Here’s what you need to know about the US Navy’s new deadly (and expensive) attack subs
The U.S. Navy inked a deal with General Dynamics Electric Boat on Dec. 2 to be the lead contractor for the newest iteration of the Virginia-class attack submarine.
The largest shipbuilding contract in the history of the service — in excess of $22 billion — the Navy has big plans for Block V. It is destined to be a true multimission submarine, with a strike capability and the ability to delivery large-diameter unmanned underwater vehicles in addition to the more traditional surveillance mission.
Here’s are the four things you need to know about the vessel:
1. A bigger boat
Most of Block V is going to be bigger (much bigger) than its older sisters in the class. Of the nine — potentially 10 — boats in the class, eight of them will have 84-foot sections plugged into the hull that will include four large-diameter tubes rated for seven Tomahawks each. In addition to the 12 in the bow, that means each Block V will have the capacity for 40 cruise missiles.
But it’s not just the traditional Tomahawk land-attack missiles that will be stuffed in the payload module. Submariners are envisioning a whole range of missions for the big tubes, such as:
Deploying large-diameter unmanned undersea vehicles for various missions.
Launching hypersonic prompt-strike missiles.
Launching Tomahawk’s new maritime strike iteration against ships in addition to the existing Harpoon missile.
Torpedoes.
Really anything they can get to fit in there that could benefit from being deployed off a submarine.
2. Responsibilities galore
Because the Navy designed a lot of versatility in the platform, the Block V will act as a Swiss Army knife for undersea warfare, taking on a range of missions that traditionally have gone to the retiring guided-missile submarines, or SSGNs, said Bryan Clark, a retired submarine officer and analyst for the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.
That’s going to require a cultural change inside the submarine community, Clark said.
“The Block V will be a marked difference in terms of the concept of operations for a multimission ship,” he said. “For strike, that mission has largely been sent off to SSGNs: They’ve focused on Tomahawk missions and SEAL delivery; the rest of the attack submarines have focused on focused on traditional intelligence-gathering missions.
“With the introduction of Block V, those missions are going to expand to a larger percentage of the force.”
Much of that is already part of submariner training, but the emphasis will have to be increased, Clark predicted.
“Submariners were always trained on Tomahawk missions, anti-ship missions and swimmer delivery: Those are all things you train for in case you have to do them,” he said. “But with the advent of Block V, those missions are going to have to be a bigger part of submariner training. And with [the] Tomahawk maritime strike missile coming into the fleet, they are going have an anti-ship mission alongside the older [Los Angeles-class] 688s having the torpedo-tube launched harpoon.
“So in a lot of ways the submarine community is going back in [the] direction it was during the Cold War — it was a much more expansive mission then back then. Then It narrowed with the introduction of the SSGN. Now its set to expand again.”
3. Quiet...
https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2019/12/06/heres-what-you-need-to-know-about-the-us-navys-deadly-and-expensive-new-attack-submarines/
