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France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

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Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#91

Post by WastingMyTime89 »

curionav wrote: post #84

Politics plays a significant role here: * next year a new presidential election will take place in France * Macron may use this contract cancellation as an opportunity to decrease France participation in NATO (technically it could leave the integrated command) as De Gaulle did before him. This would allow him to capture more votes from the right as he would appears as a strong leader then, acting in continuity with G…

> France can not go out of NATO, the alliance with all its drawbacks is just too important for its own defense.

France could. It has maintained a strategy of independence regarding its own defense. France has its own nukes, its own nuclear submarines, designs and operates its own fighters, has a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and has some limited capacity of projection. France has no American troops stationed on its soild and apart from the catapults of the carrier, none of their technologies come from the USA.

France has one of the lowest public opinion on NATO in the EU. I think France would be very much in favor of sidelining NATO for a EU force. The issue is the others members of the EU particularly in the east.

> France like other Europeans countries are too far from home to take a part in this.

France has mutiple territories in the Pacitic including New Caledonia which has a border with Australia.

Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#92

Post by corty »

sofixa wrote: post #47
google234123 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/new-pressures-emerge-in... (from may) https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/call-to-review-submarin... (Jan) mentions walking away. Doubling the price, delays, and changing the terms (reducing local contribution told from 90 to less than 60) aren’t good ways to secure a deal with a partner that was already angry in 2018.

They were aware there were issues, and negotiations happened on how to fix them, with the French leaving them with the impression everything is good. Meanwhile Australia was already negotiating an alternative deal.

> They were aware there were issues, and negotiations happened on how to fix them, with the French leaving them with the impression everything is good.

The French culture is to never deliver bad news before the deadline has arrived. Underlings will never tell their boss that something is impossible, decisions will be made by grande-ecole-bosses without technical expertise and relationships are valued far higher than knowledge and expertise. You'll always get the first impression that all is well and they'll manage before the deadline. If you need a real non-sugar-coated insight as to how the project is going you need to gather your own data. Discreetly.

However, as soon as shit has hit the fan and bosses got involved, they'll bend over backwards to make things work. But you cannot expect meeting the first deadline, ever. Same for the first budget. Subsequent ones depend on the size of the project.

Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#93

Post by WastingMyTime89 »

kryptiskt wrote: post #48

So they have failed to deliver for five years with huge cost overruns and delays and get all mad when their customer says enough is enough. I wonder if any lessons learned will make it way back to their defense industry, or if playing the victim will suffice for them too.

> So they have failed to deliver for five years with huge cost overruns and delays and get all mad when their customer says enough is enough.

The contract was signed in 2019 after a complicated negociation and is only in the design phase.

If you go read the Australian reports on it, you will see that the main cause of delay is actually Australia. Contrary to France which has experience working on this kind of deal - they sold submarines to Brasil and India and boats to many more countries - Australia is not used to do this kind of work and it shows. The Morrison government however is all too happy to pin the blame on France especially considering the deal was mostly done by Turnbull.

If you expect the American contract to go smoothly and with no overrun, you are in for quite a surprise I fear.

Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#94

Post by inglor_cz »

WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #90
inglor_cz wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is plenty to gain through the diplomatic route as long as you see China as an equal partner and not an inferior country. Does China see other countries as equal partners? Their Howling Wolf diplomacy seems to kick in whenever anything they dislike appears in any media. See their current hatefest against Lithuania, a country with population smaller than Shanghai. I for one am not very ready to sacrifice, e.g.…

> Does China see other countries as equal partners? Their Howling Wolf diplomacy seems to kick in whenever anything they dislike appears in any media. China is an authoritarian country with a strategic vision which put it at odd with its closest neighbors. It's in no way an easy partner. Then again, neither is it an unreadable one nor a completely unreasonable one. What China wants is pretty clear: control of the Sou…

"Xi Jinping is already 68. His rule won't last eternally."

Eternally not, but the recent progresses in longevity field might give him 20-30 more years at the helm.

This is an interesting strategic question that isn't discussed as much as it ought to. Even Western nations are evolving into gerontocracies. We should probably introduce some hard term limits. Already there are U.S. Senators that served more than 40 years.

Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#95

Post by WastingMyTime89 »

corty wrote: post #92
sofixa wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They were aware there were issues, and negotiations happened on how to fix them, with the French leaving them with the impression everything is good. Meanwhile Australia was already negotiating an alternative deal.

> They were aware there were issues, and negotiations happened on how to fix them, with the French leaving them with the impression everything is good. The French culture is to never deliver bad news before the deadline has arrived. Underlings will never tell their boss that something is impossible, decisions will be made by grande-ecole-bosses without technical expertise and relationships are valued far higher than…

> The French culture is to never deliver bad news before the deadline has arrived.

No, it definitely is not. You have no idea of how this kind of project works.

Naval Group has a ton of experience managing large contracts with state actors. They have worked with Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Singapore, Taiwan, Pakistan, India, Malaysia, Egypt and I am probably forgetting some. They know what they are doing.

Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#96

Post by sgent »

willvarfar wrote: post #24
jean_tta wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Including, of course, the defensive invasion of Afghanistan using article 5.

There have been a long history of "hot" confrontations and proxy wars like Korea, Cuba and Angola, Vietnam, the Russians in Afghanistan and then the US in Afghanistan etc. But go ask random people on streets in the US, Russia or Europe, and they will focus on the "cold war" and the iron curtain and NATO's defense of the west against the threat of Soviet expansion.

Yes but only the Afghanistan invasion was a NATO operation, the rest were either US only or US and allied countries, but not NATO.

The NATO treaty only protects members if they were attacked in Europe or the North Atlantic. If bin Laden had hit the Sear Tower instead of the WTC it would probably not have been a NATO operation.

Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#97

Post by lerela »

rmm wrote: post #41
inglor_cz wrote: post #2

On one hand I understand them, sudden cancelation of a contract is very unpleasant and demeaning. On the other hand, this is basically a diplomatic version of a tantrum; and powerful countries rarely respond to a tantrum by doing anything substantial. If France could get the rest of the EU behind it, then maybe. But rest of the EU looks at the problem with disinterest, given that they stood to gain nothing from the o…

>>On one hand I understand them, sudden cancelation of a contract is very unpleasant and demeaning. It was definitely not sudden. They had been warned many times for growing costs, delays etc.. It may have been 'sudden' in the sense that they didnt think Australia would actually pull through with the threat.

French and Australian Defence ministers met in August and issued a joint communique [1] mentioning that they discussed "enhancing and diversifying France’s military co-operation with Australia" and stating that "both sides committed to deepen defence industry cooperation and enhance their capability edge in the region" and most specifically that "ministers underlined the importance of the Future Submarine program".

Announcing 2 weeks later that the contract was cancelled sounds like a "sudden" announcement to me, while the press reports that discussions had been ongoing for almost 18 months in secret make that communique slightly deceitful from Australian government imo.

[1]: https://www.foreignminister.gov.au/minister/marise-payne/med...

Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#98

Post by roenxi »

WastingMyTime89 wrote: post #70
roenxi wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> lobby to get the EU - Australia free trade agreement severely limited then carry on as usual This type of response always baffles me. Australia here is not buying what France is selling. If they object to that, making it harder for Australians to buy other things France is selling is the opposite of clever. And in reverse - Australia sells food and raw materials. Under what circumstances is it bad for France to tra…

> Australia here is not buying what France is selling. If they object to that, making it harder for Australians to buy other things France is selling is the opposite of clever. Australia have been extremely untransparent regarding their position and how they conducted the whole negociation. They lied to their French counterparts during the summer and announced their withdrawal in an extermely clumsy and frankly disre…

What plausible risk is there that Australians won't honour the deals they make under a free trade deal? If someone buys a million dollars worth of Australian beans they're going to get tonnes of beans.

I don't fault the French if they don't see a benefit and want to be annoying in some sort of tit-for-tat strategy; but making trade harder is not going to make their lives better. People only trade when the trade improves their position.

A $60+ billion military deal is never going to be handled under a free trade agreement. I haven't read into the details but I doubt there was even any fraud involved; just standard political backstabbing. The French weren't given an opportunity but they are not worse off.

Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#99

Post by sedan_baklazhan »

willvarfar wrote: post #14
sedan_baklazhan wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But did NATO (ever in its history) function as a defence alliance, not as an agressive alliance, though?

NATO has only ever been a defense alliance. Early in the cold war there were a few senior generals on both sides that thought the US could or should make a first strike against Russia. But the leadership and the populous on both sides of the curtain never thought that was what it was all about at all. The aggressor was always going to be Russia invading western Europe, and NATO was always about defending it.

But which exact defensive wars/conflicts has NATO fought?

Re: France cancels defence meeting with UK over submarine row, sources say

#100

Post by lerela »

rualca wrote: post #81
jean_tta wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Australia went from an ever-closer relationship with France to ditching them, unannounced. Even if it is unwarranted, surely France reaction _is_ a major geopolitical consequence.

> Australia went from an ever-closer relationship with France to ditching them, unannounced. This is a very disingenuous take on the issue, if not outright completely wrong, and it feels like you intentionally decided to feign ignorance regarding France's failures to deliver and even meet the contract's basic requirements. https://www.politico.eu/article/why-australia-wanted-out-of-...

Despite those difficulties (that do not sound ludicrous considering the complexity and the amount of technology transfer that was required, but I'm no submarines expert), as I mentioned in another comment, the joint communique between French and Australian Defence minister from August mentioned that "both sides [were] committed to deepen defence industry cooperation and enhance their capability edge in the region" and that "ministers underlined the importance of the Future Submarine program".

Looking back, it is hard to argue that official line was not very disingenuous, even after acknowledging the issues with the program.

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