Marles warns the seabed's a battlefield — then reveals we're buying America's secondhand subs

Guardian Australia · Ben Doherty · Sunday 31 May 2026

Marles warns the seabed's a battlefield — then reveals we're buying America's secondhand subs

At the Shangri-La Dialogue, Marles unveiled new AUKUS drone tech to protect undersea cables and declared the seabed a battlefield — while confirming Australia will only receive secondhand US submarines under the deal.

Marles told the Singapore summit the seabed's a battlefield — very Mahan, very stirring — then buried the bit that matters: we're buying America's secondhand submarines. Three hundred-odd billion for boats with the previous owner's coffee rings still on the chart table. Drones to guard the cables, hand-me-downs to guard the continent. We talk like a naval power and shop like it's a wrecker's yard.

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