It's not bad. But I wished they added a few heavily armed Destroyers in with this fleet earlier rather than wait till after the hunter class get built before deciding to replace the F100 class destroyers. I have a inside information that RAN is looking at the Navantia flight III 128 cell VLS destroyers as a future vessel replacement for the F100 class. But at this stage, it only still remains on paper as a prototypes. The announcement of the F100 class replacement will be sometime in 2035.. there be grey hairs on my head by then too

Will the Australian Navy be able to compete with the Bangladesh Navy is more the question.... This is all hypothetical, what Australia needs is 12 Hunters, 12 Type 83's and 12 Astutes. By this coming Friday. Or , everyone should start learning Cantonese.

This British/Australian AUKUS submarine currently being developed to add our Virginia class nuclear submarines order, I hope is to have the capability to increase the VLS count during mid contract improvements, similar to the Virginia block V modules VPM) Richard Marles is denuding the Nuclear submarine land attack capability refusing the new Virginia Bloc V. Instead he orders new built Bloc VII as they will have minimal VLS capability thus cheaper! One of the reasons we went nuclear is that of the land attack capability and he removes it!

Australian Navy must have three times stronger protecting people in Australia very strong defence against terrisom allover the world

It's "Royal Australian Navy". Hence the RAN acronym.

About time the government is spending money on defence. We have one of the largest coastlines in the world which is woefully under protected. It will greatly enhance our patrolling capabilities and defence. We will be able to protect OUR fisheries from poachers which are stripping our reefs of seafood and stop illegal immigrants from entering our waters. Just wish it had happened sooner than later .........

How many VLS cells will the Australian version of the AUKUS nuclear submarines have?

Personally i have always respected the Royal Australian Navy.

This excludes 350 billion on nuke subs + the subs themselves ( 9) makes 35 combat vessels but excludes patrol boats and other vessels. 25 of these make it 60 plus Auxilliary. vessels and , if as one would anticipate some life extension of current vessels is also taken into account then maybe around 70/80 excluding supply , landing, etc., It would be nice if they spent an extra 50 billion - which is affordable - and acquired 3 real sircraft carriers , 3 extra ( only better) Juan Carlos class as well and an exra 5 or 6 frigates/missile destroyers. THEN i would be a respected Navy......AS LONG AS IT HAS TIME TO DO IT!...it needs to do it, because it may RUN OUT OF TIME!

A very slow upgrade the submarine fleet is U/S and no real date for upgrade total joke.

If the past is any guide procrastination will be the order of the day/ year/ decades.

So its taken us 80 years to become a stronger force

What does ‘optionally crewed’ mean?

Once a jolly swagman…….

Why did the goverment not send a ship to the Red Sea....

Yes, Labour will destroy British defence

So now Marles, who also is Deputy PM - another Albanese FUBAR - has waited and waited for the 'second' Naval Review. And what does it tell Australians? - a significant number of Tier 2 FFG's are to be acquired. Ok - given the stated options Defence/Russell should have a selected option by the end of this year - but just watch how Russell mismanage this process - and slow walk it. We have several options 'green to go' - yet Marles' made 0 effort to put his boot up Russell and to get a fast tracked decision. Benchmark Australian defence processes against Korea, Japan, Germany and Spain - we are a total disgrace. And just when even I thought Russell could not f#ck up even more - we learn, not via a Ministerial Statement - that the NH90's are being buried? China is looking on and laughing. Even the woke Biden administration must also be scratching their collective heads. And the reality is despite a change of government - nothing ever changes. Peter Dutton as Min Def made a 'small' headway - but just prior to the last election Senate Estimates uncovered that the MQ Reaper acquisition was to be canceled - wasting years of ADF personnel being trained in the US. Housed, salaries paid, allowances - you just cannot make this s#it up.

bwahahahahahahahahaha stralya cant even put half its old junkers to sea and the "new" ships are 40 years away and will be redundant before they are even made. But will never get made anyway.