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Australia and the F-35 supply chain: in lockstep with Lockheed

The Australian government has continued arms exports to Israel while assuring Australians it has not sent weapons to Israel for five years

MICHELLE FAHY. MAY 03, 2024,  https://undueinfluence.substack.com/p/lockstep-with-lockheed-australia?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=297295&post_id=143751160&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

Australia is one of six western countries that are complicit in the ‘genocidal erasure’ of the Palestinian people by continuing to supply Israel with arms, according to Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah, a British-Palestinian surgeon and newly elected rector of Glasgow University.

Israel’s relentless bombing campaign has systematically destroyed all of Gaza’s 11 universities plus more than 400 schools, and killed 6,000 students, 230 teachers, 100 professors and deans, and two university presidents.

The elimination of entire educational institutions (both infrastructure and human resources) is ‘scholasticide’ and is a critical component of the genocidal erasure, says Dr Abu-Sittah.

He named the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and France as comprising an ‘axis of genocide’ because they have been supporting the genocide in Gaza with arms, and had also maintained political support for Israel.

Dr Abu-Sittah worked in Gaza for 43 days in the immediate aftermath of the October 7 attacks. His experience was cited in South Africa’s genocide case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

In his submission to the ICJ, Dr Abu-Sittah wrote: ‘There was a girl with just her whole body covered in shrapnel. She was nine. I ended up having to change and clean these wounds with no anaesthetic and no analgesic. I managed to find some intravenous paracetamol to give her…her Dad was crying, I was crying, and the poor child was screaming…’

Australia defies the UN

The Albanese government has consistently denied it is supplying weapons to Israel, even as the United Nations pointed a finger directly at Australia, alongside the US, Germany, France, the UK, and Canada, asking these countries to immediately halt all weapons transfers to Israel, including weapons parts, and to halt export licences and military aid.

The Defence Department has refused to answer questions about whether it has halted the arms export permits for Israel that were in place before October 7, the day of Hamas’s deadly attack in Israel.

Defence approved new export permits to Israel after October 7

Defence approved three new export permits to Israel in October 2023, and none in November, December or January (to 29/1), according to figures Defence released following a Freedom of Information (FOI) request I lodged on 29 January.

In a Senate estimates hearing on February 14, the Defence Department revealed it had approved two new export permits to Israel since the Hamas attacks of October 7. Asked for clarification about the timing, Defence’s deputy secretary of Strategy, Policy, and Industry, Mr Hugh Jeffrey, said, ‘Two export permits have been granted since the time of the last estimates’. The previous estimates hearing had been on 25 October 2023.

The Senate Estimates and FOI evidence together show that Defence approved one export permit to Israel prior to October 7 and two in the period October 25–31.

Mr Jeffrey refused to say what items the two new permits covered. Instead he said they ‘would have been agreed on the basis that they did not prejudice Australian national interests under the criterion of the legislation’.

Possible implications

Israel has been using its F-35 fighter jets in its bombardment of Gaza. Australia is one of a number of countries that manufacture and export parts and components into Lockheed Martin’s F-35 fighter jet global supply chain. Given this, there are several reasons why the above information may be significant:

• The head of the F-35 joint program office, Lieutenant General Michael Schmidt, a US Air Force officer, said a year ago that the F-35 program was established with a ‘just in time’ supply chain, where parts arrive just before they’re needed and very little inventory is stockpiled. [Emphasis added.] Lt-Gen Schmidt described that situation as ‘too risky’.

• 
  In mid-December, a US Congressional hearing on the F-35 program revealed that the F-35 joint program office had been moving ‘at a breakneck speed to support…Israel…by increasing spare part supply rates’. [Emphasis added.]
• More than 70 Australian companies are involved in the global supply chain for the F-35. Several of the companies are the sole global source of the parts they produce. Without them, new F-35 jets cannot be built and those parts in existing jets cannot be replaced. The US recently authorised the transfer to Israel of 25 more F-35s.

The F-35 global supply chain is vulnerable to disruption, which is why Australia could be under pressure to continue meeting supply contracts.

In his testimony to the December 12 Congressional hearing, Lieutenant General Schmidt also made clear the role of the F-35 joint program office in closely supporting Israel:

I had the opportunity to talk with [Israel’s] Chief of Staff just yesterday… [Israel is] very satisfied with [the] performance [the] sustainment enterprise is giving them. We could learn a lot from them in terms of the quickness with which they’re turning airplanes, [plus] all of the things we’re learning ourselves with moving parts around the world in support of a conflict. [Emphasis added.]

Defence Department and Australian industry partnering with F-35 program office

Defence issued a media release on October 30, around the same time it approved the two additional export permits to Israel.

The release announced that Melbourne company Rosebank Engineering had established an important regional F-35 capability that would also contribute to the global F-35 program. The release said Australian industry is playing an increasingly important role in the production and sustainment of the global F-35 fleet and that Rosebank and the Defence Department had partnered with the US F-35 joint program office and Lockheed Martin to establish the new facility.

Lockheed Martin removes information from its website

US multinational Lockheed Martin is the world’s largest arms manufacturer and the prime contractor for the F-35 fighter jet. As the horror of Israel’s war on Gaza has unfolded over the past seven months, there have been court cases and protests targeting the F-35 and its global supply chain.

In this context, Lockheed Martin recently edited the Australian page of its F-35 website to remove the ‘Industrial Partnerships’ section. The text had acknowledged that Australian parts were used in every F-35 fighter jet.

The deleted section can be viewed at the Wayback Machine web archive. This was the opening paragraph:[screenshot on original]

Lockheed Martin has also deleted other information from its website. A feature post about Marand Precision Engineering, another Melbourne-based company supplying the F-35 program, has been removed. The page had described how Marand engineered, manufactured, and now sustains ‘one of the most technically advanced mechanical systems’ ever created in Australia. The system, an engine removal and installation mobility trailer for the F-35, comprises 12,000 individual parts. The page said, ‘Marand has worked in close concert with Lockheed Martin on the F-35 program for many years’ and revealed that in 2022 the company had established a maintenance facility for its F-35 trailer in the US, ‘to better meet Lockheed Martin’s sustainment needs’. The deleted page can be viewed at the Wayback Machine web archive.

Sydney-based Quickstep Holdings is another long-term Australian supplier to the F-35 program. In December 2020, it announced it had produced its 10,000^th component for the F-35 program. Quickstep estimated it had completed just 20% of its commitment to the program. The company revealed it manufactures more than 50 individual components and assemblies for the F-35, representing about $440,000 worth of content in each F-35.

Last year, Lockheed Martin also acknowledged that Queensland’s Ferra Engineering had been providing products for the F-35 since 2004 and that it remained a vital partner supporting delivery of the aircraft.

Despite the Albanese government’s persistent and misleading claim that no weapons have been supplied to Israel for the past five years, all of the above companies have supplied parts and components into the F-35’s supply chain during this period.

Threshold for genocide met, says UN Special Rapporteur

On March 26, Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights Situation in the West Bank and Gaza, said, ‘Following nearly six months of unrelenting Israeli assault on occupied Gaza, it is my solemn duty to report on the worst of what humanity is capable of, and to present my findings.’

Ms Albanese said there were ‘reasonable grounds to believe that the threshold indicating the commission of the crime of genocide… has been met’.

On April 5, the UN Human Rights Council adopted a resolution that included a call for an arms embargo on Israel.

Some 28 countries voted in favour of the resolution and 13 abstained. Israel’s two largest suppliers of weaponry, the US and Germany, along with four other countries, voted against it. (The Council has 47 members elected for staggered three-year terms on a regional group basis. Australia is not currently a member.)

May 4, 2024 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

AUKUS: Are nuclear-powered submarines a good idea for Australia?

“[So] the question for us is, is it sensible for Australia to commit itself to go to war with the US against China — a war we have no reason to believe the US can win, in order to acquire submarines that we don’t need?”

ABC RN / By Nick Baker and Taryn Priadko for Global Roaming 5 Mar 24

There were always going to be questions about a nuclear-powered submarine deal with a (stated) price tag of up to $368 billion.

But, as the dust settles on the AUKUS security pact and Australians patiently wait for the subs that come with it, some defence experts are warning that the deal could fall apart.

“I think the chance of the plan unfolding effectively is extremely low,” Hugh White, an emeritus professor of strategic studies at the Australian National University, tells ABC RN’s Global Roaming.

Professor White was a defence adviser to the Hawke government and worked as a deputy secretary for strategy and intelligence in the Department of Defence. He’s also been a big critic of AUKUS.

So could AUKUS sink? And what would that mean for Australia’s defence plans?

What is AUKUS?

On September 15, 2021, a new trilateral security partnership between Australia, the UK and the US was announced, called AUKUS (A-UK-US).

Australia was scrapping its earlier $90 billion deal with France for 12 conventional-powered submarines and instead securing nuclear-powered submarines through AUKUS.

More details were announced on March 13 last year, including around the two so-called “pillars” of AUKUS.

Pillar One, which has received the most attention, is the submarines.

The plan is for Australia to buy at least three nuclear-powered Virginia class submarines from the US in the early 2030s.

We will then build at least five of a new, nuclear-powered submarine class dubbed the SSN-AUKUS, likely in Adelaide, in the 2030s, 2040s and beyond.

Pillar Two involves the sharing of technology, in areas like quantum computing, artificial intelligence and hypersonic missiles.

Former prime minister Scott Morrison called AUKUS “the best” decision of his government, while current Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has said it would “strengthen Australia’s national security and stability in our region”. 

AUKUS worries

Professor White has two main worries around AUKUS.

“We do need submarines. I think submarines are a very important part of a defensive posture for Australia … [But] I don’t think we need nuclear-powered submarines,” he says.

“They’re so much more expensive. They’re so much more difficult to make. They’re so much more difficult to operate. We’ll end up with far fewer of them in our fleet.”

He says his second concern is far bigger: “I don’t think we’re going to get [the submarines].”

He claims the plan is overly reliant on future decisions and assistance from the US and UK governments, and also full of near-insurmountable technical tasks for Australia.

“I think what’s going to happen … is within the next few years, the whole thing will just come apart in our hands. And we’ll be back to square one trying to work out how to get some more conventional [submarines].”

Allan Behm, the director of the international and security affairs program at the Australia Institute, also doubts the likelihood of the AUKUS deal going ahead as planned.

One reason, he says, is that the technologies, skills and workforce that are required from a country like Australia to build and maintain nuclear-powered subs is pushing our limits, even with the involvement of the US and UK.

“We’re going into a technological domain with which we are totally unfamiliar,” says Mr Behm, who has a 30-year career in the Australian public service and was senior advisor to then-shadow minister for foreign affairs Penny Wong.

“We’re talking about a number of submarines with nuclear propulsion systems in them. And we’ve only got one nuclear reactor in Australia, which is nothing like the very, very highly enriched uranium reactors, the pressure water reactors that exist in nuclear-powered submarines,” he says.

“I think the best parallel would be, how would Australia imagine that it would undertake, conduct and retrieve a moon launch?”

US versus China

If AUKUS goes ahead as planned, is it the best way to keep Australia safe?

It’s been framed as a massive deterrent to China, which keeps building up its military.

Mr Morrison told the ABC last year, AUKUS helps to “change the calculus for any potential aggressors in our region”.

But Professor White says there are pitfalls with this strategy too.

He claims AUKUS could pull Australia into a future US-China conflict over Taiwan, which he contends the US may not win.

“China has focused so strongly and so effectively on building precisely the kinds of forces it needs to prevent the US projecting power by sea and air into the Western Pacific,” he says.

“[So] the question for us is, is it sensible for Australia to commit itself to go to war with the US against China — a war we have no reason to believe the US can win, in order to acquire submarines that we don’t need?”

While Australia has made clear it will have full control over the nuclear-powered submarines under the deal, Professor White says the US may still expect us to support them in a future war.

Cost concerns

The estimated cost of the submarine program will be up to $368 billion over the next 30 years. It’s a figure that has attracted no shortage of criticism.

“It puts so many of our defence eggs in one super expensive basket,” Mr Behm says.

“Short of expanding our defence budget by a considerable amount … we would find ourselves with very constrained capabilities in other fields in order to meet the expenditure targets of this project.”

And, based on other defence projects, he contends there will be cost blowouts.

“Whenever [the Department of] Defence says it’s going to cost you $1, always multiply it by three. And so your $368 billion is, in effect, a lifetime cost of $1 trillion,” he says.

“And you can do a hell of a lot with $1 trillion.”

A safer Australia?

The AUKUS critics have their critics too.

Peter Dean, the director of foreign policy and defence at the University of Sydney’s US Studies Centre, says he has a “diametrically opposed” outlook to Professor White and Mr Behm………………………………………………

Scrap AUKUS, totally rethink defence?

Meanwhile, Professor White, from the anti-AUKUS camp, is advocating a totally different approach to AUKUS.

He says Australia should pivot away from the US and think about “how we can develop our national capability to defend ourselves independently against a major Asian power?”

“Traditionally, Australians have believed that as a very big continent with a relatively small population … we couldn’t possibly defend ourselves. But I don’t think that’s right.”

But he says this would need a change in priorities…………………………………………………

A missing part of the discussion

Mr Behm, also from the anti-AUKUS camp, says there’s an element sometimes missing in discussions about defence.

Diplomacy has got to be central to the way in which you think about your long-term national security,” he says.

“You get much more return on your investment in diplomacy than you ever get out of defence systems, which in the life of almost all of them you never use.”………………………………….

Mr Behm advocates for more emphasis on “how you use the intellectual and cultural resources of the nation to both protect and to promote its deep and long-term security”.

“[So] I would be prepared to argue that the pivot on which our national security rests is the foreign minister.”  https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-03-05/aukus-set-to-sink/103534664

March 6, 2024 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA, weapons and war | Leave a comment