RAN Guided Weapons Facility Opening

Minister for Defence, the Hon. Peter Dutton, MP, listens to Brigadier Haydn Kohl (right) explain a point about the new Naval Guided Weapons Maintenance Facility at Defence Establishment Orchid Hills at Mulgoa, near Penrith in Sydney’s west. (Credit ABIS Benjamin Ricketts)

SYDNEY: One of Australia’s top defense analysts has sharply criticised the government’s quietly-made decision to kill the $1.3B AUD purchase of General Atomic armed MQ-9B Reaper drones.

“This is, to use a strategic term, mind-bogglingly stupid. A rare Defence project that was to deliver new combat capability in just a few years is shelved after a decade’s worth of planning and investment,” wrote Peter Jennings, head of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, in the Monday edition of The Australian newspaper here. “it would be hard to think off a more timely and relevant capability when the PLA is sending more ships around our coasts and potentially operating out of Honiara [capital of the Solomon Islands].”

The Defense Ministry took the unusual step of responding to Jenning’s critique in an official statement, basically saying that the government thought putting the $1.3 billion toward doubling the size of the Australian Signal Directorate made more strategic sense.

RELATED: Aussies ‘secretly cancel’ $1.3B AUD drone deal; Nixing French subs may cost $5B

The matter escalated two days later to the Senate. The leader of the opposition in the Senate, Penny Wong, raised Jennings’ criticism of the Reaper decision today in a Senate Budget Estimate hearing.

Addressing senior defense officials, she said the drone program was a “rare defense project that was going to deliver new combat capability in just a few years and is shelved after a decade worth of planning and investment. Anybody want to respond to that?”

Several government officials responded but no clear answer was delivered except from Vice Adm. David Johnston, vice chief of defense force. He argued that the military has lots of overlapping capabilities that can deliver lethal munitions from land and in the littoral, including Apaches. Of course, Johnston’s argument is pretty thin, given that Reapers — the capability that was nixed — can fly anywhere in the globe, flying without a pilot in the aircraft, loiter over a target for 24 hours and deliver a range of weaponry from beyond line of sight. There is no other Australian capability that can do that.

Wong broadened her criticism, beating a drum that has grown increasingly loud in recent weeks, saying the current government has talked vigorously about boosting the capabilities of the defense force but has little to show for it.

She pointed to the estimated $5.5 billion AUD that will go to pay for the cancelled French conventional attack submarine program, with no replacement until an estimated 2040. “We’ve got a $1.3 billion Sky Guardian project which has been canceled, which means we have zero drones,” Wong said. “I think we spent $3.8 billion on MRH-90 helicopters, which have now cancelled. I think, cumulatively, there are around about 13 defense projects running 79 years late, and 17 major projects running $4 .5 billion dollars over budget.”

Defense officials pushed back, pointing to Tuesday’s announcement that the government is spending $3.5 billion to accelerate deployment of two missile programs and sea mines — Lockheed Martin’s JASSM-ER, Norway’s Naval Strike Missile (NSM) and maritime mines “to secure Australia’s ports and maritime approaches.”

It’s important to note that these criticisms are not only being made by the opposition Labor Party as the federal election looms. Greg Sheridan, foreign editor of The Australian, a top tier paper here owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., has weighed in several times saying that Labor is right in its criticisms of Scott Morrison’s government.

The day after Jennings penned his critique of General Atomics’ lost deal, Defense Minister Peter Dutton made a quick Tuesday morning trip to Sydney to announce that Lockheed Martin and Raytheon had been awarded a $1 billion deal to lead what the government here calls its sovereign guided-weapons enterprise

Warren MacDonald, the new CEO of Lockheed Martin Australia and New Zealand, said in a statement, “We look forward to working with Raytheon Australia and partnering with the Australian Defence Force and defence industry to fulfill the sovereign defence capabilities that Australia needs to maintain a decisive advantage across all domains.”

In a clear acknowledgement of the importance of Aussie companies being directly involved, MacDonald noted the company “will respond to the Australian Government’s expectations by growing a skilled local workforce and working with Australian small and medium enterprises to build resiliency in supply chains.”

The idea behind this contract is pretty simple. Australia is a long way from Europe and the United States, needs weapons and cannot always rely on those foreign sources to make and ship weapons to the island state when needed.

This is how Melissa Price, minister for the defense industry, described the enterprise in a statement last year: “Australia currently relies on key overseas strategic partners, including the US, for access to a number of guided weapons. International demand for such weapons is high and production lead times are lengthy, largely due to the complexity of these weapons and their supply chains,” she said. “By increasing Australia’s capacity and expertise, it not only ensures stocks are available for the ADF, it also provides opportunities to supply key components to our key international strategic partners.”

But there are many unanswered questions about just what this award means. How will Lockheed and Raytheon apportion the work between them, let alone between themselves and their suppliers? Exactly what programs fall under this? Perhaps most importantly, are hypersonics programs included in this basket?

One clue suggests not: neither Thales or BAE, perhaps the biggest players in Australian hypersonic weapons work, are not included in the award. (Though it’s hard to know, given the opacity of the Defense Ministry and the fact that much about hypersonics may be classified. And, of course, both the American companies do work on hypersonics in the US.)