The Navy’s new 30-year shipbuilding plan, unveiled today, shows the US plans to build additional Virginia-class submarines to replace those eventually sold to Australia as part of the AUKUS arrangement, but also leaves open many questions of how that will affect the Navy’s other shipbuilding plans and an overburdened industrial base.
“Based on the trilateral agreement announcement of March 2023, the Navy anticipates building additional Virginia class SSNs in the 2030s as replacements for submarines sold to Australia,” according to the new plan, a copy of which was provided by the Navy to Breaking Defense while its top leaders testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee about its fiscal 2024 budget request.