Ultimately the Royal Australian Navy [RAN] should have eight nuclear submarines [SNA]acquired as part of the AUKUS pact [Australie, Royaume-Uni et États-Unis]. This is after the purchase of twelve shortfin Barracuda submarines was canceled [ou classe Attack] with conventional propulsion from the French naval group. But there is no question of stopping there.
In fact, on February 20, the Australian Department of Defense unveiled a new naval strategic review aimed at strengthening the RAN to “a level never achieved since the Second World War” by equipping it with 26 so-called First tier surface ships, compared to only eleven currently.
“The RAN must be able to ensure the security of our sea routes […] because they are essential to our way of life and our prosperity,” argued Richard Marles, Australian Defense Minister. This plan will benefit from an additional investment of 6.5 billion Australian dollars.
However, given the difficulties it faces and the additional costs it has already incurred, the Sea 5000 program is not suitable [ou Hunter], based on the British Type 26 frigate, will be reduced by a third, as announced last September. This means that the RAN will only receive six of the nine ships ordered.
As a reminder: The Australian National Audit Office [ANAO] recently criticized the conditions under which the Hunter program was launched, saying the reasons that led Australian naval officials to choose the British model were “unclear”.
Regardless, reducing the number of Hunter-class frigates frees up resources for other programs. The Australian plan calls for the purchase of six surface ships that can operate without a crew and are equipped with 32 vertical launch systems. It is likely that the RAN will move closer to the US Navy under the AUKUS pact, as it launched the LUSV project [Large Unmanned Surface Vehicle] to have such a capacity.
Therefore, in addition to the three Hobart-type “destroyers”, the six Hunter frigates and the six crew-optional ships, the RAN needs eleven multi-purpose frigates to reach the 26 “first tier” surface ships. Apparently they are not built by Naval Group, as the manufacturer was immediately banned by the Australian Department of Defense. And that during the defense and intervention frigate [FDI] I'm sure it could have done well.
Just like the models proposed by the British … For example, the future Type 32 frigate would make it possible to overcome the RAN's personnel problems, since its crew could only include about fifty sailors …
This market is therefore fought between the German ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems [TKMS]with the frigate Meko 200, the Japanese Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, with the frigate Mogami, the South Korean Hanwha, with the Daegu-class frigate and the Spanish Navantia, with the frigate Alfa 3000.