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Life chasing subs just got more interesting!

Flash

Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Randy Daytona said:
Question: Would it not make sense to have some of these near choke points and the littorals: i.e., Mediterranean, South China Sea? If you can get 7 of these for the price of 1 nuke would it not be better to have 7 of these boats in this area? Perhaps not necessarily hunting in the vast expanses of the Atlantic or the Pacific but in confined areas where range and speed are not as much a factor as on station presence and the flexibility that comes with greater numbers? In other words, if it makes sense to have a littoral combat ship, why not a littoral combat sub?
Click to expand...

Then you are spending a lot of money on an asset that can only do one thing of the many missions we require of our SSN's. The lower cost comes with a much more limited mission set than I think you realize. Also not included in the costs are:

- Design and building of a type of sub we haven't built in 50 years. Do you really think we would buy a Swedish, German or Japanese design? Talk about cost overruns...
- Training and support facilities for a type of sub we haven't operated in 25 years.
- Building and maintaining submarine bases much closer to areas of operations than we have now.

These are the same types of issues that the USAF is running into by being forced to continue maintaining the A-10 fleet. The USAF CoS has said that to get the same savings retiring A-10's he would have to retire 3 times as many F-16's. Why? The cost of the infrastructure that goes in maintaining another type of aircraft fleet and personnel associated with it, from training units to depot maintenance facilities to parts and people. And all for what amounts to a one trick pony of an aircraft (but, but....brrrrrt). The same goes for an SSK fleet, take the cost of each sub unit and then triple or quadruple it when you take in all the extra support infrastructure needed to build, maintain and train that fleet and its sailors.
 
Spekkio

Spekkio

He bowls overhand.
Randy Daytona said:
Question: Would it not make sense to have some of these near choke points and the littorals: i.e., Mediterranean, South China Sea? If you can get 7 of these for the price of 1 nuke would it not be better to have 7 of these boats in this area? Perhaps not necessarily hunting in the vast expanses of the Atlantic or the Pacific but in confined areas where range and speed are not as much a factor as on station presence and the flexibility that comes with greater numbers? In other words, if it makes sense to have a littoral combat ship, why not a littoral combat sub?
Click to expand...
What happens when they have to snorkel after about a week or so of operating in theater?

Where are the SSKs or SSPs going to return to port after their patrols? Open up Google Earth, the South China Sea is a big place and we have no sub bases near enough for a diesel sub maintenance facility. We currently do major upkeeps in Pearl or San Diego. Even if you could build the facility and hire all the workers in Guam (more costs), that is out of a diesel sub's range.

SSNs can do that mission set AND other missions we need them to do. While I'd love to be on a platform free from the clutches of Naval Reactors regulations, there's really no fit for diesel subs in our fleet.
 
P

Pags

N/A
pilot
Randy Daytona said:
Question: Would it not make sense to have some of these near choke points and the littorals: i.e., Mediterranean, South China Sea? If you can get 7 of these for the price of 1 nuke would it not be better to have 7 of these boats in this area? Perhaps not necessarily hunting in the vast expanses of the Atlantic or the Pacific but in confined areas where range and speed are not as much a factor as on station presence and the flexibility that comes with greater numbers? In other words, if it makes sense to have a littoral combat ship, why not a littoral combat sub?
Click to expand...
We (the Royal NATO/US partner We) do have subs like these in the locations you mentioned. They just happen to be non-US boats and instead are owned and operated by the French, Spanish, Germans, Japanese, and Swedes to name the ones that are in our camp.
 
zippy

zippy

Freedom!
pilot
Contributor
Randy Daytona said:
Question: Would it not make sense to have some of these near choke points and the littorals: i.e., Mediterranean, South China Sea? If you can get 7 of these for the price of 1 nuke would it not be better to have 7 of these boats in this area? Perhaps not necessarily hunting in the vast expanses of the Atlantic or the Pacific but in confined areas where range and speed are not as much a factor as on station presence and the flexibility that comes with greater numbers? In other words, if it makes sense to have a littoral combat ship, why not a littoral combat sub?
Click to expand...

Detection means death for a submarine in a combat environment. If a sub detected it needs to be fast enough to survive. A Diesel sub brings too much detection risk at the expense of survivability compared to the submarines we have today.

LCS is a piece of shit. You don't want us buying the submarine equivalent of it.
 
BigRed389

BigRed389

Registered User
None
Hair Warriors? said:
semi-threadjack/
On a related note to ASW and maritime patrol aircraft, has anyone here ever flown one of these puppies? If so, how good are they going to be in the air-sea domain? https://warisboring.com/the-pentago...-s-claims-in-the-south-china-sea-acc3ead472c0
Click to expand...

Probably pretty cool up until things get real hot.

An A-10 sounds like target practice for an AAW ship.

Randy Daytona said:
Question: Would it not make sense to have some of these near choke points and the littorals: i.e., Mediterranean, South China Sea? If you can get 7 of these for the price of 1 nuke would it not be better to have 7 of these boats in this area? Perhaps not necessarily hunting in the vast expanses of the Atlantic or the Pacific but in confined areas where range and speed are not as much a factor as on station presence and the flexibility that comes with greater numbers? In other words, if it makes sense to have a littoral combat ship, why not a littoral combat sub?
Click to expand...

The LCS analogy isn't too bad if you take the mission package side of the LCS only.

In other words, the idea of deploying UUVs or USVs to do what SSKs and SSPs would do is probably more worth investigating than trying to copy what our allies already do with small conventional subs.
Because as soon as you go to a big conventional sub like the JMSDF and RAN operate, I'm going to bet the whole "affordable" thing starts to go away.
 
Uncle Fester

Uncle Fester

Robot Pimp
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
I've been reading "War Beneath the Sea," which compares/contrasts the US, British, German, and Japanese sub campaigns in WWII. One thing I wish the author had dwelt more on was the pre-war boat design and training of the respective navies, because what he does talk about is interesting and revealing. He makes the point that the British and Japanese navies became too focused on over-specialized subs tailored to specific niches in the overall war plans, and as a result, fought the war with boats and tactics that couldn't get the job done. Whereas the Germans and USN Submarine Officer Conferences honestly assessed the lessons of WWI and the results of war games and drove sub design and tactics toward general purpose boats and long-range independent patrols.
 
BigRed389

BigRed389

Registered User
None
Pags said:
The HMAS Collins class of subs was an acquisition disaster for the RAN.
Click to expand...

European hull design + US based combat systems + domestic construction was probably the bigger contributor to that problem...not just large conventional. The Japanese pulled it off OK doing it mostly in house.

Glad they learned from their mistake with their newest sub. Oh wait...
 
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