The Spanish S-80 is not a French design-it is based on the joint Spanish-French ‘Scorpene’ sub.Both nations has shared the construction of boats for Malaysia & Chile,though the French are the ones with a majority stake.The S-80’s internals are almost completely different from that of the Scorpene with high American content.Sure,the Spanish may have their issues as well,but that’s one boat which the US can think of yanking away.
Well then it’s a question of how many billions of U.S. dollars will it take to convince Electric Boat or Grumman to take the job on. Frankly, if these boats are in the water in 10 years I’d be very surprised.