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Successive Australian governments have flirted with the idea of establishing an east coast submarine base to support a permanent submarine capability on both sides of the continent. Does Beijing’s latest naval exercise require an acceleration of this?
For the better part of the last four decades, Australia’s submarine force has been an exclusively West Australian affair, with the relocation of the Australian Submarine Squadron to HMAS Stirling, as Fleet Base West (FBW) in 1994.
While Fleet Base East (FBE) would periodically play host to Australia’s Collins Class submarines, their permanent basing on the west coast made it difficult for the nation to deploy these strategic capabilities in the Pacific at short notice.
The rapid deterioration of the regional geostrategic environment in the Indo-Pacific has prompted many to begin planning for a more permanent solution to the lack of east coast submarine capability, largely through the development of a fit-for-purpose submarine base on the nation’s eastern seaboard.
One of the early proponents of this solution was former South Australian senator Rex Patrick, who told Defence Connect in 2018, “It makes perfect strategic sense for Australia to have a two-ocean submarine force posture. There are good reasons for Australia to have submarines based on the east coast. In 2014, coinciding with the G20 meeting in Brisbane, a Russian Navy task group deployed to the Coral Sea.
“China is expanding its naval capability and is utilising soft power in both Timor-Leste and Vanuatu. We can expect more foreign naval activity in the eastern Indonesian archipelago, the Coral Sea and south Pacific in the future,” Patrick said at the time.
Adding further legitimacy to the thinking of Patrick is former prime minister Scott Morrison, who expressed the desire for a permanent submarine base following the release of the 2020 Defence Strategic Update and 2020 Force Structure Plan, respectively, the case for which only grew following the signing of the AUKUS nuclear-powered submarine program.
To this end Morrison said in March 2022, “The decision to establish an east coast submarine base has been many years in the making, as part of the transition from Collins.
“The government has now determined that to support our decision to acquire nuclear-powered submarines, establishing a second submarine base in the east coast would enhance our strategic deterrent capability with significant advantages in operational training, personnel and industrial terms. This is about additional national capacity, not relocating any existing or planned future capacity for Fleet Base West,” Morrison said.
In recent weeks, Beijing’s overt provocative naval exercises along the nation’s east coast have exposed a major gap in the nation’s strategic and tactical capacity to respond, particularly given concerns about the potential for a Chinese nuclear-powered submarine to be trailing the task force, adding an additional layer of complexity for Australian policymakers and military leaders.
So where exactly is the planning at and has Beijing’s recent naval exercises off our coast prompted a rethink on the time frames outlined by the current government?
It is worth noting that Minister for Defence Industry and Capability Delivery Pat Conroy told an audience gathered at the Defence Connect DSR Summit in May of 2023, “An east coast base has a strong strategic benefit around transit times, and we are looking at an industrial base on the east coast that is obviously very, very large, but also has recruitment and retention of naval families
“The Navy base is something that we want to provide in the 2030s, so we can take our time to get it right and work with the New South Wales government and Queensland government to make sure that we’ve got the right location for it. We just want to take a bit of time to get it right and we’ve got a bit of time. There are a lot of things we have to get lined up for nuclear submarine before then,” Minister Conroy said at the time.
Ultimately, the ongoing potential for additional live-fire exercises around Australia’s maritime exclusion zone and the almost certainty of more Chinese naval deployments around Australia only serves to reinforce the tactical and strategic imperatives and reasoning behind the long flirted with plans to develop an east coast submarine base.
One can only hope that given the dramatic shift in the global and regional balance of power, coupled with the findings of the 2023 Defence Strategic Review and the 2024 National Defence Strategy, itself set to be updated next year will accelerate the funding and development of the required east coast infrastructure.
