Aukus deal's importance ‘well understood' by Trump administration, Penny Wong says – but no iron-clad guarantee given

The Guardian

15 hours ago

The strategic importance of the Aukus agreement is 'well understood' by the Trump administration, Penny Wong says, despite a snap Pentagon review casting doubt on the future of the pact.
In Washington DC for talks with Quad nations foreign ministers on Wednesday, Australia's foreign affairs minister said the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, had heard Australia's position on the need for the agreement to proceed, though she did not receive any iron-clad assurances from her counterpart.
The Aukus deal outlines the sharing of nuclear-powered submarine technology between Australia, the US and the UK at a cost of about A$350bn. The federal government has already made payments worth A$800m.
Despite the review being led by an Aukus sceptic and US undersecretary of defense, Elbridge Colby, Wong said she remained confident the partnership would 'last decades'.
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She said Australia and the US understood 'the importance to both our countries and to the United Kingdom'.
'We understand a new administration is going to engage in a review,' Wong said. 'That is not surprising. The United Kingdom did so.
'This is a multi-decade partnership. It will take governments and administrations of both political persuasions over many years to deliver. We will continue to work with the United States and the United Kingdom on delivering it.'
The talks come as Donald Trump and the US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, push Labor to lift Australia's defence spending to 3.5% of GDP. The federal government is resisting that pressure.
Australia is on track to lift defence spending from about $53bn a year, or about 2% of GDP – to an estimated $100bn, or 2.4% of GDP, by 2033-34.
The Quad talks included Japan's foreign minister, Iwaya Takeshi, and India's external affairs minister, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.
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Wong said Rubio had expressed regret that Trump had not met with Anthony Albanese at the G7 summit last month. Trump left the talks in Canada a day early to deal with the war between Israel and Iran.
'I explained to him we perfectly understood why the president had to leave, given the circumstances, and we agreed that we will reschedule this meeting,' she said. 'We both look forward to the leaders meeting.
'I think that the Trump administration and President Trump has made very clear to the world that he envisages a different role for America in the world.'
One possible opportunity for a meeting between Trump and the prime minister at the White House could be after the UN general assembly in New York in September. India will host the next Quad leaders' summit later this year.
Australia could benefit from demand for critical minerals from Quad countries including Japan and India, with exports forming part of efforts to secure supply chains as a balance against China's domination of the market.
Rubio said the US wanted to diversify global supplies and processing. 'It's critical for all technologies and for all industries across the board,' he said.
'Having a diverse and reliable global supply chain of these is just one example of many that we can focus on and build upon and achieve some real progress on.'
Wong called progress on critical minerals part of efforts to secure 'concrete outcomes' for a stable and peaceful Indo-Pacific region.
'This is a supply set of supply chains we need to assure. Australia has, I think, 36 of the 50 critical minerals. We certainly have a capacity to do more for those, to secure those supply chains.'