Various forecasters and historians have attempted to predict the future of maritime warfare in light of the challenges posed by modern anti-shipping technology and weaponry. Many historians and war futurists have boldly ventured that the future of naval warfare rests with submarines particularly Andrew Krepenevich who created the USN's cruise missile-special operations submarines. This view, a vision of a future populated by "new navies of submarine warships, great and small," is also promulgated to some degree by defense analyst Michael G. Vickers, who envisions advanced nations employing largely submersible navies, including submersible fleet replenishment ships, maritime pre-positioning ships, and assault landing submarines, as well as the traditional attack submarine. But, in Vickers' scenario, complementing these vessels would be a new class of nuclear powered "arsenal ships," incorporating anti-radar "stealth" technology, armed with up to 500 missile launch tubes, lasers, electromagnetic rail guns firing 5 inch projectiles (perhaps as many as 200,000 per ship), and sophisticated unmanned air vehicles to conduct maritime reconnaissance.

It is likely that some portions of both of these visions will indeed become true. It is often missed that the submarine itself has been a projector of forms of air power, and that virtually all major nations have, at one time or another, experimented with "operating aircraft from submarines. The French, in the years prior to the Second World War, produced a series of small submarine-launched floatplanes designed by Marcel Besson to be carried and flown by a large "submarine cruiser," the Surcouf. Indeed, in the Second World War, a small Yokosuka E-14Y1 [Glenn] scouting floatplane launched from the Japanese submarine I-7 conducted a reconnaissance flight over Pearl Harbor after the attack to assess damage. Later, off Oregon, the I-25 launched another E-14Y1 that, in two attacks, dropped four phosphorous bombs triggering small forest fires; other Japanese submarines used these airplanes to conduct reconnaissance flights over the Aleutians, Australia, New Zealand, Madagascar, and Africa. Japan had even more ambitious plans to bomb the Panama Canal with larger Aichi Seran M-6A1 attack planes launched from the huge (for their day) I-400 class submarines, as well as other I-boats. The end of the Second World War likewise brought an end to actual attempts to build submarine-launched airplanes, but marked the beginning of efforts to incorporate both cruise and ballistic missiles in the armament suites of newer submarines. As a result, the international submarine community fully embraced the missile revolution, starting with early generation cruise missiles (typified by the American experience with the Republic Loon and the Chance Vought Regulus I and II), next with nuclear-armed ballistic missiles (exemplified by the Polaris, Poseidon, and Trident), and finally with nuclear and conventionally armed advanced cruise missiles (such as the Harpoon and Tomahawk). It is virtually a certainty that, at some point, submarines will serve as launching platforms for sophisticated unmanned air vehicles. For that matter, it is not inconceivable that submarines might some day operate specialized piloted craft as well. To better understand the history of submarine aircraft carriers, you have to start with the Japanese who pioneered this form of military power.

Japanese geared to fight Soviets on land not Americans at sea, Emily patrol seaplane bomber not mass-produced, submarine aircraft carriers slow development

Gibralter, Panama?

The sad truth is the current U.S. Navy and marines geared towards fighting a Soviet "blue water" Navy and Army that doesn't exist and doing ego-gratifying WW2 beach assaults to take advance naval base partial re-enactments are not doing much of anything to help win the 4th Generation War against sub-national al Queda terrorists. Some criticize hindsight as "20-20" implying we have no right to learn from history, well we damn well better or we will "BE HISTORY". Ironically the Navy/mc are in the reverse situation the Japanese were in WWII; they think they should be geared to fight at sea (the Imperial Japanese Navy-IJN or AKA: the Japanese Combined Fleet) and take advanced naval bases against a mythical nation-state foe in lieu of fighting an inland foe, which to do well means no foot-slogging from wheeled trucks. This is because the Navy/mc are still organized in a knee-jerk fashion against the Japanese surprise aircraft carrier and submarine attacks at Pearl Harbor and island conquests across the Pacific. After WWII, the Soviet communist threat was exchanged for the Japanese to perpetuate the bad, do-only-what-strokes-our-ego WW2 re-enactment force structure. We did say BAD; because the good aspects of the WWII effort; seaplanes, raiders, dazzle paint etc., a spirit of innovation were shit-canned by the U.S. Navy/marines in favor of a stale, pale gray ww2 re-enactment orthodoxy that makes the stodgy Royal Navy look like radical reformers.

Fortunately for us, the Japanese were geared primarily to fight the Russians and Chinese on land when they unwisely attacked us at Pearl Harbor to cover their conquests of the rest of mainland China and the East Indies to get badly needed oil supplies. They had not mass-produced Emily 4-engined flying boats, patrol submarines and only had a slight advantage in aircraft carriers. Admiral Yamamoto was obsessed with destroying our fleet in glorious battle even more than our own Admiral Nimitz; his submarines were used to recon ahead for the IJN instead of sinking our troop and supply ships. The IJN though they had THE BEST SEAPLANES of the war, overlooked supplying a seaplane to their cargo ships to ward off our submarines, which is what actually defeated them; we starved their ground troops out by MacArthur's "tri-phibious" warfare that bypassed strongpoints like Rabaul and let them wither on the vine. So even if Yamamoto and Nimitz got to duel each other's capital ships to the death, it would not have mattered since it was WHO CONTROLLED THE LAND ISLANDS that counted...and that takes supplies and if you don't stop the enemy's submarines with ASW you lose. Next, for some strange providential reason, they did not block the Panama canal to stop us from quickly moving forces from the Atlantic to Pacific oceans (or vise-a-versa) as the Germans strangely did not take the Straits of Gibraltar to block the Mediterranean sea. At the end of WW2 they were getting ready to strike the locks of the Panama canal with I-400 submarines launching Aichi Seran seaplane fighter-bombers. The videos below detail this near disaster that we averted by the war ending before the Japanese I-400 submarine aircraft carriers could reach Panama.

THE JAPANESE 1945 SUBMARINE-SEAPLANE FIGHTER-BOMBER RAID ON THE PANAMA CANAL

Rare Combat Footage, Stills and CGI animation of the raid

Then of course, there is the Suez Canal that was not taken, either. The point is that had Japan waited and built up her Navy instead of attacking at Pearl Harbor in 1941, and perhaps just taken the oil fields, America probably would have slept a lot longer before joining the war. After Pearl Harbor, Hitler as Japan's ally declared war on the U.S. Conspiracy theorists are right to suggest FDR used poorly defended Pearl Harbor as "bait" to get the Japanese to pre-maturely attack us and get Germany to declare war on us. We must remember Japan's mortal enemy, Russia (Soviet Union) did NOT declare war against her until the war was almost over in 1945.

Think about it.

Had Pearl Harbor NOT happened in 1941, its likely America would not have joined the war until late 1942 and then against Germany after pushed into it by some incident like U-Boats (German submarines) sinking a surface ship with a lot of Americans killed (like the WWI Luisitania incident). We would have proceeded to defeat Germany until 1946-47 while ignoring Japan just as Russia had done. THEN--all the imperial hotheads in Japan would still be around and their fleets ready with carriers, submarines and long-range seaplane patrol bombers and army rested and ready for a hard fight. The second PHASE of WWII could have lasted another 5 years from 1947-1955, and WHO SAYS WE WOULD HAVE WON? It may have unfolded that we turned to the threat of or actual atomic bombardment of Japan after 1947. Had the Japanese sued for peace with her military machine matured and imperial hotheads still in power we might have went into a "Cold War" three-way superpower rivalry of the West vs. the Soviets vs. the Japanese East. Would Coca Cola and blue jeans appealing to the younger generation have brought down the Japanese WWII era hotheads as they grew old or would killing them off still be required? Japan not humbled by WWII could have been in the same situation as Red China is today.

The Past is Prologue

The point of all of this is the smug, self-serving dismissals of the current generation to the methods the Japanese took in the war they were not fully ready to fight are wrong spirited and wrong in fact. You can see this American "Midway Myth" surface aircraft carrier triumphalism began immediately after WW2 by their condescending remarks about the Japanese submarine aircraft carriers showing an idea we Americans didn't think of (see NANEWS article above). The first thing America did after Pearl Harbor was to send out all her long-range Gato class patrol submarines to sink every supply ship in sight to starve/isolate the Japanese islands. Many military professionals and historians note it was our submarines not our aircraft carriers that starved the Japanese into submission. Many a Japanese Army ground offensive withered more due to a lack of supplies than low-grade marine corps fighting skills. Flying overhead were 4,000 PBY Catalina seaplane patrol bombers searching out for their supply and warships to destroy them and vector in our submarines like the Germans used the FW200 Condor except most of our patrol planes were more versatile and could land on the sea. Unlike the clever Churchill, the Japanese were unable to put together adequate convoy defenses and point air defense fighters like the Hurricat into service to defeat our PBYs. This is weird because they had arguably the best fighter floatplanes of the war (Rufe, Rex) and simply could have put one on each merchant ship to ward off both U.S. submarines and planes. The U.S. Navy/mc on the other hand, reacted to the Japanese Navy's set-up and created a force structure to gobble up islands with frontal marine beach assaults covered by aircraft carriers and battleship/cruiser bombardment to one-land-chunk-at-a-time keep the Japanese Navy away by Seabee-constructed air base air power. This WW2 island-hopping force structure is still somewhat with us today with a Navy with 11 huge aircraft carriers and a marine corps still packing men by the thousands in amphibious ships to do WW2 re-enactment beach assaults to take islands from a nation-state enemy that doesn't exist. Even worse, the enemy is now sub-national and fights far inland shielded from predictable air strikes by difficult terrain, civil populations and C3D2, which requires force be applied against land not sea-based targets. Dollar-for-dollar the best way to bombard land by airplanes is by heavy bombers which are best land based or seaplanes that can operate with just tender resupply ships not aircraft carriers. However, the corrupt Navy/mc bureaucracy gave up on seaplanes in 1960 just as they had matured into performance capabilities superior to land based planes because they realized they can soak up more billions of tax dollars operating aircraft carriers than more efficiently bombarding land foes with jet seaplanes and Iowa class battleships. "Cash cow" platforms for bureaucracy empires today are more important than functional efficiency in wars that may never happen tomorrow. The Navy/mc has consciously chosen to relive the WWII "Victory at Sea" fantasy ever since. Had the Japanese won WWII by delaying until they were fully ready we would be emulating their innovations like long-range patrol seaplane bombers and submarine aircraft carriers not what we defaulted to in a knee-jerk of WW2 expediency.

Where is the surprise against nation-state enemy Surveillance Strike Complexes?

SSCs: surface ships are finished unless stealthy; large aircraft carriers sitting ducks from space

Because we had command-of-the-air after the battle of Midway in 1942 when we sank the majority of the Japanese large aircraft carriers, the Navy/mc have gotten into the very bad habit of operating openly on the surface. At war's end off the shore of Okinawa, Japanese humans acted as precision guidance means and attacked our fleet with the first all-out guided missile attacks. Had the war continued and the Japanese improved the speed and number of these kamikaze guided missiles, the entire viability of the large aircraft carrier and packing marines like sardines in amphibious ships would have been put into question in 1946. The Geiger board warned the USMC to get out of the habit of massing troops by the thousands in vulnerable surface ships and to use seaplanes citing the threat of nuclear weapons which could easily wipe out entire fleets. Today the precision-guided missile and torpedo can render the same fleet-annihilating effects but the Navy/Mc continue to operate like its a WW2 cake-walk. Instead of thinking ahead and adapting to nuclear and guided weapons and submerging or heavily armoring ALL ships, the Navy's carriers and flimsy cruisers/destroyers have emasculated themselves because they have had a free ride of geostrategic peace where they could launch planes from garbage scows if they wanted to; no one was actively attacking them at sea. This day is coming to a close.

If the Navy has to defend Taiwan from nearby Red China it will be conspicuously visible from space and targeted in their "surveillance strike complex" (SSC). Hubrists within the Navy beating their chest about how superior they think our pilots/aircraft are don't get it: a F/A-18 with 8 missiles isn't going to win a fight against a lesser 9th CHICOM fighter whose missile is "good enough" to hit it or make it run for the home aircraft carrier. If the CHICOM second wave follows the empty F/A-18 back to the carrier the explosions/fires on the USS Forrestal and Enterprise in the Vietnam war warn us that all it takes is one hit and the carrier's flight operations are over and a fight to simply survive is all that's left.

If you doubt how screwed up the large aircraft-carrier-centric U.S. Navy is, here's an early version of the Thompson report:

Is the U.S. Navy Overrated?

www.knightsbridgeuniversity.com/documents/Is%20the%20US.%20Navy%20overrated.pdf.

A Knightsbridge Working Paper

By Roger Thompson
Professor of Military Studies and Senior Academic Advisor
Knightsbridge University
May 2004

Introduction

In 1981, The NATO exercise Ocean Venture ended with much embarrassment for the U.S. Navy, and more specifically, its enormously expensive aircraft carrier battle groups.

During the exercise, a Canadian submarine slipped quietly through a carrier's destroyer screen, and conducted a devastating simulated torpedo attack on the ship. The submarine was never detected, and when the exercise umpire, a U.S. Navy officer, pronounced the carrier dead, his official report was promptly stamped classified to minimize the potential fallout. Unfortunately, a Canadian submariner leaked the story to a local newspaper, and indicated that this successful Canadian attack on an American supercarrier was by no means an isolated incident. This news caused quite a stir in Congress, and the U.S. Navy had a lot of explaining to do. Why indeed had a small, 1960s-vintage diesel submarine of the under-funded Canadian Navy been able to defeat one of America s most powerful and expensive warships, and with such apparent ease?

There are several possible answers. Firstly, Canadian submariners are extremely well-trained and professional. Secondly, at that time, the Oberon submarines used by the Canadian Navy were probably the quietest in the world. A third possible reason, not so commonly stated, and with all due respect, is that the mighty U.S. Navy is simply over-rated. It is my humble contention that the U.S. Navy is not all it's cracked up to be, and that is the focus of the present article.

Diesel Subs Feast on U.S. Carriers

While Canadian submarines have routinely taken on U.S. Navy carriers, other small navies have enjoyed similar victories. The Royal Netherlands Navy, with its small force of extremely quiet diesel submarines, has made the U.S. Navy eat the proverbial slice of humble pie on more than one occasion. In 1989, naval analyst Norman Polmar wrote in Naval Forces that during NATO s exercise Northern Star, the Dutch submarine Zwaardvis was the only orange (enemy) submarine to successfully stalk and sink a blue (allied) aircraft carrier Ten years later, there were reports that the Dutch submarine Walrus had been even more successful in the exercise JTFEX/TMDI99.

During this exercise the Walrus penetrates the U.S. screen and sinks many ships, including the U.S. aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt CVN-71. The submarine launches two attacks and manages to sneak away. To celebrate the sinking the crew designed a special T-shirt. Fittingly, the T-shirt depicted the USS Theodore Roosevelt impaled on the tusks of a walrus. It was also reported that the Walrus also sank many of the Roosevelt's escorts, including the nuclear submarine USS Boise, a cruiser, several destroyers and frigates, plus the command ship USS Mount Whitney. The Walrus herself survived the exercise with no damage.

Not to be outdone by the Canadians and Dutch, the Australian submarine force has also scored many goals against U.S. Navy carriers and nuclear submarines. On September 24 2003, the Australian newspaper The Age disclosed that Australia's Collins class diesel submarines had taught the U.S. Navy a few lessons during multinational exercises. By the end of the exercises, Australian submarines had destroyed two U.S. Navy nuclear attack submarines and an aircraft carrier. According to the article: The Americans were wide-eyed, Commodore Deeks (Commander of the RAN Submarine Group) said. They realized that another navy knows how to operate submarines.

They went away very impressed.

Not surprisingly, NATO and allied submariners are extremely confident in their ability to sink American carriers. In his book The Threat: Inside the Soviet Military Machine, Andrew Cockburn wryly noted that European submariners on NATO exercises were far more concerned about colliding with noisy American nuclear submarines (running fast and therefore, blind) than about being attacked by American ships.

The Russians mug the USS Kitty Hawk

These examples provide ample evidence of the vulnerability of U.S. Navy carrier battle groups to attacks from diesel submarines, but of course there are other ways to sink a carrier, as the Russian Air Force knows well. In October 2000, the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk was mugged by Russian SU-24 and Su-27 aircraft, which were not detected until they were virtually on top of the carrier. The Russian aircraft buzzed the carrier s flight deck and caught the ship completely unprepared. To add insult to injury, the Russians took very detailed photos of the Kitty Hawk's flight deck, and very courteously, provided the pictures to the American CO via e-mail. In the December 7, 2000 edition of WorldNetDaily, Jon E. Dougherty said that the Russian photographs made it clear that there was panic aboard the Kitty Hawk. As one U.S. Sailor quipped, The entire crew watched overhead as the Russians made a mockery of our feeble attempt of intercepting them.

Russia's air force is now only a faint shadow of what it once was, but even now, they can demonstrate that they can, if necessary, do significant damage to the U.S. Navy. It's little wonder then that a Russian newspaper gloated that If these had been planes on a war mission, the aircraft carrier would definitely have been sunk. Perhaps they are right. But its not just the Russians, Canadians, Dutch and Australians who think the U.S. Navy s carrier battle groups are over-rated, expensive and extremely vulnerable. Admiral Hyman Rickover himself didn t think much of the American carrier-centered Navy, either. When asked in 1982 about how long the American carriers would survive in an actual war, he curtly replied that they would be finished in approximately 48 hours.

This isn't Top Gun

As we ve seen, U.S. carriers are remarkably vulnerable to attacks by submarines and aircraft, but what about the much-vaunted American naval aviators? How would the U.S.N. pilots fare in a dogfight with a well-trained enemy? The evidence is not encouraging. Canadian pilots routinely outperform U.S.N. aircrews in exercises, and have done so for many years. During the days of RCN carrier aviation it was well known that H.M.C.S. Bonaventure could put more planes in the air than much larger U.S.N. carriers. In the early 1980s it was revealed that the average pilot in the Canadian Air Force flew about 300 hours a year, whereas his U.S. Navy counterpart flew only about 160 hours annually. Even in this day of advanced flight simulators, there is still no substitute for the real thing (flying).

U.S. Naval aviators pride themselves as being supposedly far better than any Air Force pilots, but one merely has to look at the Canadian, Israeli and Chilean air forces to cast doubt on that assumption. The Israeli Air Force has bested the pride of the U.S. Navy, and they have done so even with less capable aircraft. A joint U.S.N.-I.A.F. air combat exercise in 2000 underlines and highlights the thesis that the U.S. Navy is overrated. On September 14, 2000, The Jerusalem Post announced that the Israelis soundly dispatched the air wing from the USS Theodore Roosevelt (which, incidentally, was the same carrier the Dutch destroyed in 1999). Israeli F-16s squared off against American F-14s and F-18s, both of which are said to be more capable than the F-16. The final results were astonishing. The Israelis shot down a whopping 220 U.S. aircraft while losing only 20 themselves. The 10:1 kill ratio was so embarrassing that the results were not officially published to save the reputations of the U.S. Navy pilots.

Chile is certainly not a great military power, but its air force is well trained, and they too have given the U.S. Navy reason for pause. In the late 1980s, it was reported that Chilean Air Force pilots, flying the relatively unsophisticated but nimble F-5, had trounced an American carrier air group in air combat exercises. Like the Israelis, the kill ratio was 10:1 in favor of the Chileans. As usual, this incident did not receive much press coverage in the United States.

Lack of Training

Despite its vastly superior numbers, resources and weapons, the U.S. Navy, the world's only true heavyweight navy, continually fails to vanquish welterweight and lightweight naval powers. This would indicate that training, not big, expensive ships, is the key to naval power. It is training, or lack thereof, that truly undermines the performance of the U.S. Navy. For example, even though the U.S. Navy maintains the most capable submarine fleet in the world (because the Russian fleet is mostly tied up at dockside), their submariners do not currently receive escape training. The Canadian submarine force is tiny, and yet it has the most advanced submarine escape training facility in the world.

The U.S. Navy boasts that its Blue Angels flight team is the world s best, but with their preference for high speed maneuvering over aerobatic artistry, combined with the team's grossly inflated number of maintenance technicians, one has to wonder. The Blue Angels perform with only six F-18 jets, whereas the Canadian Snowbirds fly nine Tutors, which are much older. The Canadian team flies more airplanes, but has a much smaller maintenance team. The Blue Angels have approximately 100 technicians, but the Snowbirds have only about ten.

American technicians are very specialized, and as a result they need lots of them to do the same job that just one Canadian technician can do. This does not sound like an efficient or cost-effective arrangement, to say the least. Through his many best-selling books and movies, author Tom Clancy has created a crisp, sharp, spit-polished, efficient, and patriotic image for the U.S. Navy. Some think he should be a paid Public Relations consultant or recruiter for the U.S. submarine force. It may come as a shock to some of his readers, however, that the American Sailors in his books are too good to be true, and that even some American submariners admit their training is not very good. Several recent books have effectively stripped off much of the shiny Hollywood polish on the American submarine force, most notably Petty Officer Andrew Karam's account of life on the USS Plunger, Rig Ship for Ultra Quiet (2002), and Douglas C. Waller's Big Red (2001). Both authors (Karam served on the submarine USS Plunger) said that there is a lot of hype regarding U.S. submarine training, but the reality is much less impressive. As for the legendary assertion that all U.S. submariners are experts on every system in their boats, one Sailor told Waller that was all bunk. Waller explained that The (submariner's) qualification only made you familiar with the rest of the boat. It didn't mean you could actually run other parts. If (the Sailor) and the other missile techs suddenly died, those nukes in the back wouldn't have a clue how to fire these rockets. Petty Officer Karam, an Engineering Laboratory Technician, concurred, and acknowledged that he could only work on other systems in a pinch. He continued the Plunger, and, for that matter, any nuke boat, was sufficiently complex that one person simply could not learn everything to that level of detail in the 14 months we were given to qualify. Not if they were doing their own jobs, too.

British allies, of course, have long ridiculed American submariners for spending too much time and effort learning about nuclear reactors. Surprisingly, Waller wrote that some U.S. Navy officers quietly agree. The Drill Coordinator on the USS Nebraska, Lieutenant Brent Kinman, told Waller that American submariners talk too much about the reactor, like mechanics, and not enough about how to fight the ship effectively: That was the problem with today's submariners, Kinman thought. They were technicians rather than warriors. The average lieutenant riding these boats considered himself a nuclear engineer first and a submarine officer second. It almost feels like we re out there just driving the reactor around. This overemphasis on engineering might explain why diesel submarines are so often triumphant against U.S.N. nuclear submarines during exercises.

Conclusion

The U.S. Navy is the largest navy in the world, and on paper, certainly the most powerful. Of that there is no doubt. With the Russian Navy all but gone, the American navy remains the dominant sea power in the world. Yet, as we have seen here, this heavyweight navy often has great difficulty handling the little guys. Indeed, if the U.S. Navy were a boxer, one might say that his dominance is due mostly to his sheer size because he punches well below his massive weight. In this era of asymmetrical warfare, of David versus Goliath conflicts, perhaps it is time for America to rethink its naval strategy, lose some weight, and as sports announcers say, focus more on the fundamentals.

For all the money America spends on its huge navy, it really needs to be much better.

The Author

Roger Thompson is Professor of Military Studies at Knightsbridge University and a Fellow of the Inter-University Seminar on Armed Forces and Society. His book Brown Shoes, Black Shoes, and Felt Slippers: Parochialism and the Evolution of the Post-War U.S. Navy was published in 1995

References

Periodicals (print and online) Collins Subs Star in Naval Exercises, The Age (online version). 24 September 2003.

This article can be viewed at:

www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/09/23/1064082993693.html?from=storyrhs

U.S. Pacific Fleet No Match for the Russian Air Force, Discerning the Times Digest and Newsbytes. November 2000.

This article can be viewed at: www.discerningtoday.org/members/Digest/2000Digest/November/u.s._fleet_no_match _for_russian_airforce.htm

Dougherty, Jon E. Russian flyover takes Navy by Surprise, WorldNetDaily. December 7, 2000.

This article can be viewed at: www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=15625

O Sullivan, Arieh. Report: IAF Whips U.S. Pilots in Exercise, The Jerusalem Post (online version). September 24, 1999.

This article can be viewed at: www.jpost.com/com/Archive/24.Sep.1999/News/Article-3.html

Books

Cockburn, Andrew. The Threat: Inside the Soviet Military Machine. (New York: Vintage Books, 1984.) Pp. 397-438.

Karam, Andrew. Rig Ship for Ultra-Quiet. (Sydney: Sid Harta Publishers, 2002). Pp. 192-193.

Waller, Douglas C. Big Red: The Three Month Voyage of a Trident Nuclear Submarine. (New York: Harper Torch, 2001). Pp. 87, 318,

Online Resource

www.dutchsubmarines.com

Creating a U.S. Navy of Undersea and Armored Warriors---not Bureaucrats and Welfare Recipients-in-uniform in horizontal Buildings that Float

We need to create a HEAVILY ARMORED, extremely FAST, low-profile, well-camouflaged Civil-War style "blockade runner" ship (BRS) that would NOT have complex electronics but would be a training ship for ALL Navy personnel to "know what RIGHT looks like" via a short training cruise to "earn" surface warrior rating. A sort of at-sea armored M113 Gavin, but for the Navy. Thus, for at least 1 period of time, the Sailor would know what a FIGHTING ship and a FIGHTING crew would and should be like; setting the PHYSICAL standard that the larger, cluttered with electronics and bureaucracy ships need to address.

Training BRS crews would:

a. Defend selves from simulated port attacks with infantry weapons and ship guns
b. Attack pirates at sea and board their vessels
c. Launch/recover SEALs
d. Perform actual firefighting and damage control to save the ship
e. Actually go into the water and have to swim selves to shore and survive using SERE techniques, taking along their weapons and survival gear
f. Fight off a simulated enemy ground force using infantry weapons
g. Simulate torpedo attacks on larger enemy vessels

Operational BRS ships would be obtained to replace the failed under 1, 000 ton Patrol Coastal (PC) class of ships as NAVSPECWAR insertion/extraction means as the "low" end to the planned 3, 000 ton Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) which would be the "high" end of a high-low naval force mix. Sort of realizing their error (post 9/11 all the action is taking place fighting sub-national terrorists), USN as "Indian givers" now want the PCs back, but this still doesn't solve the draft of the ship preventing them from getting close enough to insert/extract SEALs in small boats. The LCS at 3, 000 tons is probably going to be even more limited at closing on shores than the PCs, so a smaller "low" end ship is needed, hence the BRS.

www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/issues/2006/June/NavysSmallest.htm

June 2006

Navy's Smallest Fighting Ships Prove Littoral Warfare Concepts

By David Axe

LITTLE CREEK NAVAL AMPHIBIOUS BASE, Va. - The Navy's smallest fighting ships - Cyclone-class patrol boats - are blazing the way for a future fleet of littoral combat ships.

Little Creek is slated to receive as many as 22 LCSs in coming decades, according to base spokesman Scott Mohr. But until the LCS ships arrive, these 180-foot vessels may be one of the Navy's most useful assets for littoral warfare, officials say.

Fourteen Cyclone-class boats, known to sailors as PCs, were commissioned beginning in the early 1990s to support the special warfare community. The PCs proved to be too big for special operations in very shallow water, so the Navy began to dispose of them.

It donated one to the Philippines and transferred five to the Coast Guard, which has used them for maritime law enforcement. The remaining eight ships were slated for disposal when the war on terrorism intervened and, simultaneously, the Navy began to take littoral or "green water" operations more seriously.

In the aftermath of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the Navy found itself tasked with protecting the country's two offshore oil terminals in the shallow waters of the northern Arabian Gulf. Large warships drew too deeply to get in close to the platforms, but the patrol boats, with only eight feet of draft, were just right.

In 2003, the Navy deployed four PCs to the Gulf. This year, a fifth boat joined them.

Last year, recognizing the utility of these craft in green waters, the Navy halted all efforts to dispose of the remaining boats and even began negotiations with the Coast Guard to take back the transferred PCs. The Navy moved two West Coast-based boats to Little Creek, a move that consolidated all operations and training at the Virginia base. At any given time, three boats are at Little Creek for drydocking and training while the rest remain forward deployed.

Thirteen 30-person PC crews that are based at Little Creek fly out to the Fifth Fleet in the Persian Gulf, on six-month rotations.

Lt. Marisa McClure and Lt. Cmdr. Brent Devore, both PC skippers, say their boats are ideal for green-water operations. Their light tonnage, powerful propulsion plants and shallow draft mean they can move nimbly in crowded coastal waters. Recent modifications - including additional small-caliber weapons, such as machine guns and grenade launchers; a digital navigation system, and a stern ramp for launching and recovering small boats - have only increased the patrol boats' effectiveness in littoral missions.

"The Navy is starting to branch us out," says McClure, currently commanding Thunderbolt (PC-12), one of the training vessels at Little Creek. "Our main mission is with the Fifth Fleet. We are defending the oil platforms in the northern Arabian Gulf. But we do other missions in the Gulf as well, like maritime interdiction."

"Maritime interdiction," in Navy parlance, means boarding and searching vessels that are suspected of ties to terrorists or criminals. It's a staple of day-to-day naval operations and a huge growth business for the world's navies, especially in green waters. The shift towards maritime interdiction in shallow waters is one of the major factors in the LCS development.

In terms of missions and crew size, the PCs increasingly look and operate like "baby" LCSs.

The Navy in 2004 issued contracts to both Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics to build prototype LCS, each to their own design. Both designs emphasize modularity, maneuverability and shallow draft. Littoral combat ship hulls will accommodate a wide range of specialized modules tailored to missions such as anti-submarine warfare, surface warfare and mine warfare. While displacing around 3,000 tons, almost as much as an Oliver Hazard Perry-class frigate, LCS will be crewed by only 75 people, versus a Perry's 300.

Just 30 sailors serve aboard the 380-ton displacement PCs, which leaves little or no reserve in most tactical scenarios. "To put a [small] boat in the water takes the majority of my crew," McClure says.

LCS crews are tasked with even more diverse missions, and with twice as many sailors as a PC, perhaps face even greater personnel problems.

Devore, commanding Hurricane (PC-3), also a training vessel, says the sailors on his crew are already hybrid sailors. "On bigger ships, you'll have 30 people in each skill set," Devore says. "On a ship [the size of a PC], you have 30 people to do everything. That's hard."

"It's very senior," McClure says of her crew, "'mainly because they're asked to do a lot of things outside their ratings."

Thunderbolt Boatswain's Mate 1st Class Gary Jeter exemplifies this trend. Besides handling the PC's small boats, he also stands watch as an officer of the deck - a responsibility usually reserved for officers, of which a typical PC has only four. "I have, like, five other jobs besides officer of the deck and boatswain," Jeter says. "You've got to be flexible."

Having so many jobs means a lot more training than what a typical sailor might require. The PC community's rotation schedule - a six-month deployment every 16 months - leaves just enough time at Little Creek for schooling, under way exercises in the Chesapeake Bay and downtime for sailors, whose workloads are often greater than anything they've experienced before.

Devore says the small size of PC crews creates a family dynamic that helps sailors cope with the high stress level. Somewhat uniquely, a PC crew's morale does not seem to be tied to any particular hull. While on deployment, a crew will fall in on whatever Fifth-Fleet PC is available in theater. '[Crew-swapping] is the same as having a car at home and getting a rental car when you're traveling," Devore says. "The rental car's got a gas pedal and brakes just like the car back home. It just takes a little time to get used to the nuances."

The differences among the eight PCs are "very subtle," Devore adds.

The way the PC crews rotate onto forward-deployed boats is an outgrowth of the Navy's Sea Swap experiments that saw destroyer crews share hulls - and another preview of the way future hybrid sailors will man the LCS fleet.

The Navy's goal in swapping crews is to reduce the wear and tear that comes with repeated ocean crossings ... and to squeeze more operational utility out of fewer vessels by keeping them in the combat zone longer without overtaxing sailors.

The strategy appears to be working for the PC sailors. An eight-boat force with 13 crews has maintained five boats in the Arabian Gulf for three years.

Changes are looming for Little Creek's PC crews. McClure and Devore both speak of the day when the new Iraqi Navy assumes responsibility for the country's national waters, at which point the forward-deployed PCs will return home. When that happens, Devore says, he expects the Navy to exploit some of the boats' other strengths - namely, their similarity to the vessels operated by the world's small navies.

"The Gulf is far from being all we're capable of," Devore says. "The future of these boats is in international cooperation ... Navies in South America, the United Arab Emirates... they have a bunch of these 200-foot ships for coastal defense and combating piracy," Devore continues. "That's what we're suited to."

He says he expects Southern Command to request PC deployments for exercises and operations with friendly navies as soon as the boats become available.

LCS also will play a critical role in multinational missions, notes Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Mullen, who in a speech at the Naval War College called for a '1,000-ship-navy' with vessels from all over the world operating together to keep the seas free from terrorists and criminals.

The BRS would have the following features:

a. Hanger & helicopter pad for 2 x NOTAR stealthy MD-900 helicopters or Centaur folding-wing seaplane
b. Rear ramp area to launch/recovery F470 Zodiac and RIB boats
c. Anti-Ship Missile and tethered Aerostat (blimp) to see over-the-horizon (OTH) with radar and FLIR for self-defense would be most complex electronic gadgetry on board
d. Mini-Shore bombardment means to lay smokescreen/explosive effects to help insert/extract SEALs
e. Amphibious Invasion smashing BRS variants would have submerged-fire autocannon, and ramming gear
f. Twin bow and aft torpedo tubes with 8 torpedoes each to be able to attack while moving towards and away from enemies
g. Multi-spectral smokescreen-laying capability using diesel engines

Near-Surface Attack

Scene from the 1954 Walt Disney classic; "20, 000 Leagues Under the Sea"

Jules Verne's prophesy of the Nautilus ramming and going under wooden ships to sink them in "20, 000 Leagues Under the Sea" is not yet fulfilled but is full of merit.

The Russians have been pondering a "dive boat" that would be essentially a surface warship but with a simple and inexpensive ability to sail under the water at a shallow depth.

Such a near-surface attack exploits the surprise of a submarine while simplifying the weaponry to do the needed damage upon the enemy that could include cannons that need the air to operate. Torpedoes---essentially miniature submarines sent as sacrificial missiles to "ram" the enemy ship instead of the mother naval craft are expensive and limited in number that can be carried. If you have literally hundreds and thousands of small craft targets, say landing craft and amphibious tanks coming ashore you will be hard-pressed to sink them all with torpedoes as you would with aerial versions--missiles and guided bombs. The enemy invasion could win simply because he's got more numbers than you have munitions to hit him with.

The BRS Invasion smashing ship would look very much like Verne's Nautilus in that it can either attack from the near surface or shallow under surface. The BRS would have two automatic cannon turrets feeding from a very large supply of ammunition below deck that could fire while the majority of the ship is just below the surface. We know that gunfire as soon as it hits water goes limp and ineffective. The BRS USS Monitor II or Nautilus II class would be able to explode hundreds and even thousands of enemy landing craft by deliberately sailing into them after a sub-surface approach, then surfacing just enough for her autocannon turrets to fire.

Jules Verne, 1869

German U-Boats, 1939

As the BRS force cuts a path through the enemy invasion craft, if they should collide with them they would have a spearpoint and ramming teeth overhead and under the bow like German U-Boats had in WW2 to cut through anti-submarine nets that would smash a landing craft in two. If large enemy surface ships and subs do attack the BRS, it could fire torpedoes at a safe stand-off to sink them or make them back off. After slicing through the invasion landing craft, the force could keep going and lay smoke to escape or turn back in and decimate the enemy's ranks again. Intermingled with enemy landing craft, the BRS force would be hard for the enemy to fire on without harming their own craft.

If I were the Taiwanese, I'd be building dozens of invasion-smashing armored BRS ships to wade into any CHICOM invasion and save the day like the Union gunboat USS Monitor did in 1863 when she turned away the confederate ironclad Merrimac at Hampton roads.

Aircraft Strike From the Beneath the Sea

Another lesson here is to do what the Japanese had to do in WW2: use submarine aircraft carriers so the carrier itself is hidden from the enemy until planes are launched so they can catch their targets be they other ships or land targets in a position of vulnerability (element of SURPRISE).

Its common goal of every air force planners to catch the enemy's air force on the ground. This is almost impossible to do like the IAF did in the 1967 war with land-based aircraft in a world where there is no air/space camouflage cover due to satellites and spies reporting through the globally connected telecommunications world. The returning planes need to be recovered by their submarine aircraft carrier that submerges to hide them from enemy reprisals--we cannot afford to lead the enemy back to surface aircraft carriers (a comfy artificial "land" airbase on a ship) like we did at Midway which resulted in the loss of the USS Yorktown.

Norman Polmar's excellent article in Air Force magazine (see below) alludes to the need to catch aircraft on the ground using submarine launched fighter-bombers as an option Boeing and the Navy considered during the Cold War but rejected along with a lot of other good ideas. His superb article "conks out" at the end with the typical cliche that what we have now is so wise and wonderful that we no longer could use seaplane aircraft carriers. Let's examine this. The closest thing we have to submarine aircraft carriers is our current nuclear attack submarines which launch unmanned suicide aircraft we call "cruise missiles" when really they are indeed small airplanes with wings. Could we launch enough cruise missiles by submarines to catch an enemy air force on the ground?

Its doubtful because these are "dumb" missiles that cannot change course on the scene via a human onboard--its either hit or miss, and most likely miss. They can also be easily shot down like the V-1 cruise missiles were in WW2 due to their predictable flight paths. All of the we need manned strike aircraft reasoning the "aircraft carrier mafia" uses also applies to the submarine aircraft carrier because the only difference is one carrier can submerge and the other cannot. Its funny how the aircraft carrier apologists only want to use their reasons when they support their pet platforms not someone else's. But another illogic and hypocrisy comes from the "precision strike" aka missile crowd.

The precision strikers want a billion-dollar DD(X) surface ship to carry and fire lots of expensive cruise missiles and guided cannon shells to hit inland targets. But they only want to talk about FRIENDLY SSC capabilities, they don't want to discuss how the enemy's SSC can target and destoy their fantasy DD(X) (should be renamed the "DD R & D(X)" because its just a Research & Development cash cow not a real fighting shop) visible from air/space on the surface of the water. They also do not want to bring up the fact that their bombardment means are like the sub's unmanned cruise missiles (aircraft) ploddingly predictable and mega expensive such that if the enemy has hardened his key areas deep underground with low-technology, our high-technology is thwarted. What is needed to do precision strike is a large, armored Iowa class battleship that has large 16" projectiles that are qualitatively powerful enough to penetrate hardened targets yet by being shot out of a cannon cheap enough so we can fire lots of them to get quantitative effects. To compliment the battleship's overt presence that can withstand some enemy battle damages, our Navy needs a surprise attack capability that can adapt to the enemy situation quickly enough to strike before he can disperse/hide/react: submarine aircraft carriers.

We must realize we are indeed today in the same situation as the Japanese Navy in WW2 where we do not have sole ownership of the 3D battlespace above us and must be able to submerge under the water to avoid detection.

Submarine Aircraft Carriers: Does the Navy/mc want to contribute to the fight to defeat sub-national terror groups or not?

The days of the large amphibious surface ship packed with marines is over. These ships are too expensive and too vulnerable; if its a sub-national conflict container assault ships can be employed en masse by REAL non-linear warfighting organizations not immature kill/capture narcissist egomaniacs in the USMC to overwhelm sub-national groups and small nation-states without effective navies. Until we fight another nation-state foe, we have a very real fight against malcontent sub-national islamofascist terrorists to win. After they struck us using kamikaze airliners on 9/11/2001 the ponderous WW2 military began to gear up to go to Afghanistan. The Navy likes to brag that its carriers launched fighter-bombers to bomb mud huts in Afghanistan and later had some marines sit in a dust bowl in the middle of nowhere as proof positive that their entire WW2 force structure is AOK. Let's be brutally honest here; the Afghan northern Alliance already on the ground in tracked armored fighting vehicles and horseback were the ones who defeated the Taliban and all of the Navy's fighter-bomber strikes could have been done by land-based planes. As it was, land-based aircraft did most of the bombing anyway. After the U.S. Army's 10^th Mountain Division and Rangers had jumped into southern Afghanistan, the Northern Alliuance had ended most of the resistance. By the time the marines landed in the southern Afghanistan airbase already secured by the Army Rangers, terrorist leader Osama Bin Laden and his underlings were long gone. they are still at large today. When you consider a Nimitz class aircraft carrier houses 6,000 men who all have families full of loved ones--there is no operational security when it leaves port to go bombard an Afghanistan. You could say, well the carrier is already on station in the general area so when routine flight ops turn to actual ordance laden flights the enemy will be caught unawares. Well, it didn't work, did it? There is no hiding a nuclear aircraft carrier and what its doing even from a sub-national group.

Again, if instead our Navy had submarine aircraft carriers, the enemy's eyes will not be constantly on a large surface target, they will not know where to look. When the submarine carrier surfaces for just a few minutes, its aircraft will be inbound and it will be back under the water again moving to a new location which to recover its planes. Its nothing more than the common Army "shoot 'n scoot" tactics artillery pieces use to avoid counter-battery fire adapted to a naval environment. And we are not only talking about dropping bombs on people, either, small detachments of troops can be inserted/extracted via submarine aircraft carriers to surveill and encircle the fleeting enemy who is not going to wave a hanky at a spy satellite or a drone plane flying overhead.

We have both the submarines and F-35 STOVL Joint Strike fighters to field submarine aircraft carriers

Polmar's article reveals the secret that the engineering studies already exist to field AN-1 submarines operating catapult-launched fighter-bomber seaplanes like the British SR1 or an A-4 SkyHawk Model 640 or AN-2 subs and V/TOL planes.

Legendary innovator Ed Heinneman even designed an A-4 SkyHawk with a boat hull for the AN-1 submarine aircraft carrier. The Navy had the "Skate" seaplane jet fighter that could dock on top of a sub to refuel & rearm--all it needed was folding wings and an water and airtight compartment module on top of the sub and the sub could take it with until needed...the Regulus cruise missile (unmanned winged airplanes) boats had these!

Photos courtesy of William Trimble's superb book, "Attack from the Sea"

But back in the '50s/'60s we did not have a jet V/TOL aircraft for an AN-2 type approach. The vectored thrust Harrier is a dangerous failure. With the advent of the lift-fan F-35 Joint Strike Fighter we have a legitimate and seriously superior fighter-bomber with radar stealth capabilities that can safely take-off and land from a vertical hover.

To get maximum bombload, I propose a short take-off run off the bow of a nuclear submarine of the surface with a raised "ski jump". To recover the JSFs, they land vertically at the aft deck of the sub, perhaps with the superstructure opening at front/back to double as hanger and watertight locker for the returning fighter-bombers.

The F-35's wings would fold for compact storage and have skis and pop-out floats in case for whatever the reason it cannot hover land on the sub or another ship deck. This concept is termed "Short Take-Off, Vertical Landing" or STOVL. Special pods called JPODS can be carried by the JSFs to insert/extract 1-2 people per pod. A submarine aircraft carrier with 8 x JSFs could insert/extract at high subsonic speeds with radar stealth 20-30 commandos at-a-time compared to the current fragile troop insertions by helicopter or the abominable V-22 flying windmill/deathtrap.

Submarines + Watertight Containers = Aircraft Carriers

A SeaWolf nuclear submarine with a watertight container has a special folding-wing F-35B STOVL JSF inside depicted in the see-through cutaway model. Coming in to land is another Lightning II with GRIER pods underneath carrying 2 x SEAL or Army SOF commandos each inside.

The addition of a watertight container to an existing submarine without having to modify it is a proven technique that has been done by the USN for many years. In the 1950s far-sighted Navy officers had a watertight container large enough to transport an LVTP-6 amtrack from the sub to shore. Such a container to hold M113 AmphiGavins, small seaplanes, helicopters and the new F-35 JSF are possibilities for the near future.

The F-35B depicted has GRIER pods to off-load commandos at sea or ashore as well as do LA strike, AsuW and AAW missions.

Submarines with Watertight Containers + AmphiGavins

www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hbUusptJbs

AmphiGavin waterjet and nose floatation/wake creator nose-equipped M113 Gavin light tracked armored fighting vehicles (AFVs) with band tracks and stealthy hybrid-electric drives could be covertly deployed from submarines with watertight containers. Once ashore, SEALs would have not only stealthy mobility but an ability to fight from a position of OVERMATCHING STRENGTH from heavy weapons carried on the vehicle instead of M16 versus AK47 on foot. Light tracked AFVs provide cross-country mobility under armor protection to advance in the face of enemy fire, deliver dismounted fighters rested and intact to carry the day. Enemies killed/captured can be brought back to the sub from inside the AmphiGavins.

The USN has in the past deployed amtracks from submarines for covert operations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Sealion_(SS-315)

A year and one-half later, however, Sealion, along with sister ship Perch (SS-313), was designated for conversion to a troop carrier, and in April 1948, she entered the San Francisco Naval Shipyard for the eight-months conversion. During that period, her torpedo tubes and forward engines were removed, and her forward engine room and forward and after torpedo rooms were converted to berth 123 troops. The forward engine room and after torpedo room were designed for alternative use as cargo space. The wardroom was redesigned for use as an operating room; the beam aft of the conning tower was extended, and a large watertight cylindrical chamber was installed abaft the conning tower to store amphibious landing equipment including a tracked landing vehicle (LVT).

On 2 November 1948, Sealion was re-commissioned a Submarine, Transport, with the hull classification symbol SSP-315. Training exercises off the southern California coast, with marines embarked, took her into the spring of 1949 when she was ordered to the Atlantic for duty in SubDiv 21. During April, she operated in the New London, Connecticut, area, then, in May, she commenced operations out of Norfolk, Virginia, as a unit of SubDiv 6l, SubRon 6. On 31 January 1950, she was reclassified a transport submarine with hull classification symbol ASSP-315; and, by the spring of that year, had conducted exercises as far north as Labrador and as far south as the southern Caribbean Sea. From April through June of 1950, she underwent her first post-conversion overhaul at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard; and, in July, she resumed operations out of Norfolk.

Reassigned to SubDiv 63 in March 1955 and reclassified submarine transport APSS-315 on 24 October 1956, Sealion continued a schedule of exercises with marines, Underwater Demolition Teams and Beach Jumper units and, on occasion, Army units, off the Virginia and Carolina coasts and in the Caribbean until 1960.

FUTURE NAVAL WARFARE: Jonah & the Wale and the Moving Killer Ducks

Problem: surface aircraft carriers are sitting ducks 24/7/365

Solution: Jonah & the Wale and Moving Killer Ducks

The Wale

Ever see a F-86D Sabre jet's extending its 24 x 2.75" rocket pod under its nose?

Imagine the F-86D upside down and the fuselage is a 300 foot long nuclear submarine and the pod extends all the way from bow to stern.

At the bow end of the long pod are 12-24 square tubes with catapults for 12-24 x Model 640 A-4 sized seaplane fighters.

The submarine aircraft carrier has underwater stabilizer fins for extra stability when on the surface to compensate for not being a boat hull shape.

Jonah

When the USS Wale surfaces, all 12-24 x LT. Jonahs in their Model 640 A-4s are ready to launch in their tubes at 5 second intervals so 1-2 squadrons are gone and in the air within 1-2 minutes. The USS Wale closes its bow (front) and stern (rear) doors and dives. The USS Wale is not exposed on the surface any longer than 2-3 minutes, tops.

Moving Killer Ducks

After the LT. Jonahs are done with their mission they fly back to a pre-designated GPS coordinate on the water where a communications relay buoy is floating. Flight leader LT. Jonah radios the buoy which relays by sonar his message to the USS Wale to surface. If the water is calm, all of the A-4 "DuckHawks" lower their hydroskis/wheels and land on the water lining up behind LT Jonah to water taxi into the stern door of the USS Wale's top pod which is a flooded hanger deck. If the water is rough, they land one at a time and taxi into the flooded hanger deck. If the weather is too severe for water landings, they lower tail hooks and ski/wheel land on the top dry deck on the top of the pod, catch a wire and are taken down by elevator into the flooded or dry hanger deck.

Within no more than 12-24 minutes and likely under 5 minutes, all the DuckHawks have entered the hanger deck, the stern and bow doors are closed and the USS Wale is under water invisible once again. The point is that we use the sea and land simultaneously EVERY killer duck and use their seaplane capabilities to taxi in quickly to the hanger instead of accepting a bottleneck that dry deck aircraft carriers have of only landing one aircraft at a time using arrestor wires. If we have to land this way, the entire aircraft carrier can submerge and does not have to stay topside offering a visible target to the enemy 24/7/365.

No More Men on Exposed Flight Decks

Instead of having men on the top flight deck of a dry aircraft carrier in a hurry trying to work around the bottlenecks of limited numbers of catapults and just one landing strip, the USS Wale submerges and the flight crews are in a shirt sleeve environment and no hurry with no pitching deck to contend with under the calm sea. They spray down the DuckHawks with fresh water, refuel and rearm them, and reload them into the bow launch tubes. LT Jonahs enter their planes when needed or 2 can be inside on alert status ready-to-launch in a "snap-shoot" if contact is made with an enemy combatant and the civilian cargo ship convoy or surface warship fleet needs immediate air support.

Paul Cysz's Sea Skua

He writes: Skua is a sea bird that is a hunter/killer that can function on water or land. It is one nasty bird.

Might argue details, but I think you have an idea worth pursuing. One of my student design team did a nuclear submarine for distributing Arctic and offshore oil. It was about 1000 ft long and essentially never surfaced. It transferred people and oil submerged to undersea terminals. It was faster than surface ships and could avoid all of the surface hazards. In many ways it was an underwater blimp as the oil provided buoyancy. Bring them into a dry hanger deck not flooded. You can use skis but then you open up internal structure to salt water Maybe consider something like the attached in principle not detail design.

For the killer bees, the autogyro there is a converti-plane...it might be an option as they can get airborne in as little as 30 knots and take off right from the battle box.

A former President was on C-SPAN last night and complained about all of the Iraq and Afghanistan people we had to kill before we had determined conclusively that they we hostile and intended to harm us! Killer Wasps and Skuas kill whenever necessary to survive as we did in WWII and are not politically correct. Remember disturb a killer bee colony and they will continue to sting for 8 hours and a mile distant at whatever is perceived to have disturbed them. They do not have an 8-step procedure for live fire engagement.

Communist Red China Already Looking at Submarine Aircraft Carriers to evade surface firepower detection/destruction!

J10

side-view & head-on view

top-view

close-up

Submarine Amphibious Assault Ships: what the USMC should already be doing if it were smart

The Soviets realized that the way to land troops in light amphibious tracked tanks and supplies covertly was to use special submarines derived from the experiences in WW2. If the USMC had listened to their own Geiger Board in 1946, we'd already have amphibious assault submarines and light tracked tanks to bring marines ashore at a surprise location with speed, protection and superior firepower instead of the current helicopter foot slog clusterfuck from vulnerable surface ships reliving WW2.

The following is an ALTA VISTA BABELFISH translation of the Russian web page below:

www.deepstorm.ru/DeepStorm.files/45-92/dns/621/list.htm

Project 621.

1. Quantity of submarines of the project: no

2. Image of the project:

3. Composition of the project: It is not realized.

4. History of the project:

In 40 - beginning the 50's in THE USSR were developed the designs of Arctic submarines for delivery and landing for the purpose of the seizure of the air bases of potential enemy, and also organization of intermediate airfields for the Soviet bombers, aimed at THE USA. Then this idea not was realized for the technical reasons. Today this possibility appeared in the fleets of a number of the countries.

The winter of 1953 life on the American air base in Greenland goes by its turn: radars work, take off and sit down themselves heavy aircraft - thick cigars of transport workers, powerful flying fortresses... Suddenly airport obsluga saw hundreds of advancing sub-machine gunners in the camouflage suits. But to the runway, passing them, with the roar jumped out the tanks T -34 and on the move was opened machine gun-cannon fire. Everything was ended in the schitannye minutes; pilots and technical specialists stood with the raised hands. After a certain time, the base again revived - to concrete runway one after others landed the aircraft, only now they bore not the white, but Red Stars. Bombers were repaired and was taken course on purpose... this not the scenario of sequential Hollywood fighter about the byloy "red threat". Similar actions studied the combat Generals and Admirals, who hid then the plans of these operations into the folders with the heading "top secret - special importance".

Since the beginning of the Cold War around the Soviet Union was formed the network of the American air bases, which were being located in Norway, England, Italy, Turkey, Japan. American bombers, acting from them, could strike many objects in the territory of potential enemy. In turn, THE USSR did not have military bases near THE USA and apply retaliatory attack could only from its territory. The shortest path for the Soviet bombers lay through the Arctic, but even then they in view of the insufficient radius of action could not return conversely. Therefore the project arose: to organize the intermediate points of the refueling of aircraft in the course of flights both "there" and "conversely".

It was intended to create stage airfields on ice near the pole and on the Arctic islands. The seizure of American air bases would be ideal version. But as similar to carry out? It will be possible to send ice-breakers with the landing hardly as a result of absolute (in those years) supremacy at sea of the fleets OF THE USA and other NATO alliance countries. It remained to use underwater ships.

In 1948 in TSKB-Y8 began the development the "boat of the special designation" of project 621 for the reserved transfer of landing subdivisions with combat materiel and equipment and the subsequent supply of the landed troops by ammunition, with fuel and foodstuffs. Together with the marines had to act the tankers, artillerymen, pilots. If necessary the landing force members, as it was provided for by project, at the moment of debarkation on the move could join the battle. For the fighters, for example, the designers created a takeoff device of the type of catapult. Were developed 7 versions of pre-sketching project, from which four basic they were characterized by the composition of power plant and some design peculiarity associated with the arrangement of technical equipment and landing. Were studied versions PL with the different power plants:

- diesel- battery version with the steam-gas turbine plant for guaranteeing the economic underwater is running;

- diesel- battery with 16 groups of storage batteries;

- versions with the "united" engines, which work according to diagram YED -VVD and according to diagram YED -XPI.

Project TTZ was comprised on the basis of version with the steam-gas turbine power plant, since in comparison with others it ensured the greatest submerged endurance range. Only they approached at that time the development of design 617 and possibility of designing by new PGTU of the power required for project 621 were completely obscure. Therefore simultaneously was represented project TTZ in the reserve version with 16 groups of storage batteries of the type YA'SU on 112 elements in each. In the project it provided that in the case of absence to the required period PGTU, the boat can be constructed with the storage battery with its subsequent replacement on PGTU. In this case the displacement of battery boat with the identical to the basic version to length and the width grew by 630 tons.

The basic technical solutions in the pre-sketching project were directed toward the optimum arrangement of transportable landing and combat materiel and toward the guarantee of a landing to that not equipped by mooring cones shallow shore (beach).

PL had 5 connect together durable housings - one average, and to the right also to the left of it on two more housings from each side, located one after others along the ship. Together with the light external casing, which covers all five durable housings, was obtained united construction. In the average durable housing, which was being divided by horizontal platforms and transverse sortings in the watertight sections, in its nose and average sections, were placed transportable the technology (tanks, aircraft, motor vehicles, guns) and ammunition, and also personnel of landing. In the same region the living quarters for the personnel of boat were located. In the rear portion of the average housing was placed the central station, isolated by durable spherical sortings, and diesel-electric twin-shaft plant with the diesels of e"D. In each of the stern onboard durable housings were placed one PGTU and to one diesel Z0D, which work on one common line of shaft. Thus, PL was four-shaft.

In to the nose of onboard housings were located storage batteries and the cistern of the substitution of transportable it was cargo and the product "030". In all aboard the ship there were 35 cisterns of substitution, which made it possible without the special labor to restore ballast trimming with the landing. All durable housings were connected between themselves by passages and hatchways, which made possible for personnel to pass from housing to housing. In the external casing were placed 29 main tanks, 3 the fuel tanks, bags with the product "030", cistern equalizing and rapid sinking. In the nose extremity they find the mechanized gangplank (access ramp) by length 25 it was meter and nose diving rudders. In superstructure and fairwater artillery and rocket installations and sliding devices were located. In the rear portion of the light housing were placed two aerodynamic rudders, stern diving rudders and anchor gear. The flat bottom of the nose section of the ship protected by armor plates to avoid the damages of housing with the contact of soil during the landing. For the durable housing was provided for the application of steel with the yield point of 40 kgs/mgm2. The designed architectural form of housing PL made possible to have small sagging and to ensure conditions for the rapid landing: small sagging made it possible nearer to approach the coast.

Armament: two 57- mm of the coupled zenith of automaton even one coupled by 25- mm automaton. The launch platforms of 360 rocket projectiles were located for the fire support of landing on the deck. Load capacity landing PL was equal to 1550 T. on its board they were placed 10 tanks T -34,12 of trucks and 3 trailers, 4 passenger of automobile, 12 guns of the caliber of 85 mm, 2 guns of the caliber of 45 mm, 3 aircraft la -11 with the folding wings, machine guns, mortars, automata, the ammunition, fuel-, provisions, and also 745 people of landing. Since loading and unloading the tanks and trucks produced under its own power, powerful ventilation for the removal of exhaust gases of the operating engines was provided. The sections, where dwelled soldiers, were equipped with the system of regeneration and air conditioning. There were general cot- bunks, each to 4 people, latrines, wash-stands, two large electric stoves for the preparation of food, electro-boilers, etc.

The developers of project rightfully considered the debarkation of landing forces the most complex operation. For boat it was in prospect close to approach with nose extremity the coast, after filling main tanks, actually to lie on the soil, to open cargo hatch and to advance powerful ladder for gathering of technology and people. The cisterns of substitution were filled up in proportion to lightening submarine. For prospecting the touchdown point, mine clearing and destruction coast barrages through the airlocks in the rear portion of the boat the divers could leave.

The creation of troop-carrying submarine required solution of many complex technical problems, including of such, as creation PGTU, the ship air-conditioning system for the accommodations with the large number of located in them people, loading-unloading devices, and also realization of the commutation of the electric power of 16 storage batteries. Moreover it was necessary to carry out a whole series of the measures, which would ensure maintaining the combat efficiency of landing force members during the passage. The additional tasks, which were being laid on PL - transportation it is cargo, the supply of submarines in the ocean - they also required resolution of many problematic questions.

The absence in the country of experience of designing and use truck PL and the large number of questions, which require their solution, caused doubt about the reality of realizing of this project. The obtained in the project relatively greater load capacity, which reached by 28% of the displacement, made it necessary to assume that loads initial data in the part and arrangements were to a considerable degree optimized. A number is technical of the solutions - such, as the method of unloading the technology (aircraft, tanks, guns and the like.) and life support of personnel of landing during the prolonged passage and its combat efficiency after debarkation, it caused doubts about their reality. In connection with this the management of Soviet VMF expressed a number of serious observations and all works on project 621 were ended. The nevertheless carried out work gave a certain experience, which was used subsequently, in particular, with designing under-ice- transport PL and other submarines of analogous designation.

5. Diagram of the project:

They are designated by numbers: 1 - diving rudder; 2 - propulsion motor; 3 - diesels; 4 - central station; 5 - cargo deck; 6 - storage batteries; 7 - crew quarters.

6. Tactical-technical data of the project:

displacement 5845 t
the speed in the underwater position 8,4
it is main in the underwater position - 15
it is main cruising range is above-water - 6000 miles.
length - 147,5 m.
width - 13,3m.
sagging-? 6,3 m.
crew -? man.

7. Sources:

- A. shirokorad "tank-borne troops at the pole" (young people technique of y2-y99'g.). - A. shirokorad? ? the "Soviet submarines of postwar building" - M. Dmitriev's Figures.

PROGRESS IN 2006!

Smart SEALs kick ass - Special Ops Sub Becomes Hub for irregular Warfare

The following is a FANTASTIC article about FANTASTIC things being done by the smart submariners and SEAL operators. We now have an Ohio class nuclear submarine (SSGN) that can house 100 SEAL commandos. Their mini-sub is not working, however so they have to get "wet" to come ashore. Not good. But the SEALs are SMART and want 100% excellence as I've seen them personally in action.

We're not thrilled by the Andrew Krepenevich we-don't-need-battleships-we-got-cruise-missiles mentality but it makes more sense launching 154 from a sub that can hide than a vulnerable thinly-skinned surface ship.

Proposed Comorant submarine launched and recovered UAV

They have re-discovered the submarine aircraft carrier! Well, no shit sherlock. They figured they can launch a small fixed-wing UAV. What progress! 60 years later, after the Japanese ROUTINELY operated MANNED seaplanes from submarines all during WW2, the U.S. Navy with no one around to remind them that they are not doing this first, is now just getting around to flying some unmanned model airplanes from their submarines...wow...maybe in another 60 years they will "discover" that men could be in aircraft launched from submarines, too!

Good for them. Maybe a larger dry dock shelter for a pair of NOTAR stealth "Killer Bee" helicopters?

The NOTAR MD-900 which hopefully will win the Army's LUH competition is a very COMPACT (compare to long tail-boom tail-rotor helicopters) and stealthy helicopter that could easily fit into a sub container, trailer or in a BATTLEBOXaircraft^TM. Its got two powerful engines to counter the whining of narrow-minded rotorheads that NOTAR means loss of power. Getting shot down in flames because you are in a noisy helicopter is the "loss of power" (being DEAD) you should be worrying about.

MD-900 Explorer AS U.S. ARMY'S LIGHT UTILITY HELICOPTER (LUH) IN FORWARD-DEPLOYED SCENARIOS

The MD-900 can also be fully covered from sea spray when on deck (as U.S. Coast Guard MD90s are on ships)

by Bruce Perch's Aircraft Covers
www.aircraftcovers.com/ techsheets/md900.html
www.aircraftcovers.com/mil.html
bruce@aircraftcovers.com
(800) 777-6405
(408) 738-3959
FAX: -2729

In 1995, U.S. Naval Institute PROCEEDINGS accepted an article by 1st Tactical Studies Group (Airborne) Director Mike Sparks proposing small OH-58D Kiowa Warrior "killer bees" be located on the Navy's new Patrol Coastal (PC) ships via adding a small helipad to give the SEALS an air insertion & attack capability.

They paid him for the article, but never printed it. Did someone scare them off? Would it "rock-the-boat" (pardon the pun) too much?

www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ship/pc-1.htm

Its ironic, since according to John Pike of Global Security the Navy discovered the PCs were too large for coastal inshore work ie; get close enough to deliver SEAL teams by small RIB boat. Pike says:

"They have limited endurance for their size, and their combat systems and ammunition allowance do not compare well with similar ships in most other navies. They are about ten times the size of their predecessors but carry about the same payload. It was belatedly discovered that they are too large for the close inshore work for which they were intended."

Small helicopters have operated from ships other than aircraft carriers and submarines for many years. To deploy an entire class of ship without even a helicopter flight deck is ludicrous. Maybe if they had printed Sparks' article and added helicopter pads for small helicopters back in '95 the Navy wouldn't be getting rid of the PCs and giving them to the Coast Guard? Here's proof that A/MH-6 Little Birds were used during the 1983 invasion of Grenada to evacuate casualties onto Navy ship decks. Ironic that at the time, DoD and the Army denied that "Killer Egg" A/MH-6s were used in the operation despite amateur video going public showing the "black helicopters" in action. Here, 23 years after the fact, is a picture from DoD of a Little Bird during Grenada delivering a wounded Soldier to a Navy deck.

Little Birds can also hover insert/extract troops by FRIES if they cannot land. Pics of this are rare, here's the best one we've seen showing the FRIES set up on the A/MH-6:

If the Navy SPECWAR people are smart--which they are--they will develop a waterproof container to fit to their new SpecOps nuclear submarines to carry some "Killer Bees", perhaps NOTAR Little Birds or MD-900s to transport 1 to 3 SEAL "platoons" of 7 men by air with stealth, making them defacto "Submarine Aircraft Carriers".

Or quiet prop seaplane?

MAS...from the sea......New Capability In Centaur Seaplane

www.centaurseaplane.com/docs/new_caps.htm

The new British Centaur seaplane might compact to fit into a watertight compartment on top of a nuclear submarine with SEAL commandos. Imagine a Centaur seaplane with a DIESEL* PISTON or turboprop engine with quiet 5-bladed Hartzel prop; its folding wings inside a watertight container on the back of one of our USN SEAL commando submarines!

Able to fly under earth's curvature to evade radar, to insert/extract say 14 x SEALs (2 x 7-man "platoons") who'd combat swim ashore or use a BLUE OR GRAY NOT BLACK---Zodiac F470 CRRC with ArmorFlate etc.

* SOF really needs to get out of the gasoline outboard motor engine business and use safer fuel diesel motors in their small boats, too!

How about Inflatoplanes?

The UAV fad has spurred another look at inflatable airplanes to get aircraft capabilities through structures that minimize themselves when not in use:

www.combatreform22.com/AIAA2003_6630.pdf

The essential problem in flight by air pressure differential is that you need lots of wing or some kind of surface area to create lift that on the ground gets in the way of moving the aircraft around. An airplane that deflates would be an extreme form of wing folding--the entire aircraft can be deflated until use.

Imagine an inflatoplane made of CLEAR see-through material that would blend into the sky. Engine would be a silenced diesel engine of about 75 horsepower. Soldier pilot/observer or SEALS would wear sky gray colored nomex jumpsuits and helmets to assist in blending in with the sky.

Inflatoplane would be inflated with non-flammable HELIUM to shed about 20 pounds of weight to increase range.

Its standard practice throughout the world to use inflatable boats...if the military mind can accept his life depending on a Zodiac F470 boat in the water, why not an inflatable airplane? And an excellent place to start for a military inflatable SEAPLANE would be with the Navy SEALS deploying from nuclear submarines covertly.

http://72.14.209.104/search?q=cache:ft7cqQuG8PoJ:encyclopedia.quickseek.com/index.php/Goodyear_Inflatoplane+ga-466+inflatoplane&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1

Goodyear Inflatoplane

From QuickSeek Encyclopedia

The Goodyear Inflatoplane was an experimental aircraft made by the Goodyear Aircraft Company, a subsidiary of Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, well known for the Goodyear blimp. The Inflatoplane was roughly equivalent to the Piper Cub.

The all-fabric inflatable aircraft was built in 1956, with the idea that it could be used by the military as a rescue plane to be dropped in a box behind enemy lines. Only 12 were built, but development continued until the project was cancelled in 1973.

There were at least 2 versions:

The GA-468 was a single seater. It took about 5 minutes to inflate to about 25 lbf/in² (170 kPa); at full size it was 19 ft 7 in (5.97 m) long, with a 22 ft (6.7 m) wingspan. A pilot would then hand start the two-stroke cycle, 40 hp (30 kW) engine, and take off with a maximum load of 240 lb (109 kg). On 20 US gallons (76 L) of fuel, the aircraft could fly 390 miles (630 km), with an endurance of 6.5 hours. Maximum speed was 72 mph (116 km/h). Later, a 42 hp (31 kW) engine was used in the plane.

The GA-466 was the two-seater version, 2 in (50 mm) shorter, but with a 6 ft (1.8 m) longer wingspan than the GA-468. A more powerful 60 hp (45 kW) McCulloch 4318 engine could power the 740 lb (336 kg) of plane and passenger to 70 mph (113 km/h), although the range of the plane was limited to 275 miles (440 km).

THE GOODYEAR MODEL 466 & 468 INFLATOPLANE

The Goodyear Inflatoplane is a light aircraft with a completely pneumatic airframe. The wing and tail assemblies are made of a rubberised fabric developed by Goodyear and called Airmat, which consists of two layers of nylon fabric joined by thousands of dropped threads. When inflated the layers of nylon are forced apart, the threads being stretched taut to maintain the correct surface contours. The fuselage is of simple rubberised airship fabric. The entire aircraft when deflated can be transported in a truck, jeep, trailer or aircraft (for air-dropping). It can be inflated from a compressed air bottle or by manual pump. Maximum inflation pressure is 7 lb./ sq. in. (0.49 kg. cm.²) for the single-seat version, and 8.5 Ib./sq. in. (0.60 kg./ cm.²) for the two-seat model.

The Inflatoplane has a horizontally-opposed air-cooled two-stroke engine, mounted above the rear of the wing and driving a two-blade wooden tractor air-screw.

Flying controls ere conventional and the rigidity of the wing is such that it will support the weight of a man on each side immediately outboard of the bracing struts.

Since the original prototype flew in 1956, several improved versions have been developed under military contracts, with both open and enclosed cockpits and alternative wheel and single hydroski landing gear to land on water and snow.

On those models, a compressor can be fitted at the back of the engine to maintain pressure in the airframe even when a number of .30 in. caliber bullets have pierced the fabric.

The two current versions of the Inflatoplane are :-

Model 466 (XAO-2G1). Two-seater with 63 h.p. McCulloch 4318E engine.

-------------------------------------------------

DIMENSIONS (Model GA-466).- Span 28 ft. (8.5 m.) Length 19 ft. 8 in. (8.0 m.)

WEIGHTS (Model GA.466).- Weight empty 290 Ib. (130 kg.) Weight loaded 740 Ib. (336 kg.)

PERFORMANCE (Model GA-466). Max. speed 70 m.p.h. (112 km.h.) Cruising speed 55 m.p.h. (88 km.h.) Stalling speed 43 m.p.h. (69 km.h.) Rate of climb at S/L 500 ft./min. (152 m./min.) Service ceiling 6,500 ft. (1,980 m.) Take-off run (grass) 390 ft. (120 ft.) Endurance 5.4 hours.

GA-466

Wings

28 feet length x 6 feet wide x 1 feet high = 168 cubic feet of helium

Fuselage

20 feet length x 3 feet wide x 2 feet high = 120 cubic feet of helium

______________________________________________________

388 cubic feet of helium =

One cubic foot of helium will lift about 28.2 grams = 10, 941.6 grams =

22.42 pounds of buoyant lift

Empty weight 290.00 pounds

Helium lift 22.42 pounds

_________________________

267.58

Model 468 (XAO-3G1). Single-seater, with 44 h.p. Nelson H-63A engine. Five built for U.S. Navy, five for U.S. Army.

DIMENSIONS (Model GA-468).- Span 22 ft. (6.7 m.) Length 19 ft. 8 in. (8.0 m.)

WEIGHTS (Model GA-468).-Weight empty 225 Ib. (102 kg.) Weight loaded 550 Ib. (250 kg.)

PERFORMANCE (Model GA-468).- Max. speed 72 m.p.h. (115 km.h.) Cruising speed 60 m.p.h. (96 km.h.) Stalling speed 37 m.p.h. (59 km.h.) Rate of climb at S/L 550 ft./min. (170 m./min.) Service ceiling 10,300 ft. (3,140 m.) Take-off run (grass) 250 ft. (76 m.) Landing run (grass) 350 ft. (107 m.) Endurance 6.5 hours

GA-468

Wings

22 feet length x 6 feet wide x 1 feet high = 132 cubic feet of helium

Fuselage

20 feet length x 3 feet wide x 2 feet high = 120 cubic feet of helium

______________________________________________________

252 cubic feet of helium =

One cubic foot of helium will lift about 28.2 grams = 7, 106.4 grams =

14.56 pounds of buoyant lift

Empty weight 225.00 pounds

Helium lift 14.56 pounds

_________________________

210.44 pounds

NOTES

http://science.howstuffworks.com/helium2.htm

One cubic foot of helium will lift about 28.2 grams

Multiply the volume of the balloon by 28.2. Divide by 448 -- the number of grams in a pound -- to determine the number of pounds it can lift.

The Navy SEALS and submarines are on the right track, ehh "course".

Go Navy!

www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/issues/2006/april/specialops.htm

April 2006

Special Ops Sub Becomes Hub for Irregular Warfare

By Harold Kennedy

ABOARD THE USS OHIO-A short cruise on board this former nuclear-missile submarine off the coast of Washington state offers a glimpse into how the Navy and special operations forces plan to engage in covert military action.

During a three-year overhaul, the Ohio's 24 nuclear intercontinental ballistic missiles, known as Tridents, were removed to make room for 154 Tomahawk cruise missiles and facilities for as many as 66 special operations troops, plus a 35-man joint command element.

The joint command unit could control the ship, any commando passengers and conceivably a task force of other ships, ground troops and air components, Rear Adm. Frank M. Drennan, commander of Submarine Groups 9 in Bangor, Wash., and 10 in Kings Bay, Ga., told National Defense.

Unlike the Tridents, which were developed during the Cold War to help dissuade the Soviet Union from launching a nuclear attack against the United States, the Tomahawks-armed with 1,000-pound conventional warheads-have been fired frequently in combat.

Two of the Ohio's 24 vertical missile tubes have been reconfigured to serve as lock-in/lock-out chambers that allow special operators surreptitiously to exit and re-enter the sub while it is submerged.

Seven of the remaining tubes have been rebuilt to hold canisters to store equipment that the commandos will need on their missions, including "anything from rafts to munitions," said the ship's skipper, Cmdr. Michael K. Cockey.

Such capabilities will enable the four submarines that are being converted to operate close along hostile shores-in the green, littoral waters, as opposed to the blue waters of the deep ocean-and thus play a much larger role in the war against terrorism, Drennan said.

The Ohio and its sister ships "will be ideal for playing an enhanced scout role," he said. "They can put a contingency force ashore behind enemy lines without anybody knowing they are there."

That could be useful not only in enemy territory, such as portions of Iraq, but also in countries, such as the Philippines, Indonesia or Pakistan, where the presence of U.S. troops might be politically embarrassing to the government in power. "Sometimes, we want to be basically invisible, not only to the bad guys, but to everybody," said Capt. David DiOrio, director for SSGN readiness at Submarine Forces Headquarters in Norfolk, Va. SSGN is the Navy's hull classification for a cruise missile submarine.

Submarines have hosted small numbers of special operators ever since World War II. Until now, however, submarines-packed with torpedoes and missiles-have had space to accommodate only a handful of special operators. That is changing with the Ohio (SSGN 726) and its three sister ships. The other three vessels are the Michigan (SSGN 727) and the Florida (SSGN 728), which are home-ported in Bangor, Wash., and the Georgia (SSGN 729), which is based in Norfolk.

Initially, the Navy planned to retire them in order to fulfill a requirement of the 1993 Strategic Arms Reductions Treaty II-that the United States remove nuclear missiles from four of its 18 Trident submarines. Finally, however, the service decided instead to reconfigure the four, which were the oldest of the Trident subs, for use in irregular warfare.

In 2002, General Dynamics Electric Boat won a $1.4 billion contract to do the conversions. The Ohio rejoined the fleet in February. The Florida is set to follow this month. The Michigan is scheduled for December, and the Georgia is to be completed in September 2007.

With a length of 560 feet, the Ohio is one of the largest submarines in the U.S. Navy. As part of the conversion, she has berthing-arranged "rail-car" style along both sides of the sub-for more than 100 commandos, headquarters and support personnel.

The Ohio has a battle-management center, stuffed with workstations. "There's nothing like this on any other boat," said Lt. j.g. Aaron Riggio, the ship's assistant operations officer. "We never had a space this big before."

The center "is an ideal site" for planning special operations, said Capt. Mark McGill, from Air Force Special Tactics. "My job is putting bombs on target," he said. "I'm also looking for landing zones and any opportunities that involve airpower."

In addition, the Ohio has a more expansive fitness center than found on most subs.

The special operators exit and re-enter the ship via the two lock-in/lock-out chambers. The chambers are 87 inches in diameter and contain showers at their base, permitting commandos to cleanse their gear of salt water or any other contaminant before re-entering the sub.

Once they reach the vessel's deck, they can enter a smaller vessel to set out on their mission. The Ohio is built to transport a SEAL delivery vehicle; its intended successor, an advanced SEAL delivery system and a dry-deck shelter.

The latter is a deck-mounted cylindrical shelter large enough to house one SEAL delivery vehicle or four rubber raiding craft. [EDITOR: that's 28 SEALs or 4 "platoons" in their mindset; 2 "Killer Bee" NOTAR helicopters could carry 21 SEALs]

An SDV is a manned submersible vehicle. The Navy has been using versions of it for at least 35 years to transport SEALs to and from subs.

Its replacement has been plagued by delays. One boat, called ASDS 1, was delivered in 2003, but a Government Accountability Office report said that it lacked an adequate propulsion battery and was not quiet enough for stealth operations. The Special Operations Command's deputy commander, Vice Adm. Eric Olson, told reporters in November that SOCOM was canceling plans for additional boats-at least for the immediate future-to concentrate on ironing out design problems with the existing one.

Meanwhile, the Ohio and her sister ships are serving as platforms to develop and test new weapons systems, sensors and operational concepts that could further transform naval warfare. In particular, the Navy is experimenting with unmanned underwater and aerial vehicles on SSGNs and other subs to conduct reconnaissance, surveillance and other missions.

During a 2003 exercise, the USS Florida-cruising in the Gulf of Mexico-launched a 28-foot unmanned underwater vehicle for use in transporting SEALs to the beach and keeping them supplied.

During a 2004 exercise off the coast of San Diego, the USS Georgia released two containers called stealth affordable capsule systems. Each contained a simulated UAV. Eventually, the Navy plans to launch UAVs from such capsules floating in the ocean.

In August 2005, the USS Albany (SSN 753), while surfaced, released a UAV similar to the marine corps' five-pound Dragon Eye from its bridge, the first time that had been done from a submarine.

The Navy also is developing new weapons for use on SSGNs. In January, the Naval Sea Systems Command, in Washington, D.C., awarded Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems, of Portsmouth, R.I., a $19-million contract to develop a littoral-warfare weapon. This system could be launched from a sub to attack close targets in coastal waters, said NAVSEA spokesperson Linda O. Roberts. These include marine patrol aircraft, helicopters, high-speed patrol boats and other small craft.

The Navy in November 2005 tested a prototype of this system, using a Sidewinder AIM-9X missile at an Army base in New Mexico, Roberts said. The Sidewinder is a supersonic, heat-seeking air-to-air weapon normally fired horizontally from an aircraft. In this case, testers were able to launch one vertically from zero velocity, as would be necessary aboard a sub. The Sidewinder detected, tracked and destroyed an unmanned helicopter drone. It was the first AIM-9X to engage a target below 3,000 feet.

The littoral-warfare weapon system would fill a significant gap in the SSGNs' armory. The Tomahawk carries a 1,000-pound conventional warhead up to 1,500 nautical miles. It is designed primarily to destroy high-value or heavily defended inland targets, not a relatively nearby fast-moving small boat or aircraft.

The SSGNs also are armed with the Mark 48 torpedo, which is designed to combat fast, deep-diving nuclear subs and high-performance surface ships, making it inappropriate for small targets in the littoral, he noted.

During the cruise, the Ohio conducted a war game involving a simulated attack on Whidbey Island Naval Air Station. The station, which is home to several squadrons of electronic attack and reconnaissance aircraft, is located at the mouth of Washington's Puget Sound.

Lurking six miles offshore beneath the surface of the busy Strait of Juan de Fuca-the main entrance to the major ports of Seattle, Tacoma and Vancouver, B.C.- the Ohio carefully planned her attack. "We've been gathering data for the mission, and at the same time, trying to avoid getting run over by small boats," Cockey said. "Usually the only part of us you can see above water is the periscope."

In the war game, Whidbey Island is the site of a simulated weapons of mass destruction manufacturing and distribution facility. "We've seen the enemy's small boats headed ashore, and we've decided, 'Yes, they're distributing WMD,'" Cockey said. On his command, simulated Tomahawks were launched. In a real attack, the facility would have been destroyed.

Submerged quietly beneath a stormy sea-with winds reaching nearly 60 mph and waves eight to 10 feet high-the Ohio betrayed little sense of motion.

In fact, the stealth with which the Ohio carried out the exercise is typical of submarine operations, said Lt. Herlinda K. Rojas, spokesperson for Submarine Group 9. Unlike surface ships, such as carriers and destroyers, which proudly proclaim their identities, submarines carry no names or markings of any kind on their hulls, she said. "We don't want anybody to know who we are."

When the four conversions are complete, the Ohio and the Michigan will remain based in Bangor, while the Florida and the Georgia will be headquartered in Kings Bay, Drennan said. That will provide two SSGNs each to cover the Atlantic and Pacific regions.

Plans are for one sub to be on patrol constantly in each region, while the other is being refitted, he said. Each ship will be operated by two rotating crews, blue and gold, which will enable them to stay at sea for longer periods of time.

The Ohio's first six-month deployment is planned for 2007, Drennan said. At this point, he added, the destination has not been decided.

Meanwhile, the ship's technology continues to be upgraded. Under a 2004 contract, Northrop Grumman's Sperry Marine unit soon will replace the ship's traditional hand-drawn paper nautical charts with an advanced, interactive electronic navigation system, said Lt. Mike Slavik, assistant damage control officer.

With the electronic chart display and information system, sailors can see their ship's real-time, precise location and movement superimposed on a highly accurate electronic chart display. The result, Slavik said, will be improved safety at sea and enhanced situational awareness for the ship's watch standers. "But we'll always retain the ability to chart our location on paper," he said.

PAST PRECEDENTS

The best history of Submarine Aircraft Carriers is "Strike from Beneath the Sea: A History of Aircraft Carrying Submarine" (Images of Aviation) (Hardcover) by Terry C. Treadwell

www.amazon.com/gp/product/0752417045/104-7588159-9575144?n=283155

He also has and excellent article "SUBMARINE AVIATION 1914-1964" on the web page below reprinted with permission from Naval Aviation News, February, 1983:

http://www.members.aol.com/reallycoolpix/SubmarineWings.htm

And as usual, it was indeed THE GERMANS, the world's most military minded who first tried submarines with aircraft in WW1 in COMBAT!

Then the British tried it...had a disaster and gave up...

www.hillbeck.plus.com/sa/Boats/Barrowbuilt/M_Class/

The British Navy amazingly had submarines with 12" battleship guns in WWI!. After the war one of these subs, the M2 was converted to carry a stainless steel Peto biplane fighter.

This conversion was a success, and M2 could surface from periscope depth, open the hangar door, catapult the plane, close the door and dive again within five minutes. However, She was subsequently lost during exercises in the English Channel in 1932 when her hangar door was left open.

Then it was the French's turn...the Fascinating WW2 Combat History of the French Submarine Aircraft Carrier/8" gun cruiser the Surcouf

Beautiful painting of the Surcouf by Gregzorz Nawrocki

The Surcouf carried a MB411 float plane.

www.csd.uwo.ca/~pettypi/elevon/gustin_military/db/fr/MB410BES.html

Besson / ANF-Mureaux (411) MB.410
(France)

Development of the MB 35. The MB 410 was an observation aircraft, to be carried by the 2880-ton submarine cruiser 'Surcouf' armed with two 203mm guns. The MB.410 was a low-wing monoplane with a single central float and two small stabilizing floats, that could easily be disassambled for stowage. One MB.410 and two MB.411s were built; one MB.411 was carried on board. After June 1940 both the Surcouf and the MB.411 were used by the Free French.

Type: MB-411
Function: observation
Year: 1937
Crew: 1-2
Engines: 1 * 130kW Salmson 9Nd
Wing Span: 12m
Length: 8.25m
Height: 2.85m
Wing Area: 22m2
Empty Weight: 760kg
Max.Weight: 1140kg
Speed: 185km/h
Ceiling: ?
Range: 345km

Wikipedia does a great job covering the Surcouf's amazing history:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_submarine_Surcouf

Post-WW2 Submarine Aircraft Carrier Experiments

And the Japanese took the idea the furthest to date (see references).

The U.S. Navy ACTUALLY DID HAVE SUBMARINE AIRCRAFT CARRIERS IN THE 1950s!...the aircraft were UNMANNED cruise missiles...the Regulus missile boats...

The Saga of the Regulus Cruise Missile Submarines in U.S. Navy Service, 1953-1964

The whole UAV technohubris makes me want to puke. These assholes who think they are such "visionaries" when we had LARGER and MORE DEADLY Regulus "UAVs" in actual combat service from 1953 to 1964 on special USN submarines. The cruise missile egotists should eat some humble pie because Regulus predates Tomahawk by 2 decades, too.

http://hometown.aol.com/ntspark/myhomepage/Regulus-Missile3.html

Notice the smart people at Vought had Regulus have LANDING GEAR so we wouldn't be throwing them away and could save money through re-use. The Tomahawk uses a parachute for training flight recovery but its not as damage free as an airlanding can be.

Since WE CAN AND WE HAVE launched AIRCRAFT (cut the "UAV", "UCAV", "cruise missile" semantics crap, anything with fixed-wings and flies is an airplane) the feasibility and need for submarine aircraft carriers is solid.

There were even some manned aircraft submarine interfaces in the 1950s...the P-6M SeaMaster jet seaplane bomber and R3Y Tradewind conter-rotating turboprop seaplane transports were able to be refueled by submarines...

The picture at the top of the post-WW2 sub-heading is the USS Sealion (APSS 315) off Little Creek, VA on 4 May 1956, with an H-19 helicopter on deck. Originally a WWII "fleet boat", Sealion served in various troop-carrying configurations postwar, including special forces transport. She carried several designations: SS, SSP, ASSP, APSS, and later LPSS.

The Guardians

--Albert Einstein

We recently saw an EXCELLENT film, "The Guardian" starring Kevin Costner a story about U.S. Coast Guard rescue swimmers that is exceptional on many levels.

www.amazon.com/Guardian-Kevin-Costner/dp/B000KF0GWW/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-7581353-3596013?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1177246664&sr=8-1

www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000KF0GWW/ref=pd_cp_d_title/002-7581353-3596013?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-41&pf_rd_r=07G78Y72V2FYVYBTMYNN&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_p=252362301&pf_rd_i=B00005JP9O

First, Costner's character when sent to take over rescue swimmer training school consciously decides to stop the "PT Test" make-believe non-sense and STICK TO REALITY'S PHYSICAL TASKS. You don't do push-ups or sit-ups or runs in t-shirts/shorts/running shoes when swimming in ice cold waters to rescue people any more than you would in combat. As Socrates said, the best way to learn is by DOING THE DEED. Next, as two trainees overcome the realistic training, Costner doesn't scowl them with the typical narcissistic, existentialist crap that "you haven't proven anything to me yet" he tells the man as a man, "good for you" as an ADULT would trying to get a difficult job done to save lives not egos and needing to grow a new generation to pass the torch to. The entire U.S. military should have such an adult, this-is-a-necessary-job-so-let's-stop-playing-pretentious-games outlook. Of course, the phony U.S. military is permeated with macho narcissism as the film shows when they go into a Navy bar where "combat" Sailors rough up the two young over-achievers. The Coast Guard faces DEATH every day not just when sent on a misguided corporate war every 10 years or so. And the Coast Guard does go to war and fights but this wasn't shown in the film.

"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them."

--Albert Einstein

The primary reason why we're writing this proposal though is from a realization Carol Murphy told me as she saw the film during an underwater camera angle; "Notice how peaceful it is under the water yet on top look how violent it is". It was so violent on top, that Costner's SH-60 JayHawk helicopter was hit by a wave and a chunk of debris while hovering over a threatened fishing ship trying to do a winch & basket rescue. The helicopter's tail was knocked off, it exploded (of course, helicopter always blow up in the movies) and crashed into the water in flames, killing everyone aboard. A Coast Guard C-130 fixed-wing aircraft is dispatched to the scene and drops an inflatable life raft ("Gee, thanks!") to float Costner and the crew chief who was thrown out during the crash. IMHO both should have had LPU-18 one-man life raft kits on their persons, but the latter dies and this sends Costner to the swimmer school for a much needed recuperation.

The film is excellent except for the "official" ending which we say REJECT and accept the alternative ending offered on the DVD. Suffice it to say, that when you factor in the other Hollywood retelling of hovering USCG helicopter rescue in the film, "The Storm of the Century" based on a true incident where a helicopter runs out of gas (JP-8) and crashes into the water with tragic consequences, an objective observer has to question the whole validity of the helicopter hovering rescue approach.

We do. The conventional helicopter to get VTOL lacks the speed and range to be an adequate rescue means, to be more direct, ITS BULLSHIT. 100 mph for 300 miles ain't shit when it comes to OCEANS spanning THOUSANDS of miles. And when ships are in danger from rough seas, at best snatching a handful of men isn't shit when there's a DOZEN men needing rescue. We fault the USCG because they at one time knew better. We fault the USN for they started the whole lazy helicopter VTOL rescue shit when they chickened out and stopped flying SEAPLANES. In an all-out war at sea, HUNDREDS even THOUSANDS of men are going to be thrown into the water and the solution is lots of long-range, FAST seaplanes which we had in WW2 and THOUSANDS of lives were saved. The USN refusing to operate seaplanes for ASW/CSAR/seamining is a basic dereliction of its duties to do naval warfare right and this also applies to the USCG, too for rescue. When Costner's chopper went down, the fixed-wing C-130 was there in an instant but could only drop a raft because it couldn't land on the water. In the previous the sea-sucks movie, a C-130 had the fuel to keep the pathetic helicopter flying but the weather was so rough they couldn't connect in flight. There's no excuse why the USCG doesn't get some balls and ask Congress for some money to invert C-130 engines, watertight the fuselage, add PBY-style retractable wingtip floats and either Pantobase skis or air cushion landing systems

www.combatreform2.com/c130.htm

and BLC like the Japanese Shin Meiwa seaplanes have to take-off and land at very, very slow speeds to create a long-range rescue seaplane capability.

www.combatreform2.com/p6mseamaster.htm

www.combatreform2.com/seaplanetransports.htm

Now you might say; "the seas were/are too rough for seaplanes to land" yadda yadda. OK, first YOU HAVE TO HAVE THE SEAPLANES TO KNOW WHAT SITUATIONS YOU CAN DO AND WHAT YOU CAN'T DO. Since we've never did seaplane with the technologies we have today we don't know what we can and can't do and I dare say the margin is a lot more than you realize especially if you worship the status quo and want to sit on your ass undergirded by the laurels and hard work of better men than you ie; your mind is at best narrow if not totally closed.

The fact of the matter is that the ENTIRE CONCEPT OF BEING ON THE SURFACE OF THE WATER IS UNSAFE AND UNSOUND.

Read what we just said again.

Question.

HOW MANY ANIMAL LIFE-FORMS ON PLANET EARTH THAT GOD CREATED LIVE 24/7/365 ON THE SURFACE OF THE OCEAN?

Think hard.

Think some more.

The answer is NONE.

Nadda. Zero. Zilch. Uhh-Uhh. The surface of the ocean is where the air atmosphere and land meet and VIOLENT WEATHER ENERGY CONFLICTS TAKE-PLACE HERE. God does not have ANY of his creatures live on the water's surface, they are all UNDER THE WATER where there is no rough seas. Forget Costner's other, forgetable movie "WaterWorld" the only humans living continuously on the ocean surface are humans (oil platforms) and THEY AIN'T HAPPY ABOUT IT. ALL of his sea creatures, even his air breathing ones can stay for long times under the water. Yet MAN, greedy and lazy chooses to FIGHT against the ocean instead of working with it by trying to stay precariously on top where there are violent medium energy collisions. He is asking for trouble. He is asking for ship collisions, too since the surface of the water is a flat, two-dimensional plane more restricted than the three dimensions under the water. When God instructs man to make a surface vessel---Noah's Ark, its a giant LIFEBOAT, a desperation means with violent weather resistance the number #1 design requirement.

RESCMIN: Guardians from Under the Sea

So here is what we propose. Since there are going to be situations where even the best seaplane cannot land, instead we drop a "Jonah's Wale" from the C-130 (20 tons payload) or a larger C-17 (80 tons of payload) to gobbble up the "Jonahs" that jump off of endangered ships and reel them in UNDER THE WATER where there is no longer any storms. The rescue mini-submarine need not be heavy since it need not dive deeper than 100 feet.

"C-130 stuffer" ABCC Pod in use for many years

Flying by C-130J (400 mph) or C-17 (500 mph), the USCG can fly rapidly to the scene of the ship in danger and then deploy at 600-900 feet the rescue mini-submarine (RESCMIN) in-flight by LVAD---a drogue chute to yank it out of the rear ramp and then deploy a large cluster of cargo parachutes to point it nose down so it will pierce into the water like a giant sonobuoy.

Will this be dangerous?

Fuck, YES this will be dangerous for the 4-man crew of two submariners and two combat swimmers.

If you want to avoid all danger, take a gun and kill yourself now and get it over with since you lack the fundamental courage to live life here on earth with any meaning or purpose. But we dare