As one might have guessed for a multimission boat, the Navy has bestowed upon the Virginias nearly every possible submarine mission under the sun, which speaks volumes about their versatility. These missions, according to the Pentagon, include taking the enemy by complete surprise while conducting:• Covert Strike Warfare: Hitting inland targets with Tactical Tomahawks and possibly future battlefield support missiles.
• Antisubmarine Warfare (ASW): Destroying enemy submarines while conducting area underwater surveillance.
• Covert Intelligence Gathering and Surveillance: Keeping American eyes on potential hot spots and enemy operations.
• Antisurface Warfare (ASUW): Clearing the sea-lanes of enemy surface ships.
• Covert Mine Warfare: Laying, detecting, and possibly clearing friendly and enemy naval minefields.
• Battle Group/Amphibious Group Support: Protection and support for Carrier Battle Groups and Amphibious Ready Groups.
• Special Warfare Support: A whole variety of clandestine missions, including direct action raids, reconnaissance, combat search and rescue, directing air strikes, and tactical intelligence gathering.
While this is just a brief list of missions Virginia can “officially” carry out, imagine the potential for a class such as this. There are even discussions about making the Virginia design the basis for a new class of SSBNs to replace the Ohio-class boats, should this be required.
The general layout of the Virginia-class boats will not be unfamiliar to those who have been aboard previous nuclear attack submarines. In many ways, she is a Los Angeles-sized hull packed with systems pioneered by the Seawolf-class boats. The biggest difference with Virginia is that flexibility is the key in her design. In addition, the use of Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) technology has been maximized in order to reduce overall production costs and allow for rapid integration of new systems and software. Another key element to reducing production costs has been the use of Computer Aided Design (CAD) for this class of submarine. In fact, the Virginia will be the first American warship designed solely by computer. In her own way, she is as much of a revolution in construction and systems as Seawolf was, with controlled cost management thrown in to tighten everyone’s belt a bit!
We’ll start our brief look around the Virginia at the heart of the boat’s power. The new S9G pressurized water reactor produces sufficient shaft horsepower for a top speed only slightly less than that of Seawolf. This is one of the few areas where decreased cost has been allowed to reduce Virginia’s capability. The reactor runs two steam turbines geared to a single shaft. In turn, this shaft will connect to a very quiet pumpjet propulsor, similar to those found in the British Trafalgars and the Seawolfs.
Equally importantly from a maintenance point of view, Virginia’s reactor will have a “life of the ship” reactor core, meaning there should never be a need to replace the reactor core! The new reactor design has been simplified and, amazingly, it should match SSN-21’s impressive quieting levels within a 25 percent smaller volume. Because the overall design has been simplified, fewer components are required and the Virginia has fewer pumps and valves than any of her predecessors. This smaller size is one of many improvements that allow her overall submerged displacement to remain below 8,000 tons—a 1,000-plus ton reduction from that of the Seawolfs.
The hull of the Virginia is made from similar-strength steel as Seawolf , although because of Virginia’s littoral-operations emphasis, the steel does need to be as thick as Seawolf’s—providing additional cost and weight savings. The sub’s maneuvering performance will also be unprecedented for a boat her size. The Virginia’s control surfaces will be part of a digital “fly-by-wire” ship control capability similar to those used so effectively on fighters such as the F-16 Fighting Falcon and F/A-18 Hornet. This eliminates much of the heavy cabling and hydraulic piping that runs throughout older classes of SSN.
Though Virginia is not faster than Seawolf and does not dive deeper or even carry as many weapons (only thirty-eight versus fifty for the SSN-21 boats), these facts can be misleading. The real difference between the two subs lies in their ability to conduct operations and fight in the Navy’s new home of the littorals. While still able to fight with much of Seawolf’s prowess in the open oceans, Virginia has incorporated special weapons, sensors, and other new equipment particularly well suited to her coastal missions.
The sonar suite on board the Virginia will include special high-frequency acoustic sensors designed to hunt and classify both diesel-electric boats and those with advanced air independent propulsion (AIP) systems. As with other SSNs, Virginia will carry a spherical active/passive sonar array along with the TB-29 Thin-Line Towed Array and the TB-16 Fat-Line Towed Array. Virginia will also carry a new lightweight WAA system, specifically optimized to locate super-quiet diesel-electric and AIP submarines. In the littoral regions, special attention will need to be devoted to naval mines, so Virginia will have a high-frequency sonar suite to detect the deadly “weapons that wait.” The sensors will include sail- and chin- (beneath the sonar sphere) mounted arrays to provide the new boats with their best-ever mine-detection and -avoidance capability. Along with her sonar suite, Virginia will also have an array of sail-mounted sensors, almost identical to that of the Seawolf-class boats.
If there is one piece of equipment many submariners thought would never change, it was the old-fashioned periscope. Well, the Navy has got news for us periscope lovers—even this instrument is in for a drastic overall in the Virginia class. For the first time an entire class of U.S. submarines is being fitted without all the prisms, mirrors, and lenses found in the old optical periscopes. In their place will be two non-hull-penetrating “photonics masts,” which will consist of a number of high-resolution visual sensors that transmit visual images back to large display screens fitted within the boat. In addition to a color television pickup, there is also an advanced thermal and low-light imaging system. The photonics system will also contain a laser range finder, something that will come in handy while working in the close-in coastal regions. Best of all, as their name indicates, these masts do not penetrate the main pressure hull, making one less weak spot for water to leak through in the event of battle damage or a packing failure.
The arrangement of sensor and communications masts on the conning tower/sail of USS Virginia (SSN-774). RUBICON, INC., BY LAURA DENINNO
In addition, when the Virginia first enters service in 2004, she will likely be fitted with the new AN/BLQ-11A Long-term Mine Reconnaissance System (LMRS). The LMRS system is basically a team of UUVs (Unmanned Underwater Vehicles), with 21-inch/553mm diameter (so they fit in the torpedo tubes), that swim out and hunt freely for mines. These UUVs will not be connected to Virginia by a fiber-optic cable, as were earlier models. Instead, they will use a two-way acoustic data link. The UUVs can be launched and recovered (via a robotic arm in one of the torpedo tubes) from Virginia’s torpedo tubes and will detect and classify mines primarily of the bottom and moored variety. As the LMRS program continues to mature, additional improvements, such as underwater mapping and beach reconnaissance, will probably be added to this revolutionary UUV system.
Overall, the Virginias will have a weapons-storage capacity remarkably similar to that of the Seawolf-class boats. While Virginia lacks the Seawolf’s ability to carry fifty weapons internally (Virginia will only have four 21-inch/533mm torpedo tubes), she makes up for it by having twelve VLS tubes like those on the 688Is. This means that Virginia will have the ability to carry a total of thirty-eight weapons (twenty-six internally), including Tomahawk cruise missiles, Mk 48 ADCAP torpedoes, UUVs, and mines, to name just a few possibilities.
One other key element of the Virginia’s war-fighting suite is going to be her ability to operate in the special operations role. Similar to many of the newer submarines coming out of the yards in the next several years (most notably the Jimmy Carter [SSN-23]) the Virginias will be capable of carrying a Dry Dock Shelter and the new Advanced SEAL Delivery System (ASDS). The ASDS is a sma
ll mini-submarine 65 feet/21.7 meters long and 9 feet/2.75 meters wide. This tiny sub is fitted with a forward-looking and side-looking sonar to detect natural and man-made objects and conduct mine-detection and bottom-mapping operations. In addition, the ASDS has two masts—one a periscope and the other for communications and GPS navigation. To make life easier for the SEALs and other special operations units that might be carried, the torpedo room on board the Virginias will be easy to reconfigure. If need be, the center weapons-stowage structures can be removed in order to make room for special mission personnel, whether they be technicians, SEALs, or troops. These personnel will have access to an unusual nine-man lock-in/lockout chamber in addition to the use of the ASDS and/or dry-dock shelter.
With all these extra bodies on board, one begins to ask the next question: has submarine habitability improved in the past ten years? Unfortunately, advances in technology notwithstanding, the answer is likely to be no. Submarines have always been so crammed with equipment that it appears at times as if the designers forgot to include the sailors! Fortunately, numerous space-saving features have been included in the Virginia class. The current manning figures appear to be in the same neighborhood as the Los Angeles and Seawolf classes—around 120 enlisted and chiefs, along with 14 officers. With the significantly smaller size of the Virginias, this large complement could pose a problem. However, the manning numbers may end up dropping significantly as a result of the use of the Navy’s new “Smart-Ship” technology. 17
Already the Navy is planning on using this manpower-saving technology to reduce fifteen crew watchstanders from the control room of Virginia. This technology will allow the boat’s advanced control system to be operated by a pilot, copilot, and relief pilot, thereby replacing the diving officer, chief of the watch, helmsman, planesman, and messenger of previous submarine classes. It is technologies such as these that will inevitably bring down the number of sailors to a more “comfortable” level. Alas, as any submariner knows, as soon as they get more room in a sub, designers will add more gadgets, not more racks!
Well, now that we’ve taken a look at the Virginia, it’s pretty apparent that a boat like this can be used for virtually any mission the Navy might require. Whether it’s CVBG support in the Aegean, monitoring an embargo or communications in the Persian Gulf, delivering SOF units in Africa, or hunting enemy submarines and ships anywhere else, Virginia is one class of submarine that should be able to do it all! Now America just needs to build them, which may be the biggest challenge of all.
The British A-Class (Astute) Boats
While the United States Navy was going through its post-Cold War “shrinking pains,” what was happening to the Royal Navy (RN) of our closest military ally, the United Kingdom? Well, you can rest assured that the RN submarine force was going through some equally painful experiences of its own! Like the United States, the British were in the middle of planning for the future of the Cold War when the Soviet Union threw in the towel at the end of 1991. You would have thought that when the Berlin Wall fell, it landed right on top of the Admiralty in London. As late as 1987, the British had been discussing a new class of attack boat to begin replacing the Swiftsure-class (S-126) SSNs. In 1987, Vickers Shipbuilding and Engineering (VSEL), LTD, won a contract to begin designing a new “W” class, also known as SSN-20, and was to start construction in the mid-1990s. This new submarine was similar in design and concept to the American Seawolf, large and optimized for blue-water/open-ocean operations.
The 1990s were to have been one of the busiest and most aggressive decades for British submarine development. However, while design work on the Swiftsure’s replacement continued at VSEL, the RN was also in the midst of replacing its Resolution-class (S-22) ballistic missile submarines with a vaunted new group of SSBNs known as the Vanguard (S-28) class. While these truly awesome boats were in production, readying for their commissioning, the Upholder-class (S- 40) SSKs were also scheduled to come into service during what would turn out to be one of the worst possible times imaginable. This class, consisting of Upholder (S-40), Unseen (S-41), Ursula (S-42), and Unicorn (S-43), were commissioned into service between 1990 and 1993, but by 1992 the decision was made to decommission all four of the brand-new SSKs as a cost-cutting measure.
The Upholder boats were eventually leased to Canada, but 1992 was a particularly dark time for the Royal submarine fleet. Also in that year, the entire SSN-20/W-class project to replace the Swiftsure was canceled with VSEL. Within months, however, a seed of hope was planted when the RN and Ministry of Defense (MoD) realized (as did their counterparts in the United States) that cost and not advanced blue-water operational capabilities was going to be the driving factor for getting a new class of SSNs ordered. Once this fact became apparent, priority switched from a new class of submarines to an improved version of the already proven Trafalgar (S-107) class SSNs.
British submarine designers were asked to submit a plan for a less expensive generation of submarines than had originally been envisioned. This new submarine was to vary only minimally from the previous Trafalgar-class SSNs. The boats, which soon took on the name Batch 2 Trafalgar class or B2TC, began to look like a reality when a request for bids was issued to both VSEL and competitor GEC-MARCONI in July of 1994. GEC ended up winning this contract, which called for construction of three boats with the option for more as deemed necessary and affordable by the MoD.
Initial progress was not exactly rapid, as complex defense consolidation issues stalled efforts to finalize the contract. The first actual orders for the B2TC boats were placed in March of 1997. The £2 billion contract called for three new boats, HMS Astute, Ambush, and Artful. Finally, the B2TCs had a real name—the “A” or Astute class of nuclear-powered attack submarines. The current outlook for the Astute class is excellent, based on both the needs of the Royal Navy and the design expertise of the manufacturer. The keel of the Astute herself was officially laid down in January 2001. Thankfully, MoD support has continued unabated for Astute. In fact, it was announced in July 1998 that the Royal Navy would get two more Astutes, for a class total of five boats. Though these two most recent boats have yet to be named, you can bet that their futures will be full of adventure.
While the busy process of finding a suitable replacement for the Swiftsures was under way, an equally complex dance of consolidation was going on within the British defense and shipbuilding industries. In 1994, GEC-Marconi made an offer to buy VSEL, which had been working on the original W-class/Swiftsure replacement designs. The following year, British Aerospace also made an offer for VSEL, but in the end VSEL accepted the GEC-Marconi offer—though only after they had successfully raised the asking price several hundred million pounds! As you might imagine, this caused considerable consternation, as VSEL had been in direct competition against GEC-Marconi to build the new Astutes. These issues were finally resolved, however, and all was quiet on the submarine industrial front for several more years. This lasted until 1999, when it was announced that British Aerospace was merging with GEC-Marconi. This meant that British Aerospace now took over construction of the new Astutes. In doing so, and as a result of its merger with GEC-Marconi, British Aerospace officially changed its name to BAE Systems and continued with Astute’s construction. Because of this, HMS Astute’s prime contractor has been referred to as VSEL, GEC-Marconi, British Aerospace, and BAE Systems. The free market of the “New World Order”—what a crazy world we live in!
Now let’s walk down the gangplank and take a virtual look inside this new warship. The A-class boats will be based on a design concept similar to that of the Virginia class. That is to say, the Astutes will need to maintain the capability to fight in nearly every underwater environment, from the open ocean of the Atlantic to the littoral zones off the Persian Gulf, all while keeping costs down and weapons loads and capabilities up. From protection of the British homeland to far-off TLAM attacks, the missions of Astute require that she contain only the best electronics and weapons available.
One of
the biggest differences between Trafalgar and Astute is the size of the boats’ hulls. Astute will displace around 7,000 tons submerged and 6,390 tons surfaced compared with 5,208 tons and 4,740 tons for the Trafalgar-class SSNs. Much of this tonnage, along with Astute’s longer length (318 feet/97 meters compared with 279 feet/85 meters of the T-class boats—an increase of more than 36 feet/10 meters!), can be attributed to the newer boat’s larger weapons load-out. Where the Trafalgar-class boats carried a total of twenty-five weapons, the new warships will be able to hold thirty-six (at least that’s the number officially being claimed). They will be fired by six torpedo tubes versus the five in the earlier class. Some consideration was given to providing the Astute-class SSNs with a VLS system, but in light of cost constraints, the new boats’ warload was deemed sufficient.
Another key update included in Astute has been her reactor plant. Astute’s power plant was originally developed for the Vanguard-class SSBN. Designated PWR 2, it will be built by Rolls-Royce and is rated at 15,000 shaft horsepower. However, the Astute version is significantly more advanced than the earlier variants, and some press reports speculate that the new power plant is capable of circling the globe literally scores of times without a single refueling. Reportedly there is a lifetime reactor core design (known as an “H” core) that will give it twenty-five- to thirty-year service life. According to the Royal Navy submarine fleet’s current plan, by the time refueling is needed, the first Astute will hopefully be resting her keel on the front porch of a submarine retirement community!
Last but certainly not least, Astute’s propulsion systems would not be complete without the two turbines with a single shaft connected to the now standard (and very quiet) pumpjet propulsor. Of course, quieting is the most important characteristic for submarine survival in a hostile environment these days, and Astute’s improved reactor will be significantly quieter than Trafalgar’s. As a whole, Astute will be capable of operating not just in littoral and blue-water regions, but also in such varied climates as those that are found under the arctic ice or in the warm waters of the tropics.