http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Khaa3y0i87s No, this is not a song and dance to get Congress to panic and release more money for ASW.
The USN's ASW capability is a mere shadow of its former self. Many of the Colossus and SOSUS stations have been shut down or leased to oceanographers for research! I know the PLAN has stations like this, how many and where they are, I have no idea. I know Russia has stations but, in what condition? What other navy's might have these listening stations, I don't know?
In exercises, SSNs get killed by SSIs because the SSNs have to enter the area at high speed then slow down (RoEs) to hunt the SSI (an SSK with AIP). This allows the SSI is get an idea as to where the SSN is.
The following is small portions of an article from the March 2006 issue of US Naval Proceedings. US Naval Proceedings "International Navies Special"
"Friendly Enemy" By Norman Polmar 03/06 Pg. 22 & 23
The HMS Gotland has a blue and gold crew. Each has 35 men and women (twenty officers and fifteen enlist). The blue and gold crews serve four weeks at a time and then are sent home until the next cycle.
The captain, chief engineer and, (enlisted) cook, have their own bunk, everybody else "hot bunks." The captain has his own room.
Gotland will spend 160 days at sea the first year with the US Navy normally deploying for twelve to sixteen days to help US Navy ASW forces learn how to cope with small quiet submarines. It has been difficult for US forces in deep water and will be more difficult in coastal waters. "At what we do," said Commander, "we are the best -IRS (intelligence, reconnaissance, surveillance), special ops close to shore for long periods.
A 'REBUTTAL' article appeared in the USN Proceedings (05/06 Pg #14-16) By Capt. James H Patton Jr. USN Ret. It puts things into a different perspective.
To put things in perspective, on a nominal diesel-electric boat there might be about 300 megawatt-hours of stored energy in its full fuel oil tanks to supply high-power diesels that require large volume of air, and a lead-acid battery storing about 3 megawatt-hours of energy that can be drained quickly for high speed operations as necessary and later recharged by the diesels. With AIP, about 30 megawatt-hours of stored energy is available at 'low rates' --primarily to "hotel loads" (sensors, lights, air conditioning, heating, and other necessary auxiliaries) while keeping the battery fully charged. The hotel for these nominal submarines is in the order of 50-80 kilowatts (KW).
The Gotland, then using one of the two Stirling engines, might have 10-20 KW left over for propulsion, which is 15-30 horsepower (HP) -- something that will provide "steerage" at 2-4 knots, but certainly not not drive that 1,600-ton submarine at 10 knots as the article claimed. Even with both Stirlings running, something redundancy-minded submariners would prefer not to do, the cubic relationship between speed and power would rapidly gobble up those extra 100-plus or so extra HP --if 20 HP drove the ship at 3 knots, 6 knots would require eight times as much, or 160 HP. AIP gives you endurance, but, not mobility --you don't go much of anywhere on it. The Gotland was delivered to San Diego on a barge.
The AIP diesel-electric submarine is a formidable opponent when deployed in its own waters as an anti-access/area denial deterrent. If there was a U.S. need to defend the Gulf of Mexico, a six-pack of AIP SSks home-ported in Key West could "plug" the Straits of Florida and the Yucatan Channel very nicely against all but the most modern nuclear-powered submarine. In fact, in 1994 I was making a presentation at a London conference at which a Swedish submarine flag officer was briefing the then-very new Gotland. In a private conversation with him, I had to concede that his was the better solution for what his Scandinavian needs. When I asked him, however, what platform he would prefer if his mission were to operate if his mission were to operate off the United States, his answer was "one of yours!" bem se tem medo de um gotland o que sera de um 2012A OU UM 214/U209PN
