“Australia buying a couple of nuclear submarines is a bit like parking your Lamborghini under the carport in front of your fibro-cement bungalow in Dandenong and expecting your neighbours to respect you”. (Peter O’Brien ‘Will Trump sink Aukus’, 5/7/25)

O’Brien writes that given the “contempt the Albanese government has shown towards the US” on a number of fronts, it is more likely than not that President Trump will pull the plug on the submarines - Pillar 1 of the AUKUS agreement.

It might not be all that bad an idea, according to the ex-ADF officer. He points out that Australia's only strategic commitment to the containment of China is the alliance with the US, and our geographical location as a base of operations. On the tactical level, Australian forces come under Australian command; but strategically - “nuclear submarines, long-range bombers/missiles” - the US would be in command.

So, these expensive submarines, bought in peacetime, might well be taken out of Australia's control in wartime, even crewed by Australians.

It could be a better idea to offer the use of our ports for America's nuclear submarines, while we devote our defence spending to areas and equipment we can (with the will) produce ourselves.

Peter O’Brien also points out that Japan has diesel-electric submarines, quietly operating, and costing ten times less than the American nuclear ones.

It would be good to have nuclear submarines, but it shouldn't be at the cost of a “balanced and formidable conventional force”; one up to countering the recent, and earlier, “humiliations” visited on us by China.

However, the author is not convinced that much needed changes will be possible with “Handsome Boy at the helm”.

Sycophantic American arse lickers like this nobody O’Brien will say “contempt the Albanese government has shown towards the US". The truth is the Albanese government is making no more than token gestures of asserting Australian sovereign independence in the face of American bullying (from Trump). Its about time Australia ditched the so called "American Alliance" ANZUS< AUKUS, nonsense, and charted a far more independent non aligned course in world affairs. When it comes to spending Australia should concentrate on DEFENCE, and tell America to stick their belligerent militarism up their you know what, and we are not going to be a part of it!

Peter O’Brien, Phd, is an academic and ex-ADF regular officer. He is a published author of fiction and non-fiction books. He is a prolific contributor to magazines and organisations e.g. Quadrant and Spectator magazines. He is also involved in technology and Aboriginal/Torres Strait affairs.

He has suggested a plausible alternative to the sometime/maybe AUKUS deal as our contribution to the American alliance, without which Australia is virtually defenceless, thanks to years of neglect by the uniparty.

An interesting aside to defence: Australian companies are making drones, shells and weapons which they sell to overseas countries - but not to our own defence department.

Albanese trips - Xi 4 Trump 0 - could suggest to some people that he is playing for the wrong team; and we might now all be going to pay for it, with 200% tariffs on our $2 billion pharmaceutical exports, and 20% on copper exports. These things used to be exempt; but Australia used to be a very different country, and Albanese's ‘going-it-alone’ nonsense and dislike of Trump has removed any special status we had with the US.

Why the hell would America NOT pull out of AUKUS. There are plenty of islands in the Pacific who would like to replace Australia as a strategic piece of land to deal with China.

“... no Australian prime minister since the war has done more to damage our defence interests than Albanese”. (Peter Jennings, Director of Strategic Analysis Australia, ‘PM doesn't get it, but Curtin knew we needed the US’, July 8 2025)

It has been revealed that for 2.5 years of the first 3 years of the Albanese catastrophe, Defence Minister Marles was kept in the dark by his department; and he didn’t think to ask why.