As the US gets AUKUS Pillar Two up to speed, its focus on non-nuclear technologies may open opportunities for countries like Canada and New Zealand to join the emerging defense alliance.
This month, Defense One reported that the Pentagon is pushing for the next phase of the AUKUS defense-technology pact involving the US, UK, and Australia, focusing on advanced technologies like AI, autonomy, electronic warfare, hypersonics and quantum technologies.
Defense One mentions that this initiative, known as Pillar Two of AUKUS, follows Pillar One, which aims to provide Australia with nuclear-powered submarines by the early 2040s.
The report notes that critical aspects of Pillar Two include AI integration on submarine-hunting aircraft and testing of unmanned gear. However, it says its success hinges on the US Congress amending laws restricting sensitive technology exports.
The US Pentagon has emphasized the importance of these legislative changes for AUKUS’s long-term success, particularly for deeper and broader capability collaboration, according to the report.
Defense One mentions that concerns about potential security risks have been raised, fearing that easing export restrictions could result in adversaries like China gaining access to sensitive and secret US technology.
Despite those concerns, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has announced new milestones for Pillar Two, including trilateral experiments and exercises starting next year to enhance autonomous maritime systems’ capabilities and interoperability.
The Defense One report mentions that the Pentagon plans to deploy AI algorithms on P-8 submarine-hunting planes used by all three alliance nations. The report says this will allow for shared processing of sonobuoy data, thus improving anti-submarine warfare. It also notes that this year AUKUS demonstrated technologies like autonomous swarms and trusted robotics.
Defense One says an AUKUS innovation challenge will invite companies from all three countries to compete in developing specific technologies, starting with electronic warfare. An AUKUS industry forum will also be established to guide policy.
The report mentions that the US is investing in its industrial base to support AUKUS, including a proposed US$3 billion transfer from Australia to upgrade the US submarine industry, but faces legislative hurdles.
The report says that the US State Department plans a US$2 billion foreign military sale to Australia for training related to Pillar One. It notes that the sale aims to advance submarine capabilities, incorporating technologies from all AUKUS partners, and will include training for Australian naval crews and civilians.
The shared history, language, culture and political values between Australia, the US, and the UK sets AUKUS apart from other defense arrangements. That high level of trust enables the sharing of sensitive technology that could only occur within the tightest of alliances.
Each AUKUS member also has its own interests in the arrangement, however. For Canberra, AUKUS integrates Australia’s strategic defense even closer to the US.
For London, AUKUS also enables the UK to project a more significant footprint abroad as part of its “Global Britain” ambitions. For Washington, AUKUS is a long-term investment in its strongest alliances to counter an increasingly assertive China in the Pacific.
However, AUKUS has been criticized as having no substance beyond deterring China and, at best, is a modern manifestation of Anglophone hegemony.
Nevertheless, techno-centrism is one of the alliance’s main defining features, with Pillar Two notably moving beyond nuclear propulsion, a very politically sensitive technology.
AUKUS’s current membership, however, notably skips over two other potential Anglophone partners – Canada and New Zealand.
In a May 2023 article for the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Christopher Hernandez-Roy and other writers argue why Canada should join AUKUS.
Hernandez-Roy and others mention that Canada was not considered for AUKUS membership primarily due to cost, as AUKUS comes with a US$ 179 to US$245 billion annual price tag, running over 30 years in the case of Australia.
They point out that Canada would struggle to spend at that level, as it has struggled to maintain its military since the end of the Cold War.
The writers refer to leaked documents saying Canada will never be able to match NATO’s required 2% of GDP defense allocation. They note Canada’s lack of credible commitments to build up its defense may result in it being left behind on critical issues such as maritime security, integrated deterrence and defense-industrial cooperation.
Hernandez-Roy and others argue that AUKUS membership would bring multiple benefits to Canada without the controversy associated with nuclear submarines.
Those would include becoming a technological accelerator for Canada’s role in the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and under NATO command, encouraging greater collaboration between member states’ defense industries, and promoting strategic convergence against China in the Pacific and Russia in the Arctic.
In the case of New Zealand, Robert Patman mentions in an August 2023 article for The Conversation that in March the US invited the former to join AUKUS Pillar Two. Still, he notes that the New Zealand government has yet to decide.
However, Tim Fish notes in an October 2023 article for Breaking Defense that the chances of New Zealand joining AUKUS Pillar Two dramatically increased following its general elections that month.
Fish notes that Chris Luxon, the winning National Party’s leader and now New Zealand’s prime minister, has stated that his government is looking at how it can participate in AUKUS Pillar Two but acknowledged it was too early to know what that would entail.
AUKUS membership would inevitably give New Zealand’s flagging military a boost. In August 2023, The Straits Times reported that the 15,000-strong New Zealand Defense Force (NZDF) is not fit to respond to future challenges, citing policy review documents.
The Straits Times mentions that the NZDF was designed for a benign strategic environment rather than one characterized by great power competition, complicated by China being New Zealand’s top trading partner.
Sovereignty concerns may also prevent New Zealand from joining AUKUS Pillar Two, as doing so would impact its independent foreign policy based on non-nuclear security and seeking closer Pacific ties.
Patman points out that while New Zealand shares much politically with the US, Australia and the UK, it does not accept China as the only threat to the liberal rules-based order and that the “China threat” may be overblown.
He also says New Zealand’s worldview does not sit comfortably with the idea that great power competition will decide the Indo-Pacific’s future. He argues that joining AUKUS Pillar Two does little to advance New Zealand’s foreign policy interests to strengthen the international rules-based order and could be interpreted as a retreat into the Anglosphere.