Roger Wicker,the top Republican on the Senate armed services committee,previously vowed to block the submarine transfer unless the Biden administration funded a massive increase in the US domestic production capacity.
Loading
The letter shows these concerns are widely held among Senate Republicans.
The senators say in their letter the US would have to produce up to 2.5 submarines a year – up from 1.2 boats currently – to make up for the sale of up to three submarines to Australia and avoid shrinking the US Navy’s operational capacity.
Speaking in Brisbane ahead of the annual Australia-US Ministerial (AUSMIN) consultations,Albanese said he was “very confident” Australia would secure Virginia-class submarines from the US.
“I met with Republicans and Democrats in Lithuania just a couple of weeks ago and what struck me was their unanimous support for AUKUS,the unanimous support for the relationship between the Australia and United States,” he said.
“It’s never been stronger.”
Albanese said that,just as in Australia,all legislation does not pass through the US Congress unanimously.
US ambassador Caroline Kennedy said on Friday she did not believe the AUKUS legislation had stalled as it was expected to take some time to pass through Congress.
“This is a hugely complex part of our annual defence appropriation budget and so there’s a lot of issues that go into that,” she said.
“There is absolutely bipartisan support for AUKUS in the US and the Australian alliance.”
Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Defence Minister Richard Marles are holding meetings with their US counterparts,Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin,on Friday before the joint AUSMIN dialogue on Saturday.
Loading
Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham said the government faced “a critical test for Australian diplomacy to ensure that we maintain as broad a possible bipartisan support for the AUKUS arrangement throughout US politics and right across the US Congress”.
“And so it is critical that any concerns that are raised through those congressional proceedings are ones that we are across and that we are engaging and responding thoughtfully to,to make sure that support is strong,is bipartisan and is ongoing and consistent throughout the very long life that AUKUS has.”
The Republicans’ concerns seem to be mostly limited to the Senate given the US House of Representatives foreign affairs committee voted unanimously on Thursday (Australian time) to authorise the sale of up to two nuclear-powered Virginia-class submarines to Australia.
Cut through the noise of federal politics with news,views and expert analysis.Subscribers can sign up to our weekly Inside Politics newsletter here.