OPINION | Britain's submarine challenges do not spell AUKUS failure

As with 2025, early 2026 sees AUKUS Pillar One, Australia’s plan to acquire a nuclear-powered submarine capability, back in the headlines.

This time the focus is claims by a former Royal Navy admiral and former director of nuclear policy in the British Ministry of Defence about the parlous state of Britain’s nuclear submarine industrial base.

And he’s right. From the availability of Britain’s nuclear-powered attack boats and nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarines, the more than a decade it took to build the recently commissioned HMS Agamemnon, and concerns about nuclear core production, the challenges are real.

But they do not spell failure for Australia’s nuclear-powered submarine ambition under AUKUS, nor for the co-design and co-building of an AUKUS-class submarine. AUKUS helps address some of these challenges for Britain, which needs AUKUS to succeed.

Despite the headlines, AUKUS is not on the rocks.