Consider these factors as the Pentagon dissects AUKUS

Driving the news: The Pentagon’s policy office, led by Elbridge Colby, last week announced that by fall it would conclude its “America First” examination of the initiative, which rolled out during the Biden administration.

• Colby has expressed AUKUS skepticism in the past, namely over resource allocation, but in March said Washington should “do everything we can to make this work.”

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Actual application. How the Trump administration perceives Australia’s commitment to using the subs, and to countering China, could make or break a ruling.

• “They’ve been very coy about how they would actually employ the submarines, other than to say, ‘Well, it’s a deterrent, it could be employed to defend Australia,'” Bryan Clark, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, told Axios.
• “You’ve got to be willing to say that you would use it offensively if you want to gain the deterrent value out of it,” he said, “because China could come away thinking Australia is going to buy these submarines, but they don’t have the resolve to use them.”

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InfluenceWatch: Hudson Institute