To be or not to be? USN Carrier Based Fixed Wing ASW...

[DarthAmerica]

Be interested in peoples opinion of this. All other Navies in the world rely on land based long range ASW aircraft or ship based ASW helo's. Considering that the USN has the most lethal submarine force in the world. Why isnt there an international effort to develop fixed wing carrier based ASW? I realise that most non US carriers are limited to VTOL/Helo. But those that arent, especially France and Russia, dont seem to be interested either. Whats up?

OK this part is only my theory so take it for whats its worth and please correct me where I'm wrong. In the old days of the Cold War where we had a defined blue water submerged threat with fairly noisy submarines. It seems logical that it was much easier to detect Subs at long distances with passive means organic and non organic like SOSUS ect. The only way to take advantage was to have a platform that could get out there fast, establish and maintain contact and prosecute if necessary. Given the vast size of the oceans its impractical for all the S-3s in the world to just roam around uncued looking for needles in the haystack. So in this modern era where the blue water sub threat is diminished. WHY DO WE NEED fixed wing ASW? It would seem that Helos are actually better suited for organic ASW in the types of areas we would most likely encounter a submarine. For the few remaining blue water capable threats, it would seem like more SSNs are whats best.


Thought/Comments/Discussion on the current state of USN Carrier Based ASW appreciated.


Thanks
DA

 

[gf0012-aust]

in the absence of comments from the members who have actual nuke/conventionals/carrier experience, I'll start it off pending their input.

Be interested in peoples opinion of this. All other Navies in the world rely on land based long range ASW aircraft or ship based ASW helo's.

thats a legacy of force structure and local financing. there were significant numbers of fixed wing carrier based ASW in the cold war. France is probably the only one left with that capability. for the others it was an issue of economics, it just wasn't cost effective to go out and develop their own, and the S3 was not a good fit on the other nations carriers. (launch/recovery issues etc)/ the russians only attempt at building collapsed when the Soviet Union fell over. Their current carrier design (STOBAR) doesn't provide a good fit even for a refurbed S2

Considering that the USN has the most lethal submarine force in the world. Why isnt there an international effort to develop fixed wing carrier based ASW?

Money and requirements when assessed against likely threat

I realise that most non US carriers are limited to VTOL/Helo. But those that arent dont seem to be interested either. Whats up?

see above. look at the geographics as well as force structure - then add in the threat matrix for the owners and you can see that its not an essential requirement for most countries.

OK this part is only my theory so take it for whats its worth and please correct me where I'm wrong. In the old days of the Cold War where we had a defined blue water submerged threat with fairly noisy submarines. It seems logical that it was much easier to detect Subs at long distances with passive means organic and non organic like SOSUS ect.

a bit of a generalisation but point taken. The Oberons were considered to be the creme de la creme of conventionals, and certainly were regularly able to demonstrate what acoustic opportunities were present. remember that in 61 during the Cuban Crisis that the USN was able to pick off 4 of the 5 nuke armed conventional subs - you only need one to get through to make a mess and cause dislocation. That was also at a time when the USN was operating dedicated ASW CV led groups. One of the members in here spent a fair bit of their service time as part of an ASW group. Also, SOSUS was fully functioning then - its not now. There are however different technologies under development which are going to see the light of day eventually. At the last UDT I attended, over 80% of the technologies discussed were not in the public domain, so there is active development in play.

The only way to take advantage was to have a platform that could get out there, establish and maintain contact and prosecute if necessary. Given the vast size of the oceans its impractical for all the S-3s in the world to just roam around uncued looking for needles in the haystack.

the mission is defined by the threat management requirement. If (for example) the PLAN was ever going to be a real bluewater threat to the same level and capability as the soviets, then I would imagine that there would be an immediate shift in USN delivery stance. They don't go out willy nilly, they have a fundamental mission to forward deploy and sniff out the enemy ahead of the fleet. It's like comparing a beagle to a bloodhound.

So in this modern era where the blue water sub threat is diminished. WHY DO WE NEED fixed wing ASW?

because range is still an issue. you want to manage the threat beyond the group. land based fixed wing is inadequate if you intend to operate at the true blue water level for numbers of reasons - and is way beyond the scope of just giving a "simple" answer.

It would seem that Helos are actually better suited for organic ASW in the types of areas we would most likely encounter a submarine. For the few remaining blue water capable threats, it would seem like more SSNs are whats best.

No no no. They are suitable within the confines of their own mission capabilities. generally speaking, platforms in isolation are not as good as co-ordinated assets. the issue is flexibility to deal with an evolving threat - and the threat is evolving rapidly into different constructs. Helos are suitable for issues such as triangulation, searching etc within a specific range, but if you want to expand your search capability and have sufficient hunting/searching power - then fixed wing does that. the sensor suite on a helo is not the same as an S2, S3, PC3, Nimrod.

In actual fact, I'd argue that fixed wing carrier-borne ASW is going to get resurrected in some fashion. The most likely candidate is the Osprey, but from discussions I'm having with people right now, it's a bloody disaster waiting to happen - but is the only viable immediately available modifiable solution.

 

[type 209]

well, would it be possible to take a jumpjet airframe and engines and change the electronics and weapon systems so you give it sonar buoys, torpedoes, ASMs, and the capability to use mines and depth charges and to use external fuel tanks. you have a carrier MPA right there

 

[gf0012-aust]

well, would it be possible to take a jumpjet airframe and engines and change the electronics and weapon systems so you give it sonar buoys, torpedoes, ASMs, and the capability to use mines and depth charges and to use external fuel tanks. you have a carrier MPA right there

weapons carriage is only part of the game - its the capability of the sensor suite that is the primary issue.

 

[type 209]

oh sorry i dont know proper aircraft terms when i said electronics i meant sensors/visual displays/weapon systems

 

[gf0012-aust]

oh sorry i dont know proper aircraft terms when i said electronics i meant sensors/visual displays/weapon systems

Its an issue of suitable airframes to undertake the mission. There are very very few available platforms available that fit the minimal sensor suite and mission requirements.

Personally, IMV, one of the dumbest things to do was to not only kill off the S3, but also not have an adequate replacement under consideration. Unfortunately, thats a legacy of the rapid change in the political environment due to the collapse of the Soviet Union - and the fact that the US-Chinese relationship shifted somewhat after Clinton (although I guess some of the americans might disagree with me here).

Capability needs to be considered against likely threats, and if the threat is undergoing rapid evolutionary development across all platforms, then the response has to be developed accordingly.

to hunt and kill subs you need to dominate and compress the battlespace across multiple dimensions. - thats an expensive but necessary process - and it requires political will and committment as well as military competency

 

[Big-E]

Be interested in peoples opinion of this. All other Navies in the world rely on land based long range ASW aircraft or ship based ASW helo's. Considering that the USN has the most lethal submarine force in the world. Why isnt there an international effort to develop fixed wing carrier based ASW? I realise that most non US carriers are limited to VTOL/Helo. But those that arent, especially France and Russia, dont seem to be interested either. Whats up?

This is no longer the case for the USN as well. I have already been to one VS decom and going to another next month. The S-3 Vikings are history along with it any fixed wing carrier ASW capability.

OK this part is only my theory so take it for whats its worth and please correct me where I'm wrong. In the old days of the Cold War where we had a defined blue water submerged threat with fairly noisy submarines. It seems logical that it was much easier to detect Subs at long distances with passive means organic and non organic like SOSUS ect. The only way to take advantage was to have a platform that could get out there fast, establish and maintain contact and prosecute if necessary. Given the vast size of the oceans its impractical for all the S-3s in the world to just roam around uncued looking for needles in the haystack. So in this modern era where the blue water sub threat is diminished. WHY DO WE NEED fixed wing ASW? It would seem that Helos are actually better suited for organic ASW in the types of areas we would most likely encounter a submarine. For the few remaining blue water capable threats, it would seem like more SSNs are whats best.


Thought/Comments/Discussion on the current state of USN Carrier Based ASW appreciated.

Current DoD thinking is that the need for 55+ fast attacks no longer exists. With navies like PLAN building tons of cheap diesel/electric subs costing in the millions and US nukes costing in the billions it makes no sense to have a one on one scenerio. The solution is to have rapidly deployable SOSUS like nets that can be commanded from a platform like a Virginia SSN. These bouyes would be as small as soda cans and contain SONAR/BEAM/HYDROPHONE accesses that could triangulate the exact location of targets. These hi-tech bouyes will give any platform the capability of laying a networked defense reducing the need for ASW assets.

 

[sidishus]

Carrier Based Fixed Wing ASW

Be interested in peoples opinion of this. All other Navies in the world rely on land based long range ASW aircraft or ship based ASW helo's. Considering that the USN has the most lethal submarine force in the world. Why isnt there an international effort to develop fixed wing carrier based ASW?

Submarines are but one component in the ASW picture. Airborne assets play equally vital roles. In the case of helo vs fixed-wing, both bring complimentary capabilities to the table. While helos excel in close-in prosecution, fixed wing aircraft can conduct much more extensive searches and can react much more capably against fleeting datums.
In Littoral ASW fixed wing assets are also much more able to reach ahead long before helos could and suppress potential threats. Since this airspace may well be hostile, they are more survivable as well.

The demise of the S-3 ASW mission in the USA was a "Hobsons Choice" made by the NavAir leadership in the fiscally tough times of the late 1990s. A leadership too focused on fighters made some shortshighted decisions.
It was widely regarded then, and by many still, as a mistake. Either way, the primary ASW asset aboard now are a limited number of overworked SH-60s.

One may argue the VP community can shoulder the entire ASW fixed wing burden. However, this is a flawed assumption. First off, land bases within range of the conflict or the intervening airspace may be denied. Onstation time is limited unless the action is fairly close. Coordination is an ever recurring problem. And the ever shrinking numbers of VP aircraft are increasingly being tasked with other roles such as overland ISR. Bottom line is, that support may not be forthcoming when most needed. A carrier is capable of carrying the aircraft suited for the job...and it most certainly needs them aboard.
Current airgroups are being forced to siphon away limited TACAIR assets from their primary tasks- assets which are unsuitable for the mission- to fill the gap once performed by the S-3 in surveilling beyond the relatively limited reach of the helos...of course the only contribution they can offer is surface search.

The mission need has not gone away; just the best suited aircraft for the job has been retired without replacement.

In the old days of the Cold War where we had a defined blue water submerged threat with fairly noisy submarines.

While the Soviet sub threat is no more, potential 21st Century adversaries are fielding ever more capable submarines. To further complicate matters, many of these subs are advanced diesel subs employed in an Anti-Access/Area-Denial (A2/AD) role in Littoral regions. Their main job is to deny a CSG/ESG the very battlespace they are obliged to enter in order to Project Power Ashore. Since there is no tougher target to prosecute than an AIP equipped diesel in the noisy littorals, the ASW problem is perhaps more acute now than it was in the halcyon Blue Water days.

Acoustic conditions and constrained waters in the MED offered up Littoral ASW scenarios long before the term was coined. And ASW prosecution was invariably an exercise in frustration...especially against diesels. A favorite tactic of Med deployed Tangos was to creep into the carrier's MODLOC (and these are quite predictable) and merely wait for the carrier to come blasting overhead on Fox Corpen. They were overwhelmingly sucessful in getting treated to a sight like this:
http://www.dutchsubmarines.com/pictures/images/tijgerhaai2/scope_tijgerhaai2_uss_america_med_oct93_1.jpg

The chances of a sub skipper wishing to do harm of getting into a position to savor such a view is enhanced by the lack of fixed wing ASW aircraft aboard.

 

[sidishus]

Lethal Diesel In The Littoral

Scratch one flattop...Carl Vinson nailed by HMAS Onslow during RIMPAC 98


http://www.defence.gov.au/news/navynews/editions/1998/08_10_98/100898story5.htm

 

[DarthAmerica]

This is no longer the case for the USN as well. I have already been to one VS decom and going to another next month. The S-3 Vikings are history along with it any fixed wing carrier ASW capability.

Do you feel that this is an appropriate decision considering today and tomorrows likely requirements?

 

[DarthAmerica]

Scratch one flattop...Carl Vinson nailed by HMAS Onslow during RIMPAC 98


http://www.defence.gov.au/news/navynews/editions/1998/08_10_98/100898story5.htm

http://www.defence.gov.au/news/navynews/editions/1998/08_10_98/images/scope.jpg

I believe I recognize S-3's on the flight deck. Vertical tail and colors.(I have tools to enhance the photo a little) So they would have just went to the bottom with the Carrier. IIRC the S-3's didnt end their ASW mission until FY99. Also the SSK was within range of Land Based ASW. Not trying to nit pick but I just need to see how this is relevant considering that fixed wing ASW was present. Anyway without being able to discuss the actual operational details of the scenario publically. I wouldnt use it as a definitive example except other than to say the USN got caught slipping in THAT SCRIPTED SCENARIO.

 

[gf0012-aust]

I wouldnt use it as a definitive example except other than to say the USN got caught slipping in THAT SCRIPTED SCENARIO.

I'm guessing that you're unfamiliar with the difference between DACT and what happens in these types of exercises. DACT is very much controlled.

To use the commonly touted Cope India examples.

• both sides get together and plan the force layout
• the host side naturally effects what they seek to achieve
• in Cope India the IAF wanted a ratio of 3:1 in their force favour - that apparently reflected their reality of what they would bring to bear in a real fight
• US was not permitted to use AWACs - so as to reflect their likely threat
• US was not permitted to use AESA - so as to reflect their likely threat
• US was not permitted to go BVR
• US missiles were electronically sim'd to reflect earlier generation missiles
• if a plane is killed in the fight, then it can do a "Lazarus" and be bought back in

so, in the above case, the ROE's are very very scripted so as to maximise the training curve for both sides.

A RIMPAC or Fincastle is different. In the most brutal of analogies its as such:

• there is a prescribed training area - everything in that area is operational and "live"
• the goals have to be achieved within a prescribed time frame
• to all intents and purposes, its electronically "weapons free". everyone is "cleared weird"
• as the closure window approaches, then the tempo lifts up. that sims the reality of "desperation" to kill the primary, or hunt the sub.
• if you're killed - then you stay killed unless there is a force imbalance. at that stage you might well end up on the other side
• the sub must kill the primary and also slot the secondary within the time frame denoted
• in the case of a recent RIMPAC, everything that was a ASW solution was used to try and find Rankin - incl some assets going "active"

So there is no limitation on what you can and can't do to effect a kill on the primary and secondary objective. All available assets can be used to their maximum capability. similarly there is no restriction on the defender using whatever assets are available to find and kill the sub. That includes other subs and land based ASW as well as organic ASW. Force compression advantage lies with the defender.

These exercises are nothing like DACT - and can't be compared to scripted engagement as such.

To give another example.

Australian exercises run recently also don't allow a "Lazarus" effect. They also set a fuel limitation. That means a greater emphasis on planning so as to not sacrifice capability or try to cheat by "swarming". Countries that have trained under those rules have found it "interesting" as it means that they can't drop assets in and out of the game through artificial sacrifice.

Its a whole lot harder - and the advantage doesn't lie with the sub.

 

[Big-E]

Do you feel that this is an appropriate decision considering today and tomorrows likely requirements?

No I don't. Although the mini SOSUS net is a great idea I think you need something to deploy it rapidly like a fixed wing asset. Maybe if they equipped the Greyhounds to carry the ASW equipment might be sufficient, or an Osprey.

 

[type 209]

several jumpjet airframes that are available in good/fair supply are yak-38, GR.Mk 3, FA.Mk 2, and GR.Mk 5 all these air craft would be suitable for the ASW jumpjet i described.

 

[gf0012-aust]

several jumpjet airframes that are available in good/fair supply are yak-38, GR.Mk 3, FA.Mk 2, and GR.Mk 5 all these air craft would be suitable for the ASW jumpjet i described.

nope, every one of those platforms is unsuitable for a number of reasons:

• internal real estate issues - no room at all for a complex ASW suite
• endurance
• insufficient onboard power to drive a complex ASW suite
• projection
• persistence
• loiter at range
• adequate load out at range

to be blunt, they'd be useless at the job and completely unable to fulfill basic mission requirements that a helo like the SH-60 can already do.

 

[DarthAmerica]

I'm guessing that you're unfamiliar with the difference between DACT and what happens in these types of exercises. DACT is very much controlled.

Don't guess. I'm familiar enough with the differences. Unfortunately I think you may have missed my point or taken my comments out of context. I wasnt doing an analogous rehash of why DACT isnt a basis for platform comparisons.

 

[gf0012-aust]

Don't guess. I'm familiar enough with the differences. Unfortunately I think you may have missed my point or taken my comments out of context. I wasnt doing an analogous rehash of why DACT isnt a basis for platform comparisons.

hmm, when one says "THAT SCRIPTED SCENARIO." it points to either no idea about how these things are run, or bad communication - it certainly raises the issue of familiarity. Its a relevant common sentence used to try and explain DACT, but has no useful analogy to ASW exercises such as RIMPAC or Fincastle

 

[DarthAmerica]

hmm, when one says "THAT SCRIPTED SCENARIO." it points to either no idea about how these things are run, or bad communication - it certainly raises the issue of familiarity. Its a relevant common sentence used to try and explain DACT, but has no useful analogy to ASW exercises such as RIMPAC or Fincastle

Bad Commo. Should have said exercise rather than scenario. Hell GF its Friday and I havent had a day of in 10 days. Red Bull only works to a point so give me a break. All I was saying is the results of that engagement during the RIMPAC exercise doesnt by itself mean that there are capability gaps. What I didnt say in the interest of staying on topic and avoiding upsetting national sentiments in the spirit of this forum was that the USN wouldnt be fighting Oz all by itself and in the unlikely event of an Oz vs US conflict, I personally doubt an SSK would get a shot at a carrier at all for a lot of different reasons that are best left unsaid in this thread for the same reasons above.

Please nobody misinterpret the last few comments. If you would like an explaination just ask otherwise I accept any disagreement in advance.

Thanks

 

[gf0012-aust]

Bad Commo. Should have said exercise rather than scenario. Hell GF its Friday and I havent had a day of in 10 days. Red Bull only works to a point so give me a break. All I was saying is the results of that engagement during the RIMPAC exercise doesnt by itself mean that there are capability gaps. What I didnt say in the interest of staying on topic and avoiding upsetting national sentiments in the spirit of this forum was that the USN wouldnt be fighting Oz all by itself and in the unlikely event of an Oz vs US conflict,

you don't have to worry about upsetting national sentiments as they don't come into my answers. I'm focussed on platform and platform capability.

I'm not even interested in the US fighting Oz as its never been part of my response structure anyway.

I personally doubt an SSK would get a shot at a carrier at all for a lot of different reasons that are best left unsaid in this thread for the same reasons above.

and that ignores the reality of what others in the trade think. we've had this discussion before. believe me, there are people who are far better versed and experienced in this who have some very different views.

is the USN dominant? - absolutely. will they lose a carrier? - quite possibly - and in some sectors they argue "certainly". and the concern has gone up with every passing year and becomes worse with every passing year.

there are capability gaps - and everyone knows it. fortunately the other side have more gaps than walls. that will not last forever.

any further discussion re our own views can go offline.

 

[rickusn]

"Its a whole lot harder - and the advantage doesn't lie with the sub."

If there is a "prescribed training area" and a limited (time frame" the advantage will always fall to the diesel submarine.

So in essence it is "scripted" by those limitations alone. Because both mobility and limited time before they have to become indiscrestionate. Those are the "achille heels" of diesel submarines.

OTOH again if we are training to overcome "acess denial" the strength of the diesel submarine platform then even though that is also by definition a script it is valid for that limited scenario.

But unless the Carrier Group comes to them they have been effectively neutralized.

Remember also that there are:

"Only two kinds of ships:

Submarines

AND

Targets"