Australia Unveils $20 Billion Military Shipyard Plan in WA, but Funding Lags Behind Ambitions
Naval Warfare Post
Washington DC: Faced with the massive demands of the AUKUS submarine program and a planned doubling of the nation’s surface navy, Australia today announced a formal plan to develop a military shipyard and port complex in Western Australia. The project, valued at up to $20 billion, is expected to create up to 10,000 jobs. However, the funding so far remains modest, with only AUD $127 million (USD $85 million) allocated for a three-year planning and feasibility study, crucial to the nation’s long-term naval strategy.
At the heart of this ambitious development is a new “graving dock,” commonly known as a dry dock, which will likely be part of the HMAS Stirling base. Australia has not constructed a major dry dock since World War II, when the Captain Cook dock in Sydney took four years to complete. This new dock will be essential for servicing and maintaining the nuclear-powered attack submarines to be stationed at Stirling, and it may take inspiration from the $3.4 billion USD (AUD $5.9 billion) dry dock project currently under construction in Pearl Harbor, designed to support Virginia-class submarines for decades.
Rear Admiral Wendy Malcolm, who leads the Royal Australian Navy’s AUKUS infrastructure efforts, recently voiced urgency regarding this dry dock. She warned that unless critical work on the dry dock and adjacent shipyards begins soon, Australia’s ability to host, build, and maintain nuclear-powered submarines could be jeopardized.
The dock will be a key component of the broader expansion and consolidation of shipyards at HMAS Stirling, with US and UK nuclear submarines expected to begin rotations there from 2027. While a temporary floating dock might be leased in the meantime, it would not be able to provide the level of maintenance required for submarines over time.
Defence Minister Richard Marles called the expansion of the shipyards the most significant defence investment in Western Australia since its federation in 1901. The new defence hub will be located at the southern end of the Henderson shipyard, where new landing craft for the army and general-purpose frigates for the navy will also be constructed.
This project is politically significant as Western Australia is seen as a key battleground for the ruling Labor Party in the lead-up to the next election, which must be held by September next year. Opposition shadow defence minister Andrew Hastie, a representative from Western Australia, criticized the government’s commitment as insufficient, saying the $127 million allocation was “barely enough to get works underway” and accusing Labor of delaying vital defence projects.
Hastie further criticized the government for not keeping pace with inflation in its defence budget, while warning that any further delays could compromise the nation’s naval ambitions.
An image from the Australian government showing build-out plans for future naval docks. (Australian MoD)
