Submarines

[Timsup2nothin]

Sort of. It came from WWII, and essentially is the point that a burning sinking ship is also a very useful signal (and potentially the only one) of where a submarine is/was.

I know. Mine was the updated, peacetime version.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Das Boot was a realistic 80s movie about a German U-Boat in WWII, not for the claustrophobic.

My dad was merchant marine in wwii and his ship was sunk by a U-Boat down near Cuba. He got out of that and started flying B-17s.

That's a good movie

The only effective defense a carrier strike group has against enemy submarines is friendly submarines, so they have to be included.

Why is this?

They're never going to be used properly in their intended role and even if they are they're not a war winner.

They had decisive roles in both world wars and carry most of one 'arm' of the American nuclear triad. They have almost all of Britain and Frances nuclear deterrent as well.

 

[amadeus]

I’ve only ever been on that U-boat that’s in Chicago. I really don’t know much about naval strategy and the role of different surface ships (cruiser? Destroyer? Frigate?)

I remember submarines being used mainly to torpedo fighting ships and merchant ships, but I suppose today many countries use them to carry nuclear missiles.

So what do the non-nuclear countries do with them?

 

[Old Hippy]

I’ve only ever been on that U-boat that’s in Chicago. I really don’t know much about naval strategy and the role of different surface ships (cruiser? Destroyer? Frigate?)

I remember submarines being used mainly to torpedo fighting ships and merchant ships, but I suppose today many countries use them to carry nuclear missiles.

So what do the non-nuclear countries do with them?

Australia stalks US Carriers and goes on goodwill visits to China

 

[hobbsyoyo]

So what do the non-nuclear countries do with them?

You answered your own question -

I remember submarines being used mainly to torpedo fighting ships and merchant ships

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Why is this?

Lots of reasons, most of which overlap. They all revolve around the fact that surface ships make so much noise that they can't hear...well...stuff. There's a word more commonly used there. Anyway...

A ship moving on the surface is an endless splashing of waves against the hull, either from the water moving or the ship running into the water. They are also a constant roaring of foam; which is bubbles that are always popping. Little tiny bubbles make little tiny pops, but a zillion little bubbles popping at the same time, all the time...not a little tiny noise. It's like flying over a forest listening for deer...in a helicopter. They ain't gonna hear nothin' but themselves, period. Now, @IglooDude was a surface ship submarine hunter and may claim that it isn't that bad, I dunno.

A submarine survives by being quiet. They don't have to 'quiet down' just to listen, because they are always being quiet. Every aspect of designing and building a submarine factors in being quiet. So if the only way to find something is by hearing it, you want to listen from a submarine.

That's the first thing. Now, consider having to kill this thing. Everybody has weapons with ranges in miles, maybe tens of miles, maybe even a hundred miles. That includes the submarine. The problem is that the submarine has a pretty good idea where surface ships are even before they are in range of the longest ranged weapons. They can track, and close in, and track some more, and plot and chart movement and calculate, and do it some more. If a surface ship starts coming towards them they can evade it while it is still far enough away that it doesn't know the submarine is anywhere around, because the submarine not only knows it is there, it is tracking its movements. If we're in a large room and I'm blindfolded and just groping around trying to find you, how hard is it going to be to stay out of my reach, really? You see me coming clear across the room and just get out of the way. If you want to kill something you can't let it see you coming. The only thing a submarine doesn't see coming is a submarine or a derelict.

Ultimately, the only thing a submarine fears is a better submarine.

 

[amadeus]

That’s what I was wondering, if they still served that as their main military function.

With how little risk there is at present for most countries to fight another country with a naval arm, I was just thinking out loud that they might not be as critical to war as they once were.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

That’s what I was wondering, if they still served that as their main military function.

With how little risk there is at present for most countries to fight another country with a naval arm, I was just thinking out loud that they might not be as critical to war as they once were.

Very few countries actually even have a "naval arm," so yeah, the odds of one of them squaring off against another of them are pretty slim. Of course this "naval arm" is a relative term. For example, a war between Taiwan and Indonesia (in a vacuum, no outside intervention) would be a 'naval war.' Taiwan has a number of blue water vessels, something under fifty. Indonesia has a significant fleet, probably three times the numbers and firepower, but all coastal ships. Taiwan would be able to pick and choose where to engage, but before they could successfully land troops they would have to neutralize the Indonesian fleet, which would be a very challenging task for their navy.

Because Taiwan has blue water vessels while Indonesia has greater numbers and firepower, which one has the 'stronger' navy depends on what metric you use, but one or the other will land at about tenth on a listing of the most powerful navies in the world. India, with by most measures the seventh most powerful navy in the world would likely look at Indonesia and Taiwan together as "lacking sufficient naval forces to be considered opposition." Again in that vacuum with no outside intervention India has sufficient blue water vessels and firepower that they could just eliminate any naval resistance and land troops in Indonesia at will. They also have more than enough of a coastal defense fleet to resist any incursions by Taiwan at the same time, and once they were done doing whatever they were doing in Indonesia they could eliminate any coastal resistance that Taiwan had to offer as well. It would be no contest.

Conversely, Japan, which has the fourth most powerful navy in the world, would likely consider India to be very nearly unarmed in terms of naval warfare. They are pretty closely matched with the Chinese, and the Russians, and the three of them put together would lose access to the sea in a war with the US in a matter of days. Elimination of coastal defenses would take a little longer, but basically if the US navy declared the oceans of the world off limits the entire rest of the naval forces on the planet combined couldn't really do anything about it.

Unless, of course, someone with a ballistic missile sub full of nukes (Russia, UK, France, China?) just popped the cork and accepted MAD. That is why ballistic missile subs full of nukes will likely never go out of style. No one messes with someone who just might be crazy enough to pop that cork, so every madman on the planet wants a cork to pop in case they ever feel the need.

 

[really]

Never been on one. I was at a museum in Milan miles from the sea that had a retired one but it wasn't open which was annoying.

'Ireland's' only submarine:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenian_Ram
Designed and built by an Irish inventor in the US, funded by Fenians to fight the British, they argued over money, the Fenians stole the ship but then couldn't operate it. Holland the inventor refused to help them. A very Irish story.
Holland designed submarines for the US and UK.

Our main problem with submarines, other than the nuclear doom on our door step is Royal Navy submarines snagging trawlers
https://www.gov.uk/maib-reports/col...rawler-karen-and-a-dived-royal-navy-submarine

 

[rah]

Oh, hey, I wasn't even thinking about tours and such. I got to tour this Soviet boat and this WWII German boat.

I've done the 505 tour a few times. My only experiences on this topic.

 

[Cutlass]

I did the U-505 tour. But it's probably been close to 30 years since I've been to Chicago, and don't remember it well. USS Lionfish at Battleship Cove. USS Albacore at Portsmouth NH. USS Nautilus at the US Navy Submarine Force Museum at New London CT.

 

[IglooDame]

Lots of reasons, most of which overlap. They all revolve around the fact that surface ships make so much noise that they can't hear...well...stuff. There's a word more commonly used there. Anyway...

A ship moving on the surface is an endless splashing of waves against the hull, either from the water moving or the ship running into the water. They are also a constant roaring of foam; which is bubbles that are always popping. Little tiny bubbles make little tiny pops, but a zillion little bubbles popping at the same time, all the time...not a little tiny noise. It's like flying over a forest listening for deer...in a helicopter. They ain't gonna hear nothin' but themselves, period. Now, @IglooDude was a surface ship submarine hunter and may claim that it isn't that bad, I dunno.

A submarine survives by being quiet. They don't have to 'quiet down' just to listen, because they are always being quiet. Every aspect of designing and building a submarine factors in being quiet. So if the only way to find something is by hearing it, you want to listen from a submarine.

That's the first thing. Now, consider having to kill this thing. Everybody has weapons with ranges in miles, maybe tens of miles, maybe even a hundred miles. That includes the submarine. The problem is that the submarine has a pretty good idea where surface ships are even before they are in range of the longest ranged weapons. They can track, and close in, and track some more, and plot and chart movement and calculate, and do it some more. If a surface ship starts coming towards them they can evade it while it is still far enough away that it doesn't know the submarine is anywhere around, because the submarine not only knows it is there, it is tracking its movements. If we're in a large room and I'm blindfolded and just groping around trying to find you, how hard is it going to be to stay out of my reach, really? You see me coming clear across the room and just get out of the way. If you want to kill something you can't let it see you coming. The only thing a submarine doesn't see coming is a submarine or a derelict.

Ultimately, the only thing a submarine fears is a better submarine.

It isn't that bad, for two reasons. One is towed-array sonar that some surface ships can deploy, which gets the microphones below the surface layer and thermoclines (dramatic temp-change layers in the ocean that tend to bend sound waves) to hear better, and the other is ASW helicopters that can drop sonobuys or sometimes hoist-suspended dipping sonar, for the same purpose. Helicopters (and ASW patrol planes) are better insofar as they're largely immune to counterattack from the submarine, unlike surface ships.

But yeah, it is a pretty big imbalance, for the reasons Tim describes.

 

[Cutlass]

It isn't that bad, for two reasons. One is towed-array sonar that some surface ships can deploy, which gets the microphones below the surface layer and thermoclines (dramatic temp-change layers in the ocean that tend to bend sound waves) to hear better, and the other is ASW helicopters that can drop sonobuys or sometimes hoist-suspended dipping sonar, for the same purpose. Helicopters (and ASW patrol planes) are better insofar as they're largely immune to counterattack from the submarine, unlike surface ships.

But yeah, it is a pretty big imbalance, for the reasons Tim describes.

How effective are aircraft at hunting and killing submarines?

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Russia has unveiled a new submarine type IIRC

 

[Timsup2nothin]

It isn't that bad, for two reasons. One is towed-array sonar that some surface ships can deploy, which gets the microphones below the surface layer and thermoclines (dramatic temp-change layers in the ocean that tend to bend sound waves) to hear better, and the other is ASW helicopters that can drop sonobuys or sometimes hoist-suspended dipping sonar, for the same purpose. Helicopters (and ASW patrol planes) are better insofar as they're largely immune to counterattack from the submarine, unlike surface ships.

But yeah, it is a pretty big imbalance, for the reasons Tim describes.

Even towed array sonar works better when you don't drag it behind a giant noisemaker. Back to advantage, submarine. Admittedly we didn't have any helicopters though. However, I suspect the helicopters (and fixed wing aircraft) scattering buoys like seeds are only practical after you have some general idea where to start, and that general idea usually arrives when something blows up.

People have this image of the old WWII movie "torpedo run" where the little torpedo hits the side of the ship, usually a freighter, and blows a hole in it. Guys run around and try to patch it while water streams in; very dramatic. Then there's a destroyer and the armor on the sides makes it a lot harder to punch and the hole is smaller and gets a mattress stuffed in it, but a second last minute shot "must have hit the magazine" and there's a towering explosion. Modern torpedoes aren't meant to actually hit the target. They explode underneath the keel and create a gigantic steam bubble that lifts the middle of the ship. Ships are meant to be supported along the full length and lifting the center will generally break them in half, or at least severely weaken them so that when the middle comes back down into the "crater in the water" left by the steam bubble the flexing in the opposite direction will complete the process. Water rushing into the cavity pushes from both ends and finishes folding the target in half, and it's gone.

Modern naval warfare is very much a "shoot first, leave no survivors" kind of business.

 

[warpus]

There is a surprisingly high number of good movies set on submarines. If there's a new movie primarily set on a submarine, I will always give it a chance.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

There is a surprisingly high number of good movies set on submarines. If there's a new movie primarily set on a submarine, I will always give it a chance.

I'm always up for a submarine movie. Heck, I've got the DVR recording season one of Voyage To the Bottom of the Sea off of MeTV. In books, Das Boot, To Kill the Potemkin, and The Gold Crew are standouts. For movies I guess Hunt For Red October has to be a favorite because they did location work on an actual submarine from my own era.

 

[Ajidica]

How good are modern Chinese submarines? Last I heard about Chinese submarines was they weren't let out to sea because they had a habit of catching fire while docked, but that was shortly after the Cultural Revolution.
From what I've read China has been putting its area denial funding into various missiles rather than submarines to keep the USN away from the coast.

 

[Zardnaar]

How good are modern Chinese submarines? Last I heard about Chinese submarines was they weren't let out to sea because they had a habit of catching fire while docked, but that was shortly after the Cultural Revolution.
From what I've read China has been putting its area denial funding into various missiles rather than submarines to keep the USN away from the coast.

Not very good by most accounts.

Germans can still make good electro subs, it's like a tradition.

Russian probably can as well but mist if their navy is dated, they can't afford to build much and they lack the shipyards of the old USSR.

They can afford a few new frigates and a handful of subs.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

How good are modern Chinese submarines? Last I heard about Chinese submarines was they weren't let out to sea because they had a habit of catching fire while docked, but that was shortly after the Cultural Revolution.
From what I've read China has been putting its area denial funding into various missiles rather than submarines to keep the USN away from the coast.

From what I can find their Shang class is comparable to a Soviet era Victor 3, which was the Soviet state of the art when I was in the navy 35 years ago and made so much noise compared to a US boat then that we called them trains. Reduced acoustic signature is a very difficult science to develop, and in a submarine it is really the only thing that matters. Speed, maneuverability, depth, firepower...compared to acoustic signature and sonar capability that is all just so much lipstick...if you're a pig you're a pig.