New Submarines Considered

[Wilber]

I had agreed with the Tory proposal for heavy icebreakers. I'm sorry they didn't go through with it.

They got dumped because of budget restraints and ballooning deficits. The Liberals didn't resurrect them so I guess neither party thought the issue important enough.

[jdobbin]

They got dumped because of budget restraints and ballooning deficits. The Liberals didn't resurrect them so I guess neither party thought the issue important enough.

I think you're right about that. I am not convinced that slushbreakers are going to do the trick in the north as far as the Passage goes.

[jdobbin]

I'm not sure what a Canadian sub - even a superduper keen sub - is going to do if it detects another nation's sub. Torpedo it? Drop bricks on its head? What's the point of monitoring chokepoints? In order to send a diplomatic protest over an intrusion that the other country doesn't even recognize as such?

It's true that one sub detecting and shadowing another submarine is just a form of war games. It only becomes important if the intent is to kill that sub.

Are far as monitoring the Passage for underwater traffic, Canada can make it clear that if hostilities ever did break out that the chokepoints would make a submarine detectable and vulnerable.

[bush_cheney2004]

It's true that one sub detecting and shadowing another submarine is just a form of war games. It only becomes important if the intent is to kill that sub.

Not so....detecting submarines at standoff ranges through acoustic advantage and staying "in trail" is a lot more than just "war games". Submarines are used for intelligence gathering on other platforms (surfaced, submerged, even airborne), including performance envelope definition, tactics, and acoustic/electromagnetic signatures, which comes in handy for not only target classification and weapons system deployment later on, but also correlation/confirmation with other fixed or mobile sensor systems (like acoustic arrays/sonobuoys).

A smaller Canuck version of the Cold War SOSUS Array (i.e. Americans wired most of the ocean for sound) using modern sensors and digital signal processing would be much more effective in the short term if detection is the primary objective. Canada has certainly done ASW before, but has very little practical experience with such cat and mouse games under the sea using submarines, let alone under the polar icepack. ScottSA proposes an important consideration....what will Canada do if it catches a nuclear submarine in disputed territorial waters? File the protest in bold font with an extra exclamation point?

Remember those dogs who used to chase cars? What was he going to do if he ever caught one?

Edited October 11, 2007 by bush_cheney2004