I'm not sure that submarines are needed in the 21st century. The navy seems to have its hands full with boat people or perhaps pirates not Cold War scenarios. Having said that I wonder if the Collins sailors are in more danger from the unreliability of the vessels themselves than from the enemy in a war situation.

I understand that after the air warfare destroyers are built the ASC will be looking for a project to work on and retain its skills base. I think they should get involved in land based installation of US made prefabricated small modular reactors. These will probably be light water pressurised reactors while submarine reactors normally use molten lead in the primary heat exchanger. That would keep the ASC busy til 2030 and beyond. Then see if we still need nuclear subs.

I'm sure that its technically possible for Australia to run nuclear submarines, but its politically impossible. Full stop.

The real problem with our present submarine program is that the government insists on buying votes in South Australia by having them built there. Much cheaper to buy off the shelf, tested designs and have them largely built elsewhere..

I'm not against nuclear subs as such, but I certainly would be against them if they were built in SA. It was bad enough with the Collins Class.

Diesel powered subs and nuclear powered subs are in a different league.

Nukes are more expensive, but cheaper to run, and have a far greater range and abilities. Diesel are useful for short range and defensive applications.

I would recommend both.

Dear Stefaan,

A powerful article that should get the grey matter going.

It seems that from a strategic perspective I’m not sure we have any choice but to go to very modern nuclear powered subs.

The USA, India, China and Russia I think operate nuclear patrol subs in our region. But it does seem a bit silly to invest in AWD’s if we have no hope of defending them?

Indonesia outnumbers our military but they have to get here by sea, likewise any other potential aggressor, they can’t get here by air so Aircraft Carriers would be major players. Our only hope would be to have long range, long patrol, high tech subs. There is only one option, Nuclear Powered Subs.

As you know we had a go at building the Anzac Class ships, you may also know that they never had Aegis capability so could never be effectively integrated with allied fleets. We used to unkindly refer to the Anzacs as “picket boats”. The main defense was a telephone box on the top deck. This is so they can call Canberra with just enough time to say “inbound”.

So no, we don’t have the capability to build these, we have 60 years to catch up, so we should just buy them. If we don’t we should just turn our Navy into border protection vessels and rely on the Yanks to defend us. Well, that’s pretty much where we are now anyway.

The new subs never need surface other than for victuals, they don’t have periscopes so don’t even need to come up to PD.

So can we order six of your Astute Class submarines please, delivery ASAP. Thanks

We sure do need nuclear subs, & surface vessels for that matter, but nuclear armed, not powered. Nuclear powered would be better than mostly not powered as we have at the moment, but not that critical.

The only way a small, rather tin pot country like Oz could defend itself against any even medium aggressor is with nuclear arms. With the few bits of equipment we have, even with the far above average men we have to man it, we have no chance.

Attrition would have us defenseless in probably hours, or at best days in a real event. About the only useful defense we could afford would be a ring of nuclear armed cruise missiles, & the capacity to move them to any area of attack very quickly.

Such a defense would make it far too costly for anyone smaller than China or the US to try to land an attack force here.

Fortunately we don't have to worry much about them. We have invited the US to do whatever they need to do here, with our help. That is actually a good idea, to ensure their help if some minor power wanted to attack us.

China is also no problem, as it is obvious they have decided to buy us out, rather than attack us.

Of course the greens & other ratbags would rather die than see us able to defend ourselves. Hell they don't even want us to defend ourselves against the ongoing invasion of boat people. It really would be good spectator sport watching parliament, if a government introduced a bill to but nuclear armed anything.

Why get rid of Collins subs when as conventional subs they are the only ships that regularly sink US aircraft carriers in war games? Nuclear powered subs can't do that, tooo noisy, unless you use a nuclear armed weapon system but that requires thinking about the children et al.....

Given Australia's track record on building reliable subs, any thought of building nuclear-powered subs is madness.

We could get China to build them for us using our iron ore. Then we could call them 'Yellow Submarines'!

dkit
I keep on hearing different things about the performance of the Collins.. can you remember where you heard or read that they regularly sink US carriers.. ? Curious..

Oz navy is nothing but a joke. They sail around in there little boats trying to catch boat people and often cant at all. We should always encourage many more boat people to Australia because it will benefit us all in the long run. The Aussie navy are to weak anyway, to stop any enemy that attack us now. So why a new submarine, whether it's desiel or atomic? Doesn't matter because we had good subs before but Aussie Navy don't know how to operate one. Because they are always broken down and never sail to anywhere!

This is a glacial issue - sound of one hand clapping until Adelaideans stop building the AWDs around 2017

and after we have a great deal more money for the Defence budget.

Most depends on how marginal South Australia is electorally after September 7.

The subs will be built for money, jobs, unions and votes not war.

Doesn't matter how our next six (never really twelve) subs are powered or whether they work or not :)

Pete

dkit, diesel powered subs are very, very quiet, during a war game scenario in the late 1990s (if memory serves me right) one of our Collins did 'sink' a US nuclear aircraft carrier after sneaking in amongst her escorts. The yanks, of course, cried and carried on and denied it was possible. You need to understand acoustics to know the how's and why's.

I was unfortunate to be on the first ANZAC class frigate (FFH)not long after commissioning and can attest that these so-called warships were pretty much set up, as we used to call it as 'fitted for-but not with', i.e. we had the capability designed in, but very little real infrastructure which would make for a modern warship, particularly if one was to be put in harms way.

Notwithstanding the above, I think Curmudgeon and others have indicated why we will probably never get a nuclear powered, let alone armed submarine for the foreseeable future.

Most simulation and therefore planning has probably been based on fairly limited international strategic defence scenarios, i.e. do we need an offensive or defensive platform.

If the first, there are arguments for both nuclear and non-nuclear.

If the latter, one would need to assess the risk matrix, one that unfortunately changes geo-strategically all the time.

As such, and given the long lead-time if building locally, I would suggest the simple solution would be to purchase a viable off-the-shelf model, one with flexibility in capability and both offensive and defensive capability relevant to our future theatre of potential influence and capability.

It's not a simple scenario and one I would hesitate to make a certain judgement on, particularly given the precarious nature of the global financial system and the inherent risk that geo-politically lies within this risk threat.

Geoff

If our humanity cannot move beyond nuke weapons and MAD, there is no future for anyone. This includes the gutless elite 1% and their nuke shelters.

I read the linked report, and I agree with the points made. Technically it would be feasible to build nuclear powered submarines in Australia.

However, I would like to make the point that neither the report, article or comments really discuss how the decision is made regarding the size, type and capabilities of any future Australian submarine. The very fist question should be: what capabilities do we need to defend Australia's sovereignty and national interests? Once this question is answered, then we use this information to investigate what strategies and equipment are available to achieve these capabilities.

I am not an expert in Australian military strategy, but it seems to me that it is seen as important to our defense to have an independent submarine (and ship) building expertise and technology. As stated above this also has political importance (both SA and nuclear-phobia). It also appears that Australia has unique capability requirements. The European subs do not have the range that we require, due to the fact they are much close to the area of military interests. Very fast, attack type subs, such as the Astute/Virginia may be great at what they are designed for, but if we require are very quiet, intelligence gathering capability, then these would not be right for us. Perhaps the Japanese and/or Korean subs would be worth looking at, but currently we do not have the type of relationship to share VERY sensitive design info. Japan also restricts sale of military equipment such as this anyway.

Continued:
It also should be noted that the actual building strategy does not need to be a giant new project started up every 20-30 years. Countries like Korea (and Japan?) have a continuous build submarine system, where improvements are gradually implemented in every new model. This both avoids huge gaps in production, and allows a gradual evolution rather than the large risk with a brand new design.

Finally, I want to highlight that the initial problem with the Collins class were some initial design flaws in the prop, which was solved with help from our allies over the pond. Once this was sorted almost all further issues were due to the very flawed management of the maintenance process. The Collins class is widely regarded (to people to know what they're talking about) as a very good submarine for the role it was designed to do (refer to capabilities above). I believe it is true that one of the Collins class "sunk" a Nimitz-class carrier during exercises, but like I said earlier lets identify the capabilities we need and then chose the submarine best suited for this role. It doesn't really matter if X is faster or larger or has more weapons that Y, so lets avoid these sort of comparisons and chose/design whatever is best for our country.

Hi Stezza,

You focus too much on the issues of “built” in Australia and neglect the fact that it is the “capability’ that counts and not where it is built. We could purchase for about $1.5Bn each, the capability to effectively defend our territory and threaten aggressors.

The biggest single threat to any military is quiet submarines. It remains absolutely futile to have any Navy capacity that cannot be defended. Our regional defense requirement is vast, the only advantage we currently have is the tyranny of distance. That distance can only be occupied by the threat of being sunk by a submarine.

A US Carrier squadron typically has between 10 and 25 vessels all operating under the carrier command under Aegis. Three or four of these vessels would typically be silent subs for protection (Hunter/Killer Class). Australia has not implemented Aegis capability.

Collins Class is adequate for “inshore” protection but not the vast expanses of the Indian and Pacific oceans. Our Naval capacity remains weak, vulnerable and totally inadequate. In serious conflict it would last for perhaps a week.

Diesel subs can be very quiet, nuclear subs even quieter however, submarine detection is not about the propulsion method, it’s about acoustics. A nuclear powered sub is much quieter than a diesel sub but both types are noisier than a sub that has no propeller, is pulse or pump driven.

Modern nuclear subs are the quietest at low speeds and they have the added capability of long endurance “on station”. This is absolutely critical for the region we have to threaten/defend. ASW destroyers are ace at detecting and eliminating the poor bastards that have short range detection, have to come to PD to “see” or deploy “towed arrays” or to vent at easily predicable intervals. If you can’t sit on a target, on station for weeks, even months you are gone.

The Collins Class had a one off hit against the US, she used the “wake” of the AC to mask her acoustic presence, it won’t happen again.

Give us the Astute Class capability. Please.

It is interesting to see powers at play and the game played by the Poms' sales representative. But sorry, we are not watching Ashes, and Australian are not so naive to buy a US or UK sub on the shelf only based on the stamp on the hull.

Nonetheless here are some facts based on my experience of (nuclear AND conventional) submarine designer and builder in Europe:
- Yes, a nuclear submarine is a good system to answer Australia's operational need. No need to detail, we nearly all agree on that.
- No, I strongly disagree with that rubbish report nuclear subs are much more risky to design, to build and to operate. Not only the nuclear systems but all the other ones (such as cooling systems for the other parts) are designed specifically. There is a HUGE safety analysis to perform, TUNED to the country in which you are operating, maintaining.Aaah, that terrible picture of Astute stranded and waiting for some tug to help....
- No, come on, SSN are much more expensive to design, to build and to operate. Cost of the fuel, cost of the maintenance, cost of the premises, cost of the reprocessing...No need to refuel, bahh, and what about the ASME rules for pressure vessels inspections ? You have to open it. OOoops, I spilled radioactive water, where is my sponge...
- Yes, European diesel subs have long endurance at sea. A small 2,000 tons Scorpene for Brazil can stay more than 70 days at sea on normal mission. Imagine a bigger one the size of Japanese Soryu with batteries with high capacity...
- Yes, conventional subs are slower, but they are quieter and as deadly.
- I do esteem Poms and Yanks, but let's put in the basket the Frogs' Barracuda to get the big picture and compare. To plug a US combat system on a European platform is no bigger deal than on UK/US stuff.

In a word, please, let's use our brains and let us not be influenced by so-called experts who are only sales representatives and know so little os submarines.

The primary role for Australia's submarines is surveillance and protection of sea routes. Conventional submarines are more than adequate for these tasks. Nuclear power would only be needed if Australia wishes to have a global strategic war-fighting role, which not make sense unless nuclear weapons were also acquired.

There are many viable non-nuclear submarine options available for Australia, mostly from Europe. The first option would be to buy Spanish submarines from the same company already selling Australia surface warships (partly built in Australia).

More at: http://blog.tomw.net.au/search/label/submarine

Issues that need to be considered in the nuclear versus conventional propulsion debate include:

- advances in satellite technology, particularly China's, which will make the "indiscretion" rate for conventional subs much more serious. That is Chinese satellites and other sensor platforms will increasingly be able to detect our subs running on the surface or imagery of snorkels particularly during the long (relatively slow) 3,000-4,000 km transit voyage from Fremantle to stations north or far west of Australia.

- running diesels to recharge batteries is an essential but noisy process for conventionals even if battery operation is relatively quiet. Increasing numbers of Chinese submarines and perhaps Chinese SOSUS arrays will increasingly be able to detect noisy recharging.

- nuclear subs may be more expensive on a one to one basis with conventional but it is likely that far fewer (only four to six?) nuclear subs would be required instead of twelve conventional.

- Australian conventional subs won't/can't shadow nuclear subs over long distances in the open ocean. We remain dependent on US nuclear subs to do that.

Pete

Australia should lease nuclear subs from the US and make a maintenance and training agreement also.
Only sensible option which was considered some time ago.