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Will Submarines Soon Become As Obsolete As the Battleship?
An anonymous reader writes: The United States spends $1.8 billion to build a brand new, state of the art, Virginia-class nuclear powered attack submarine. They are the backbone of the U.S. Navy and the ultimate threat to those nations who are building massive amounts of missiles to keep U.S. naval forces like aircraft carriers away from their shores — think China, Russia, Iran and various others. Sadly, the era of the submarine could be coming to an end. New types of detection technology could make the stealth capabilities of subs obsolete, just like the age of flight made the battleship into a floating museum:
"The ability of submarines to hide through quieting alone will decrease as each successive decibel of noise reduction becomes more expensive and as new detection methods mature that rely on phenomena other than sounds emanating from a submarine. These techniques include lower frequency active sonar and non-acoustic methods that detect submarine wakes or (at short ranges) bounce laser or light-emitting diode (LED) light off a submarine hull. The physics behind most of these alternative techniques has been known for decades, but was not exploited because computer processors were too slow to run the detailed models needed to see small changes in the environment caused by a quiet submarine. Today, "big data" processing enables advanced navies to run sophisticated oceanographic models in real time to exploit these detection techniques. As they become more prevalent, they could make some coastal areas too hazardous for manned submarines."
This could force submarines to stay far away from areas where they could be found. Alternately, they could evolve into something different: underwater aircraft carriers hosting drones that could strike below the surface.
"The ability of submarines to hide through quieting alone will decrease as each successive decibel of noise reduction becomes more expensive and as new detection methods mature that rely on phenomena other than sounds emanating from a submarine. These techniques include lower frequency active sonar and non-acoustic methods that detect submarine wakes or (at short ranges) bounce laser or light-emitting diode (LED) light off a submarine hull. The physics behind most of these alternative techniques has been known for decades, but was not exploited because computer processors were too slow to run the detailed models needed to see small changes in the environment caused by a quiet submarine. Today, "big data" processing enables advanced navies to run sophisticated oceanographic models in real time to exploit these detection techniques. As they become more prevalent, they could make some coastal areas too hazardous for manned submarines."
This could force submarines to stay far away from areas where they could be found. Alternately, they could evolve into something different: underwater aircraft carriers hosting drones that could strike below the surface.
Most of the biggest potential war zones involving China are on the coast. Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, Koreas, and the many disputed islands out there. So I doubt they will become obsolete.
Also, Bertridge's law says no.
How much credibility does this article lose once you put "Big Data" in there?
Why the hate on battleships? Why are they out of favor?
Even if they're easier to detect there's no way they're going to be obsolete. Pretty sure we can detect aircraft carriers and destroyers too; are they obsolete? Not every weapons platform has to be 100% undetectable. Not all of their value is in the fact that they're hard to spot.
And just what vessels will deploy such sensors, and how many decades will it take to fully deploy such networks?
The Virginia class will be in use for many decades. Navy generally plans ship hulls for 30-50 years of active use. The enterprise cvn was in service for 50 years.
While such sensors may limit future sub combat options it is decades away. For one simple fact you still have to move attack assets into positions. Battleships disappeared due to two separate but equal reasons. The armor effectiveness/ weight versus gun size and firepower was drastically shifting in favor of the guns. And airplanes made those big honking guns worthless for antiship combat. As one or two bombs could still sink that battleship.
Sensors alone arent useful. You need weapons following those sensors. Those weapons can come from many sources but I bet sub's will be one of them.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Betteridge says the likely answer is no. Looking at the article, there's a whole lot of predictions and guesses in there. LEDs and lasers? Water is very good at attenuating light, and even a ship directly on top of a submersed vessel wouldn't be able to detect anything using light... and coastal water attenuates light MUCH faster than open ocean, due to all the extra stuff in the water...
As long as they can remain undetectable from beyond the range of their nuclear warheads*, they will be indispensible. You should even be glad your enemies have them, as they are one of the most stabilizing technologies because they discourage first strikes (by guaranteeing a second strike).
* I know the Virginia-class subs don't have nukes yet.
I thought the whole point of submarines these days was as mobile launchers for nuclear weapons.. Launchers that could be anywhere (not necessarily close to the coast), and therefore harder to eliminate in a first strike.
Usually called "torpedoes".
They are self guided, self propelled vehicles for carrying explosives...
While each DB of quieting maybe more expensive it's also more effective.
Attack submarines, like the Virginia class, are not the backbone of the US Navy. The aircraft carrier battle group, typically including one or two attack submarines attached, is still the main battle group of the US navy. The other type of submarine is the SSBN ballistic missile submarine which always deploys alone and spends its entire patrol hiding from anything and everything, its sole purpose being to guarantee a nuclear 2nd strike capability for the United States as part of our nuclear triad. The Ohio class submarines serve in this capacity for the United States and even then they aren't the "bakbone" of the US Navy, but rather a specialized asset with a singular purpose. The US doesn't show the colors around the world with submarines, it's the carrier battle group that commands respect, even from our enemies.
little subs might be more effective (and tasty).
Not only is there a whole lot of requirements to make them obsolete, the most obvious reasons will still keep subs working.
Long ago Submarines were ship killers. That is what their job was, and they did it very well. Over time that role changed, primarily due to the advent of nuclear missiles being tucked inside. Submarines are the single best deterrent anyone has for nuclear war. New sensor technology won't change that, because a sub does not have to be close to another ship to launch, does not have to be close to a shore to launch. That is a role the sub will remain for, no matter how good the detection gets.
Attack subs won't go away either. They are still very effective ship killers. In order for a detection ship to catch a sub, it has to get close. A sub can kill a ship from a hefty distance. It gives away their position, but multiple torpedoes can take out multiple ships.
I read this article like I read the old "fighter jets don't need guns argument" which was also proven wrong.
Battle ships were a pretty special beast, they didn't go away due to effectiveness but cost. 21" guns are amazingly expensive to fire.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
We can't find MH370. If we can't find a missing plane in the ocean, then the tech for finding subs has a ways to go before it makes submarines obsolete. Plus, I bet all these detection techniques only work over a short distance. You'd need a lot of detectors to get good coverage. The ocean is large. Plus, anything active (sound, lasers, etc) can be detected by the sub and avoided.
Plus, for non-ship based sensors, you try covering the ocean with highly sensitive detectors. Things that are highly sensitive and the ocean don't mix - unless you are going to pull each detector up on a regular basis for maintenance. Plus, detectors require power. Getting power 50-200 km offshore isn't all that easy. Surface ships pinging away in shallow waters pose the greatest danger. But for every threat, there is a way to counter it. Satellite tracking of enemy ships so subs have some warning of what's coming. Special coatings to reflect lasers. Active cancellation of the acoustic waves.
Retiring subs will free up money for more horses and bayonets.
Table-ized A.I.
As a former USAF pilot my first thought is wondering how much we will see small submarine drones.
TFA suggests correctly that submarines of the future will be a) nuke trucks or b) "underwater aircraft carriers" which launch and control fleets of semi-autonomous vehicles. It doesn't say that manned submarines are going to disappear completely.
The submarine as it exists today - an independent attack/surveillance platform which operates in or near territorial water of other countries in peacetime - is almost certainly going obsolete. But submarines as a class of ships - big hunks of technology and explosives that can hide hundreds of feet beneath the ocean surface - aren't going away anytime soon. When carrier battlegroups start disappearing, you can start worrying about submarines going away.
To be fair, the submarine fleet of the future will probably be much smaller, with most human functions replaced by robot overlords. Yet another reason to GTFO! (nevermind the sleep/oxygen deprivation and spending 80% of your life in a metal tube with 120 other dudes...)
It was Mr. Obama who offered the snark about "horses and bayonets."
At the outset of the Afghan War, our Special Forces learned to ride horses so they could cover terrain to designate targets for PGMs. The bayonet or knife or some form of edged weapon is the last-ditch defense when the enemy appears within arm's length. Which is not an unusual tactic for enemies our forces have faced, given our ability to pound them from the air when they separated from us by rifle distance.
The Commander-and-Chief was showing his usual ignorance of military affairs, and Mr. Romney was showing his awkward inexperience for letting this remark ride.
hunter killers of naval warfare. You think you can find them? Best of luck. Lasers don't go far under water and they diffract all over the place in the water column. US Submarines have some of the most sensitive acoustic detection equipment designed. They can hang suspended in the ocean, listening. They can silently go shallow or deep in the water column. Just stick the nose above the main thermocline, or tilt down to just penetrate into the deep sound channel.
If you are a surface ship, and a submarine wants you you are just dead. By the time you hear a MK-48 torpedo, it is too late. You don't even want to be in the same ocean with one those because it will kill you. By the time you detect that harpoon missile you might get the first one but the second one will get you. Your a surface ship, you can't hide, but that submarine can and you cant hear it over the background noise of the ocean.
Look up how many weapons a Virginia class submarine can carry. If you are a surface group dumb enough to be cruising in proximity of each other, they can put a shit load of torpedoes on your ass, turn around, go deep and haul ass while you are still trying to rescue your sinking ship mates.
5 US Nuclear Submarines can deny ANY fleet the Straits of Gibraltar, The Straits of Hormuz. There is not a Navy in the world that can challenge the US Navy at sea. If the Chinese tried to cross Taiwan Strait it would just be a shooting gallery.
Lest anyone think I know not from whence I speak, I spent 10 years in two classes of fast attack submarines in the US Navy. Are motto was then and still is now, "There are two kinds of ships, Submarines and Targets."
Hey KID! Yeah you, get the fuck off my lawn!
Ah, here it is:
(see my comment title. spoiler: No)
Betteridge's law of headlines at play! There's no faster way to deliver a nuke than a SLBM on a depressed trajectory. Until this is not the case, nuclear-powered attack submarines (which can stay submerged for months at a time) will be indispensable to a nuclear-armed nation.
What are drones going to strike underwater? This is a new capability.
Homos pull down the pants of other homos who take it up the bum hard like a bitch slut poof
So you can detect all my subs with your fancy sensors and "Big Data". So how are you enjoying the cyber attack/EMP burst/barrage of cruise missiles targeting your power grid?
Can you hear me now? Didn't think so.
Why is a American submarine shooting an Russian torpedo will be the last thing said after the new sub with speakers that can play sounds of other subs seeks it's way pass the monitoring stations
The battleship still continues, but in the form of a guided missile frigate. What made a battleship in WWII wasn't the size of the ship or the big guns, in themselves, being the capital ship with the tallest radar masts and the longest throw. So it's really the SM-2, Harpoon and ASROC (and, I guess Tomahawk/TLMA) have replaced the big guns, and so the Ticonderoga class cruisers with the AEGIS (SPY-1) radar and vertical launch tubes has replaced the role of the battleship in the big capital ship sort of way, while the aircraft carriers have replaced them in the force projection sort of way.
There are notions being turned into reality of vessels that allow waves to slide over flat decks such that the above water profile is close to zero. These barge like platforms have some ability to propel and steer into the action zones much like the very first iron sides in the Civil War. They are automated and unmanned and carry drones or highly automated missiles. They are towed by a tug into the region near the conflict and the tether is released sending the attack platform the last several hundred miles. Once in position they use their weapons and then try to retreat and escape and get back to the tug or if need be scuttle themselves. Only the tiny crew on the tug boat ever suffers any risk at all. Obviously these attack barges can be built in a variety of sizes carrying a few drones or perhaps thousands of drones. And if these barges get into the throat of a harbor and scuttle they could seal off that harbor for years. Such barges could be made to submerge and wait on an ocean bottom until activated at a later date allowing the tug to be thousands of miles and days away before striking their targets. Really the Air Force is shrinking as drones become better and better and the US Navy could also shrink down in size to a small organization as well. It seems that the Air force and Navy are far easier to automate than the Army or Marine Corp as land is a greater challenge than air or sea to drones and robots.
The answer is "no". People who say submarines are obsolete are the same people who say "stealth doesn't work". They're missing the point. The point is not to be able to sidle up to your enemies without detection and tag their ships with slogans. The point is to gain a tactical advantage by detecting the enemy before he detects you. Detection isn't a yes/no thing - it's all about range.
I'm sure he learned his lesson.
lucm, indeed.
It's not well known, in fact actively hidden. A friend of mine was disciplined for taking a photo of an unladen donkey in Afganistan because that could provide a leak of information about keeping long range patrols supplied. There was nothing on the donkey to indicate it was a military pack animal, but taking a photo of a donkey on the base was still seen as potentially revealing secret information to the enemy.
Simply being detectable doesn't make the sub as exposed as a surface ship.
First it is literally below the surface of the sea. A weapon has to be specifically designed to target them down there. And it is generally a lot harder to kill things down there then it is on the surface of the sea.
Simply being down there is a strong defensive positive.
Second, these detection systems are going to be the first elements of an enemy's defensive grid to get trashed. Just as the airforce makes a point of trashing enemy radar before they send in heavy bombers, these detection systems are going to be the first causalities of any engagement. At which point, the subs are going to be hard to detect again.
Third, arms races are all about the race between offensive and defensive technologies. So you've got some new detection gear? Okay. But have we heard from the engineers about how they'll mitigate it? Nope. That's silly. They could jam enemy detection, change the shape of hulls so they don't reflect strong sonar returns, etc.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Nuclear attack submarines are a surprise weapon that attempts to win a nuclear conflict immediately. They don't work. ICBMs are a better investment.
The Russians have a dead man's switch in the event of a surprise nuclear attack: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand_(nuclear_war) I'd be very surprised if the Chinese didn't have something similar. I'd also be rather surprised if the USA didn't as well.
A surprise nuclear attack ends the world just as effectively as a non-surprise one.
This doesn't mean there isn't a use for submarines.
That webpage also says that global warming is certainly not manmade. I'm wondering why you think that a phd in polisci lends credibility to the domains typically filled by nuclear engineers, physicists, and climate scientists.
OMG, it's like Russia's Katrina. Quick, someone shop the Soviet Vodka Looter Guy.
With all the talk of "big data" and simulations, eventually there will be no more war because we will anticipate and detect anything the "enemy" may do and have programmed countermeasures in place, lending a deterrent to doing anything in the first place. If any skirmishes do occur, they will be far away from both parties and consist of autonomous or remote controlled drones firing at each other. Perhaps war is becoming more humane?
BB's were used as ground fire support in Nam (a co-worker once told me an apocryphal story about a call for fire that got routed to a BB), but other than showing the colors, they really haven't done anything else since.
They were used in the 1980s to shell various hostile positions in Lebanon after the Marine barracks was attacked. This included killing a Syrian general in his command post.
They were also used in the 1991 Gulf War to shell various Iraqi positions.
The issue isn't "The End of War" or even MAD. The issue is that we are very quickly approaching the technological threshold where unmanned vehicles will outperform all manned vehicles at a fraction of the cost. (And needless to say, reduced risk to our military personnel).
To put a finer point on it: How well will the latest Virginia-class sub fare in a combat scenario against 150 different 2-meter long drone vessels?
Want to bet that the 150 drones can be produced for less than $1.8 billion?
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
old boomer here, amen bubblehead, amen.
subs are so damn hard to find, case in point, during hunt and hide exercises, the damn p3 orion hunting us couldnt find us until it dropped a damn buoy on our hull. 4 knots to no-where gets you gone.
There's no good way to match the rate of high explosive delivery a battleship could implement in support of an amphibious attack.
Two 2,000 pound shells every minute from each of 9 guns is throughput an F-35 just can't touch.
Nah, it's losers that have sex without protection. Winners don't make stupid life changing decisions like that.
Modern satellite transmitters have the ability to interfere with the electrical activity of the human body. The penetration capability of such signals is extremely high, most likely to launch depth. These satellites can scan the entire ocean and engage with milliseconds, killing everyone on board. Further, the RF shielding effect of salt water is not the barrier it once was. Modern physics provides for a range of ways to get high frequency radar signals through ice caps and into the deepest parts of the ocean.
In short, subs can be seen and they can't engage. The same principle applies to both ground troops and most modern fighter aircraft.
So, given all of this, the big question becomes, why do we even have militaries??? Only drones can fight modern wars. Even cyber warfare is completely AI based.
To me, it sounds like a racketeering operation protecting jobs and that scam is being run by the US, Russia, China, Britian, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, etc., etc. I suppose they are all concerned what would happen if their soldiers became unemployed.
... you will read something like
Sadly, the era of the submarine could be coming to an end
Imagine how the public traffic systems can be improved, how much medicine could be bought, how many research projects of all kinds could be funded or what NASA could do with that budget once those death-platforms are finally disassembled and recycled!
...to hide boomers fulled with nukes in the deep parts of the ocean, or under the Arctic pack ice, to surface after a global thermonuclear for the U.S. to dominate the world for WWIV. Or our stupid country thinks that it is a need. Or maybe the true need to justify this worthless expense as dictated by the military-industrial complex!
I'd take that bet. It will be contracted out to a politically connected firm. Inevitable due to the requirements. Subcontracted out a dozen times due to good laws that say you have to. And each stake on the pole with take their piece of profit. Also, 12 million a drone doesn't seem that far out, if you take R&D and pork into account.
(If the headline is sensational and a question, the answer is always 'no'.)
TFA is saying that, in the future, submarines may go from "operat(ing) largely with impunity" to actually being detectable in coastal areas. So (obsolete) carrier battle groups can't count 100% on submarines to protect them. It's carriers that are obsolete, not submarines. TFA itself says a solution to the problem is building submarines to do the job of carrier battle groups. Submarines are not obsolete.
Advances in passive detection have gained ground as the limits of quieting are reached, but submarines remain hard to hear in a really big ocean. Wake detection from the air and active sonar may detect a submarine in a sneaking war, but once you get into a shooting war, those detection assets will get destroyed.
Submarines kick ass and will continue to do so, maybe not with "impunity", but with something close to it.
The Virginia-class would win, quite easily, unless you already knew where it was, which would defeat the purpose of the exercise. The Virginia class would just have to wait silently for a few minutes, then continue on with it's mission.
The drone you're talking about already exists. It's called a torpedo. It has very limited range, and limited speed, as would any drone 2m long. While modern anti-submarine torpedoes are slightly longer (2.7m for the Mk-54, 2.9m for the Mk-50), their ranges are about 6-10 miles. They cost about $900,000 each. I suppose you could increase the range by lowering the explosive charge, but realistically, you're not going to get much increase. Add a better sensor package to your drone, and make it smaller, it will be more expensive.
Let's assume we find some miracle method of increasing range 2x while reducing cost 3x and size to 2m without reducing destructive power on your drone. That's a theoretical drone that can go 20 miles for $300K. You could launch 6,000 of these drones for the cost of a Virginia class.
Let's further assume that they only had to search at 2 depths (minimum needed, one above and one below the thermocline, in reality it would be more), and that they can each cover an area of 10miles square at each depth (they can't, it would be a 10 mile diameter circle, which is much less). These drones would cover an area of 600,000 square miles, or roughly 1,000 miles x 600 miles. That's not quite 1% of the Pacific ocean.
So, for your $1.8 billion dollars, on these theoretical best case scenario drones not yet possible to make, these drones can cover 1% of one ocean for about 15 minutes. Once. If you recover and reuse them, you drop the range in half and the area covered by 1/4. Also, the ships deploying the drones would be vulnerable to the sub (you'd need a ship to pick them up, even if you used a helicopter to pluck them out of the ocean it would need a refueling base).
Also, that doesn't take in account the cost of deploying these drones, the risk that the noise they'd make being deployed would be noticed by the sub, and the fact the sub can move or be silent and has other evasion techniques. My money would be on the submarine, since, even if you could only bet on the 15 minute period while these drones were deployed, the odds would still be 99-1 in the submarine's favor. When you take time in consideration, the odds go up considerable in favor of the sub.
Drones are an effective part of warfare, but we are no where near the technological threshold where unmanned vehicles will outperform all manned vehicles. We don't use unmanned tanks or wheeled vehicles on combat missions. We're don't use unmanned aircraft carriers. We don't use unmanned fighter planes, just bombers.
That's nice. How does that counter the premise? Perhaps you should read it. "New types of detection technology could make the stealth capabilities of subs obsolete, just like the age of flight made the battleship into a floating museum"
In my head I hear the phrase "standard tactics would be to slightly outpace them and turn them on each other"
Submarines will themselves become drones, disguised as coral or other naturally occurring phenomena, and will crawl at walking speed through the depths. Subs will no longer be used to attack naval fleets, but rather to park loads of nuclear warheads miles off the coasts of other nations where early warning systems are useless. It won't matter that it will take them months to arrive at their destinations. It will only matter that a seemingly innocent coral reef will actually be a shallow water missile complex.
And yes, i used some measurement techniques which required a lot of computational power (fitting procedures which ran over days).
And no: if your signal is too weak, no computation in the world can bring back the lost information. If i know that you will try to detect me optically, i paint the ship using another colour.
As far as i understand submarines are anyway not meant t o go close to any coastline.
You're assuming that 100% of the technology within the sub can't be replicated or improved upon within the drone design.
That's an incredibly poor assumption.
Drones will only get faster, cheaper, more efficient and smarter. They will always be more expendable and capable of higher risk environments. Betting against them in a contest with a sub will eventually be a very poor bet.
In stand-off areas such as Taiwan, Hong Kong, and other areas that China has ambitions to control submarines are exactly the weapon system you want to have. In my opinion Aircraft Carriers are the Battle Ships of WWII. They are sitting ducks with nowhere to hide. They would have to stay so far away from the area that launching their aircraft would be impracticable. Yes they could launch stand-off weapons too but would be of no value other than that. That's why we need these upgraded subs. They need to stay on the cutting edge of stealth are are being outfitted with new types of weapons and drones.
The sub contains a nuclear reactor. There's a minimum size that you can make one of those, and you really don't want to put one in a disposable vehicle that you're going to use anywhere vaguely near your own (or your allies') coastline. Without that, the drones are limited to chemical power.
One of the emerging roles for aircraft carriers is effectively big portable charging stations that the drones come back to when their batteries are empty.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
How well will the latest Virginia-class sub fare in a combat scenario against 150 different 2-meter long drone vessels?
Well enough: it can simply ignore them. A Mark 48 torpedo is 5.8 metres long, costs $3.8m, and is equipped with top-of-the-line sonar and associated signal-processing - and it needs to be guided to within a few km of a submarine to stand a decent chance of tracking and killing it. What do you think a hundred or so 2-metre robotic dinghies are going to do to a submarine that could be anywhere in a million square km of ocean?
It's people using "cloud" for just about anything that creates confusion. That cloud gaming you describe is closer to "gaming as a service" rather than it is to cloud computing.
A SaaS offering, like your gaming example, may or may not be based on cloud computing; but that distinction is not something the end user can see.
Cloud computing is pay-per-use and elastic, just like electricity. Cloud gaming is neither - you pay for a service, it's SaaS; maybe you can have in-game purchase, but from a resource perspective you don't pay more or less based on what you do, and you can't get things like burstable performance.
Time-sharing on a mainframe can be pay-per-use, it depends on the service provider, but it's not elastic, you can't get more resources on demand. And from an architecture perspective, it's not cloud computing because it's not distributed and resource allocation is not automated.
When you say that dumb terminals and mainframe computers in the 50s were cloud computing, not only are you wrong, you are also insulting the incredible work that took place at Amazon and other companies to make computing a convenient commodity. Next time you sit in your sofa to watch a movie on Netflix remember that this type of service at that price would have never been possible with a mainframe architecture. Your Netflix subscription is SaaS - but Netflix's infrastructure is running on Amazon EC2 and that's pure cloud computing.
lucm, indeed.
Want to bet that the 150 drones can be produced for less than $1.8 billion?
And this is the crux of it.
War on an industrial scale depends on how much you can produce and how quickly. This is the lesson learned between the Sherman and the Tiger. The Tiger tank was superior in almost every way, it could destroy 5 Shermans, the problem it had is that there were always 10 Shermans for every 1 tiger. Big ships are expensive and vulnerable but in previous wars (as in WWII) we had no choice as few other options were available for projecting power across the ocean.
If we have another total war in the near future and somehow avoid nuclear Armageddon, the weapons we produce now will be nothing like the ones made for war. The Jets and ships we make now are ideal peace time weapons but are too expensive and too complex for wartime application. Going back to WWII, in 1945 a Supermarine Spitfire cost GBP 12500 and a P51 Mustang cost US$51,000.... Adjusting for inflation they're both under US$1,000,000 of todays money (GBP 490,000 and US$670,000 respectively). A FA18 F costs 66 million USD and a Eurofighter Typhoon costs 125 million pounds (sterling), we will need to produce something cheaper and more reliable en masse. Even the Chinese J10 will be way too expensive to keep making (US$27 million).
The traditional submarine isn't the only weapon we'll see obsolete in the next war, the heavy bomber will go, unmanned patrol craft will take the place of attack helicopters and other CAS aircraft. In the same way WWI saw the end of carefully lined up infantry regiments and WWII saw the end of the big gun battleship.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Actually, I allowed for a very generous amount of technical advance in the drone that, in reality, is no where near happening. 100 percent of the technology in the sub can't be replicated in a 2m drone, for the simple reason that it's a fraction of the size and can't carry it. There's a minimum size for a nuclear reactor, it's a lot larger than will fit in a 2m drone, and there's no possible way the drone can carry that much energy in any other form. If they could make a drone with more range, then torpedoes would have the same technology. They don't.
Yes, technology progresses, we all know that. And my math assumes a drone that is faster, cheaper, more efficient, and smarter than anything that can be built today, and they still are pathetically outclassed by the sub. "Eventually" the drones will get better, but not in the foreseeable future. I would win the bet continuously until you were penniless. It isn't even close - You can have a sub now, or, maybe in about a decade the technology will advance enough where you might be able to buld a drone array that can hunt the sub for 15 minutes in 1% of one ocean (assuming miraculous instant deployment) for the same cost. Even if you pickup and redeploy all the drones, the sub can then move into the area you just searched. It's a useless strategy, and one that's at least a decade out from being a reality.
Not sure why it was modded down to zero. Very insightful. For all we know, there are many ancient communities on Earth and elsewhere living that way already. Even though I have written in the past about "refugia" for humans (see my website and grad student plans from the 1980s) I agree that swarms of AI probes could scour Earth (even underground eventually) and most things in space would be visible and approachable (including by high velocity kinetic weapons). So, I've come around to thinking the the best way to have a happy singularity is for humans to get our social house in order before then, because the direction we take coming out of a singularity may have a lot to do with out path into it. Thus I'm for a basic income, an expanded gift economy, increased subsistence, internet-enhanced democratic planning, and so on.
I grew up as a kid watching Sealab 2020 which I loved. Somewhere in the late 1980s I sent a letter to a Navy Admiral about making self-reliant undersea bases, but never heard back. I won a Navy Science Award for a high school robot project and had sent it to the admiral who had signed the letter. An interesting related book about the reality of living underwater (although personally I feel both in the ocean and space humans will just stay in structures or work pods and rarely try to go out in special protective clothing): ..."
http://benhellwarth.com/
"SEALAB is like the underwater Right Stuff: The story of how a gutsy group of U.S. Navy divers and scientists set out to develop the marine equivalent of space stations -- and forever changed manâ(TM)s relationship to the sub-aquatic world.
BTW, on evading "detection" -- there are layers there. If you think about the human immune system, things can be "detected" but they may only be acted on if they seem like a threat (especially given limited resources and multiple real pressing threats including internal issues).
Read the first prologue part of Vernor Vinge's "A Fire Upon The Deep" for some related thoughts on resisting powerful growing AIs. I quote from that here: ... "
http://www.pdfernhout.net/on-d...
""Of course [the humans] suspect. But what can they do? It's an old evil they've awakened. Till it's ready, it will feed them lies, on every camera, in every message from home."
Thought ceased for a moment as a shadow passed across the nodes they used. The overness was already greater than anything human, greater than anything humans could imagine. Even its shadow was something more than human, a god trolling for nuisance wildlife. The the ghosts were back, looking out upon the school yard underground. So confident the humans, a little village they had made there.
"Still," though the hopeful one, the one who had always looked for the craziest outs, "we should not be. The evil should long ago have found us."
"The evil is young, barely three days old."
"Still. We exist. It proves something. The humans found more than a great evil in this archive."
"Perhaps they found *two*."
"Or an antidote." Whatever else, the overness was missing some things, and misinterpreting others. "While we exist, when we exist, we should do what we can."
But perhaps the deepest wrongness these days is what I mention in my sig -- the ironic perils of the tools of abundance (like nuclear energy, AI, robotics, nanotech, biotech, bureaucracy, etc.) in the hands of those still fighting over perceived scarcity). Think of all those Navy subs, powered by relatively clean safe nuclear reactors, ready on political command to use other arrangements of nuclear energy to destroy all of human life as we know it on Planet Earth for petty and short-sighted conflicts over oil profits... It would be hilarious if it was not so deadly serious.
See also my "OSCMOAK: ideas (going back to the 1980s) for a better way -- although the Maker movement is busy working towards surpassing thos
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
..it's possible, therefore it's obsolete. Stupid programmer logic. Just because it's possible doesn't mean every government is going to invest huge amounts of resources into doing it. Everything described here, I very much doubt any government would invest in it.
the mighty airship, hovering silently among the clouds under its vast bag of helium, its deadly cargo of bombs poised to drop on any nation which dares to threaten our island democracy.
Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
The issue isn't "The End of War" or even MAD. The issue is that we are very quickly approaching the technological threshold where unmanned vehicles will outperform all manned vehicles at a fraction of the cost. (And needless to say, reduced risk to our military personnel).
To put a finer point on it: How well will the latest Virginia-class sub fare in a combat scenario against 150 different 2-meter long drone vessels?
Want to bet that the 150 drones can be produced for less than $1.8 billion?
the next step of course being that the majority of combat will be conducted automatically, computer reflexes being so much faster than human. For instance firing one of those super duper gun things at an incoming missile. which for all i know is already automated.
Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
Your response leads totally into something I have been thinking. If I were President, I would immediately launch a program dedicated to reducing the cost of cruise missiles by 10-50x, based on the idea we would buy 1000x more of them. This way, anywhere on the globe, if there is a problem we need to intervene about, just push a button, and a solution of cruise missiles will be delivered in 30 minutes or less, with enough numbers that we could overwhelm any sort of ground defenses the enemy may have. If we had enough numbers that could continually deliver cruise missiles to a target, they would have no opportunity to regroup, and we simply continue until they collapse or surrender.
That's why I think just do away with everything except cruise missiles. If we could get the cost of those down 10x-50x, we could just buy an endless supply of them and just fire them at will at anywhere on the globe continually until an area is quelled.
It seems they were talking about hunter killer subs only.
Large ballistic subs have no interest in hanging out in shallow waters. Their job is to hide, and nothing like the deep, vast oceans to do that.
They can cruise at 600-900 meters depth for their entire mission life, except for launching missiles and replenishing.
Hunter killer subs can launch torpedoes that can hunt their targets for 100Km.
The reality is subs are of limited usefulness in today's hush hush war times, they make a lot of noise moving above 1/3rd their speeds, which means that in order to be quiet, they need to go very slow (like 10 knots or lower).
Subs also have zero means to attack their most deadly prey, sub hunting helicopters and long range aircraft (like the new Poseidon).
Being able to drop active sonar buoys is a significant threat to subs, but there are thermoclines to hide under (very hard to listen through thermal layers, specially through double thermal layers).
You really should read up on hydrogen fuel cells.
Germany has a substantial line of ultra quiet hydrogen fuel cell subs, with significant range. Deadly. Type 212 class.
In fact to deadly they only offer third parties a watered down version of their subs.
They can't go many times around the world, but they have enough autonomy to go for a month with surfacing, without the heat signature, radiation signature, and noise a nuclear reactor generates.
The ultimate defensive weapon for the seas, and deadly enough an enemy would think many times over to launch an armada against a country with a few dozens of fuel cell subs.
With the ability to perform some deadly offensive strikes (specially when loitering close to enemy shore isn't needed).
I've talked to men who were the captain of an aircraft carrier, battleship and submarine. A battleship isn't obsolete, only stupid people think that. Why? because a battleship can do things nothing else can. Like pound a position for weeks or months using cheap shells. Also, nothing intimidates like a battleship. They are also a lot more versatile than a carrier. The captain of a battleship said we're fools for removing them from the inventory.
Subs likewise aren't obsolete. It's a race to be sure. They build detectors, we find countermeasures. Guess wrong and you die. It isn't worth it.
Here's a thought - stop being dumbasses and try to get along with other people. American, Iranian, Chinese, Russian, we're all the same when you get down to it. We all put our pants on the same way, grow up in a very similiar manner. Why try to kill each other? Just a thought.
You are an irredeemable bottom burp!
Just so we are clear: do you refer to some kind of fart, or to the lowest item in a stack of burps? Because if it's the later, I think a more sophisticated term would be "mezzanine burp".
lucm, indeed.
The assumption is WW-3 between major technological players. Might as well restart SDI and Brilliant Pebbles if that's really the future battle.
The next 20-30 years will likely be continued, isolated regional spats over religion and politics.
Battleships have been used to resolve diplomatic impasses just by parking off the cost of a selfish nation.
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