Why not in first place: French tech (Diesel) inferior to German. Japanese also offered better off the peg solution - problem was some fucking SA backbenchers wanted jobs via a guarantee that manufacture occur in SA. This was always going to be problematic but French agreed on basis that this would win them the contract.
Why pull out: Its became clear that French expected to minimise local SA production (understandable given have to build up industry) but they haven’t read the situation well and have been slower than expected getting to grips with reengineering of their existing models, haven’t felt contract at risk and communication (esp from Australia) has been poor. Ultimately it was a huge mistake (and a massive shock at the time) that the French were chosen. They should have gone either German (imo) or Japanese (many experts preferred pick at time) and gone off the peg instead of spunking 10s of billions trying to build a domestic sub workforce for the benefit maybe 5,000 SA jobs.
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Re safety. The big thing in Aus (which perhaps I didn’t make clear enough before) is that it really binds us to US with respect to defence integration. Strategically this has a number of problems but most importantly it makes the China/US choice unrevokeable and ensures Aus is pulled further from Chinese orbit without damaging domestic politics. Ultimately this will prove the right thing to do as disentangling from China is crucial to Aus security. So yes this part does make me feel safer. I also expect that Aus will have to use some sort of interim solution(S) and I expect we will now see further ramp up of US troops in Aus and friendly South Pacific ports unless we get an isolationist US president in 2024.
However, it also makes the nuclear-by-stealth arguments easier and I am confident that this will form part of the liberal govts wedge politics (nuclear replacing coal which will upset Labor and Greens) but also could even see Australia (eventually) pull out of the nuclear non proliferation treaty and go to nuclear ballistic subs.
What is SA?
Oh! so you mean in the pov of Aus not France?
What is the reburbishment capacity of Aus, surely being so isolated having a decent capacity is an immense advantage, no?
I’m no expert on these things, what I do know is that France seem desperate to win contracts, often so much so they agree to stuff that puts ‘too’ much pressure on what exists and can be obtained. Thsy do find solutions though.
Sorry SA is South Australia. Ship building jobs in Adelaide were the key reason the French bid beat out Japan - typical pork barrel politics by the LNP.
What’s pork barrel politics? 
‘what is SA’
???
perhaps if you are going to engage, you should at least get a basic grounding in the subject…
to save you the ‘effort’ of a google search, in the context of thgis debate its ‘south australia’
in future, itd be great if you could grasp the subject matter in a basic manner before trying to influence the debate. cheers.
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So an alliance with France who is looking to expand it’s maritime influence was not such a bad idea for a continent so far away. I presume the big blocking point was lack of industrial infrastructure in Aus, not being capable of supplying the mechanical parts necessary.
The French weren’t intransigent per se, they were perfectly willing to tack on extra time and costs.
France should have known this was in serious trouble in June, when the Aussie PM basically asked Macron to do whatever he could to fix what was becoming a catastrophic situation, and got nothing. They left the door open, thinking Australia had no real options.
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That really isn’t a very long time ago. Though this has been faultering for some time.
So what you are saying is that Aus blamed the French despite Aus changing the goalposts all the time?
Seems like manoevering to me. 
I personally think this is a big coup for Australia. The US simply does not share its technology with anyone (except the UK).
The collaboration isn’t just about submarines, it really strengthens the 5 eyes alliance but at a hardware level. The resources now being made available to Australia are far beyond those that France would have been able to bring to the table.
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The French have treated this as a commercial contract, where once they get their foot in the door, they can run up profit on the basis of contract interpretation, add-ons, change fees, etc. The Australians should have gone off the rack, but fundamentally were trying to fill an urgent strategic need.
What happened in June was seen as humiliating for Australia in military procurement circles, but at the time, Australia did not appear to have a choice.
A lot of what France is doing now seems to be for domestic consumption, but what happens within NATO will be the real test.
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yep.
‘Scot from marketing’ gets most things wrong, but…credit where its due, hes happy to go toe to toe with China, despite the odds…ill give him that much
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Have you a source for this or can you give a short overview?
?
What do you mean by this?
Basically on the short term nothing, in the long term that will depend on how the EU interprets all this and whether France can get some momentum on the EU defense straegy (from where I’m sitting that doesn’t look great as I mentionned before imo if France want tolook serious about this they need to be seen as ‘upping’ it domestically and that just is not the case).
On source - can’t find them now, the stories were much lower-profile and less numerous, completely buried now by all the more recent stories. Basically, Morrison told Macron he needed help, the cost and delays were becoming a crisis - probably as much for him personally as for Australia. Macron more or less patted him on the head and told him to be on his way.
The expression of pique over a commercial loss must surely be intended for domestic consumption, lost jobs and profits at stake and so forth, because from a strategic point of view it is fairly hard to take particularly seriously. Note that Canada was also excluded from the discussion, which has ruffled some feathers here.
The NATO question really intertwines with the EU defence question, and in that way the shoe is on the other foot for Macron. Just as he quite happily assumed that over the next decade Australia had no other options, what other options does France (and the EU) have, particularly? The US is pivoting to counter China, NATO is seen as less important than it was in the last century and not particularly reliable in Washington.
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This whole story is very low profile in France so I don’t understand this.
I really am trying to understand the positionning but don’t seem to be getting much help here due to the percieved ideas from the anglo-saxon position.
But then it is hilarious and petty!
Apart from increasing their military capacity and form a central command, whether they do this and even if they do how long will it take and how strong in reality collaboration is is to be seen. of course my opinion on this is already briefly stated before. I think it has to happen however someone has to take the lead and the onus is on France and they just are not doing what it would take from what I can gather.
A big problem as I see it is Macron is not a politician, never has been, never will be, and even if Drian is quite decent all Macron’s cronnies are yes men. In any case on foriegn policy Macron is all powerful.
Front page of Le Monde and lead story on the Radio France news doesn’t strike me as that low profile.
The need to increase military capacity is the heart of it. European capacity is better than it was a decade ago, but still nowhere near where it would need to be for Europe to have any real capacity for power projection. France is talking like this is some sort of frustration of their strategic initiatives, but behaving like a salesman that just lost a big deal at the last moment.
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EU should crack on with building a standing army. A centralised, interventionalist euro core capable of acting should be a game changer. Difficult to see happen of course but I’m forever hopeful for the rise of a German-French-Benelux entity capable of fulfilling the moderating, socially democratic force for good that the US is no longer capable of doing alone. God knows we need everyone to band together whenever possible to isolate China and Russia.
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There’s a lot of noise recently regarding European Defense Forces (EDF). Think there’s some engagements in Africa under an European umbrella too.
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