Originally Posted by
tartare
I thought the water round there and the Timor Sea was pretty shallow too?
Big, strong tides and currents.
Hard to get a big boat (in a submarine sense) in and out, treacherous on the way and easy for people who wanted to - to track arrivals and departures.
Only when you get over near West Timor, or east of the Gulf of Carpentaria that it starts to get really deep.
Pretty much the arafura and timor seas aren't that good for subs. The only imho place worse for naval base in australia would be the north east coast of queensland because of the barrier reef
If you wanted to make new base and willing spend the billions broome / derby / port headland area would be the place. Hundreds of KM from anything gives go good security. Virtually immediate access to open/deep water