We should call this program F.A.R.T.S.
I don’t have time to work out what this acronym would stand for, but our biggest threat militarily right now are extremely silent submarines. We’ve had submarines float on up next to our warships during war games and we never noticed them coming.
Russia has them. China has them, and we’re left trying to figure out how to track them, because they carry supersonic speed warheads.
We need a commander-in-chief that understands the world is out to get us and we have to keep up with the pace. We are woefully behind since Obama has taken command.
The Economist: For an inkling of the silence of the new generation of such subs when they are running on battery power alone, without their engines turning, Jerry Hendrix, a former anti-submarine operations officer on the Theodore Roosevelt, asks: “How loud is your flashlight?”
ht/ sig94
Fixing
A
Regressive
Totalitarians
Stupidity
Finding
Audio
Retentive
Tactical
Submarines
Foreign
Adversary’s
Really
Taciturn
Submersibles.
Let’s hope the subs cooks fix lots and lots of beaner burritos….you cant silence the F A R T S….
You can thank two Western countries for selling the silencing machinery, tooling and technology to Russia and China – Kongsberg Vapenfabrik of Norway and Toshiba of Japan. Fucktards, the both of ’em.
Fluidic Armament Rapid Threat Suppression
-or-
Piss on ’em
Eventually the Russians inside the sub will fall to the floor after getting drunk, so wait for the thud.
Just reinforcing the axiom that there are precisely two types of ships in a modern navy; subs and targets.
Short answer, stop building surface ships and put three or four times as many quiet subs of our own out in the oceans as our adversaries.
A side benefit would be staying out of problems that are not our own via airstrikes and ground troops, if you “must” interfere, better to do it with submarine launched missiles.
An excellent submarine read:
“Blind Man’s Bluff: The Untold Story of American Submarine Espionage” by Sontag and Drew.
Didn’t Slick Willy give those secrets away too?
Served on 4 different subs, loved each of them. Finding, Acquiring, and Reducing Threats on Surface.
@JustAl – Spot on!
The era of the carrier group is ending. The cost of new defensive tech to ward of new offensive tech is lots more expensive and difficult than that new offensive weaponry. The new hyperspeed torps cost millions, but their targets cost billions and take up to 10 years to build.
Plus there’s something about a carrier group that smacks of “my dick is bigger than your dick” bravado.
And don’t forget Toshiba who in the mid 1980’s sold the Rooskies technology to make their propellers quieter.
Our newest carrier, the USS Gerald Ford, cost is almost $13 billion and may never reach it’s full operational potential due to “reliability issues”.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3701727/Navy-s-12-9-billion-USS-Gerald-R-Ford-delayed-dogged-reliability-issues.html