Nuclear submarine arrives at new homeport in Scotland

Hi Robert, would they ever look at converting the Vanguard, if it’s still pretty fresh, to an “arsenal” type sub for, conventional ICBMs, TLAMs, hypersonics, etc? I guess that type of role will be more for the SSNRs but having one big “Zumalt” type sub could be handy to have in the sub pool or not?

Hi Quentin. I don’t think it would happen. Vangard boats are designed from tip to toe to carry the nuclear deterrent. Re-roleing would be hugely expensive, and that type of capability is really for the SSN’s.

So was Ohio and they converted four in to SSGN for $2billion.

Yes, but we are not the US with a US size defence budget.

It’s been proposed according to HI sutton

https://www.google.com/search?q=vanguard+SSGN&rlz=1C9BKJA_enMY813MY813&hl=en-GB&prmd=nisv&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj6ksjKyqv9AhWKSEEAHVo4BcIQ_AUoAnoECAIQAg&biw=1112&bih=719&dpr=2#imgrc=EBSCzLqMi0uiHM

Ahh yes, I remember these in an earlier article thread, I think from Nigel. Very good illustrations.

Potentially rerolled as an SSGN and gifted to OZ? Have asked Deep to comment re remaining pressure hull life. Admittedly, not a probable scenario, but the Aussies deserve an exploration of all the technically feasible, short-term options.

I don’t think re-roleing such a massive and complex boat like a Vangard class and selling it is feasible.

I think the RN needs to keep the Vanguard for itself first. Shouldn’t give away all the “family silver”… Lol, and training for Aus is being done on the Anson anyway, totally different subs. Hopefully the SSNR can be brought forward a bit and benefit the RN too if Australia adopts UK sub.

I think they will end up sat in a dockyard for years waiting to be dismantled.

No way we can gift Australia vanguard legally. We could potentially retain two Vanguards ourselves then forward deploy two Astutes in Western Australia with mixed crews to eventually lease the boats outright to Australia.

This would leave us with 5 SSN 2 SSGN to cover Atlantic assuming the Aussies provide our SSN escort for CSG group east of Suez.

? Please explain the legal constraint.
Believe a tectonic shift may have just occurred in world politics. Transferring ownership of SSN/SSGN may soon become a trivial matter. Mad Vlad has just unilaterally suspended the sole remaining nuclear arms control treaty, and this status will probably persist, for at least the duration of Russian-Ukrainian conflict. In any event, predict that New START Treaty will sunset in 2026 as scheduled, w/out renewal, if Mad Vlad is still at the helm. The next treaty(ies) to fall will be either the nuclear non-proliferation, or the test ban (or both simultaneously). The Iranians are perilously close to a nuclear threshold. The Saudis and GCC may take a decidedly dim view of that development, and have the resources to develop (or purchase) their own capability. Meanwhile, in the Indo-Pacific, the South Koreans and Japanese are alarmed by the antics of Kim Nutbag and family, as well as the ChiComs. All parties are making balance of power calculations
vs. the allies (read as US and friends).

Welcome all to the American Wild West (Tombstone, AZ Territory), where the Earp brothers may soon face the Clantons at the OK Corral.

It will be tricky due to Non Proliferation Treaty transferring an SSN. Tricky but probably doable as their is precedence with India and Russia. Transferring an SSBN even if we say it’s an SSGN is just a different legal ball game. China will have a field day at the UN and Australia’s Labour government would **** a brick. Remember Australia one of the most anti nuclear countries in the world. Suddenly buying some second hand SSBN’s is a massive stretch for them politically.

They wouldn’t just be buying the boat but also ‘buying’ the enormous costs of decommissioning as well, which will need to be done before too long anyway as it’s oldish boat. Think if I were the Aussies I would want a new boat for the that cost.

Yeah, the solution would be for use to retain the Vanguards longer and lease Australian two Astutes.

…re-roled…🙄😁

Big difference between now and 1981 was that we are not facing the Soviet Union in Europe so we don’t have to have a 150,000 strong army and 30+ fast jet squadrons so we can afford 20+ nuclear boats.

Two shipyards knocking out a boat once every two years with a 30 year build cycle gets us to 20+ boats in the 2040’s.

It’s very doable for a bit of extra funding. The CCP’s stated goal is to be the worlds most powerful nation by 2050. This is the real security threat, not today when American is still dominant and NATO massively over powers it’s potential adversaries but 30 years from now.

Maybe we get lucky by 2050 and China turns democratic but it looks unlikely now and having a massive SSN force is the best insurance policy we can buy to stop Chinese Communist hegemony.

We might get lucky… due to climate-change by 2050 the Chinese are likely to have their hands full dealing with other issues
https://xdi.systems/xdi-benchmark-gdcr/

Even more reason the Chinese under Xi might need more “living room”. Phillipines, Taiwan, Thailand, Myanmar etc should be worried.

Hi Jim. Appreciate your points, however I am of the view the RAF front line jet squadrons need considerably more than the current 7 Typhoon + 1 F3F sqns . A reduction from 31 to 9 sqns is irresponsible. I’d prefer to see an investment in fast jet expansion before the SSN fleet.

I don’t disagree however every member of NATO basically has fast jets and many are acquiring F35 which is probably the best in the world and years ahead of anything China can build and we already have 1,000 built with easily 2,000 more to be acquired just at peace time procurement levels. However for all the vast economies of America and Europe combined we can produce at best 3 nuclear submarine’s a year and as we see with the AUKUS deal increasing numbers to be manufactured takes a minimum of twenty years just to get the first boat much less a fleet.

US war gaming over Taiwan straits is showing us much the same as our own war gaming in the 80’s, surface ships carriers and aircraft won’t last long in a fight.

This is why keeping the submarine edge is critical and it’s the one area that the UK excels in and is at-least equal to the USA (in terms of quality) and could potentially match the US in terms of numbers as well.

Let our Allie’s focus on fast jets and land based army’s while we focus on high end naval capability that they can’t build.

I think you’ll find your China argument also applies to expansion in their air force ability and carrier air wing capability. I can’t see 20 SSBN being achievable .

However, do bear in mind that I’m an ex air force type, and so have a natural bias to all things RAF!

Me too!
However, I also prioritise the SSN alongside FJ Sqns.

I’m sorry Jim, but getting to 20+ SSN’s is not doable “for a bit of extra funding ” We aren’t talking about ordering a few more tanks here (and we can’t even afford that) we are talking about the most complex machines mankind has ever built. To get to anything even close to 20 SSN boats would require a massive increase in defence spending, or massively slash somthing else. And the biggest problem would be recruiting the extra personnel we would need. The submarine service struggles to recruit for the number of boats we have today. It’s a nice aspiration, but it would take decades to achieve and many many billions spent. Even to get back to 10/12 attack boats would now take a massive effort.

One SSN cost £1.3 billion. If I increase our buy rate from basically one every two years to one every year then it cost me £650 million per year more. The defence budget is £50 billion a year so I’m talking a 1.3% increase. The boat requires a crew of 98 sailors. We can crew a fleet of 20 for the number of people contained in just two infantry battalions. It’s not a big deal we have just convinced ourselves it is. What is a big deal is the technology and industrial base to build them. Almost no one has that and the USA is already tapped out on what more it can do. I believe we have the capability to increase our build rate substantially. We have one yard trying to build one boat every two years. The USA has only two yards and they are trying to build 3 a year. We have what was our second yard sitting largely idle at CL we could build more if we throw a bit of money at the problem and have a desire to play in the big leagues again.

Jim. It is a big deal, and the money and manning just doesn’t work in the way you have explained. That is massively over simplifying it. It takes decades to build up the experience to build these things. This is why so few nations can build nuclear submarines. They make the space shuttle look like a lego set in comparison of engineering complexity.

Spot on Robert 👌

Whilst that is all very true, the drumbeat can be upped and the reasons we so have only 7 SSN was the gapping between end of SSBN and Astute production.

If the drumbeat had been maintained then there would be around 12 SSN in service.

The fact remains that we did manage to crew and sustain low double digit number of SSN previously- up to not that long ago.

There is also a coherent argument that running only 7 SSN’s is not that cost effective as various establishments are not used to capacity and there is a lack of skills depth in certain trades.

Hi mate. I agree 12 is the ideal number and a number we maintained for many years. But defence cuts reduced that number to save money, especially operating costs. The gap between classes was large and we lost a lot of experience, same withT42 to T45. But If those mistakes hadn’t been made, I’m not sure that it would have resulted in keeping 12 boats. Defence reviews over the years haven’t resulted in a new requirement to get back to 10 or 12 boats even if the industrial capacity was available. And now we simply don’t have the man power in the submarine service for more than 7 SSN’s. Its always difficult to attract new recruits for the silent service.

The thing is cart and horse?

Is the real driver containing an assertive China? It is real and very threatening.

What happens when China’s invasion of Russia kicks off?

Russia is going to become a Chinese vassal state pretty soon. That is a very large land mass under Chinese influence.

The next problem is ‘can you afford not to do it?’

Subsea is an area where a lot of mischief can happen.

Believe that the commissioning of a flotilla of twelve RN SSN(R) boats by some point in the 2040’s is feasible, provided AUKUS participation by UK yields tangible design and manufacturing benefits, HMG provides the requisite funding and MoD leadership (unfortunate that Big Ben does not have a lifetime appointment) and the strategic threat assessment remains at or above the current level. The ace in the hole for AUKUS members re submarine ops. may well be the development of autonomous underwater vessels w/ enhanced C2ISR capabilities, developed during the same timeframe w/in AUKUS R&D program. 🤔

It’s doable, the only issue is that people in the UK (especially the political class) have lost any thought or vision for operating at a true world power level independently of the USA. The mere mention of an ambitious project is met with scoff and ridicule.

It called common sense since Jim. We would require a 6% + defence budget to achieve what you are talking about.

That’s £150 billion a year. You think we need an extra £100 billion a year to build a second SSN every two years. It’s not HMS Death Star 😀

Again, that’s not how it works. Think about the operating costs alone. The cost of weapons, refits, maintenance periods. How much more in infrastructure and extra accommodation. Where do all these new Submariners all come from? Cost of training ect. It’s a very expensive business. 10 Attack boats and 4 Dreadnoughts is a more realistic ambition. But as things are, it will be 7 Astute and 4 Dreadnought. And it takes longer than 2 years to build an SSN.

It would require an absolutely enormous effort, I just can’t see it ever happening, but it’s a wonderful dream at least.

John I do not doubt it would be a massive effort, I have a pretty good idea of what would be involved to uplift the production of PWR3’s, cores etc by 50%.

But there is a huge Green and Gold coloured Elephant sitting quietly in the back garden till next month.

There is zero possibility of the RAN Aukus project happening unless someone increases build capacity somewhere.
Be that hull sections, power plants, ancillary kit, weapon delivery systems or even complete boats.

If we think boosting U.K industry capacity is expensive just think of doing it from ground zero with no Nuclear Industry.

Mind you a brand new green field site would probably not involve trundling hull sections along Bridge Rd to the DH.
Damned impressive though 😉

Absolutely, I think the only way AUKUS can work is if there is a joint SSNR design, with Australia building the front end and the UK the rear, with final assembly in the UK.

The logistics and security needed for moving half a super classified SSN halfway across the planet would be daunting, but doable.

It would require gargantuan efforts in Australia, and expansion and huge efforts in the UK, but perhaps a build of 16 to 24 ( if threat levels continue, then 12 boats a peice) boats would reduce the costs, as long lead eye watering expensive items like the PWR3 could be ordered in greater numbers to match an increased number of hulls and a faster build rate….

It’s the only way I can see it happening, unless Australia wants to sign a blank cheque to start from scratch and sink half their defence budget into into it.

I have serious doubts Australia’s industrial base can do it. No disrespect to Australia but welders in Aus get paid an absolute fortune in the Oil and Gas industry and I don’t see how you keep the skills at the shipyard without paying an enormous amount.

In comparison the UK is cheap as chips.

We are living in dangerous times with Mad Vlad in charge of Russia and China clearing wanting to rise to world domination and building up a gigantic military to achieve president Xi wishes.
The question has to be asked can we afford not to rearm or are we in the UK and the rest of our NATO allies, who have reaped the supposed peace dividend going to simply allow Russia and China to write history as they see fit?
Democracy’s freedom comes at a price. That price is our willingness to defend it at all costs and against all enemies. Therefore yes I think a 2nd SSN production yard and moving heaven and earth to rebuild our military via a crash rearmament programme is necessary.
I’d like the RN to reinsert 5 type 26s back into the programme and to accelerate both type 26 and type 31/32 builds. Order more astute until SSNr is ready. Sequential Dreadnought and Astute builds.
Recent pentagon war simulations demonstrated that in conflict with Russia and or China the US navies most effective weapons platform was it’s SSN fleet, which qualitatively are superior to Russian and Chinese platforms. As an astute is broadly known to be superior to sea wolf, Los Angeles and Virginia class SSNs in submarine Vs submarine warfare it makes sense that astute by default are our very best conventional weapons. It is folly to only have 7.

Good points 👍

Hi ABCRodney,

I can’t see us being able to increase capacity anytime soon. All we can do is make sure we get the best out of the capacity we have and at the moment that isn’t happening. Barrow, until recently at least, was still recovering from the ’90’s hiatus (delays to Audacious) and there are serious risks around there being a gap between the last Dreadnaught and the SSNR production starting, especially on the pressure hull fabrication apparently. Hopefully BAES will be able to make up some of the lost time, if the politicians don’t throw any bombs into the pond.

Putting the nuclear fleet to one side for the moment, another medium to long term option might be to reintroduce SSK’s to the fleet. There is a lot of development going on in to electrical energy storage within the wider economy so something might come out of that effort that could be spun into the defence supply chain. SSK’s are a lot simpler than nukes, not that they are simple per se but it should be well within our capability (technically) to put together a seperate production facility. There is still the problem of how to crew the new fleet of SSK’s… but perhaps short patrol times might make it more appealing..?

Cheers CR

Should inference be drawn that CL could prove to be a suitable location for developing an ancillary SSK flotilla, provided requisite funding/capital investment, skilled labor and management, time, etc.are available? 🤔

All good points however it’s worth noting Barrow assembles one boat every two years and the yards in the US and in theory Russia are working at twice the speed or more I.e One per year. CL and other ship yards could build additional sections to be assembled at Barrow or we just go to the expense of rebuilding CL, have them work on sections for Barrow until ready to start building full sized boats. Not easy but not impossible. We have reactivated yards before including Barrow itself.

Remember the US is simultaneously building Columbia and Virginia class with modules made both at Electric Boat and Newport News and British shipyards actually have more experience of US ones working in modules and than US ones. Even Astute has work done in other shipyards like H&W.

Also Barrow needs to have massive sheds for SSBN’s. A second production line at CL working purely on SSN’s could be smaller.

I wouldn’t worry about the Russian submarine building yards too much.

Id be rather more worried about the Chinese who will be taking all of the Russian submarine tech, including stuff the Russians never actually deployed as they didn’t have the R&D budgets post Cold War, in return for basic munitions to save Mad Vlad’s next. The Chinese will have a long shopping list of what they want. They have time on their side and will sit there with a blank face repeating ‘Yes, Vlad you can have what you want when you give us all of this’. Vlad will try and negotiate but be given the blank face. The Chinese know that Vlad will get more and more desperate so their leverage grows.

I am sure the way it will be done is to export them to some client state who will then sell their stockpiles to Mad Vlad nothing to see here, nothing to do with Xi.

No it’s purely the pressure hull that defines life time. Vanguards already had her reactor swapped. Astute already had much of her machinery swapped out as well.

Err no. Vanguard had to have an extended refit due to leaks in her coolant system caused by microscopic irregularities due to radiation. Her reactor was not swapped out as that is virtually impossible. Due to the time needed for the remedial work they took the opportunity to change her H core early. The work on Astute was to avoid the same problems occurring in PWR2 system.
Non of that means the life of the life of the boat can be extended because we do not make the PWR2 H Core here in Derby anymore, just full bore building PWR3 and that is it.

Excellent point, had significant doubts re viability of suggestion.

We have 4 SSBN’s Mr Bell, you omitted Vengence from your list. But you are correct, they have been worked extremely hard due to Vanguards refit issues overrunning. Victorious is the next oldest so will be next in line for a re-fuelling. I imagine that the hope is that the other two Boats dont need to be re-fuelled, its very costly and you dont get the same return of service from them. Time as they say will tell.

See Deep32’s post below. He is ex RN Submarine Service.

Thanks for the extended response, correlates well w/ a different post above. Would be willing to bet that Ohio class SSGN conversions came up in steering group discussions, before being dismissed for reasons given.

Thank you I am fed up saying there are no more un allocated PWR2 cores and no way to build more.
Hull life is irrelevant it is the life of the reactor and machinery.

Believe AUKUS master plan will serve as a very useful role as a forcing function in the design/ production of SSN(R)/SSN(X)/SSN(OZ). Fortuitously or providentially, BAE/RR previously awarded concept exploration contracts for SSN(R). Occasionally, a plan comes together successfully. ,🤔😳👌

Question answered!

After all, we wouldn’t want to give the trolls on here something to laugh about.

You are one of the trolls Nigel. Who are you kidding. Heaven forbid if anyone disagrees with you.

Blays Back I see, no real answers so he presses his usual button.

https://www.findmeagift.co.uk/site_media/images/products/p_main/fun137_bullshit_button_1.jpg

Hi Nigel, not sure what set you two off but I think it’s time for a truce. You both make valuable contributions here and we all get up each other at times.
Deal?

I’ve asked him many times over the years to stop posting in reply to my comments but it seems he is unable to stop.

He told @Graham Moore only a few weeks back that he doesn’t reply to my posts and within a week guess what!

He should try posting his own comments and stay off of mine it really is that simple.

It’s an open forum here so there’s going to be a bit of agree, disagree, and maybe a bit worse at times. I can’t remember who said it, but everyone here has a say. I like the banter and i know it gets personal at times but I think it’s all pretty mild compared to what’s gets said out in the big world. And if I can say in jest, maybe men can be a bit bitchy too?

Seconded. Two of my fav posters always at it!

Early start it seems.

https://www.etsy.com/img/39126399/r/il/fe5e55/4531841689/il_fullxfull.4531841689_i5cw.jpg

I once walked into a pub here The Rocks, I’m Sydney, near our bridge, it’s called “The Australian”, nice pub, famous for its “pizzeta’s”, small pizza’s. And I asked for a cup of tea (English habit) and got laughed at by the bartender and some others standing near by. They couldn’t believe it. Anyway I was in a good mood and laughed back and enjoyed my cuppa. I think everyone else was on the alcohol.

I worked in Australia for three years based in Melbourne with another one of our post-production houses based in Sydney.

Next time ask the bartender for a pot, but don’t mention tea 🍺

I agree with the Polish assessment. This is going to be a long war.

WW2 was in fact a number of smaller wars that coalesced into a global conflagration. If China gets more involved that basically links the tensions in the east with the tensions in the west – not good news at all.

So the west needs to step up and see to it that the Ukrainians get the kit they need and we should all expect this awful war to be going on for years to come, especially is Putin thinks he can out at last the west. It took the Imperial Russian army three years to mutiny back in WW1…

The UK recently announced that it is training Ukrainian pilots here in the UK. Not sure if it is basic flight training or advanced training on western fighters i.e. Typhoon in the UK. Sunak did say all options are on the table but that it would take years to be in a possition to deliver fighters to Ukraine. Typhoons are very different beasts to Mig 29’s.

Grim CR

“Sorry, I haven’t had a rant on this subject for a long time. I should warn you that it is quite a large button you pressed”

No doubt, It’s just annoying to see countries like Poland that can reach a quick and informed decision and start receiving the equipment they require double quick time and for some reason, we fail to do so in many cases, particularly at a time when it might just be required.

With the recent threats Mad Vlad has made, lets hope the Government and the bean countries free up the cash to put things right.

Here’s dreaming!

Nice one mate.