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Given a fleet of submarines is $50B and the cost to fully instrument the entire ocean with sensors is $1B, is the price of a submarine worth it anymore?
by rockxloose 8y ago
Given a fleet of submarines is $50B and the cost to fully instrument the entire ocean with sensors is $1B, is the price of a submarine worth it anymore?
- AnimalMuppet 8y agoSensors don't attack. Sensors don't even defend themselves. They are one piece of the "kill chain", but they aren't the "kinetic" piece.
- gdy 8y agoDo you necessarily need a sub to kill another sub once it's detected? Surface navy and aviation could do the job.
- yourapostasy 8y agoWe don't have adequate wartime data to know for sure one way or the other. Historically, there has only been one underwater combat engagement between submarines [1] openly acknowledged (there might be classified engagements). However, even generously accounting for all submarine lost at sea accident reports as hostile engagements doesn't yield sufficient numbers of engagements to know what would happen with today's subs between each other in open warfare. Let's hope it stays that way indefinitely. [1] https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/the-true-story-the-only-underwater-submarine-battle-ever-23253 https://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-buzz/the-true-story-th...
- AnimalMuppet 8y agoThe target doesn't have to be a sub. The sensors could detect a surface vessel, and the sub could be the way of attacking it.
- gdy 8y agoA bomber can do it cheaper and faster.
- rockxloose 8y agoWhat do magic realists say? [1] https://jamestown.org/program/a-smarter-battlefield-pla-concepts-for-intelligent-operations-begin-to-take-shape/ https://jamestown.org/program/a-smarter-battlefield-pla-conc...