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France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

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Re: France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

#161

Post by worrycue »

rmk wrote: post #45
tmilard wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because I am french I will not say anything too dark. But yes, this SUB contract was big. Giant.And Naval Group is partially a state company. The Worth for french community is this : 1) French just hatted Trump. Deeply. His sense of hatting his allies ( Germany...) and loving his foes ( North Corea, ect). 2) As opposed, French loved Biden. More rounded, multi cultural, more social like in Europe. I would say french p…

The nuclear subs appear to have much bigger advantages over conventional subs, so on the merits of the product, perhaps the US/UK combine increases security in the Pacific and strengthens the "contain China" strategy. Similarly, withdrawing from Afghanistan puts an end to twenty years of lying to the American public that the Afghan war was even a modest success, and allows resources and political capital to be focuse…

Nuclear submarines are expensive to dispose of though. The UK hasn’t completely dispose of any of their retire nuclear submarines if I’m right. Is the US going to dispose of the subs for Australia when they reach the end of their life or are the subs going to sit in dock forever like the UK subs?

P.S. Hell, the US itself is behind schedule disposing of their retired nuclear carriers.

Re: France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

#162

Post by edrxty »

gpayan wrote: post #89
tkojames wrote: post #16

It is super laughable because the nuclear powered version that they are building for themselves was a fixed bid contract for something like 10 billion for 8 subs.. and the Australian contract keeps going up and up something like 35 billion for ten subs. The diesel sub for Australia is based on the nuclear sub that they signed the fixed bid contract for. Anybody with half brain can tell they are making up the lost of…

Actually, as mentioned multiple times in the past couple of days by former French Ambassador to the US Gerard Araud, diesel was an Australia demand, which required France to modify its subs (all nuclear powered) and added complexity to the project. According to the former Ambassador, it would have been much easier and cheaper for France to supply Australia with nuclear subs.

Then why is it the US's fault Australia changed its mind?

Re: France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

#163

Post by ericmay »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #159
ericmay wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Looks to me like political hardball being played and it’s surprising France (and to a lesser extent the EU). Frankly, France and the EU have been trying to straddle a middle ground between the US and China, and strategically Europe is mostly irrelevant outside of the UK (yes I know France can project some power I’m not downplaying them) but they have been dragging their feet and the action is just not going to be in…

"Europe is mostly irrelevant outside of the UK" By what metric did you conclude that? It doesn't have a majorlead in anything measurable Re. USA and Russia, it was US, not EU pressing for greater sanctions against Russia

Militarily it's no longer relevant to US interests. And as far as economics go, well, nothing is changing here.

> Re. USA and Russia, it was US, not EU pressing for greater sanctions against Russia

Right... that's my entire point. The US is doing this on behalf of Europe based on the idea that there is a Russian threat (there isn't really for core EU nations) and that Europe wants to be defended. Europe doesn't want to be defended and isn't onboard with US actions to "defend" Europe. So why would the US spend any time here? What's to gain? A Europe that doesn't want the US? There's much more important things going on and you can't waste time and resources on this.

Re: France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

#164

Post by throwaway0a5e »

math wrote: post #17
xyk2 wrote: post #7

Is it just me or are there more off-topic political posts on HN lately?

Disturbing observation: 5 years ago, the trends that seemed most important to me were all technical - I really paid no attention to politics. Today, they are mostly geo-political.

Let me guess, 5yr ago you had an order of magnitude (or two) less money tied up in markets and illiquid investments.

Re: France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

#165

Post by WastingMyTime89 »

ericmay wrote: post #94
skissane wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn’t just that Australia cancelled the deal and made a new one with someone else. It is they kept their plans secret from France instead of letting them know about it and giving them a chance to make a counter-offer or save some face. France has nuclear submarines too, so maybe France could still have played some role? Maybe AUKUS could have been AFUKUS? They didn’t allow France into the negotiation room, and the…

Looks to me like political hardball being played and it’s surprising France (and to a lesser extent the EU). Frankly, France and the EU have been trying to straddle a middle ground between the US and China, and strategically Europe is mostly irrelevant outside of the UK (yes I know France can project some power I’m not downplaying them) but they have been dragging their feet and the action is just not going to be in…

> Europe has been unwilling to throw their cards in with America 100%

Why should they? America is an unreliable partner. They torpedoed a good deal with Iran, mismanaged the withdrawing from Afghanistan, have been a nuisance regarding the building of pipelines between Germany and Russia and an overall destabilizing force in the Middle-East. Trump did happen. The fastest Europe separates itself from the American sphere of influence, the better.

Re: France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

#166

Post by edrxty »

i_am_proteus wrote: post #158
mahkeiro wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

French contract took 4 years to be negotiated, the US one less than 6 months, in total secret with no public check… expect big surprises at the end, US weapons program are not known to never overrun their costs

The most recent submarine program (Virginia class) was effectively on-budget.

Probably due to its predecessor, the Seawolf, from which it was derived ended up being wildly cost ineffective.

Re: France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

#167

Post by will4274 »

fruffy wrote: post #60
tkojames wrote: post #16

It is super laughable because the nuclear powered version that they are building for themselves was a fixed bid contract for something like 10 billion for 8 subs.. and the Australian contract keeps going up and up something like 35 billion for ten subs. The diesel sub for Australia is based on the nuclear sub that they signed the fixed bid contract for. Anybody with half brain can tell they are making up the lost of…

How trustworthy is The War Zone? It seems to be largely focussed on US defence tech industry, so I expect fairly biased reporting on this topic. Is there a better source?

All reporting is biased. You shouldn't try to find unbiased reporting - you'll never succeed, except at fooling yourself - instead you should identify the biases of the things you read and read sources with a variety of biases.

Re: France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

#168

Post by beerandt »

gpayan wrote: post #89
tkojames wrote: post #16

It is super laughable because the nuclear powered version that they are building for themselves was a fixed bid contract for something like 10 billion for 8 subs.. and the Australian contract keeps going up and up something like 35 billion for ten subs. The diesel sub for Australia is based on the nuclear sub that they signed the fixed bid contract for. Anybody with half brain can tell they are making up the lost of…

Actually, as mentioned multiple times in the past couple of days by former French Ambassador to the US Gerard Araud, diesel was an Australia demand, which required France to modify its subs (all nuclear powered) and added complexity to the project. According to the former Ambassador, it would have been much easier and cheaper for France to supply Australia with nuclear subs.

Well I suspect the demand was at least partially due to budget, as opposed to philosophical or technological reasons for diesel over nuclear.

Separately, I've got to think turnkey access to the tomahawk missiles has almost got to play a bigger role in this than the sub itself, other than being capable of carrying said missiles.

Re: France Recalls Its Ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia over a Submarine Deal

#169

Post by akfanta »

RobRivera wrote: post #15
xyk2 wrote: post #7

Is it just me or are there more off-topic political posts on HN lately?

geopolitical topics != politics impact of nation-state relations have a very real impact on the world commerce

Didn't know we are are Commerce News.
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