The French submarine deal was a major political morass in Australia, according to Australian news stories I saw months ago. The deal was sold to the Australian people as creating loads of high paid jobs, developing their industrial sector, etc. this almost immediately turned into long delays, tripling of costs, and few jobs n Aust.— most in France, for diesel subs the Chinese could detect and destroy. This was a deal that needed replacing. Just as in Afghanistan, it’s not the big picture policy that was wrong — it’s Biden’s clueless, incompetent implementation.
Kerry’s interjection of “literally” is almost certainly a tell that he is prevaricating. As VP for 8 YEARS of the French sub deal, Biden had to know quite a lot about it (mebbe he forgot...). He just proceeded without thinking, as is his wont.
That is my take, as well. This appears to be one of the many well thought out policy initialtives of the Trump administration, to counter the CCP.