I don't think you are reading this correctly. This seems largely a procurement dispute rather a question of alliance or alignment. If anything, the only real diplomatic difference seems to be that the US is willing to burn its bridges with China more than France (hence China's fury).

• The US saw the opportunity to pick up a nice juicy defense contract. Those are extremely competitive.

• France's program had ballooned in cost, like many of those programs do and slipped in schedule.

• Australia, had, from the beginning on a build-local-as-much-as-possible model. Those often blow up in the face of all the participants, especially if the locals in question have limited experience. A past Australian politician is on the record stating he wouldn't trust a local Australian shipyard to build a canoe.

• Last, but certainly not least, what's being delivered here is very different in nature. A conventional sub, like the French ones, has to surface - to snorkel depth - every so often to recharge its batteries and is limited in range, endurance and speed underwater. The acquisition of a nuclear attack sub (non-missile) gives a much more capable system, all other things being equal, because none of these limitations apply. Which is why China is angry. To do this, the US had to agree to supply/sell this tech to Australia, which probably was too much for France to contemplate. On the other hand, Australia itself must be mighty worried about China to engage in this acquisition.

It's quite possible that a secondary motivation for the Australian PM is to "reboot" a failing construction project on their watch. By the time the US project gets seriously going, if the same implementation mistake happen again on the Aussie side, it will be somebody else's problem, but he'll have "acted decisively" on his watch.

It's not like US shipbuilders are ever known to engage in cost overruns and schedule slippage of their own. No sir.

That all being said, Biden's lack of grace in springing this from the blue and not letting the French "spin" the press releases does not impress.

I don't think you are reading this correctly. This seems largely a procurement dispute rather a question of alliance or alignment. If anything, the only real diplomatic difference seems to be that the US is willing to burn its bridges with China more than France (hence China's fury).

• The US saw the opportunity to pick up a nice juicy defense contract. Those are extremely competitive.

• France's program had ballooned in cost, like many of those programs do and slipped in schedule.

• Australia, had, from the beginning on a build-local-as-much-as-possible model. Those often blow up in the face of all the participants, especially if the locals in question have limited experience. A past Australian defense minister is on the record stating he wouldn't trust a local Australian shipyard to build a canoe, prior to the French contract.

• Last, but certainly not least, what's being delivered here is very different in nature. A conventional sub, like the French ones, has to surface - to snorkel depth - every so often to recharge its batteries and is limited in range, endurance and speed underwater. The acquisition of a nuclear attack sub (non-missile) gives a much more capable system, all other things being equal, because none of these limitations apply. Which is why China is angry. To do this, the US had to agree to supply/sell this extremely sensitive technology to Australia. On the other hand, Australia itself must be mighty worried about China to engage in this acquisition.

It's quite possible that a secondary motivation for the Australian PM is to "reboot" a failing construction project on their watch. By the time the US project gets seriously going, if the same implementation mistakes happen again on the Aussie side - which will probably happen - it will be somebody else's problem, but he'll have "acted decisively" on his watch. And brought home the bacon to his constituents.

It's not like US shipbuilders are ever known to engage in cost overruns, schedule slippages and straight-out technical screwups of their own. No sirree.

That all being said, Biden's lack of grace in springing this from the blue and not letting the French "spin" the press releases does not impress.

In terms of actual alliances, there is probably little direct impact on Western China-containing alignment (not the capability, that has increased with nuke subs). The other big signal is that Australia is willing to give Beijing the finger.