A
aesop081
Guest
This is only my personal opinion......
Submarines are an indispensable part of a modern naval force. The army and the air force talk about dominating the battlespace. This applies to the navy as well. The sea is the environment and it is not sufficient to control only the surface. Submarines have an incredibly disporportinate effect in relation to their size ( one only has to look at the effect that a single RN sub, HMS conqueror, had on the Argentinian navy in the Falklands. After the sinking of the cruiser Belgrano, the Argentine navy confined itself to harbour). Did the Canadian military need other new equipment , Yes. Were submarines needed, Yes. The ability to see without being seen is of incalculable value in naval operations. Beyond the purely operational aspects, they provide invaluable training for ASW force. Wether they be surface assets or air assets, ASW forces need to be able to train using the real thing. At present time, we do not have any sophisticated means of simulating ASW ( speaking only from my so-far limited experience in the MPA world) and have to learn these skills the hard way. From what i have been told and from what i have been able to see so far, ASW is a very perishable skill and it would cost alot of lives to have to re-learn them in wartime.
Was the choice of SSKs right for Canada ? IMHO it was. I remember the uproar of an uneducated Canadian public to the conservative decision to buy SSNs. Canada needs nuclear submarines if it is to patrol its arctic waters, that , to me, is undeniable. Can we afford it ? I seriously doubt it. SSK do serve their purpose and Canada also needs them. SSNs tend to be big, open ocean affairs. SSKs on the other hand tend to be small, able to operate near shore and inland waters. This makes them essential as alot of the world's navies focus on litoral operations.
I'm not saying that the decision to buy the Upholder class was good. I certainly do not agree with the decision to base the subs on different coasts. IMHO, all of them should have been based out of Halifax for ease of training and for the resons i mentioned in a previous post ( relating to rotation on patrol). I also believe that Canada should have bought more. A larger number would have assured that we would have more subs available for deployment at any given time and would have given us more resources to carry out operations as well as the myriad of training these vessels and our ASW forces require ( not to mention the disproportionate effect i alluded to)
That being said, i realise that all 3 elements have their own pressing needs and we will have to continue to set priorities for the conceivable future.
Submarines are an indispensable part of a modern naval force. The army and the air force talk about dominating the battlespace. This applies to the navy as well. The sea is the environment and it is not sufficient to control only the surface. Submarines have an incredibly disporportinate effect in relation to their size ( one only has to look at the effect that a single RN sub, HMS conqueror, had on the Argentinian navy in the Falklands. After the sinking of the cruiser Belgrano, the Argentine navy confined itself to harbour). Did the Canadian military need other new equipment , Yes. Were submarines needed, Yes. The ability to see without being seen is of incalculable value in naval operations. Beyond the purely operational aspects, they provide invaluable training for ASW force. Wether they be surface assets or air assets, ASW forces need to be able to train using the real thing. At present time, we do not have any sophisticated means of simulating ASW ( speaking only from my so-far limited experience in the MPA world) and have to learn these skills the hard way. From what i have been told and from what i have been able to see so far, ASW is a very perishable skill and it would cost alot of lives to have to re-learn them in wartime.
Was the choice of SSKs right for Canada ? IMHO it was. I remember the uproar of an uneducated Canadian public to the conservative decision to buy SSNs. Canada needs nuclear submarines if it is to patrol its arctic waters, that , to me, is undeniable. Can we afford it ? I seriously doubt it. SSK do serve their purpose and Canada also needs them. SSNs tend to be big, open ocean affairs. SSKs on the other hand tend to be small, able to operate near shore and inland waters. This makes them essential as alot of the world's navies focus on litoral operations.
I'm not saying that the decision to buy the Upholder class was good. I certainly do not agree with the decision to base the subs on different coasts. IMHO, all of them should have been based out of Halifax for ease of training and for the resons i mentioned in a previous post ( relating to rotation on patrol). I also believe that Canada should have bought more. A larger number would have assured that we would have more subs available for deployment at any given time and would have given us more resources to carry out operations as well as the myriad of training these vessels and our ASW forces require ( not to mention the disproportionate effect i alluded to)
That being said, i realise that all 3 elements have their own pressing needs and we will have to continue to set priorities for the conceivable future.