N J CURRIN

HMAS Sydney fires Royal Australian Navy’s first Naval Strike Missile during a SINKEX off the coast of Oahu, Hawaii as a part of Exercise Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) 2024. This is aligned to Government Direction announced in the 2022 Defence Strategic Review and in the 2024 National Defence Strategy.

The Royal Australian Navy has achieved a major milestone in integrating enhanced lethality strike capabilities into the surface combatant fleet as directed by Government.

Naval News Staff  22 Jul 2024

Australian Department of Defence press release

Hobart class destroyer, HMAS Sydney, has conducted a successful firing of the Naval Strike Missile, Navy’s replacement for the ageing Harpoon weapon system.

The firing was conducted during Exercise RIMPAC 2024, being hosted by the United States Navy off Hawaii, during a simulated activity which tested the sinking of Ex-USS Tarawa LHA1.

This is a major milestone towards achieving the objectives of the National Defence Strategy by enhancing Defence’s integrated, focused force, and a great example of Defence’s collaboration with industry and international partners.

HMAS Sydney – built at Osborne in South Australia – is a guided missile destroyer that can provide air defence and maritime protection for accompanying ships, land forces and infrastructure in coastal areas.

Minister for Defence Industry, Pat Conroy said:

​”This collaboration between Defence and industry partner Kongsberg Defence Australia, along with local Australian companies such as Marand, Aerobond, Australian Precision Technologies, Nupress Group, Axiom Precision Manufacturing and Stahl Metall, demonstrates the Australian Government’s commitment to working with defence industry to accelerate enhanced lethality capability integration.

“The National Defence Strategy outlined a strategy of denial as the cornerstone of Defence planning to prevent any potential adversary from succeeding in coercing Australia through force, while supporting regional security and prosperity.

“This firing was an excellent example of Defence, our international partners and Australian industry working together to accelerate the delivery of new capability to promote regional stability.

“Australia’s strategic environment is changing rapidly, the introduction of Naval Strike Missile allows our Navy’s surface ships to conduct long range maritime strike and delivers on our promise to increase the capability and lethality of our Navy.”

https://youtube.com/watch?v=hHENjUZSHBA%3Ffeature%3Doembed

The Chief of Navy, Vice Admiral Mark Hammond, said:

“HMAS Sydney’s firing of Naval Strike Missile during RIMPAC 2024 represents a significant increase in the lethality of our surface fleet, and delivers on our commitment to accelerate the introduction of enhanced lethality strike capabilities.

“Naval Strike Missile is a key capability for the lethality enhancement and survivability of our ships and enables our ability to hold an adversary at risk at greater range.

“Multi-domain strike capabilities including Naval Strike Missile are foundational to deterring any potential adversary’s attempts to project power against Australia.”

Australian Army soldiers from 2nd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, conduct amphibious operations in Zodiac inflatable boats as a CH-47F Chinook helicopter takes-off from HMAS Canberra off the coast of Tonga in 2022. (Source: Defence)

More than at any point in history, contemporary navies provide nations with a strategic game-changing capability. In a post-crisis era, Australia’s naval capabilities will provide the nation with the strategic freedom to defend our interests in a competitive global environment.

While raw, overt naval combat power and presence is critical and will only become more important in a post-crisis world and Indo-Pacific, the strategic force multipliers and connective tissue capabilities are equally important, if not more so.

As we discussed in the first part of this post-crisis force conversation about the future of the Royal Australian Navy, focusing on the “central pillar” capabilities and the composition of the future surface combatant fleet with an emphasis on power projection, lethality, scalability and sustaining concurrent deployments across the region.

However, these capabilities are just part of the equation and while forming a critical component of Australia’s post-crisis naval force and while the emphasis on power projection is apparent, there are key enabling platforms that enhance the overall strategic capabilities to secure the nation’s maritime interests in an increasingly contested Indo-Pacific.

At the forefront of this is Australia’s future conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarine fleet to be procured under the trilateral AUKUS relationship which will serve as the core of the nation’s strategic deterrent capability, elevating the nation to an elite group of nations that operate a fleet of nuclear-powered submarines.

No less important is the nation’s sealift capabilities that provide critical mobility and logistics support for the Australian Army, support humanitarian and disaster relief missions in the region, as well as critical “auxiliary” capabilities like the nation’s hydrographic, mine hunting and laying capacity that serve as integral components of the nation’s maritime security in a post-crisis world and region.

Let’s also not forget that we are emphasising a more efficient and effective use of personnel and the adoption of novel sensor and effector technologies to create a smarter and more lethal naval force capable of securing and promoting regional peace and stability and Australia’s place in the world.

Finally, we have the nation’s maritime border patrol and interdiction force which forms the outer layer of the nation’s security in scenarios below the threshold of open peer or near-peer conflict, so we have a lot to cover!

VIEW ALL

Promoted by Toll Group

Resilient supply chain required to deliver the ADF’s “North Star”READ MORE

Promoted by Jones Lang LaSalle Australia

When teamwork is more than a marketing catchphraseREAD MORE

Promoted by Defence Connect

Read the latest Defence Connect digital magazineREAD MORE

Our strategic deterrence force – nuclear-powered submarines and autonomous underwater systems

Debate aside about the delays and setbacks for the Collins Class replacement program, the nation’s acquisition of a nuclear-powered submarine fleet fundamentally transforms the nation’s strategic capability and weight, unfortunately, Australia will never be capable of fielding a fleet large enough to offset the submarine capability of our main strategic rivals.

Don’t confuse my ambivalence, Australia’s fleet of eight proposed submarines is a good place to start! We just need to get that number up to nine, this would allow for three submarines to be at sea at any given time, with one providing escort duties attached to the larger fleet formation, either in support of our new carrier or sealift capability, with the other two conducting, as the United Kingdom terms it, “continuous-at-sea-deterrence” patrols.

Advocating for an expansion of Australia’s SSN-AUKUS fleet echoes similar sentiments identified by William Freer and Dr Emma Salisbury for the Council on Geostrategy, in a report, titled A more lethal Royal Navy: Sharpening Britain’s naval power, in which they advocate for the acquisition of 12 SSN-AUKUS (up from the planned like-for-like replacement of the seven Astute Class boats) and “ensure their design has significant land attack and anti-ship missile capability, including vertical launching systems (VLS)” along with expanding the capacity of automation to minimise the crew requirements in face of mounting workforce shortages.

The emphasis on offensive firepower is further enhanced by the confirmation of Australian Submarine Agency Director-General Rear Admiral Jonathan Mead that Australia’s future nuclear-powered submarines will be equipped with hypersonic missiles, when he said, “It (SSN-AUKUS) will be able to fire more long-range missiles or hypersonic missiles … It’ll be able to fire more long-range torpedoes. It will be able to carry a larger reactor for more power. It will be able to carry uncrewed autonomous vehicles.”

Bringing us to a critical force multiplier – autonomous underwater vehicles – again referencing the Australian-developed Ghost Shark and platforms like Boeing’s Orca, extra-large uncrewed underwater vessels as “long wingman” style force multipliers attached to our submarine fleet, without the costs associated with radically expanding the submarine fleet.

Building on this, the advent of mass producible, cost-effective surface and underwater autonomous systems like the Ocius Bluebottle, Northrop Grumman’s Manta Ray, and Leidos’ Sea Hunter platforms add further scalability to enhance maritime security and deterrence capabilities by establishing a dispersed web of sensors, linked to a scaled set of effectors establishing an important set of “trip lines” through the maritime environment of the Indo-Pacific.

Maritime border control – Australia’s Coast Guard

Many long-time readers will no doubt be familiar with my advocacy for a militarised Coast Guard, reorganising the Australian Border Force and elements of the Royal Australian Navy into a single, coherent organisation focused on maritime border security and patrol, both our northern approaches and, as has often been overlooked by successive governments, Australia’s Antarctic interests.

With one of the largest maritime exclusion zones in the world, the fact that Australia doesn’t effectively have a single, coherent Coast Guard is quite frankly a bit of a joke, instead, deferring to the Navy a responsibility that takes away from the core mission of the force, which is to fight and win at sea and secure our national interests away from the continent.

In a post-crisis world, one is obligated to ask if this business-as-usual approach is viable, as is the platforms, namely the Cape and Evolved Cape Class, respectively, currently serving in the maritime border patrol and security force (I have not raised the question of the now scaled back Arafura Class offshore patrol vessels as that has been done to death).

The scaled back Arafura Class are scheduled to undergo investigations to determine future roles either in the maritime border patrol function or in support of autonomous counter-mine, hydrographic and a range of other roles.

So it becomes clear we need a more capable and “militarised” capability to form the core of a post-crisis Coast Guard, with the force to balance both traditionally crewed platforms while maximising the capability provided by a range of aerial, underwater and surface-based autonomous systems. While I don’t want to prescribe specific platforms as solutions, it is helpful to understand what is available to fill these mission sets, with Australian-shipbuilder Austal presenting a solution in their Offshore Patrol 83 design.

Adding further range and endurance to the Coast Guard is of paramount importance. Again, this is where autonomous systems come into their own, with platforms like Bluebottle and, perhaps, most critically, the Leidos Sea Hunter come into their own, providing a rapidly scalable, commercially viable, off-the-shelf design that can be tailored to meet the unique operational requirements of Australia’s Coast Guard.

Finally, bringing us to Australia’s southern interests, in particular, Australia’s Antarctic interests that are increasingly being encroached upon and contested by near-peer and peer competitors with potentially nefarious intentions against the “soft underbelly” of the nation.

Protecting the nation’s southern interests requires both ambition and consistent, considered investment in our Australian Antarctic Division and it’s maritime capabilities. Importantly, we don’t need to reinvent the wheel when it comes to securing our southern maritime border, with a range of shipbuilders around the world providing a fit-for-purpose multipurpose polar patrol vessels designed to deliver the desired capability for both the Coast Guard and to help Australia’s scientific endeavours in the region viable and competitive.

Again, we find that autonomous platforms provide an important force multiplier to enhance Australia’s situational awareness and persistent presence in a critical component of Australia’s area of primary interest. All of this necessitates a major logistical footprint to support, providing the perfect repurposing of the nation’s troubled Supply Class fleet replenishment vessels without detracting from capability.

Strategic sealift, Military Sealift Command and Counter Mine warfare

Sealift provides the nation with critical tactical and strategic flexibility, Army in particular, with a reimagined amphibious role and supporting follow on “mass” requires a flexible, credible tactical and strategic sealift capability in order to deliver Australian forces to the battlefield in a timely, survivable manner.

Following the cancellation of the $3-4 billion SEA 2200 program, Navy will defer heavily to the Littoral Manoeuvre Vessel Medium and Heavy to provide the bulk of the nation’s sealift capability and rightfully so, at least in the case of the medium-sized vessels in particular, however, getting the “Heavy” vessel right is critical, as is maximising the strategic sealift capability available to Australian decisionmakers.

Worth serious consideration in particular is the Littoral Strike Ship concept currently being developed for the United Kingdom, conveniently based upon the base design of the proposed hybrid fleet oiler and solid store replenishment vessels, providing Navy with a critical advantage in terms of economies of scale, ship interoperability and capability.

The British Littoral Strike Ship concept, similar in many ways to the US Navy’s Mobile Seabasing concept, delivers an incredible base package for both Navy and Army, providing the equivalent capacity of 90 C-17 Globemaster aircraft loads of stores, while maximising the use of personnel through the integration of commercial automation and maximises survivability through the inclusion of a host of self -defence measures, and perhaps most critically for amphibious forces, the integration of containerised strike capability.

Perhaps most enticingly, these vessels could also serve to provide the core of the Albanese government’s long promised “Strategic Fleet” or “Military Sealift Command” when not in service with the Australian Armed Forces, again leveraging the example and success of the model established by the UK’s Fleet Auxiliary or even be utilised by commercial operators to support maritime trade during peacetime (potentially turning a profit to be returned to the Defence budget).

Finally, the modular base of this ship design provides the basis for Australia’s own specialised humanitarian and disaster relief hospital ships to support the nation’s soft power strategy and Pacific Step Up while also providing the nation with ships capable of delivering a domestic response without having to detract from Navy’s core mission of fighting and winning at sea.

It is easy to see then how a fleet of six such dedicated sealift ships serving alongside our fleet of medium littoral manoeuvre vessels will prove invaluable, combined with two humanitarian support and disaster relief, hospital ships would provide immense value to Australia’s tactical and strategic objectives at a time of increasing instability and multipolarity.

Autonomous systems can play a role here to, with platforms like Leidos’ Ranger and Mariner autonomous surface vessels ideal candidates to provide follow on autonomous logistics sealift capabilities, removing the risks to crewed platforms, while also providing avenues for further local industry participation and expansion through shipbuilding partnerships with the likes of Austal for variants of the Expeditionary Fast Transport and partnering with Australian SME’s including Greenroom Robotics to enhance the autonomous logistics support capabilities.

The government’s decision to abandon SEA 1905 and the replacement of Australia’s ageing but venerable Huon Class mine hunters in favour of a purely autonomous focus leaves the nation exposed at a time when we can ill afford it. But this may very well be where the remaining Arafura Class vessels find their home as reconfigured, specialised Mine Countermeasures Motherships (MCM) and home to a host of autonomous systems to serve in this role.

Letting crewed countermine capabilities go would prove to be one of the greatest tactical and strategic disasters in military history and must be avoided at all costs, so let’s leverage the platforms we have and our partnerships, particularly with the United Kingdom and other European nations that are rapidly expanding their MCM fleets with adaptable, future-proofed and highly capable platforms to confront and solve these challenges.

Final thoughts

In the next part of this series I will move on to the Royal Australian Air Force, Special Operations Command, along with the national economy and industrial base and, finally, our diplomatic pathways for ways to “harden” ourselves and prepare for a challenge we all pray never comes.

Importantly, to do this and deliver such outcomes, Australia will need to have an honest conversation about how we view ourselves and what our own ambitions are. Is it reasonable for Australia to position itself as a “middle” or “regional” power in this rapidly evolving geopolitical environment?

Equally, if we are going to brand ourselves as such, shouldn’t we aim for the top tier to ensure we get the best deal for ourselves and our future generations?

If we are going to emerge as a prosperous, secure, and free nation in the new era of great power competition, it is clear we will need break the shackles of short-termism and begin to think far more long term, to the benefit of current and future generations of Australians.

Get involved with the discussion and let us know your thoughts on Australia’s future role and position in the Indo-Pacific region and what you would like to see from Australia’s political leaders in terms of partisan and bipartisan agenda setting in the comments section below, or get in touch at [email protected] or at [email protected].

HMAS Stalwart conducts a dual replenishment at sea with HMA Ships Brisbane and Toowoomba during a transit as part of a regional presence deployment. (Source: Defence)

As a maritime trading nation straddling two of the world’s major oceans, the Navy is critical to securing and promoting Australia’s national interests and security – in a hyper-competitive and multipolar post-crisis world, Navy will only become more pivotal for the nation.

As the largest island continent on the planet with a maritime jurisdiction of in excess of 8 million square kilometres, Australia, as a nation and a people, is defined by its relationship with the ocean.

Beyond the social and cultural aspects, our relationship with the ocean and our maritime approaches has ranged from angst to anxiety through to hostility and outright apathy as a result of our “tyranny of distance”.

This “tyranny of distance” is rapidly being replaced by a “predicament of proximity” given the nation’s geographic location at the crossroads of the Pacific and Indian Oceans and the economic, political, ideological, and strategic competition of the 21st century.

This has only become more front of mind since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the ongoing conflict in the Middle East and the Red Sea, which is responsible for constraining waterways responsible for US$1 trillion (AU$1.5 trillion) worth of maritime trade every year, never mind China’s ongoing brinkmanship and antagonism in the South China Sea putting at risk more than US$5.3 trillion (AU$7.83 trillion) of maritime trade every year.

Yet for much of our history, we have enjoyed the free and unhindered access to the global maritime commons, secured initially by the British Empire and the might of the Royal Navy and now secured since the end of the Second World War in part by ourselves, but at a global level by the United States.

This benevolence and security provided Australia with the opportunity to trade with the world, opening up the vast and unrivalled mineral wealth of the nation and unlocking our agricultural promise to the benefit of millions at home and hundreds of millions abroad.

While Australia was far from alone in benefiting from the post-Second World War peace and security, as a nation, Australia has disproportionally benefited in many ways, buoyed by the voracious appetite of nations across the world, but in particular, right on our doorstep in the Indo-Pacific.

VIEW ALL

Promoted by Jones Lang LaSalle Australia

When teamwork is more than a marketing catchphraseREAD MORE

Promoted by Toll Group

Resilient supply chain required to deliver the ADF’s “North Star”READ MORE

Promoted by Finni

Get a better loan with FinniREAD MORE

Indeed, as Australian Strategic Policy Institute Senior Fellow David Uren explained in his recent report, The trade routes vital to Australia’s economic security, “A recurrent theme in Australia’s defence strategy has been our reliance on and need to defend Australia’s trade routes in a globalised world. The vulnerability of Australia’s limited stockpiles of critical goods and its concentrated sources of supply have driven military capability and planning for decades and remain a justification for strategic investments.”

This longstanding consideration has formed the basis of Australia’s strategic posture, defence policy and force structure planning as far back as the immediate years following the end of the Second World War and, more recently, has driven the government’s 2023 Defence Strategic Review and supporting Independent Analysis into Navy’s Surface Combatant Fleet which stressed the importance for an increased Australian capacity to control and secure the critical sea lines of communication and maritime that the nation depends upon.

Yet in the aftermath of a great power conflict and crisis closer to home, we are left wondering if the proposals outlined by the government, including the vaunted acquisition of the nation’s future conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarines are enough to truly preserve and protect Australia’s interests in an era of unrestricted multipolar competition.

So in a similar manner to our discussion around a post-crisis Army, what does a post-crisis force look like for Navy as we confront said challenges?

Utilising our most precious resource

As has long been established, Australia needs to do a far better job of utilising its most precious and finite resource, namely its personnel, with Navy in particular facing major challenges to recruitment and retention rates that will only become more pronounced if not rectified rapidly.

Currently, the Royal Australian Navy, according to its own website, consists of “nearly 50 commissioned vessels” but actually operates a fleet of 41 “major warships” against “over 16,000 personnel”, bringing together a fleet of advanced combatants in the three Hobart Class (180 crew) air warfare destroyers; the venerable, but seven ageing Anzac Class (177 crew) guided missile frigates; the two Canberra Class landing helicopter docks; two Supply Class auxiliary oilers; and six Collins Class (48 crew) submarines.

For comparison, the Royal Canadian Navy operates a fleet of 68 commissioned vessels against a full-time, active personnel workforce of approximately 8,400 personnel, albeit with a far more, consolidated and “rationalised” fleet of 12 Halifax Class (225 crew) guided missile frigates; 12 Kingston Class (47 crew) maritime coastal defence vessels; four of eight Harry DeWolf Class (65 crew) arctic offshore patrol vessels; and four Victoria Class (53 crew) submarines.

Yes, some will say, but Canada doesn’t operate the “big amphibious ships” like Australia’s Canberra Class, our Supply Class auxiliary replenishment ships, and the single, HMAS Choules and that is a fair statement. For reference, a single Canberra Class has a crew of 358 while a single Supply Class has a crew of 122 and HMAS Choules with a crew of 158, respectively.

Even to a lay person with limited understanding of naval capabilities and personnel management, Australia seems to have over-capitalised in personnel for less combat capability at sea, something recent decisions around Australia’s contribution to RIMPAC and following a US request to contribute a warship to the Red Sea which were effectively declined by the government seem to reinforce.

It becomes a reasonable question then if we have all of these people but struggle to deploy a single frigate or destroyer to support our “great and powerful friend” and primary security benefactor, what the hell are we doing?

The ‘central pillar’ platforms

As it stands, Australia’s Canberra Class amphibious warfare ships, HMAS Choules and, to a lesser extent, the two Supply Class auxiliary serve as the lynchpin or central pillars of the Royal Australian Navy and its transition to delivering “impactful projection” and deterrence capabilities as part of an “integrated, focused” and “balanced force” in the post-crisis world.

Accordingly, these platforms, or more likely their replacements, will remain the “central pillar” of our national naval capability, despite the rhetoric around Australia’s future fleet of conventionally-armed, nuclear-powered submarines being our new “capital ships”, the reality is far different.

Now, of course, we will have to consider the trends emerging among both our partners and adversaries, either revealed or potential, as well as learn the lessons of the crisis scenarios and any number of alternatives to inform the optimal capability mix in order to form the broader “integrated, focused” and “balanced force”.

While many analysts have advocated for the position that the advent of reliable and mass producible anti-ship ballistic and cruise missiles make large surface vessels like aircraft carriers and large amphibious warfare ships obsolete for contemporary peer or near-peer conflict.

Now that isn’t entirely true, as the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) scenario revealed, while there is a heavy toll on large surface combatants, this comes as a result largely on the lack of defensive measures, namely missile magazine depth or a lack thereof, particularly in the Australian context.

Equally, there is an assumption held by Australia’s strategic planners and decisionmakers that Australia will always be able to call upon an American or, at a stretch, British or maybe Japanese or South Korea aircraft carrier to provide reliable and credible fleet air cover and support at extended ranges beyond the Australian mainland.

So that presents two factors worth serious contemplation and raises an old question, does Australia need a fixed-wing naval aviation capability?

The answer is actually quite simple – yes. Particularly in a post-crisis world where our access to the cover provided by an allied carrier capability maybe limited at best or non-existent at worst. This only becomes more apparent as potential adversaries develop their own carrier capabilities or our neighbours may deny or restrict Australian access to airfields throughout the region to avoid being dragged into a further conflict.

This is also, by no means, advocacy for a supercarrier, that would be counterproductive, but rather an opportunity for Australia to further enhance our relationship with key allies via a common platform developed in conjunction with either or both Japan and South Korea in order to maximise the value proposition while also aggregating capability among like-minded nations in the Indo-Pacific.

The real question now becomes about the number of ships, the size of the platform and airwing capacity and if there are any structures already in service that we can modify and emulate to suit Australia’s operational structures, requirement and environment.

As a base concept, we would need to field an optimal number of three, allowing for coverage of the east, west and north coasts of the mainland, allowing for a vessel on deployment or exercise, a high readiness vessel and one in its maintenance cycle.

In order to maximise the strategic impact of the ships, the base design would need to sit in the weight class of the Italian Navy’s new large deck amphibious warfare ship Trieste at 38,000–40,000 tonnes, with a similar crew complement, while also allowing for reasonable growth margins and power generation capacity, supporting a fixed-wing airwing of 24 aircraft and 16 support helicopters and uncrewed systems.

Importantly, none of these ships would have an organic amphibious warfare capability, they will be purely focused on projecting Australian airpower and fleet aircover abroad but should – like the UK’s HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales – be capable of providing sizeable follow-on ground forces via air assault should it be required in support of amphibious operations.

Finally, in order to mitigate the inter-service rivalry and concern over “capability theft” over a return to fixed-wing naval aviation, borrowing the hybrid model utilised by the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force provides invaluable lessons for Australia to learn from and emulate with “Australian characteristics” while also ensuring that the surface Navy provides invaluable tactical and strategic options for decisionmakers.

Equally important is the nation’s at-sea replenishment capability or as it stands at the moment, seriously limited capacity despite the “brand new” nature of both HMA Ships Supply and Stalwart which face a range of serious and well-documented issues. These invaluable vessels provide the Australian Navy and our allies, for that matter, with the capacity to sustain operations at range for protracted periods of time and, as such, are vital components of our strategic capability.

So getting this right should be paramount. These ships further hinder Australian naval capability as a result of their large crewing requirements and limited self-defence capabilities, issues that need to be rectified or should never have been issues to begin with, for that matter. That is not to say that we scrap the two Supply Class vessels, it is now more a case of repurposing them (but more on that later).

In their place, we have the opportunity to consolidate and expand the nation’s auxiliary fleet while leveraging existing supply chains, working with allies in both the United Kingdom and South Korea to field updated variants of the AEGIR-18A initially proposed by a conglomerate during the original tendering phase for SEA 1654 Phase 3.

These ships provide enhanced range (10,000 nautical miles versus 6,000 nautical miles), a smaller crew complement (63 standard embarked crew versus 122 standard embarked crew, while the Norwegian variant of the AEGIR-18A has a smaller crew again at 43 standard complement), albeit with a significant increase in size of the vessel affording greater store capacity (19,000 m³ for diesel oil, aviation fuel versus a combined total of 10,505m³ for liquid fuel stocks).

The Royal Navy’s Fleet Auxiliary currently uses the larger AEGIR-26 as the basis for their four (although one is extended reserve readiness) Tide Class tanker fleet, built partially in South Korea and serves as the basis for the Fleet Auxiliary’s Fleet Solid Support Ship program of three ships to be built in Belfast, Northern Ireland, so Australia could theoretically work with both the UK or South Korea (including providing steel) to field a well-rounded, highly capable and manpower-appropriate level of capability.

Recognising that even with a smaller crew complement, Australia can only field a limited number of auxiliary vessels, so balancing the design to maximise both liquid fuel and solid store capacity will be paramount, so again collaborating with either or both the United Kingdom and South Korea will provide an optimal pathway to delivering a sizeable expansion of the capability (from two ships, to six) in a timely and cost-effective manner.

Post-crisis surface combatant fleet

Bringing us to the future of Australia’s surface combatant fleet, which as outlined by the government’s review into the future of the major surface combatants is slated to expand in size, being broken into two tiers of combatants, with the nation’s three Hobart Class destroyers and six Hunter Class destroyers (I am going to begin referring to them as destroyers because on size metrics, that is what they are) serving as our “Tier One” combatants with a fleet of optimally 11 “Tier Two” general purpose frigates.

These surface combatants will be supported by a fleet of six, Aegis combat system equipped “large optionally crewed surface vessels” (LOSVs) to be armed with 32 vertical launching system cells (the same “standard” vertical launch system loadout as the Hunter Class destroyers which have seen frequent criticism for being underarmed and use the Aegis Baseline 9 system.

In a post-crisis world, it remains to be seen if the surface combatant fleet outlined in the surface combatant review is sufficient to respond to the challenges, and many would argue it isn’t – I am one of them. I am also not sure the proposed major surface combatant fleet composition is optimal either.

Again, what am I proposing? First and foremost, increase the missile capacity of the Hunter Class from ship one, spending billions of dollars on a leading-edge warship with the billion-dollar Aegis combat system only to equip them with the naval equivalent of a cap gun-level of missile capacity is pure insanity.

Second, accelerate the build process to bring the fleet into service quicker as well as accelerate the design and development of the Hobart Class replacement program to begin construction at the launch of ship four of the Hunter Class, with an emphasis on deep missile magazine capacity, heavy automation to mitigate crew requirements, increased power generation, and next-generation self-defence capabilities.

As it comes to numbers of particular units, it is clear that the government’s preference for LOSVs (which are still unproven and in development) is an attempt at sleight of hand and begs questions around why we would spend billions on a suboptimal platform? Rather, we need to maximise the capability of the platforms we already have in the pipeline, not pursue science projects.

But to answer the numbers question, optimally, we would see the Hunter Class fleet returned to nine, with the follow-on Hobart Class replacements to be an equal number of hulls, again allowing equal coverage of our three major coastlines with high capability “Tier one” surface combatants capable of performing a range of duties, including, and perhaps most importantly, escort duties for our “central pillar” platforms.

Bringing us to the “Tier Two” general purpose frigates, proposed by the government as a mechanism for expanding the nation’s naval capability in a rapid, cost-effective manner by leveraging an “off-the-shelf” design with either the German MEKO A200/A210 or Japan’s Mogami Class frigate seemingly the frontrunners for the multi-billion program.

The seemingly “firming” number of 11 frigates is equally an odd choice, when a firm number of 12 would allow Australia to forward deploy a squadron of three in the region, operating out of a shared facility in Singapore or other “like minded” nation to help maintain regional peace and stability through projected presence and strength.

Now how do we make these surface combatants “smarter”? Well, we already have the keys to success here through innovative Australian platforms like the Ocius Bluebottle uncrewed surface vessels (USVs) which provide cost-effective persistent, long-range intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities to establish a wide-reaching web of sensors linked to effectors across the region and mainland Australia.

This surface combatant fleet would be further enhanced by the fielding of advanced large, uncrewed underwater systems, namely the Ghost Shark along with a scaled system-of-systems approach to autonomous aerial systems to effectively extend the eyes and ears and reach of the fleet. These sensor nodes would also feed effectively into the nation’s integrated battle management system being developed under AIR 6500, serving to enhance the protective shield provided by the sea-based leg of air and missile defence capabilities.

Final thoughts

Our post-crisis Navy has proven to be a bigger beast than I initially expected, so I will be covering the remaining components of our naval capability (including the Coast Guard) in a second part of this series before moving on to the Royal Australian Air Force, Special Operations Command along with the national economy and industrial base and, finally, our diplomatic pathways for ways to “harden” ourselves and prepare for a challenge we all pray never comes.

Importantly, to do this and deliver such outcomes, Australia will need to have an honest conversation about how we view ourselves and what our own ambitions are. Is it reasonable for Australia to position itself as a “middle” or “regional” power in this rapidly evolving geopolitical environment?

Equally, if we are going to brand ourselves as such, shouldn’t we aim for the top tier to ensure we get the best deal for ourselves and our future generations?

If we are going to emerge as a prosperous, secure, and free nation in the new era of great power competition, it is clear we will need break the shackles of short-termism and begin to think far more long term, to the benefit of current and future generations of Australians.

Get involved with the discussion and let us know your thoughts on Australia’s future role and position in the Indo-Pacific region and what you would like to see from Australia’s political leaders in terms of partisan and bipartisan agenda setting in the comments section below, or get in touch at [email protected] or at [email protected].