fruitcakes! š¤£
Roger-
I's rather you work omn closing the border. The way things are going under the Biden aministration policies our domestic problems will subsume our foreign ones.
Congress can't even pass a defense budget. So how in the world do you double production.
Roger needs to take his meds and hush on up with this nonsense.
Let the adults who are not suffering from dementia do the real thinkin'.
This is nonsense. Why doesn't he focus on Senator Tuberville, who is holding up all high level military appointments? This is leading to a leadership vacuum for our military. That's a crisis of his own making. Support our troops.
Maybe we could borrow money from Hunter to build some more subs.
There sure are a lot of special folks on here this morning.
Maybe Wicker agrees with Pence. Pence says it's not his concern how the American people are struggling. I can see it now, Pence/Wicker 2024.
11:06 - The military won't collapse due to a lull in top-level promotions. When our military collapses, it will be due to ramrodding wokeness throughout all branches of our armed services.
This is where Roger Wicker stands, it’s certainly not with his Mississippi electorate:
Here is the full roster of Davos 2022 attendees
I want to make sure you know who is attending the WEF's invite-only gathering.
USA group includes 25 ppl. Gina Raimondo & John Kerry are WH reps. They will be joined by 12 Dem+10 GOP pols.
Michael McCaul Congressman from Texas (R)
Pat Toomey Senator from Pennsylvania (R)
Roger F. Wicker Senator from Mississippi (R)
Francis Suarez Mayor of Miami (R)
Daniel Meuser Congressman from Pennsylvania (R)
Ann Wagner Congresswoman from Missouri (R)
Darrell Issa Congressman from California (R)
Debra Fischer Senator from Nebraska (R)
Eric Holcomb Governor of Indiana (R)
Larry Hogan Governor of Maryland (R)
The Soviet military complex chased us into their bankruptcy. Now let's our military industrial complex chase China into our bankruptcy. Or are we somehow immune?
In this regard I agree with him. In the next 10 to 20 years we will be involved in a war with China. China threatens Taiwan which if you bumpkins don't know is the sole country that supplies the vast majority of high end chips. That means your smartphone, the computer you use at work, the chips for your cars, etc. Relocating that supply chain stateside has started with the CHIPS act, but that is all that has happened: Legislation passed. Movement of those facilities and personnel will take years. And China has its eye on Taiwan. The questio is can we relocate enough to dampen or completely negate the inevitable blow.
But not only that, China is the preeminent supplier of rare earth minerals. They have cornered the market. If they were to get a hold of Taiwan and keep the facilities up and personnel they can freeze out our economy and do untold damage. Over night your quality of life will plummet.
At least this has nothing to do with the dumpster fire that is Ukraine.
Our enemies don't need a navy. They will just walk across the border.
July 20, 2023 at 11:43 AM
If you think the US has a demographics problem, China's is absolutely worse. The One Child policy did untold damage to China so much that India is likelyt to overtake China's population.
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/chinas-shrinking-population-and-constraints-on-its-future-power/
While we may have issues, if Peter Zeihan is right the US is sitting pretty compared to the rest of the world. Especially if the US stops guarenteeing the safety of international shipping lanes. You should read The End of the World Is Just the Beginning
I was all in for a quick win, but Ukraine got rained on by the sloth of Biden's Bolsheviks who slow walked weapons, as Ukraine lost momentum and faced one stalemate after another while bodies piled and entire cities were vaporized by Putin.
Ukraine has lost all but the will to fight and the hope that the world will force Russia to pay for its reconstruction
@12:13
China is part of BRICS
the Crown Prince of Saud is joining BRICS
That means the USD will no longer be the de facto petroleum reserve currency.
We have maybe 5 years left before the USD is worth less than the Zimbabwe dollar.
Of course, (((they))) will swoop in and save us with a CBDC once we’ve experienced a few months of empty grocery store shelves.
12:00 War with China? Is a WAR with China worth what we lose if China takes it's island of Taiwan back? A shooting WAR with China ain't like Ukraine or fighting in Afghanistan. Millions will die and they won't all be Chinese.
They all out the cages oddly .
Funny to see comments from people who have never been to Asia, or haven’t visited in the last 20 years.
Right now China is more globally influential than the US.
Chinese ministers and diplomats are treaded like celebs when they visit countries like Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, etc.
The One Child Policy is barely in the minds of your average Chinese.
Any Chinese male with a college degree and career can get a wife from outside of China.
China is in vastly better shape than the USA.
They will win because they suffer none of the socially ill effects of wokeness of multiculturalism.
They even have a term Baizuo for the mentally ill left in the West.
Btw, Kissinger is in China and Xi granted an audience to the 100 year old statesman who is responsible for all of this.
Each time you analyze your monthly budget and realize you're missing $500-$600 you used to have leftover, you can thank "conservatives" like Roger Wicker and 18 of his other "conservative" friends who helped pass the ridiculous 1.7 trillion dollar bill last December. Hope those defense contractor campaign donations were worth bankrupting America over.
@1:08 you must have made bad investments, my bond portfolio is churning out $500-600 a month.
Funny to see comments from people who have never been to Asia, or haven’t visited in the last 20 years.
Hilarious, but not surprising, to see your self-importance on full display. You don't know where anyone here has been, ever or in the last 20 years.
@1:33 PM
I will keep it simple.
You people wouldn’t make so many ignorant comments about China if you had been there in the last decade.
Anywhere you can imagine in Asia is better than the USA right now.
Vibrant, growing, and optimistic.
Wicker is completely fiscally irresponsible and a horrible warmonger, but Mississippians will keep reelecting him the remainder of his life, which will probably be a long one as his father lived into his 90's.
US needs more attack subs you say?
Quick! Someone send Treasury Sec. Janet Yellen to China to kowtow to the PRC Finance Minister and beg for China to buy more of our junk treasuries to fund the MIC!
LMAO
Life is wonderful in China, the ChiComms are f'ing celebrities with mail order brides and here's some random ass video from the Philippines to prove it!
LOL LOL LOL
@4:17
….meanwhile in Jackson, Mississippi
An attack sub costs anywhere from $2.5 to $8 billion. We have sent well over $100 billion to Ukraine over the last year, all supported by RINO Roger. You can do the math.
Look around and see how this country is quickly falling into a state of disrepair. It is because our taxes have simply been handed over to defense contractors and war hawks. It will be a great day when Wicked is voted out.
Always interesting to read the opinion of the Senator representing Tel Aviv.
Senator Wicker, you've kissed enough behind to be the President of the United States of America but- you're kissing of behinds I hope leads to you're being defeated in your Re-Election efforts. This goes back many Years due to your smiling- coming from a good Family etc. You've always Kissed the Ring of Senate Politics, always followed Party Politics to be re-elected- I have to hope you're replaced by someone who listen's to Mississippians.
Sen Wicker, how much of this money, to be spent on Submarines, will end up with in your son and son and law pocket? I notice you're not saying much, if anything at all, about the pay to play scheme that the Bidens have been accused of.
No Senator, how about fixing the broken submarines that are sitting (moored) in shipyards and keep them fixed?
Is Roger still in office? You never hear of him doing anything until Election year…. Has he gotten any legislation through? Has he done anything to help MS and secure America?
Two shadows that I plan to never cast for vote for are Roger Wicker and Michael Guest. They constantly battle for who is the most useless member of the Ms Delagation.
Post a Comment