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> fast attack subs / aukus IMO (western) subsurface analysis dance around just how stupid expensive these platforms are relative to opportunity cost of other a

> fast attack subs / aukus IMO (western) subsurface analysis dance around just how stupid expensive these platforms are relative to opportunity cost of other aquisitions or potential counter measures. Writings will acknowledge nuke boats are pricy multi billion dollar platforms/programs, but don't go the extra step to show the math that each VLS/torpedo tube/cell/unit of fire on a nuke boat costs $100m to hull around, approaching $200m on SSNX, and that's only with more compact TLAMs/cruise missiles... subsonic munitions with very high interception rate - hence gamble on stealth shaping, but doesn't really alter physics that slow munitions are easy to intercept. Extrapolate to more performant but larger prospective hypersonics and you can x2 that multiplier. Factor in usually 1/3 or 1/2 are deployed at any given time (rest training or maintainence) and value proposition gets even more stupid / nonsensical. Then factor in multi week round trip (port and back to theatre) for reloads unless at sea replenishment gets figured out. A B21 costs 700-800m, and can carry much more more ordinances per $ , with significantly greater turnaround. Western nuke boats supremely expensive platform during war per unit of fire, rationalized by increased survivability. But if equation starts biasing toward detection, that rationalization breaks down. > no magical detection of everything everywhere / AI We may reach point where where detections/sensors can functionally prevent nuke boats from operating permissively - negating their advantage. Meanwhile quietting has reached returns technical floor. PRC throwing out lots claims of better / cheaper detection methods as they build out their ASW (SQUIDS/ELF waves etc) last few years. Operationally this means better sensors with longer detection range maybe able pickup subs beyond their torpedo range in fleet, or less # of platforms can significantly extend detection bubble/coverage. On the extreme end, you have programs like DARPA ACTUV (I'm sure PRC has their alternative) which relies on dirt cheap surface UVs that just permenantly shadows subs once they leave port, costs $10,000 per day to operate vs $500,000-$1,000,000 for ASW destroyer (US/DARPA estimates, PRC will be lower), i.e. if PRC can push ELF detector ranges, they can basically park ASW platforms right outisde of 24nm contiguous zone off any western sub port (claiming FONAP) and shadow. TLDR is if likely future trend since PRC got into ASW game (relatively recent) is counter to subs is evolving rapidly, likely getting much cheaper, while western subs are getting more expensive, and are multi decade programs that locks in strategic capabilities. Empahsis/caveate on "western" subs - PRC/PLAN just extended their nuke boat production lines to 4-8 hulls per year. Meaning they see value in nuke boats, but their value proposition per hull =/= USN (or AUKUS). Doubt they'll be paying 6-8 billion per boat. >If not the submarine, then what For sea control, there's always PLA rockeforce / air launch AShMs model. 360Billion can buy a lot of mobile IRBM + TELs in hardened shelters to take out shipping (and other targets). 360B doesn't buy a lot of subs, half of which likely will be destroyed in port because they're juicy targets. There's good chance SCS will be so packed with PLA ASW going forward that SSNs will be operating outside of 1IC, in which case subs will stuck in AIP territory off AU coast anyway. There's arguably economical/better/future proof alternatives for shit hits fan. But AUKUS / nuke boats are "good" peacetime procurements, good for photo ops / propaganda / posturing, good for recycling 100s of billions into local economies if AU can actually get the domestic production / supply chain in place. Hence IMO AUKUS will fall through if ends up funnelling 100s of billions into US/UK industry instead of AU (which is where things seem to be moving towards).

ckozlowski 2y ago
Thanks for this reply! You’re right to call out just how enormously expensive nuke boats are. Anything carrying around a nuclear powerplant for that matter. They are the modern day battleships (Just see how the US Navy names theirs). For AUKUS, I tried to keep my argument to the warfighting value of the boats separate from the economics. But there’s a whole line of argument there you call out, which I think finalizes with the question “Can Australia afford to build forces necessary to participate in a Pacific conflict away from its shores?” Not off the Australian coast, but north of Indonesia where they envision defending Taiwan, protecting the Malacca strait, etc. I don’t think that’s an easy question to answer. I don’t think their previous plan of getting new AIP boats was a good one if that was their aim. But it’s fair to question if they can afford nuke boats either. I disagree that rocket forces can be a stand-in for submarines. They’re great defense weapons: certainly for shore defense, questionable for longer distances that that (I’m making an obligatory nod to China’s ballistic anti-ship efforts), and of course, air-launched AShMs were a primary threat during the Cold War. But these all lack persistence, and require a lot of effort to target the thing on the other end; something made much more difficult the further away it is. And that’s the thing a submarine VLS cell gives you that an air-launched or shore launched missile doesn’t; It’s right there. I don’t think the subsonic speed is much of an issue when it pops up 10km from your task force. It’s the persistence, the endurance, that gives submarines (and surface ships for that matter) their role that land and air based missiles can’t. The latter can make things painful, but they can’t truly control a body of water for duration in the way those platforms can. But you’re right to point out that China’s math is likely different than that of say, the U.S., because the latter has to come across the Pacific to do so. Force projection is expensive, and this is the challenge facing Australia. The U.S. can afford to do it (though I think it’s slipping in this regard), other major militaries such as the U.K. are facing hard questions about just how global they want to be. Australia is far enough away that if they want to help in those aforementioned scenarios, they need to bring the fight north, and that’s an expensive prospect for a country of just 24 million. The last thing I’ll mention is while I think your points about the challenges of operating in the South and East China Sea would be very difficult in the face of enemy ASW, those submarines would not be operating alone. They operate as part of a whole (land, sea, air). It's not the pacific submarine campaigns of WWII and lone wolves hitting shipping. Though if it turns into that, we’re in real trouble.

ckozlowski 2y ago

Thanks for this reply! You’re right to call out just how enormously expensive nuke boats are. Anything carrying around a nuclear powerplant for that matter. They are the modern day battleships (Just see how the US Navy names theirs). For AUKUS, I tried to keep my argument to the warfighting value of the boats separate from the economics. But there’s a whole line of argument there you call out, which I think finalizes with the question “Can Australia afford to build forces necessary to participate in a Pacific conflict away from its shores?” Not off the Australian coast, but north of Indonesia where they envision defending Taiwan, protecting the Malacca strait, etc. I don’t think that’s an easy question to answer. I don’t think their previous plan of getting new AIP boats was a good one if that was their aim. But it’s fair to question if they can afford nuke boats either. I disagree that rocket forces can be a stand-in for submarines. They’re great defense weapons: certainly for shore defense, questionable for longer distances that that (I’m making an obligatory nod to China’s ballistic anti-ship efforts), and of course, air-launched AShMs were a primary threat during the Cold War. But these all lack persistence, and require a lot of effort to target the thing on the other end; something made much more difficult the further away it is. And that’s the thing a submarine VLS cell gives you that an air-launched or shore launched missile doesn’t; It’s right there. I don’t think the subsonic speed is much of an issue when it pops up 10km from your task force. It’s the persistence, the endurance, that gives submarines (and surface ships for that matter) their role that land and air based missiles can’t. The latter can make things painful, but they can’t truly control a body of water for duration in the way those platforms can. But you’re right to point out that China’s math is likely different than that of say, the U.S., because the latter has to come across the Pacific to do so. Force projection is expensive, and this is the challenge facing Australia. The U.S. can afford to do it (though I think it’s slipping in this regard), other major militaries such as the U.K. are facing hard questions about just how global they want to be. Australia is far enough away that if they want to help in those aforementioned scenarios, they need to bring the fight north, and that’s an expensive prospect for a country of just 24 million. The last thing I’ll mention is while I think your points about the challenges of operating in the South and East China Sea would be very difficult in the face of enemy ASW, those submarines would not be operating alone. They operate as part of a whole (land, sea, air). It's not the pacific submarine campaigns of WWII and lone wolves hitting shipping. Though if it turns into that, we’re in real trouble.