Congress unlikely to block Australian deal to buy US submarines: Marles

Defence Minister Richard Marles has brushed off concerns the US Congress may block Australia's bid to buy American submarines.

A group of Republicans in the US Senate have expressed their fears that selling nuclear-powered submarines to Australia through the AUKUS arrangement would leave their own navy short.

The powerful Republican ranking member on the Senate Armed Services Committee, Roger Wicker, called for more funding for the US military before they said they would support the sale.

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His Democratic counterpart Bob Menendez lambasted Wicker's position as "foolish".

But Marles was confident the political back-and-forth was "business as usual" in Congress.

"We are actually really encouraged by the pace at which this is proceeding through the Congress, the attention that it is receiving," Marles told Today.

"So we are still very confident about this."

Marles said he knew there was a commitment to the Australian-US alliance across the political divide in Washington.

It comes as an American warship was commissioned in Sydney today, the first time such an event was held outside the US.

The USS Canberra was designed and built by Western Australian company Austral.

"There is Australian DNA right through this," Marles said.

"The USS Canberra is the story – it tells the story of the alliance and it is a real symbol of the closeness between our two countries."

Australia is set to buy five Virginia-class submarines from the US in the 2030s.

The purchases are a major part of the federal government's estimated $368 billion submarine deal.

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