Looks like our next Australian one term PM is set in stone, Tony Abbott. From a guy going to the election promising to be open with both the public and his own party he has made it a habbit of making decisions on a whim with absolutely no consultation within the public or his party. Have no issue with him bringing back knights and dames for Australia in general but he made no consultation, The system started in the UK so should stay there, They can hand it out to foriegners as they see fit as they have done in the past. We dont need some polly giving it to them selves to make them selves look better, Just degrades the honor and makes them look like a bunch of w*****s. What may have really tipped the scale against him though is that before he was elected he vowed to build 12 new submarines in South Australia, He has since back flipped and said that the boats me be built over seas. Personnaly I believe the boats should not be limited to be being built in South Australia, Queensland, NSW and Victoria are all capable of building them just as well with industry in place already. But we should never build them over seas. Yes Japan is a allie and they do have the sub that closest fit's our needs and requirements but the industry should not be shut down due to the failure in building the Collins class. The Collins class had many faults some of them being government made but we have finally got them into a good position, You dont shut up shop when everything just starts to run smoothly. You especially dont build the most important weapons in our military arsenal off shore. Sorry guys, Just my little rant against the growing incompetence in Canberra =) Cheers, v_n
I can understand where you are coming from...But Labor was an embarrssing joke of a party...a group of wannabes...great ideas, couldnt execute a one of them (and i am/was a Labor man!) The Subs story is a complex one...it was difficult getting the skills together and tough again to get them together once more for a even more complex submarine...it would cost billions...perhaps far more than if we bought them off the shelf from someone like Sweden...Not as good perhaps, but far more cost effective...
Since the USN needs the money, there's always the Los Angeles class SSNs....the ones that the Canadian government was rumored to have been considering buying surplus from the US Navy a few years back. Anything's better than those PoS we bought from the UK.
The LA class is a nuclear submarine isnt it? Australia is committed to deisel/electric...still the quietest of all subs... Everyone builds counters to American hardware...can be prudent to buy a different system...sometimes anyway.
Realistically both political parties have become a joke, Which is why in my view there has been such an influx in minority parties and independents. Idiots can't get the country in order so the average Joe has stepped up in a great many numbers. Should state that I'm not against a foreign design though the Japanese have the closest thing to our need's, But it should be built here unlike Abbott's idea of building them in Japan.. There are the LA's but they are nuclear, Australia lacks the industry to support them. If Australia was to go the way of nuclear energy (Not impossible, We already have the experiance) then nuclear powered submariens would be a possible option. That being said, Most nuclear sub's are quite large, With the shallow waters of the South Pacific smaller submarines are key. As for the Victoria class submarines of the RCAN, I think they have suffered from the same problems as the Collins class. Both navies had had little experience and both classes were few in number as such preventing the capability of learning from other navies solutions. The Australian governments short sighted and simplistic view of the submarine issue is very wrong and bad for the country. Just because Japan can build a submarine for a little less then $600m while our Collins cost in excess of $1b they think we can't build them cost effectively. What they dont take into account is Japanese industry and the JMSDF has had decades of experiencing and learning curves. Their industry is also operating at a constant while Australian industry through short sighted government planning has had a non stop habbit from the early 1900's of stop-starting. By the time the industry has adapted and the skills are put in place the contracts run dry and the workers go else where, Then the industry has to start from scratch again. Which for the record I dont understand seeing as our naval needs can more then acomodate a continuous build program. Then again both parties suck with fiscal management. (ie: State of Victoria, Regional raillink, 45km long, $4.8+ Billion)
