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  • Submarine article

    U.S. Submarine Force: Future in Declining Numbers
    Source: Naval Forces
    Publication date: 2006-01-01
    Arrival time: 2006-06-04


    By Jacobs, Keith
    Fig. 1: USS "Honolulu" (SSN-718) seen 280nm south of the North Pole. SSN-718 is on its final Western Pacific deployment and will not return to homeport Pearl Harbor, but will go directly to Kitsap- Bangor Naval Base (WA) for decommissioning later this year, short of its planned 30-year career. (Photo: Courtesy U.S. Navy, provided by author)

    On February 6th this year, the U.S. Navy re-commissioned the USS "Ohio" (SSGN-728) at Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor, first of a new generation of cruise missile submarines. The commissioning represents conclusion of work begun in 2001 under a US$ 1.2Bn authorisation to convert the first two retiring ballistic missile submarines (SSBN) of the "Ohio" (TRIDENT) design. But the future of the SSN portion of the fleet is less secure, already planned to decline to 42 SSN boats in the coming decade, while secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's infamous PBD 753 memorandum of December 2004 cut US$5.27Bn from planned FY 2007-11 funding plans for the "Virginia" (SSN-774) class construction programme - effectively retaining the current building rate of one-per-year through 2013. Congress has ordered the Navy to begin a new submarine class - one that is more affordable and can sustain a two-per-year building rate within likely Navy shipbuilding budgets. What follows is less certain and certainly subject to change.

    THE PLAN OF TODAY

    For the U.S. submarine fleet, it has been an interesting and challenging year. Doctrinal emphasis changes are resulting in more submarines in the Pacific, away from Cold War Atlantic and Mediterranean duty, and a forward-deployed submarine squadron at Guam to be nearer the Western Pacific area of operations.

    New Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) Admiral Mike Mullen has accepted the inevitable budget realities that it is no longer possible to have a 55 SSN fleet and that numbers will decline with decommissioning to 42 in coming years.

    And Congress has entered the picture on the future of the U.S. attack submarine force. Fiscal Year 2006 congressional authorisation (HR 1815) "requires the Secretary of Defense to commence design of a New Nuclear Submarine Design, with construction slated for 2014." Formal design work is likely to begin next year, with formal contract award in 2012 and first hull laid down in 2014 (if the congressional directive is followed in coming years).

    BUDGET PRESSURES MOUNT

    The National Military Strategy planning requires the Navy to maintain 55 SSN. The Navy had hoped to maintain this number with either a 375-ship fleet (a fleet rapidly declining to 310-ship fleet under 2001 QDR). It simply was not affordable with a Navy now in the low-280's. According to CNO planning documents, the SSN fleet will decline to 42 (plus 14 SSBN and 4 SSGN) in coming years. Fifty-five is simply not sustainable financially - and will be even less so in the post-Iraq war decade - and there are questions as to whether such a number is necessary (especially if the reconnaissance mission is removed), and the submarine 'community' simply lacks the influence it once did on Capital Hill (or at the top ranks of the Navy). The Navy's budget is not formed within a vacuum but must also contend with sharing the defence budget with the Army and Air Force - the latter already showing signs by mid-next decade of growth in the proportion that it takes from the annual defence budget.

    Future demands on the Shipbuilding and Construction (SCN) budget will remain heavy over the next two decades. Long-term planning is based on a fleet headed up with 11 aircraft carriers, plus sixteen CG(X), ten DD(X) and 73 LCS shown in most Navy planning documents. The current Future Years Defense Plan (FYDP) covers only five DD(X) - and long term plans only cover seven ships.

    CNO Admiral Mike Mullen's submission to Congress to raise the fleet from its current 281 ships to an average of 313 in the early- 2020 period represented his thinking that "We need to stop getting smaller". What remains controversial and possibly unattainable is the cost: the fleet plan submitted would require raising the SCN budget from US$9.5Bn (2007) to about US$13.5Bn beginning in 2008 and rising slightly over later years. This calls for 51 new ships at a combined cost of US$66.3Bn over the forthcoming five years. While most numerous are the new Littoral Combat Ships of two initial designs - beginning with USS "Freedom" (LCS-1) - it also includes six more "Virginia" SSN (FY 08-13).

    Fig. 2: USS "Jimmy Carter" (SSN-23) seen here post launch, will remain a one-of-a-kind in a likely fifty-year career (with ERO), focused on systems and weapons development with the sub's unique ability to load external payloads into the ocean interface section on the lower hull.

    Budget pressures are coming from numerous quarters. The Navy- Marine team also just officially kicked off the CH-53X heavy helicopter programme - the newest multi-billion dollar procurement programme alongside J-35 Joint Strike Fighter, F/A-18E/F SUPER HORNET, V-22 OS-PREY and other programmes. As a percentage of future procurements, aircraft procurement begins to take a significantly greater percentage of the annual Navy budgets from FY 2008, while SSN funding remains steady through FY 2011-12. From that time, Cruiser Modernisation [CG(X)] begins to take a growing slice of the annual SCN.

    While the U.S. Navy would like to have a 313-ship fleet in 2035, IF (a big question) the Navy gets its long-term shipbuilding plan, it would have 332 ships in 2019, but down to 312-ship by 2035.

    In 2006, the Navy will take delivery on 14 new ships while retiring 12, raising the fleet numbers to 283 by end-of-year. Former Navy secretary and now Senator John Warner (R-VA) noted: "A fleet of this size may well jeopardize the Navy's mission to meet its requirements and the financial viability of the vital shipbuilding industrial base" - since the influential senator comes from the home state of Northrop Grumman-Newport News Shipbuilding (NG-NNS), his support for an ever expanding Navy (which he was not effective at retaining during his Navy Secretary days) is no surprise.

    START TREATY CHIEFLY GOVERNS NUMBER OF SSBN

    The Navy's fourteen SSBN are based at Kings Bay, Georgia and Kitsap-Bangor, Washington. Each boat has a crew of about 15 officers and 140 enlisted. The "Blue" and "Gold" crew concept continues, deploying with one of these crews for 77-days each deployment cycle, followed by a 2-3 day turnover and a 35-day maintenance period after each deployment. The Navy has changed the traditional balance of SSBN between the Atlantic and Pacific fleets, when USS "Kentucky" (SSBN-737) and USS "Pennsylvania" (SSBN-735) shifted colours to the Pacific.

    The SSBN force is in compliance with START I treaty provisions, negotiated by Presidents Clinton and Yeltsin and to be fully implemented by December 2007. This requires the U.S. to reduce nuclear warheads to 3,500 warhead limit under START II. This became the impetus to reduce the SSBN fleet from 18 to 14 - along with scrapping 50 PEACEKEEPER ICBM and 23 B-52H STRATOFORTRESS Strategie bombers by late-2007. The treaty also reduces the number of warheads for 500 MINUTEMAN III IBCM from three to one, and on SSBN TRIDENT D- 5 SLBM from eight to five warheads.

    Fig. 3: USS "Cheyenne" (SSN-773), last of the 1-688 class delivered seen in April 2003. Five SSN are now forward based at Apra Harbor, Guam. ERO revitalisation and upgrades have been discontinued for all SSNs, as the force will be allowed to decline to 42 boats in coming years.

    SSBN boats undergo complex overhaul and reactor refuelling every ten years and the service is supporting this Engineering Refuelling Overhaul (ERO) process. Since FY 2005, one ERO per year has been funded (FY 05 @ US$262M. and FY 06 @ USS230M) and a total of six are provided under FY 2006-11 years. In addition, each submarine is being fitted with BQQ-10 Acoustic Rapid COTS Insertion (ARCI) sonar update, which began with USS "Alaska" (SSBN-732) in 2000.

    Retrofitting ofUGM-133A/D-5 SLBM to the last SSBN is nearly completed (about mid-year). Funding for 12 TRIDENT II (D-5) SLBM (US$136M) was included in FY 04 and a final five (US$72.8M) under FY 05 budgets. This is part of an added 115 missile buy being produced to maintain adequate inventory beyond the 425 operationally deployed on SSBN submarines. The 313-ship fleet is to retain 14 SSBN until the mid-2020s replacement SSBN(X) will be required to enter production at a one-per-year rate to replace existing "Ohio" class boats. One future option would be to reduce the number to 10, with the oldest four being converted to SSGN configuration. The size would likely be twice that of a SSN-774 and likely accommodate only 17 TRIDENT D-5 (including future conventional warhead versions), but have some provision for cruise missiles and Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (UUV), using a hull based on SSN-774 or its replacement. Navy estimates costs at US$3.6Bn, but this will be more likely in the range of US$6.2Bn each.

    THE NEW SSGN

    The Navy is no stranger to the new generation of guided missile submarines. As Rear Admiral John D. Butler wrote in COMNAVSUBFOR Reserve Note (August 2002): "In the last years of the Eisenhower administration, USS "Tunny" (SS-282) underwent a conversion that would change her mission profile from an open o\cean attack submarine to one of strike warfare - a novel concept for the U.S. Navy's submarine fleet." In 1959, "Tunny" began a series of deterrent patrols that changed the submarine paradigm forever - though it was not immediately apparent to many naval strategists at the time.

    He went on to write: "REGULUS was an evolution concept - its obvious inspiration being the German V-1 Buzz Bomb of WW II. It was designed by the Navy and Chance Vought Aircraft after the war, and first deployed in the fleet in 1955. The airframe consisted of an unmanned turbo-jet powered vehicle, and was capable of delivering a 3,000-pound, 40-50 Kiloton W5 or 2,800-pound 1-2 Megaton W27 thermonuclear warhead within a range of 500 nautical miles - a substantial payload for those times."

    RADM Butler goes on to note: "The SSBN force today forms the linchpin of the nuclear triad... These supremely capable submarines were a relatively new addition to the nuclear triad; the lead ship of the class, USS "Ohio" (SSBN-726), was commissioned in 1981. But a decade later the world changed when the Cold War ended, and the needs of national defence and strategic deterrence changed with it... as the last of the TRIDENT hulls - USS "Louisiana" (SSBN-743) - [was] being commissioned in 1997."

    And RADM Butler concluded: "...the SSGN concept is the definition of Transformation. We are taking an existing platform and remoulding it to perform and entirely new mission - one never envisioned by its designers. The SSGN programme represents a relatively low cost way to leverage the highly successful TRIDENT maintenance and training infrastructure and proven two-crew (Blue and Gold) concept to maximise forward-deployed war fighting capability. Having rotating crews allows the ship to be at sea about 70-percent of the time."

    Much heralded is the potential of each SSGN-726 to accommodate the following:

    * capability to launch from 98 to 154 BGM-109 TOMAHAWK TLAM from up to 22 launch tubes depending on configuration;

    * capability to launch Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (UUV) and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) from two launch tubes, again depending on overall configuration;

    * launch platform for the Advanced SEAL Delivery System [ASDS, meanwhile delayed for technical reasons] and ability to embark from 60 to 102 SEAL or other SOF personnel, with inclusion of ASDS reducing the overall missile tube availability for other weapon loads. SOF personnel bunking is via 'hot bunking' if more than sixty SEAL or others are accommodated for short periods.

    In February 2002, Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems was given the contract for demonstration and validation of the Multiple All- up round Canister (MAC) that is at the heart of the ability to launch alternative configurations in the former TRIDENT SLBM silos. The MAC will replace 22 of the original 24 launch tubes. Each MAC carries seven BGM-109 SLCM, or alternative loads still to be developed.

    Fig. 4: USS "San Francisco" (SSN-711) enters Apra harbour, Guam. Now one of five submarines are operating permanently out of Guam - the island offers significantly less transit times to deployment locations in SE Asia and the Indian Ocean, an issue of new importance as the fleet declines to 42 subs.

    One reason the load-cuts differ is that the inner and outer silo tube dimensions differ. According to Navy releases, these are the most likely uses for the MAC and weapons loads:

    * Maximum Strike: launch silos No. 3 through 24 each carry one 'seven pack' MAC; all 154 TLAM can launch within a six minute firing period.

    * Strike with SOF #1 - launch silos No. 5-24 load; total 140 TLAM plus silos No.3 and 4 loaded for SOF stowage canisters, plus one or two ASDS vehicles. Launch silos No. 1 and 2 are permanently modified for 5-man SEAL team lock-in/lock-out and for attachment of ASDS or Dry Deck Shelter (DDS) vehicles.

    * Strike with SOF #2 - silos No. 7-24 load with 126 TLAM plus silos No. 5 and 6 kept empty or loaded with added SOF equipment and two DDS carried.

    While the 154 TOMAHAWK launch ability has been given over-kill status in the media - and wrongfully so - the most likely load-out remains at 98 to 125 SLCM, due to the provision to carry both ASDS and DDS deck loads. Two ASDS could be carried, due to system development problems with ASDS, only ASDS No. 1 is operational. Development of other vehicles is delayed by contract cancellation with Northrop Grumman Oceanic and Naval Systems until a new contract RfP is developed and released. In the interim, two DDS are expected to offer some protection and mobility for SEAL teams. With these onboard vehicles, the loadout of TLAM is limited to 98 missiles.

    The next three submarines to commission will be USS "Florida" (SSGN-728) that entered ERO status at Norfolk Naval Shipyard (Portsmouth, VA) in July 2003 and began silo conversion in April 2004. Units three and four - USS "Michigan" (SSGN-727) and USS "Georgia" (SSGN-729) began their ERO at Bremerton Naval Shipyard and Norfolk NS, respectively in 2003 and both will commission next year.

    RADM Butler notes: "Development and demonstration of flexible payload modules and capsules is currently being funded to enable rapid insertion of off-board systems and technologies developed by others for the SSGN ... we are funding an upcoming demonstration of the development of an existing intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance unmanned airborne vehicle (ISR UAV) from expendable capsules, with implications of the use of UAVs for battlefield surveillance, special operations support, and as decoys against advanced surface-to-air missile sites is obvious."

    Another effort of mating the Navy penetrator warhead to an Army ATACMS-type land attack missile is still being pursued (though found unacceptable for surface ship application). The delivery system would be intended to destroy hardened and deeply buried command-and- control bunker targets, mobile and other interdiction targets. Another future development for SSGN uses involve demonstration of "a buoyant capsule that would allow for submerged launch of standard Army TACM missiles from an SSGN. Again, the vehicle and payloads already exist in the inventory - we are just interested in proving new ways to get this package to its intended destination", notes RADM Butler. Along with ATACMS applications, more promising is fitting a variety of conventional warheads to the existing TRIDENT D- 5 SLBM.

    RADM Butler concludes by putting the SSGN in perspective: "So, the SSGN's role in battlespace preparation seems perfectly clear. It is the SSGN's role in battlespace attack that cinches the deal in enabling Assured Access and Joint Force Transformation. The SSGN would be engaged in the suppression of enemy air defences, attack hard or deeply buried targets far inland (recent operations against the Tora Bora redoubt in Afghanistan come to mind), and providing battlefield interdiction against enemy coastal defences and surface combatants."

    Fig. 5: USS "Seawolf" main control room shows well the layout of a modern U.S. Navy SSN. With capability to have 50 internal stowed torpedoes and TLAMS or other payloads (UUV, UAV) plus 12 TOMAHAWKTLAM's, the SSN-21 class remains the ultimate in SSN development but not to be repeated in the future.

    THE SSN FLEET

    At the end of last year, the Navy had three "Seawolf" (SSN-21 class), 28 "Los Angeles" (SSN-688) and 23 Improved "Los Angeles" (I- SSN-688) nuclear attack submarines. The SSN-688 class is rapidly de- commissioning. Two SSN-688 ERO were funded under FY 2004 (US$445.8M.). One SSN ERO is scheduled (vice planned three) under FY 07 and one under FY 08, there being only two SSN ERO planned under FY 06-11.

    What remains of the 688/1-688 is the sad result of the Navy having to reduce its nuclear-powered attack submarine fleet from 80 boats in 1996 to 50 by 2003, resulting in many "Los Angeles" class submarines being decommissioning before reaching their 30-year service life. The very existence of the "Seawolf"/"Virginia" SSN classes was based on a Joint Chiefs of Staff postulation that the Navy would need ten to twelve "very quiet" attack subs by 2012 to compete with the latest of Russian designs - but a requirement that stemmed from trends then evident before the end of the Cold War. Were it not for that requirement, the Navy today could still do quite well with retaining the 688/1-688 force and extending their usefulness over the next two decades with ERO and upgrades for littoral operations.

    Fig. 6: USS "Ohio" (SSGN-726) post conversion in Puget Sound after departing Kitsap-Bangor Naval Base (WA) in late January this year on trials and media day events. All four SSGN conversions will be in commission by late-2007.

    Thus more than a dozen years after the end of the Cold War, the Navy continues construction of the very expensive "Virginia" class and will continue to do so, in part from political pressure from Congress with shipyards in two key states, and from its own internal lack of developing a suitable alternative design (conventional or nuclear-powered).

    The first two SSN-21 - "Seawolf" and "Connecticut" - were commissioned in 1997 and 1998, respectively. The long delayed and highly modified USS "Jimmy Carter" (SSN-23) commissioned in June 2004. "Jimmy Carter" joined her sister boats in the Pacific Fleet in late-2006. The SSN-23 modifications include upper deck attachment points for Advanced SEAL Delivery System (ASDS) or DDS, internal berthing for Special Operations Force personnel and equipment stowage, and eight 673mm (26.5-inch) torpedo tubes and a 50 weapons (Mk.48 ADCAP, TOMAHAWK TLAM cruise missiles, etc.) capacity. Long delayed and costly (US$689M at 1991 contract revision time), "Jimmy Carter" will remain a one-of-a-kind over the next decades.

    Construction of the "Virginia" (SSN-774) class began in August 1997 at General Dynamics - Electric Boat Division. The Navy has two submarine shipyards involved in SSN-774 construction: GD - Electr\ic Boat (Groton, CT) and Northrop Grumman-Newport News Shipbuilding (NG- NNS) - both capable of undertaking total SSN construction but currently in a shared construction programme due to the one-per- year construction rate. At present, five submarines are building (SSN-775 to SSN-779 - USS "Texas" (SSN-775) due to commission next June 30th but months late in completion) - plus four further (SSN- 780 to SSN-783) in advanced procurement funding.

    Named forthcoming submarines are scheduled for commissioning as follows: "Texas" @30 Oct 06, "Hawaii" @18 Dec 06, "North Carolina" @17 Dec 07, "New Hampshire" @16Apr 09, and "New Mexico" @16 Apr 10. Further (unnamed) boats (SSN-780 to SSN-783) are due to commission in mid-April in each of the years 2011 to 2014. It looks as if SSN- 784 and SSN-785, now in long-term planning and considered options, are unlikely to ever be built. The last (SSN-783) would commission 14 April 2014.

    Under the final fiscal year 2006 defence appropriation and authorisation bills, congressional conferees imposed caps on future "Virginia" class boats: SSN-779: US$2.33Bn; SSN-780: US$2.47Bn; SSN- 781 : US$2.55Bn; SSN-782: US$2.67Bn; and SSN-783 at US$2.72Bn. It is an indicator of growing concern for the cost of these huge SSN boats and an effort to end the cycle of ever more costly subs. It is the major reason Congress is ordering the Navy to begin a new, less expensive nuclear-powered or diesel attack submarine beginning 2014.

    SSN(X) DESIGN CONSIDERATION

    Key SSN-774 characteristics of the class include a displacement of 7,800-tons submerged and a crew of 12 officers and 101 enlisted (ratings). The submarine has vertical launch silos for 12 BGM-109 TOMAHAWK land-attack cruise missiles (TLAMS), four torpedo tubes with a total of 38 (SSN-21 has 50) torpedoes (mostly Mk.48 ADCAP), anti-ship torpedoes or various mines. In the future, this will include unmanned underwater vehicles (UUV) that can be launched from 53.3cm torpedo tubes. The massive Lockheed Martin BQQ-10 sonar suite is optimised for open ocean warfare, with some modifications to aid in littoral warfare operations. The submarines were designed "to be as quiet at sea as an SSN-688 pier side". The S9G nuclear water reactor and pump jet develop 40,000-shp and has been highly insulated to quieten noise generation. Wide aperture (BQG-5A) passive arrays and a TB-16 towed array are carried for passive detection of hostile submarines underwater. Their almost 115m length, width of 10.37m is clearly impressive - but, also very expensive. And, that's the problem.

    How to replace such capability? First, size is an important factor in cost. Clearly, 7,800-tons is massive and too large for future littoral missions against significantly smaller diesel- attack submarines as operated by many potentially hostile Navies.

    Second, there is a requirement to operate more TOMAHAWK TLAMS - and to operate a new generation of UUV for mine detection, trailing operations, sensor planting and other missions. A new-generation of Small UUV is being designed, but to gain flexibility the new design might do well to include 67.3cm torpedo tubes (as on the SSN-21 design). Since the 1-688 SSN carry 25 torpedoes or mine and other weapons, there remains great pressure to carry a load at least as large as on I-688s.

    Fig. 7: USS "Virginia" (SSN-774) during arrival ceremonies at New London Sub Base (CT)in November 2005. As first of the class that has proved very capable in open-ocean ASW operations, their future is being cut short with a new SSN(X) class scheduled for ordering under FY 2014 budget.

    Third, passive and active sonar system design may have to replace existing BQQ-10 to be more optimised for shallow water operations more common with littoral (0-500nm from shore) operations. This adds expense in advance to the design.

    Lastly, the design must be cost effective - capable of construction at the rate of two-peryear for as long as a decade, without breaking the Navy shipbuilding and construction (SCN) budget (as two "Virginia" class subs would do now). Thus, whatever design is chosen, it must be on the order of US$1.0Bn per boat, once series production begins. Considering the Navy planned to build 30 "Virginia" class boats though 2017 with final delivery in 2025, with continued need to keep SSN-774 construction at one-per-year this means current construction is insufficient for a 42 SSN-774/SSN-688 fleet. As such, the Navy will either have to quickly begin a two- per-year rate with a new design or plan for more engineering overhaul / refuelling (ERO) events for "Los Angeles" (all 1-688) class submarines to maintain the required force level.

    FUTURE AIP SSK: RIGHTLY TABOO-ED?

    It is worth noting that even in the late year of former CNO Admiral Vern Clark's tenure, the Navy still planned to build 20 additional "Virginia" class (SSN-784-803), an indication of optimism until events since March 2003 (Operation IRAQI FREEDOM) began to impact negatively on future budget planning.

    The "Virginia" replacement [SSN(X)] must cost less than the US$2.6Bn average for SSN-774 class; one of the Navy's goals is to attain a two-per-year building rate - simply not possible with costs today. Some have advocated return to diesel-attack submarine designs with air independent propulsion (AIP) machinery, but this seems unlikely while the Navy retains no more than 39 SSN-688(I)/SSN-774 and three SSN-21 classes in-service.

    But it is a reasonable consideration, given advantages in sonar and other operational performance in littoral waters. Resistance within the Navy to diesel-attack submarines may not be as high as it was during the Admiral Rickover era, but it remains deeply engrained within the submarine community.

    However, facing serious budget issues - not just from the shipbuilding and construction sector - including soaring health care costs multiplied by military service losses in the Iraq war, the future admirals' next decade will face some hard choices. The overall U.S. military budget, while having increased, still does not rival the impact of the Vietnam War military spending increases versus gross domestic product (GDP) -but unbridled Homeland Security Department spending is driving up the Federal Budget and in the years after the Bush administration will force the next President and the military chiefs in the coming decade to trim defence outlays (much as was the original rationale for the first Quadrennial Defence Review after the Cold War).

    Faced with such issues next decade, the U.S. submarine community and Navy leadership must develop more affordable solutions to the 'numbers' requirement generated by forward-deployment in support of American foreign policies. A new SSN or SSK design requires five years lead time; therefore it is expected for research design work to begin next year. The challenges will be both technical and political and it is far too distant a time to predict the outcome. In the intervening years, the Navy will see its SSN force decline; though experiencing some improvements in technical capabilities with new innovations in UUV and other technologies.

    Keith Jacobs has written extensively in various academic publications on the military forces and Navies of Asia. He holds degrees in Sino-Russian studies. He regularly assessed for NAVAL FORCES U.S. shipbuilding plans vice operational needs voiced by the Navy.

    Copyright Moench Verlagsgesellschaft mbH 2006

    (c) 2006 Naval Forces. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.


    http://moaa.yellowbrix.com/pages/moa...952855&ID=moaa

  • #2
    So basically, they want to do the same thing with the Virginia that they did with the Seawolf. I mean, isn't the Virginia already supposed to be a cheaper, smaller alternative to the Seawolf with better littoral capabilities? For cryin' out loud.
    I enjoy being wrong too much to change my mind.

    Comment


    • #3
      It never ends Armchair.

      Comment


      • #4
        Some moron really thinks that a new design is going to save money? They have already made this mistake once. I am not the most knowledgable about subs, but think that I once read that diesel subs would not be a good fit for the USN because of the long ranges and length of missions that are required. Is that a legit statement? Its stuff like this that makes me fear for the future of the navy. Subs are important, really important.

        Comment


        • #5
          Originally posted by HKDan
          Some moron really thinks that a new design is going to save money? They have already made this mistake once. I am not the most knowledgable about subs, but think that I once read that diesel subs would not be a good fit for the USN because of the long ranges and length of missions that are required. Is that a legit statement? Its stuff like this that makes me fear for the future of the navy. Subs are important, really important.
          I actually asked rickusn about SSK's a couple of weeks ago. IIRC, the supposed advantages of SSKs in quietness compared to nukes may be overstated, and American submariners pretty much always win against allied SSKs. The problem with AIP is that you simply cannot go very fast without your range dropping like a stone. Thus, once you get somewhere, if you want to stay undetected, you stay where you are, 'cause it takes too long to get anywhere. Basically, their only advantages are silence and cost. The silence issues with nukes are getting less and less, and the cost advantage would quite possibly be canceled out by the need for more subs to make up for lost capability. The disadvantages in speed and range tip the balance in favor of nukes.
          I enjoy being wrong too much to change my mind.

          Comment

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